Day 1
It's not quite Day 1 on the planet - we arrived here two years ago after seventy nine years asleep on a ship that seemed to cry itself when we left earth, trembling and groaning in the agony of it. It is strange to have slept for so long and know that everyone you left behind is long dead, and the gardens you used to tend turn to dust, but there is no point thinking about that. They say gardeners believe in the future, and I recite that like a mantra as I plant.
The first two years we had enough food to last us, which gave us time to investigate this new landscape and discover plants that could sustain us. We have thousands of seeds brought from Earth, and will plant those too, but I'm tasked to the New Earth gardens, where we are experimenting with seeds and plants we have found here.
Today I press beans into the rich red soil. There are two beds - one that is enriched with humanure, and one that's just straight New Earth soil. I feel like they'll do fine without the extra fertiliser - I can smell the soil (I'm so relucntant to call it earth and it smells vital, alive, and there's bugs and worms and bacteria swimming in it like no Earth soil I've ever worked with).
So, beans. Spotted, purple beans. They remind me of borlotti beans, but when they grow, they are anything but. They're really, really twisty, growing in twirls and loops, and they grow so fast that you don't want to stand still lest you be entwined with them. Within a week, we'll be eating them. Their fruits are wonderful - little birds, my daughter calls them. Their structure does remind me of birds, and as they get older, the wings expand, and indeed, some of them take off before you can harvest them, flying into the night sky and glowing yellow for the bats to eat them and spit them out far away to seed somewhere else.
Day Seven
The bird beans, as we've come to call them, have fruited. They're delicious - a little like a star fruit crossed with a beetroot, earthy yet light. The trick is to harvest them before they take off, which about twenty percent do. The beans in the humanure have wilted and died. The old methods of gardening don't hold here.
We learn new things every day. Last week we planted a leafy green that we discovered was like a venus fly trap. It's huge leaves opened invitingly and waited for small creatures to brush up against it, then enfolded them in a kind of cacoon casing until the bones were dissolved. We put aside our nausea because it's the closest thing we can find to kale or spinach, and is incredibly nutritious. We've been collecting it in the wild for months now, and everyone delights in the fresh taste that counters the staleness of the emergency rations made so long ago. Sometimes we find little bones in our steamed greens, but we just push them to one side and add them to the compost. But it doesn't like being cultivated. We take notes and urge the botanists to label this one as important in the wild, and to protect the valleys where it grows so abundantly.
My daughter likes the space violas the best. They're not really violas, but it's the closest Earth flower to them. They are small and edible, sweet like honey, and their colours change according to the weather.
On stormy days they are almost fluorescent, and if it's humid, they soften to a baby blue with little polka dots on their petals. We collect them daily to garnish meals and everyone adores them. Someone has dubbed them chameleon flowers and whilst it's not quite accurate, it's stuck.
Day Twenty Nine
A week ago we lost one of our gardeners to the terra snails. People have, understandably, redubbed them 'terror snails'. They're ten times the size of Earth garden snails, but it's not just that - they have a bite on them like you wouldn't believe, and their saliva has a deadly poison that kills within minutes. The doctors are working on an antidote and we've taken to wearing reinforced gloves so we don't get bitten when we pick lettuce. It was a bit of a shock to us all, so it's been hard to maintain this garden journal.
Still, the fruit is starting to ripen on the trees. When we tried it in the wild, it tasted something like coconuts crossed with ginger, and we were able to grind it to a flour for spicy cakes. We've had to put guards on the gates to the garden though because there's strange animals trying to get into the garden. All day I can hear them shooting - hardly a peaceful way to work in the gardens. We're all a little bit on edge, but a gardener believes in the future, right?
Day Thirty Five
We lost three guards to the monkey like creatures that have figured out how to break in. We've been banned from the gardens until it's safe, but we harvest most of the cocogin's, as we've called them, and have been happily feasting.
The zoologists have collected gigantic eggs from the highlands - they don't know what creature they came from, but we have muffins, pancakes and scrambled eggs!
Meanwhile, I've started some seedlings in the polytunnels from the seeds we collected on the first expeditions.
Day Forty Two
I'm typing this in the ship. The creature came for it's eggs. There's not many of us left. We can't take off - there's too much damage. That fucker was huge. If you thought earth roosters were scary, you oughta see the New Earth ones.
Day Forty Three
The snails are in the ship with us. They're breeding fast. They're in the walls. They're eating all the wires.
We eat the last of the cocogins raw, in the dark.
This post was written in response to Hive Garden's Creative Garden challenge, which asks us to imagine gardening on another planet. There's a few prompts to write on, so get over to @gardenhive and give one a go - it's fun!
Images Co created by me and Midjourney.
With Love,
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That turned dark fast! 😆
Love the images. How amazing is it that we can now have anything in our mind made into a photo! I love the bird/moth beans. I'm curious as to what words you put in to create it.
I know it's CRAZY! Hmmmm - let me look at the prompt - I thin it was simple:
YEP - it was! Haha... it worked the first time, which is kinda rare...
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Is it a flower bird?
It's AI generated to suit the story. Read the story and it will make sense.
😂 At first I wasn't sure if this was real; I loved those bird beans!!
Then I started looking up giant snails, and it looks like some made it to the UK; are they ten times the size though? They sure look huge on that hand
Great story telling! 😮😃
Oh wow they are huge?!!!! Imagine the slime you'd have left behind! Kinda cute those .. at least they don't have teeth!!!!
😂🤣
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Your daughter is spot on.. those beans look like tiny little birds perched in a tree. When the wings open - incredible! What cools pics. Thanks for sharing my friend.
I don't have a daughter. It's fiction.
Ah.. then the fictional character is spot one.. well and of course your imagination, as that's a perfect description imo.
This is beautiful, it felt real.
Great work of art
Thanks
I've never seen these kinds of leaves before
They look like a bird
Anyone who sees them from afar will think that they are real birds
Did you read the story?
Yes, I did bit I was trying to say that I have never saw something like this online
I know you went to the planet...
With you and yiur daughter
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Bleak!!! Never leave home! Oh my goodness, it's curtains for the new earthlings.
Great artwork. I really need to figure out how to do that. Cool story of course. I always love your stories. Setting this in journal form was a great idea. The reader is hopeful and amused at first, like the gardeners themselves, then alarmed, then...
The End! So sad.
Haha I like doing bleak as you know..it was fun to write. Thanks for actually reading it 🤣
Most new planetary colonies succumb to the local fauna..
Or kill it.
Saludos, wuau hermosa historia, tremendo post,
Wow! Cool... That story makes my brain twist! LOL
Nice story and creative photos Love the bird beans. greetings 💖
Oh my god River... This is too awesome! I love it so much, you have a really great imagination. And I love all the ai images you made too.
The whole thing was really captivating. Ever thought about making a whole book out of this? I think it would be very entertaining for sure.
Now I understand this whole thing about "biting snails".
Thanks for the story
Haha aw thanks so much!!!! I can never get past the 1500 word mark before losing interest 😂
I have just put together a book of short stories I've written on Hive though, waiting for my author copies now!
https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0CFCTF1FP