It's almost synonymous with 'The Beauty and the Beast' with its two distintive features!
Just admire them! Aren’t they gorgeous? We added this beautiful plant to our garden late September, 2006 and by the third week it delighted us so with such glorious bi-coloured blooms of deep pink and white. I love it so much that I wrote an article about it in another blog of mine, just to capture all its beauty and note down some important oleander plant facts and culture!
However, blooms withered in less than a month and plant by early November had reached a height of about 5 feet and looked awfully leggy! I decided that it seriously needed a drastic crop! If left to grow unattended, it'll soon be top-heavy and I'm definitely convinced that the slightest strong wind will bring it down as its container will be too small to steady it!
Thus, one early November evening, armed with my prunning shears and with one last adoring look at our Nerium Oleander 'Pink', I went reluctantly 'chopping' from the top downwards, leaving behind only an eight inch stump! Prunning is a task that I dislike most, more so if the plant looks so promising and still radiant with its lush leaves! But what has to be done must be done!
You won't believe it - in less than an hour after that prunning task, my right palm started itching and showed little signs of skin allergy! Why right and not left, you'd wonder! Hehe...you're correct...I'm left-handed and the beast in the Oleander has left its mark and tainted my right palm with its toxicity! By next morning, the allergy rash had spread to both my right and left palms/fingers!
Eeeeek!! Aaaargh!! Ouch!! The itch was unbearable, so my beloved hubby took me to see our family doctor for consultation/medication! I was prescribed Clorphenamine maleate (piriton) tablets, Betnovate Cream and Potassium Permanganate, though it took almost 2 weeks for the rash/itch to be eliminated!
SO BEWARE, NERIUM OLEANDER IS TOXIC! WEAR GARDEN GLOVES TO AVOID CONTACT WITH ITS TOXIC MILKY SAP!
Humph! I thought this was a very good lesson learnt, yes...no? Yet again had to go through
another awful attack just 3 weeks ago (early March 2007)! A fool never learns!
No comments:
Post a Comment