Tsuri-shinobu looks just like a planet
Takuo Fukumoto
Saving electricity during the hot and humid summer is a difficult task, but here is something you can hang on your window to help you feel just a little bit cooler.
Tsuri-shinobu, or hanging squirrel’s-foot ferns planted on moss balls, is now in high season. Tsuri-shinobu En, a plant nursery in Takarazuka, Hyogo, will offer them until the end of July.
The nursery grows tsuri-shinobu by hanging them – looking like planets floating in space – for a year on to arrays of ropes in a facility constructed with iron pipes. They become ready for sale after some 20 leaves come out.
The nursery grows 10,000 plants annually. With a wind chime attached under each of the moss balls, tsuri-shinobu plants are shipped to markets in major cities like Tokyo and Nagoya. They are also available through mail order or online shopping. They are becoming popular as gifts for Father’s Day coming up on Sunday, June 16, with orders doubling from last year. They are offered at 2,500 yen or more, plus shipping. “You can feel cool when you see the leaves waving in the breeze,” said the nursery owner Makoto Ichihara.
(June 12, 2013)