I thought I would share a recent design scheme that I worked up for a client.

The design proposal addressed three distinct areas of the existing garden:

Front of house…what was once a static lawn becomes a softened low maintenance bed of movement, courtesy of a perimeter planting of bamboo muhly grass and the introduction of an invisible water fountain as a prominent visual focal point on approach to the house.

Onto the back…

A wall garden: The intent here was to create an intense planting scheme close in to the house that would gradually fade out and “naturalize” into larger shrubs and palms as the planting went further up the hill. This area will have a deer fence enclosing the property.  The cascading prostate rosemary and trailing lantana softens the vertical wall, adding a little repetition before a looser planting scheme kicks in further up the hill. Small sedums and stone crop will be tucked into the stone crevices for additional wall planting sprawling interest.

Here is the hillside top garden:  Does anyone recognize that mock orange?  This scene incorporates boulders that already exist on the hillside, planting extends the view up the slope to offer the illusion that the garden continues…

“To infinity and beyond!” … (Buzz almost three light year )

Back inside the Patch…

It amazes me at how fast things have returned to life and stature after our tough-for-Texas winter, even my Barbados cherry (center) has made a decent return from a cut back stump!

As has My Mexican lime tree that I chopped down to just above ground level.

My pole beans have reached the top of their poles and the Hoja Santa is seriously on the rise, not surprisingly, considering I forgot I left the soaker hose running all night…oh yes, it liked that alright!

Here is a tale of the unexpected…

I bet this little amaranth only dreams of a soaker hose, let alone one being left on all night…poor thing.  I cannot believe a seed actually germinated in this ungodly environment…worse than a Hell-Strip…the road…THE ROAD!  I keep resisting the idiotic temptation to water pure tarmac, especially when I just know this plant is destined to lie under the wheels of a church / funeral going vehicle that consistently line my street. The watering police would have a field-day…

“You are accused of watering on a non-designated watering day”?

“Yes I had to, the plant is growing in tarmac.”

“So let me understand, you are watering tarmac on a non-designated watering day?”

“Oh just go ahead and arrest me.”

It seems like enough of my decomposed granite has been blown off my hell-strip by my hose that the road in front of the Patch can now harbor life…

“Fascinating.”

“Its life Jim, but not as we know it”.

“Have you thought about upgrading to an iPad Jim?  Your current tablet PC really is quite embarrassing”.

Live long and prosper little amaranth.

From a really parched amaranth to a refreshing purple Madame Ganna Walska water lily.

My water lilies are once again growing at a ridiculous rate, I thin them out… two days later the pond is completely smothered again, still, the leaves and spent blooms make for the best nutrient-rich composting material.

I started out with two plants for crying out loud!

Blooming pride of Barbados foliage looks even better when it is planted against a dark back-drop.

layered leaves don’t get any better.

And do blooms get any better then  Echinacea or purple cone flower, pity they do not last very long before they look like a blow-torch has hit them…oh wait, that would be the Texas sun, and it has!  Pass me an iced turban please.

More layered foliage, dark shade areas really help to create a sense of depth, emphasizing the foliage of the plants.

Hello Aloe Vera?

What was once brown and very mushy has now has bounced back with full vigor in the summer Texas heat.  But can I eliminate that irritating ivy weed? look closely, you will recognize it, you know the one, it finds its way into the spiniest of plants and is incapable of being pulled up from the roots, ever!  Oh yes, it is the bane of my entire gardening existence.  This is by far the most irritating character that resides in the Patch, even more obnoxious then the Botox Lady!  I feel as though I have been pulling it up, let me re-phrase, snapping it at the base, for more years then I care to mention, without incidentally making a real dent.

I am about to take another approach that involves a really small oil painting brush and an undiluted, super-concentrated round-up palette of immediate death.

I need to quickly Move on:

I made a new acquaintance today…

…who became a close friend…

Okay, that’s enough…Brrr, now you are being creepy…time to leave now, as must I.   

(Starts shaking hand)

Stay Tuned for:

“Moi Grande Rain Dance”

All material © 2010 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late  (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

Oh dear…Oh dear…oh dear!

Winner of an IDSA Silver award:

Nano Garden is a vegetable garden for the apartment kitchen, using hydroponics, so you don’t need to worry about pesticides or fertilizers. Instead of the sunlight, Nano Garden has lighting which promotes the growth of plants. The amount of light, water and nutrient supply is also controllable, so you can decide the growth speed. It lets you know when to provide water or nutrients to the plants, which makes it easier to grow them. Moreover, Nano Garden functions as a natural air purifier, eliminating unpleasant smells.

Designer: Seul Ki Park

Credit: Hyunjung Lee, Jaeyong Park, Changjin Shon and Seulki Park of Hyundai Engineering & Construction (South Korea), and Ill-woong Kwon of Gromo (South Korea)

Gross Post Alert!…Gross Post Alert!

The stench inside this cavern I cannot put into words, for fear of involuntary retching over my laptop keyboard once again just remembering it (mops side of mouth with Kleenex). It really was the most diabolical combination of fermented sweet and sour, and I am not talking about a kimchee – esque aroma, (which I love) oh no! Let me try and explain it, just to get you in the appropriate gag arena: Imagine a sickly sweet pumpkin pudding aroma, combined simply with fizzing rotten chicken (description courtesy of my oldest hobbit, minus the fizzing), it also had the texture of moist bread! (Burp… starts to look around worried).

This nasty cavern, (caverns being a popular post-topic recently in the Patch), was created as I started to examine this thing of immaculate beauty…

My largest

Colocasia

or giant elephant ear. Granted it is looking more like the painful stump of an elephant’s foot right now, but not for long, not for long at all!

I have left this tuber in the ground for the past four years, no problem, but this year’s prolonged cold winter temperatures had apparently taken their squishy toll. I prodded it, my hobbits prodded it, it started to ooze flesh, this could not be good. Then we all prodded it some more. Remember the infamous scene in poltergeist when the paranormal investigator started to touch his face, then proceeded to dig in his fingers and pull off his face?

Well that’s how we got started with this Taro…A prod led to a poke that led to a gouge that…

led to a push…

That led to the Taro finally “giving way” in a scene reminiscent of the horrible resuscitation scene from “The Thing”.

I think we all remember what disgusting “thing” happens next! I digress. When the head of the taro rolled back everyone recoiled and “ewwed” simultaneously, turning our faces away from the smell that hit us like a tsunami of flatulence. A stink horn is a terrible thing (right G?) http://thegerminatrix.com/?p=637 but this rank atrocity came pretty close as far as tickling ones stomach release valve.

“It’s just a rotten Taro ESP, nothing to be scared about”.

If you say so scary Kane! Brrrr

A couple of hours after the decapitation, I reluctantly revisited the carnage and found these tiny iridescent

Dolichopus

flies having a great time, their wings flicking back and forth in sick excitement.

These tiny, tiny flies are really interesting visually, looking like molten metal, their segmented bodies are really quite amazing. This one is about to make a left turn apparently.

Enough nastiness…

What!

Okay I promise that is it on the gross front…

Today was the day to move a rather large rock, a rock that has stayed where it fell from a truck that delivered a large delivery of decomposed granite some time ago.

The rock was wiggled and pried, rotated and shuffled down the slope until it came to rest and leveled in a more appropriate location…Thanks Bob at Draco! http://dracogardens.blogspot.com/ (and “PP” for the pry-bar and strategic leveling).

…right in front of my beautiful gas meter. While I was messing around in this part of the Patch I decided to relocate a plant or twelve, the agave and agave parryi var. truncata all coming from this container:

None of these plants were doing particularly well, buried in the shade of the vines that are slowly coming back into the land of the living.

This area took a real beating when the hole where the Tahoe hit http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2009/09/dude-wheres-my-car/ was being repaired, it received a lot of foot traffic and compaction as the house was repaired and repainted. Here it is the area planted up, the bed also has Mexican bush sage pushing through that will soften the scene and provide good contrast with the agave’s as they mature. The two silver Agave , known as Parry’s agave or mescal agave, are slow-growing agave’s native to Mexico (Sonora), hopefully these will reach their full potential in their new, more sun-loving home.

An old ceder carcass is added for a “Waltons” moment.

Now to wait for the scene to fill-in. There is also a line of tiny transplanted feather grasses in front of the moss boulders, well it wouldn’t be the Patch without them after all!

While all this transplanting and rock shuffling was going on, my Hobbits were being way..way too quite…

They had found my last trowel, (my favorite trowel has been missing for the last couple of weeks), I surmise that somehow it has found it’s way to “Davy Jones’ Locker“ at the bottom of my stock tank fish-pond. Mmm…Now I wonder who would do such a thing?

Apparently the hole was to house a pill bug and this snail, a few leaves were thrown in then the hole back filled.

The raggedy pram makes it into yet another shot. After the hole was filled in, my oldest hobbit went to the back garden to check on her new container garden that she has taken over as manager…

…and things seem to be growing very well. This is all hers!

Moving on…

Snail, cactus and verbena…

Here is the same purple verbena in full flight…

attracting once again the zombie / Thestral eyes of this swallowtail butterfly.

“I see the swallowtail too Harry”

Looking like a glittering harlequin’s hat, the blooms on this ghost plant are really quite involved… when you get up close.

This paper wasp is looking pretty sharp, color coordinated on the blooms of this gopher plant…

and my Mexican lime lives, it lives I tell you! This is the first bit of green it has developed at the base of the trunk. I knew she would pull through!

Tiny seed pods are now replacing the fading blooms of the mountain laurels.

The ESP is jumping further out of winter everyday, the survival of my Mexican lime tree and my Barbados cherry has made my week, even both of my dwarf bottle-brushes are steaming back to life. Although spring usually lasts a matter of hours in Central Texas, I plan to make the most of it…an iced turban will be in my future soon enough after all!

That little sotol in the middle of my circular bed is finally starting to develop a presence!

And finally:

I told you I was not finished with these four “nervous” daisies quite yet.

Inspirational Images of the week:

Anybody visiting Zilker Gardens in Austin last weekend for the plant festival, probably noticed this crazy Texas red bud specimen…

MacCrimmon’s Lament [Song]…Mac Umber

Stay Tuned for:

“If you Mock Orange Me, I’ll Satsum ya!”

All material © 2010 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by  late  (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

Remember a few posts back that I had been seeing a few small caves around the Patch?

Well today we noticed this particularly deep hole, a hole that was not there yesterday…I dropped a piece of decomposed granite into it, there was a delay, then I heard a splash as the rock hit water! I immediately backed away from the pot-hole. This warranted further investigation. The eldest hobbit was straight onto this.

“Flashlight!”

She hunkered down to the sink-hole with a flashlight, then remembered that she had a better tool for the job…

…a tiny flashlight.

“We’re going in!”

We harnessed up and propelled ourselves into the dark pit, switching on our flashlights as we descended.

After landing in some shallow water at the base of the cavern, we turned around and our flashlights illuminated what had to be an ancient Naboo temple at the far end of the cavern.

“Fascinating ESP, it looks exactly like giant timber bamboo roots”.

Thanks for that Spock!

The organ-pipe architecture was staggering and housed small openings which I surmised were openings into the Naboo living quarters, a sort of cliff dwelling existence?

We also noticed a lot of snail shells scattered along the dank edge of the cave, perhaps the tribe is partial to escargot ?

I was pondering this ridiculous culinary possibility, when a horrendous piercing scream filled the cavern, we heard the crunching of large footsteps on snails… and they were drawing closer.

We glanced at each other then started to run.  We ran through some ancient reeds,

…past sharp, man-eating plants,

that would close in on themselves as we ran by.

We finally made it back to where our ropes were hanging from the cave entrance. Naturally my flashlight was dropped in typical Jurassic Patch fashion, just to build up some really irritating fake tension.  Half way up my rope I shone the beam back onto the cave floor…

and was shocked to see a fifty foot anole staring back up at me, it let out one final deafening scream, it’s tongue trying to latch onto my ankle.

“Oh, like you have problems ESP?”

We scrambled out of the cave entrance, and pulled up our ropes…top-side at last.  I placed a Texas holey rock over the cave entrance and continued with my weeding, hoping to bump into the Naboo to ask them about the temple.

Moving a little more sanely on:

Oil on Canvas?

Brushfoots and Swallowtails have started to appear in the Patch this past week.

Vanessa cardui

(Painted Lady) …I think.

All of them made an immediate bee line for the mountain laurel blooms that have now started to decline.

Vanessa atalanta

Red Admiral

This Swallowtail was attracted to the verbena…

which has got enormous in my middle cactus and succulent bed.

My purple leaf sand cherry

“Prunus Cistena!”

just keeps on developing more and more fragrant flowers, the pale pink blooms with burgundy centers that pick up the foliage color is a knock-out this time of year, and it creates a great contrast with the emerging green plants, like inland sea oats.  A great drought tolerant shrub for Texas color.

“I like it, I like it”…and yes that is compost at the side of his mouth, he got into a bag when I was planting some more bamboo muhly in my hell strip.  I hate to think what he did with it.

My other hobbit patiently held her three beans (magic beans) in a plastic egg while I constructed a grow teepee for them out of bamboo.  A bean was planted at the base of each pole. She administered the beans into the troweled-out holes like a pharmacist.  Now the painful wait for the beanstalk to grow.

She got her beans at the East Austin Garden Fair: “A Passion for Plants.” Unfortunately the weather made things feel like the event was being held in the Scottish Highlands rather then Central Texas, but we all had a great time.  I will be putting this event on our calender for future years.

“Ach! ye canny say that, its no like the highlands at a’, I canna believe ye would say such a….”

Oh shut your cake-hole William!

We walked away from the event with a bunch of freebies, frozen mouths and some great planting information.  I even got to watch a live south American cockroach crawl up it’s handlers sleeve to escape the cold…Brrrr in more ways then one! (Neck twinge only, for some odd reason).

One of my Texas Sages has suddenly acquired a lot of these nasty olive chappies.

Luckily there were also a whole load of ladybugs chomping (I hope on them) as fast as they could.  May your jaws ache with the feast, my dotted allies.

Other Springing things in the Patch this week.

Glossy foliage is emerging on my holly fern, all it needs is some sushi served on it’s leaves.

The first water lily of the year has surfaced.

This daisy never gets on my four nerves.

“Oh Ha ha ha ha ha! Hey Joe? We got a wise-guy blogging over here.”

The first amaranth is rising out of the decomposed granite…

as is the Hoja Santa, returning from the dead.

Ice plant wasting no time throwing in some shiny spring color.

Feather Grass and an illuminated loquat manuscript providing some textural contrast.

Another sinkhole, this one was full of aptly named…stonecrop.

Is that a baby grasshopper on this dwarf conifer?  What IS that?.  Talking of dwarf conifers how about this:

Adrian Bloom’s garden, Foggy Bottom, Bressingham, Norfolk, England, 1987-89

“I have never seen anything like it, so many conifers in one garden”.

Finally:

“I cannot believe you did not include me anywhere in this Jurassic post ESP?”

Sorry Jeff, …no flies!

Stay Tuned for:

“Bread Rock”

All material © 2010 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by  late  (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

With the rains have come a bumper bloom and a pronounced artificial grape aroma all around my back porch…

…this week is the week of the Mountain Laurel in Central Texas.

Sophora secundiflora

I keep this one pruned up as high as I can, I think they look better when the trunk is partially exposed.

The bees have been swarming the short-lived blooms on the tree.

Talking of small trees / shrubs…

…All the loquats

Eriobotrya japonica

around the Patch have also responded to the rains and sun, sending out an explosion of new growth. The name loquat derives from lou gwat, the Cantonese pronunciation of its old classical Chinese name.  In modern Chinese, it is more commonly known as pipa from the resemblance of its shape to that of the Chinese musical instrument pipa.

This is the first year that these shrub / small trees have reached a height that has really started to change the perimeter aesthetic of the Patch.  Surprisingly they were not effected by the cold snap, it seems they do not mind dry cold but have a deep hatred of wet freezes like we have had in previous years. Even when they do get nipped, with a quick cutting of the frozen parts, they bounce back extremely fast.

Even with all of the new growth happening right now, I am still discovering frost killed plants.  This wizened agave reminds me of Nero’s ship emerging from the “singularity event”.

“Stop being ridiculous ESP, or I will send some red matter into the core of your home-world.”

Not so much red matter as green!  New growth on the Inland sea oats, the feather grasses…

and the Fatsia Japonica, this one was warming it’s glossy alien looking fingers to the sun.

Giant Timber Bamboo also looking glossy after a recent shower.

Yes the Patch is finally breaking dormancy.

With the resurgence of all this life in the Patch there sadly was life’s cold counterpart.

The first thing very odd, like a harbinger of death from the sky, was a Grackle…a male grackle, that I see all the time as the sun sets, talking a final drink from my stock-tank before nightfall.  This grackle is in it’s prime adorning regal robes of purple and black, but today this dark knight had fallen to an enemy, slain, I surmise, by a warrior of the feline variety.

The ESP witches swooped out of my Post Oak in some sadistic anticipation of a final breath, their breaths foul.  http://www.eastsidepatch.com/about-the-esp-witches/

The grackle landed on the side of my stock-tank, with one of it’s legs in tatters.  The poor bird drank, bled like a bad actor, delivered it’s sleepy hollow omen, then flew up to a nearby ligustrum.  About an hour later, the last remaining fish of my original trio, the great Grandfather of all my remaining fish, appeared to have beached itself like a whale up onto a submerged marginal plant in the same pond.  A coincidence?  Thinking the fish had accidentally grounded itself, I cupped it in my hands and released it back into deeper water, but something was still terribly wrong.

No, not that!

No sooner as I released the fish, it found it’s way back to the same spot, almost like it was deliberately trying to end it’s life.  The fish with the red spot on it’s back desperately wanted to help it, it seemed seriously concerned and would not leave the old dying fish alone.  It kept nuzzling it, pushing it as if to say no, you can’t be done yet.  It even managed to dislodge it once again into deeper water.  It kept on nudging it and swimming right up against it, I had never seen anything like it.  The old fish once again mustered up some energy and drove itself up onto the same plant, this time I did not interfere. The red-spotted fish never once strayed from it’s side.

It was like a really sad episode of flipper! Do they exist?

I have never witnessed such social behavior from these aquatic creatures.  As the sun set in the Patch, I left them both in peace.  I believe the morning will bring a new addition to my compost pile, I just wonder if the spotted fish will still be by it’s side.  Goodnight old fish friend.

On a lighter note:

Ivy going completely crazy with the almost perfect growing conditions.

My stone crop waterfall has finally started to take shape, streaming down the rocky escarpment that never made it as a water feature.

And this variegated pittosporum has made the perfect camp-out area for the Patch hobbits.  The sweet orange blossoms that are just about to bloom will perfume this part of the garden for the next few weeks, this plant is not called “mock orange” for nothing.  For shady areas, like under my post-oak, the light colored leaves add interest and a spot of brightness in the shade, it is one of the best small trees for deep shade.  The plant makes an excellent specimen plant and a beautiful tree form can be achieved when it is trimmed correctly.  Like my Texas mountain Laurels, I like mine to be trimmed up high – one tough durable plant, that can withstand drought, this one is about five years old.

Purple leaf Sand Cherry,

Prunus X Cistena

is also in full bloom right now…

Again, a great drought resistant small shrub, and a great specimen to provide splashes of purple in the garden.  Mine is still quite small in width,  but this shrub will get to 7-10′ tall and wide over time.  The shrub is relatively short lived though at 10-15 years…we will see!

This Agave americana var.marginata ‘Aurea’ looks like it is stretching is arms out and yawning after a long and harsh winter… (well harsh for Texas anyway!)

And finally…

Cherry tomatoes in!  Fingers crossed we are done with the cold.

Inspirational Image of the week:

This is an early-afternoon infrared view over Tresco Abbey Garden in Isles of Scilly, England, looking south. A tiny, four-day-old crescent moon is just visible. (Though I challenge you to spot it!) This photo was taken by Jonathan Berman, who won the title of International Garden Photographer of the Year, last year…how did I miss this picture!

And here is the island of Tresco…not a bad looking place!  The island is renowned for its plants and its collection of shipwrecked figureheads of all things. The gardens shrug off salt spray and Atlantic gales to remarkably host 20,000 exotic plants in sub-tropical beauty.  The tropical garden is home to species from 80 countries, ranging from Brazil to New Zealand and Burma to South Africa. How can this be possible twenty miles south of the English Cornish coast?  Well by building tall windbreaks of Monterey Pine and by building high walls, that’s how.

The garden was built by the merchant banker and avid plant collector Augustus Smith who took over the residence in 1838, he successfully designed and channeled the weather up and over the network of walled enclosures.  He also created a series of terraces, drier terraces at the top suit South African and Australian plants, those at the bottom provide the humidity that favors flora from New Zealand and South America.

Statues symbolic of natural forces punctuate this sub-tropical garden.

Happy St Patrick’s Day from the ESP!

Stay Tuned for:

“Jurassic Patch”

All material © 2010 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by  late  (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.