2010 started eerily in the Patch…

I walked outside this morning only to find this other-worldly mist sweeping in, and it was dense.  The other thing odd about this morning was that it was very quite, unusually quite in fact.  I clambered further into my timer bamboo for a better look at this strange phenomena.

I peered through the giant timber culms and heard a muffled sound, I squinted into the dense fog then recoiled as I witnessed my neighbor being attacked by something over the garden fence, something hideous…something that came from…from….inside

The Mist!

Eeek, Eeek, Eeek!

Okay, so the mist actually turned out to be nothing more than steam emanating from the washing machine duct, and my neighbor?  Well that was the last I saw of him.

The Giant timber near the house has climbed to a significant height, you can really see it this time of year when the surrounding pecans have died back.  Have I told you how I can’t wait to get rid of these trees, and that stubborn sticker on the stock tank?

This Timber Bamboo is already prematurely celebrating it’s win over the Pecans by proudly displaying this victory belt around the mid-drift of it’s culm.

Another bamboo patch…

My Buddha’s Belly Bamboo.

Bambusa tuldoides ‘Ventricosa’

Apparently this bamboo only develops the sought after Buddha bellies if it is root bound in a container, well not this one.  I do not know what sort of neglect and torture I have inflicted on this plant underground but I have about 64.2% belly culms, (adjusts nerdy glasses) the rest straight.  Not bad considering it is planted in the ground.  This bamboo has grown a lot in the last year, although all the new culms this year have been frost-nipped and are doubled over.  I think this is due to the fact that this bamboo is still an infant, albeit a twenty foot one, (something that makes me shudder with a slight twinge of a neck crick).

Guess what we did this week?

The ground was once again covered in a blanket of seed snow.

Yes, cattail wands were once more frantically casting their seedy spells all over the Patch, streaming tiny seeds up into the thermals…

…and a few others in less welcome places.

“What were the clouds like when you were young”?

The seeds provided all manner of play, when the spells had all been cast, then the shoveling and “cauldron” concoctions were started. I took advantage of the distraction to wander freely around the garden to see what else was happening. The relative peace!

Sedum reflexum

Sedum reflexum ‘Blue Spruce’ (thanks Pam), this little succulent is spreading very nicely in my cacti & succulent bed.

I tuck this plant in wherever I can, usually it ends up between my moss boulders where I invariably trample on it as I am contorting myself into some ridiculous shape to reach “that” dandelion all the way back there, (well that is where they always are, all the way back in there)!

Dandelions I have found, also love to co-exist right up against the spiny fat belly of a barrel cactus or any other flesh ripping plant for protection, like this sotol, “gently does it…easy…just a little more…almost there”…then Snap, you are left only holding only the top of the weed.  Aarggh! The recoil motion invariably causes the the back of the “pulling hand” to adhere to an adjacent barrel cactus followed by ten minutes of highly colorful language, twenty-seven if I am alone.  I have come to the conclusion, dandelions are smart.

Now where was I?  Yes sedum…trampling, anyway this little plant always seems to bounce right back no matter the abuse, a great plant for filling in those small “detail” cavities in the garden.

Moving On…

The life-force continues to coarse through the ivy veins, despite the freezes we are enduring.

Seed-pods on my Thryallis, does this plant ever stop doing something?

Great winter color on the ornamental grasses.

And yes my Artemisia is officially out of control, almost time for the chop.

Question: is there a correct time to cut back this plant?  I usually just wait until it is so leggy I cannot stand it anymore.

Even in the depths of winter this lantana is still throwing out spring-like blooms, it’s leaves turning from green to a frost bitten deep maroon now.

Finally…

Here are some winter games in the Patch recorded on my new “Flip”.

The music I created in GarageBand, it features sampled snippets of my oldest hobbit when she was little, finding her very first bug in the garden, and it wasn’t the featured ladybug that caused my youngest’s conniption in the video.

“Ewww”!

Inspirational image of the week:

Sometimes the simplest ideas are the best, just as this 3D effect rug called John Deere tractor. Designed by Permafrost, manufactured in Sweden and wool from New Zealand.  The inspiration behind this rug came from a common image of rural America, the John Deere tractor.

Stay Tuned for:

“Carnival”

All material © 2009 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by  late  (and extremely unpleasant)
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]]> http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2009/12/new-years-peeve/feed/ 10 http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2009/11/cut/ http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2009/11/cut/#comments Tue, 03 Nov 2009 21:23:22 +0000 ESP http://www.eastsidepatch.com/?p=2542

Syrphid Fly? or Waspy, green, grass-hoppery weird bee thingy, summat or nothin’?

This adult Syrphid Fly (I hope I am right with this identification) is unlike any I have ever seen in the Patch…It is green! What manner of creature is he trying to mimic? Most Hoverflies mimic bees and wasps to protect themselves from predators, this one even had a “buzz” sound as it flew around, trying to be even more convincing…but green? I know it is a fly as it has only two wings, short antenna, and large compound eyes.

Like a multitude of insects in the garden this week, it was completely engrossed in my fragrant mist flowers that are now  going at full tilt, stinking up a whole section of the garden…now am I the only one but is the term “fragrant” used extremely “loosely” to describe the overpowering fragrance of this plant? I may not care for the stench of  it too much, but the insects, the moths, and brown nosers seem to love it.

Can someone ID this bug?

Here is the mist flower its all its cloudy glory.

The favorite past times of the week, have been moth catching and handling…

…a spot of entomology…

and some obligatory bubble fountain fondling, his face says it all!

The fragrant mist flower also succeeded in attracting this…No, not Sid James, this…

A Great Purple Hairstreak,

Atlides halesus…

this has to be one of our most beautiful southern butterflies.  Although it is most commonly known as the great purple hairstreak, it has no purple on it. The brilliant iridescent scales on the upper surface of the wings from which it gets its name are blue not purple.  This is also a new visitor in the patch, the “fragrance” is pulling them all in it seems!

Here is the fragrant mist flower earlier in the year, with Mexican petunia, a hint of Barbados, and a loquat as a backdrop.  As  I was sitting down in front of the mist flower today, taking bug pictures, I could hear the audible popping of the petunia seed pods as the sun heated them up… throwing their seeds as far as they can muster, what a great explosive technique!

Next stop for me: Gregg’s mistflower!

Philippine Violet

Barleria cristata

has also now made it to the ranks of full bloomer. The dark foliage really sets off the purple blooms on this very “classy” looking plant. I plan to get a bunch of these planted at the far end one end of one of my beds, the dark foliage backdrop and height will work well for some lower growing frontal “poppers”…something that does not bloom at the same time, Mmm?

Another great combination planting  is the spiky, soft leafed yucca, married with the fuzzy blooms of a swath of Mexican bush sage…

Salvia leucantha

The way the blooms weave their way through the yucca is an added visual bonus.

The contrast of the soft purple blooms with the spikey yucca just works,

I think this would also look great as a mass planting with a couple of large sotols!  The height would almost be perfect, being a little taller than the yucca.

Here are mine with a line of Mexican feather grasses in the front, the embedded yucca and a few arching lemon grasses, and of course a few random amaranths thrown in for good measure.  The sotol (far left) is in a different bed, but ohhh I can see the future so clearly now!  I also have a young sotol planted in the middle of this bricked circular bed, (almost hidden in this picture). When mature it will almost fill the diameter of the brickwork, while still allowing all the smaller plants to fill-in around the edges… the taller “antler” plants will be moved.

Why do sotols have to take so long to grow anyway?  It seems to take them forever to get going then, all of a sudden…

kaboom!  Overnight it seems, they get enormous – love this razor-sharp plant!

Moving on…

Oh yes… I have been flailing around the Patch like Tom Hanks in the hilarious “bee scene” in the movie “The Money Pit” of late, why? Because of these…

“Got One”!

“Why you little…”

I am so tired of the mosquitoes this year, is it just me or has this been a “bumper” (ahem) year?  To make matters worse they are also coming through the “Dude where’s my Car?” hole in the side of our house where the Tahoe came unexpectedly into our living-room for some very late afternoon tea some weeks back.  An average movie-watching evening in the Patch now consists of everyone sporadically slapping themselves about their heads. To the outside world, we must look like lunatics through our windows. This endless slapping is always preceded by either a disappointed “Uurrgh”! Or “Got One”!  At which point we all have a

“Walton’s moment”, all happy and supportive and such. Interestingly, and ironically, we used to have to slap our TV to get a clear, snow-free, reception, but since the collision (it happened directly behind our TV) it has miraculously fixed itself… amazing what a Chevy Tahoe impact can do for some temperamental consumer electronics.

We have even started to spray repellent on the hobbits at bedtime, it has got that bad – Frodo uses a whole bottle of spray at a time just to cover his rather large feet!  The mosquitoes are eating us alive. Last night one particularly annoying mosquito became obsessed with the inside passages of my right ear, you know how you can hear them buzz when they get in there?  This one kept it up for hours, almost asleep…bzzzzz, almost asleep…bzzzz… etc.etc. I can’t wait for a cold snap to kill them once and for all, can you tell?

Purple amaranth growing to great heights.  The pine cone cactus provided some eerie Halloween atmosphere in my middle bed, with it’s slender ghostly fingers. The Jewels of Opar (bottom left), seem to make it into every post I write recently. I did learn today that it’s nickname is Old Lady Hat Pin, because the thin stalks and flower pods resemble the old fashioned long hat pins ladies used to use to hold their hats in place.

Looking down the throat of this agave, a shadow caught my eye.

Ripening satsumas. Almost there, this little tree is buckling even more now as the fruit have swollen, mmm, maybe that is the reason to thin them out somewhat? Anyway it is going to be a great fall harvest, to be exact 94!  Give or take one or two.

Finally I would like to give my sincerest thanks to Linda and the super friendly film-crew at CTG for entering bravely into the ESP last Monday. The Naboos finally allowed everyone right-of-passage, after all the paperwork was completed.  A lot of mouth clicking later we were all guaranteed that no-one would get hit with a poisoned blow dart…something that I have feared for weeks.  The morning of the shoot, before anyone arrived, I stealthily walked slowly to my shed. I calmly removed a roll of silver duct tape. Cutting a length from the roll, I walked slowly back up to where the Botox Lady was loudly “resting”. I knelt like a knight beside her stone head, my hands unwillingly approaching her rather large snoring mouth, my duct tape at the ready… you will not believe what happened to me next…She…

Stay Tuned for:

“Silence is Golden”

All material © 2009 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by  late  (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

“Oh come on ESP…a REAL grasshopper”?

“That’s right ‘Hopper’, and I can pull that CAD face too, look!  Oh, and if you bully those ants one more time”?

I caught the real thing lurking in the subterranean environment deep inside one of my large agaves. Is he squinting his beady eye at me?

This character jumped onto one of my decomposed granite walkways, this shot highlights his camouflage capabilities:

A master of disguise! I tried and tried to get the red flashing on his legs, his most distinguished feature, but to no avail.

These blue fingers allow no escape, can you guess who they belong to?

“Stay away from the fingers, don’t go into the fingers”.

Interesting how the color gradates through the lily…there, I told you.

Madame Ganna Walska, Nymphaea x, tropical water lily. I thought I would post these pictures as the plant is about to go dormant, it’s growth has slowed considerably, it’s flowers getting smaller. It is a matter of time now before the plant starts to shrink back into my ponds murky depths for the winter. It has served the patch well, albeit if a tad aggressively since the spring.

Staying on a similar color scheme…

Fall Aster is living up to it’s name and dominating the areas I have it planted with its cheerful blooms.

I like the Artemisia and fall aster combination, silver and pale purples always work well for the “Patch Palette”.

Here are the “Powis Castle” hills in the distance, I need a couple more asters dispersed in the artemisia to really make this scene work. See the little green succulent to the lower right?

This plant has now earned my full respect, breezing through our drought with no additional water, The patch has a couple of these vibrant plants, I want more. This is…

Limón talinum

…and it houses thousands of garden jewels that resemble a chemistry model. The plant is native to the West Indies and Central America and has common names of Fameflower and Jewels-of-Opar.  Knowing that a plant has a common name synonymous with a mythical ancient city full of riches should offer a clue that someone thought very highly of this plant at some point in time. This plant made it through last winters mild conditions, I have my fingers crossed for this year.

If you are a  fan of Tarzan, then there is a distinct possibility that you have heard the Jewels-of-Opar name before. Edgar Rice Burroughs mentioned the forgotten city of Opar in 1913 in his second Tarzan book, The Return of Tarzan, and then in 1916, he wrote Tarzan and the Jewels-of-Opar.

Opar is located deep in the jungles of Africa . Portrayed as a lost colony of Atlantis in which incredible riches have been stockpiled down through the ages, the city’s population exhibits sexual dimorphism caused by a combination of excessive inbreeding, cross-breeding with apes, and selective culling of offspring. Consequently, female Oparians are physically perfect, while male Oparians are beast-like brutes.

“MMUUSSTT GET MOORREE OF THIS PLAAANNNTT”

The ruler and high priestess of the city is Queen La, who on her first encounter with Tarzan falls in love with him, and subsequently carries a tikki-torch for him. Tarzan, already committed to Jane, naturally, spurns her advances with the most likely phrase “Me Tarzan, you not Jane”, thus endangering his own life, as the religion of Opar condones human sacrifice…poor Tarzan.

More purples…

Another purple taking center stage at the moment is the Mexican Bush Sage. The plant has taken a bit of a beating with all the Texas rains we have been having and it is flopping here and there, with a bit of dryer weather it should perk up, I hope.

This plant is full of life right now in the patch, bees, sphinx moths (too elusive to capture as yet) hover flies, anoles – you name it, it is on it. I have a fair amount of this plant, I love it’s naturalistic, free-for-all aesthetic, and who can resist the fuzz?

Here is some more Bush Sage planted in my front garden.

Another purple just now coming into the limelight, and one of my all-time favorites is Amaranth. This plant exists all over the patch and like the Mexican Bush Sage, it is a creature and insect magnet, and it will remain so for quite some time. Insects swarm this plant. I gather the seeds and distribute every year then allow the plants in the more “appropriate positions” to reach maturity.

There were three Gray Hairstreaks hanging around on the freshly emerged purple seed-heads.

Strymon melinus

as well as a multitude of other insects.

This line of amaranth lining one of the patch’s central paths, sprung up to great heights while we were on our trip to Scotland, it amazes me just how fast this plant grows with a little bit of moisture.  This must have grown about three feet in less than the same weeks.

This prostrate rosemary also has it’s fair share of the insect population, the bees are going wild over the blooms. It looks like it is covered in snow right now, it has so many blooms. Behind it is my small satsuma tree completely full with fruit.
This next shot or two I need your help with…I believe we have some new “little people”, smaller than the Naboos, much, much smaller, living in the Patch.

At first I thought these little Pixie Hollow baskets full of metallic rounded pebbles must have something to do with some tribal Naboo ritual or offering to the Gods, but the tribal member in charge of tribal relations,  communicated via a series of elaborate mouth clicks that these had nothing to do with their tribe. Although this simple communication between us was brief, it took the best part of an afternoon. I was now even more confused.

Where had they come from?  What will these seeds grow into?

I have checked all the adjacent plants but none of them develop seeds like this. Does anyone have any ideas what these are?  (Apart from the obvious fact these baskets were manufactured by fairies in Pixie Hollow that is).  Can you tell I have watched “A Bugs Life” and “Tinkerbell” 14.25 times (each)?

Here is a wider view of the area, there are loads of these rustic baskets.

I must say with the damp soil conditions, it has been perfect conditions for a pride of pixie’s to move in.

These were particularly colorful toadstools.

Moving on…

The emerging interlocking blood-stained jaws of this agave always demand respect.

Is that spinach?

All my purple heart is now blooming after the rains, and this tiny, super-shiny

Syrphid Hoverfly

wasted no time at all getting stuck into the egg-yolk goodness.

Here is another trying to stare the camera lens out,  The wings on these little flies are spectacular in their iridescence. They look like cartoon flies.

“Bzzzzz…Utter nonsense ESP”.

Golden thryrallis

has been blooming steadily throughout the summer with only the minimal amount of supplemental water.  A great deep shade plant for a splash of golden color. I have two of these planted under my large Post Oak.

And finally…

And behind the mistflower, looking like an old-fashioned Victorian Christmas tree,  the most enormous ornamental pepper I have ever grown. This is one plant, and it is going to look great when all the individual peppers turn their many colors.

Fish petting area in the patch. My youngest cups the goldfish in his hands, I fear for them knowing that a toddler “squeeze” may be on the horizon for one poor fish, even though I keep drumming it into him to be gentle.  He spends hours gazing and throwing things in this pond, you can see toy tractors, pans, cars etc, it looks like a wrecking yard on a clear-water day. The rock on the right has turned into his “pond perch,” he straddles it like Tom Sawyer while he whiles away many an hour in the Patch, tickling and naming the individual fish in his own two-year-old vernacular.

Stay Tuned for:

“Panic in the Patch”

All material © 2009 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by  late  (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

The other morning I walked outside and we had actually had some rain in Central Texas during the night.
I walked over to my “Callahan’s” rain water collection tank under my gutter and was surprised to see it full to the brim. I lingered at the rare spectacle, then noticed the dripping from the gutter…big drops. I went for my camera like a gunslinger, but could I capture the moment of impact, being the geek that I am?
I have to say this was one tough subject.

The top one is my favorite with the sunlight reflected in the middle of the explosion.
This one was like atomic shock waves.

Also sparkling after the rains like pink champagne were these succulents. They look good enough to eat, so I did.
I washed them down with a nice chianti. (More obligatory Lector noises).

Here is my new middle bed with its contouring. I was planning to wait until the spring to plant anything else in here, but as usual I could not wait. I had a thought this morning to raid my defunct waterfall area (to be a stonecrop waterfall this year) of all it’s remaining lava rocks, what I didn’t realize was just how many were buried in there. I found them under leaves, under a layer of dirt, under other stones…the sheer luxury. I had totally forgotten how many of these rocks I had originally picked up from a work colleague’s house some years ago. I love when projects are spontaneous like this, one thing leads to another, and before you know it the layers are coming off and the work (if you can call it that) begins…rocks were layed and some transplants were going in.

I managed to get a whole line of these sedums from one container
that I divided.  I am planning large swaths of similar plants that
conform with the mound contours. That is the plan, I await
the reality.

Final moss boulders were placed around the perimeter to finish defining the bed.

Then on with the lava rocks. Many of these rocks already have small stonecrop plants growing from puddles of soil that, over the years, have gathered in their nooks and crannies. I think these will spread fast when the warmer weather hits this year.

It takes a while for stone placement to “feel right,” so I know I will be moving and generally fidgeting with a few of these boulders before all the limestone dust settles… ah, all part of the fun. The rocks will look a lot more embedded when the small plants grow and ”naturalize” the landscape and the rock edges around them.

I finished the scene up with a couple of cedar carcasses and a gazing ball. Now I really do have to wait for the last frost to do my planting. In the meantime I will get some recycled tumbled glass for a shiny top mulch finish.

Okay, so I did transplant one soft leafed yucca – well it was looking really unhealthy trapped in it’s container, it was the humane thing to do, and anyway, I was sick and tired of it groaning and wheezing every time I walked past it.

“What is this place sis”?
“I am not sure, perhaps an ancient megalith? Lets eat before we absail off the nostril area”.
I have transplanted more of the champagne succulents around this megalith’s “botoxed” face
to look hopefully like a future bizarre hair-do.

What?       You get the idea, this one is from the Lost Gardens of Heligan, Cornwall, England.
(Thank you for the link Monomom).

Here is a view of my new middle bed taken half way up the ladder into my post oak.

Some other backyard oddities:


I cut my giant elephants ears off about a week ago (a painful thing for all involved), and now look at it.
It looks like some abstract art piece…

Or perhaps a Taro sushi roll! A fried shrimp roll (courtesy, Wikipedia) Have you seen the full “Wolf” moon as of late. The wolf moon arrives amid the cold and deep snows of midwinter, a time when the wolf packs would howl hungrily outside native indian villages. Thus, the name for January’s full moon.  Sometimes it was also referred to as the Old Moon, or the Moon After Yule.  Some called it the Full Snow Moon, but most tribes applied that name to the next Moon.

“Dude look at that Wolf Moon!  And get that man some Listerine, immediately!”
“Dude gargle”!

This was the disturbing scene I encountered at my Giant Timber Bamboo at the bottom of my yard…I am concerned.

Either a cat, a racoon or perhaps…

Angelina?
More likely…

“Arrrgh! Naughty paw, m-m-must stop scratching at ESP’s
Giant Timber bamboo”!
Bambusa oldhamii.


Dead Post Oak leaf lying on top of one of my red chairs. I shot this image a couple of months back on a barn in Salado, Texas.
Interesting use of old saws. I wish my shed was a little larger!

One more new arrival in the patch to finish.  I have been looking out for this one for about a year. I first saw it at the Natural Gardener, (back toward the chickens). They have three of them that shroud some AC units. It makes a really great (and super dense) privacy shield, about 10-15ft high.

“So many saws, saws within saws, spiraling saws”!

The bamboo is called
Bamboo ‘Alphonse Karr’
Bambusa Multiplex ‘Alphonse Karr’

What caught my attention about this bamboo was the green on yellow
striped stems. Armed with a christmas gift card, it was most
definitely a must have. It is already in the ground.

Stay Tuned For:
“Thyme Lords”
All material © 2009 for east_side_patch. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.