When the Weather Blows
OK, so it turns out that when wind gusts hit somewhere between 35 and 40 miles per hour, large potted plumeria plants can fly.
Off of your garage roof.
OK, so it turns out I’m growing plumeria on my garage roof.
Originating probably in the Yucatan Penninsula, plumeria thrive in hot, sunny weather and are drought-tolerant. But if you supply them with the right amount of water and fertilizer, they produce some of the world’s most beautiful and fragrant flowers, which are used in Hawaii to make leis.
It so happens that I have these old 70-foot-tall pecan trees towering over most everything in the back yard. The trees cast a nice shade and keep the yard cool. But plumeria do best with at least six hours of sunlight. The only place in the yard that gets at least six hours of sunlight and also can support plants is on the flat tin roof of my garage.
Thus, about 50 plumeria plants are up there, sitting on boards so as not to get burned by the hot tin roof. Yeah, I have to climb up and down a ladder to water/fertilize them, but it’s usually just once a week and I can use the exercise.
So it seemed like a pretty good arrangement until the damn wind picked up to about 35 miles per hour for an entire day on Thursday.
One plumeria, fairly good-sized, in an eight-inch pot no less, flew off one side of the garage onto the ground. On the other side, a smaller plant was knocked over but stayed on the roof, while a big, expensive rooted cutting with lots of leaves flew off of a shelf and landed on a whole flat of seedlings.
Amazingly, two of the plants lost a leaf apiece. I had to re-pot the big ones, but nobody really got hurt, not even the seedlings.
Still, I suppose this means I’ll have to clear off the roof the next time there’s a hurricane.
→ B.Dunn, Jun 07, 2008, 07 41 am
