I wonder how many of you ever try or believed that by feeding a feather with pencil shavings, it will grow and reproduce. I did! When I was in primary school, my classmates and I used to keep those beautiful colored feathers in books and fed them with pencil shavings.
When I tell this to my primary 4 daughter, she wanted to try it. After 2 months, there is still no sight of a new born feather…I remember it did reproduce when I was in primary school or my eyesight something wrong…hehe.
Another thing I used to keep in my books is ‘落地生根’ (pronunced as LuòDìShēnɡGēn) or Bryophyllum pinnatum leaf. I used to tear a leaf off from my godmother pot of 落地生根. After some time, roots will grow from the leaf! To a primary school boy, this seem to be a miracle!
So what other things you keep in your books besides bookmarks?
Can’t remember growing feathers in a book, but I used to keep the same kind of leaf too. My mum told me it’s called “nail grass”, translated from the Chinese words “tie ding chao”.
Keeping a feather in a book and fed it with pencil shavings is something new to me. Not even during my children’s time when they were in school. But, I do remember keeping a Bryophyllum leaf in a book until new roots spouted out at the edges of the leaf. The plant was quite common in the kampong behind my house.
I used to keep the silvery leaf of the Elephant Climber (Argyreia nervosa) in my book. Picture here
i don’t remember placing feathers between the pages but the bryophyllum leaves, yes. used to marvel how they could grow without soil and water.
bryophyllum plants are very easy to propagate. at one time, i used to have more than 50 small pots of them.
First blog I read after wakeup from sleep today!
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I’m surprised that even keeping feathers in book and feeding with pencil shaving is not known to Philip’s generation…maybe it became popular only during my time. But I did came across some blogs mentioning about it.
Hi,I’m looking for this plant – 落地生根 that you have mentioned in ur blog, do you know where can I get in Singapore? Thanks in advance.