Agaves

“I Tripped over a Leaffooter”

ESPatch Feb 28, 2010 11 comments

This Coreid Bug or Leaffooted bug…

Acanthocephala declivis

in fact the acanthocephala genus contains the largest insects in this family, with the declivis being the largest member…I had found a monster! Such a intimidating character with his flared and spiny collar. Although members of another family, the Pentatomidae, are commonly called stink bugs, this chap smells much worse, probably in part because they are bigger insects. If disturbed, these large insects will squirt a disgusting liquid out of the glands on the sides of their bodies. Brrrr.

The body is a dusty gray color and is hard to misidentify. It is frequently found under leaves during the winter months and on warm winter days you may find them sunning themselves on small blankets.

The trunk-like appendage tucked up under it’s body is called a stylet or rostrum,

I said rostrum!

when it is ready to start sucking on a plant, this is it’s modified-mouth-part weapon of choice. Within this tube move the stylets – sharp needle-like structures with which the insect pierces the plant tissue. The method of feeding by plant bugs as a whole is to inject saliva into the plant tissue which assists in its breakdown thereby making this tissue easier to assimilate.

“I like this declivis of Earth”

My eldest screamed “Big BUG” shortly after I had dug up a baby feather grass, I must have disturbed him. I went back with my camera to catch him delicately wading like an H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds tripod through my succulent bed. I was really happy to get these shots without encountering any serious “emissions”.

While I was clambering around in this bed I did happen to notice this little bit of zen…

What a great place for a grass-seed to germinate, very sculptural. It looks as though the Naboo have tied it together, perhaps as a rudimentary shelter? I am pretty sure that these blocked up caves are where the Naboo tribe take shelter in the cold winter months. I find them all over the Patch, some even have the remains of tiny fires at the cave entrance.

The frost distressed skin on this agave made it look completely bizarre, very rhino.

“Is that really what my skin looks like?’

“Meee, I am afraid soooo, Mr rhinooooowwww“.

Yes, to the delight of the hobbits their friend, Drake the cat, dropped into the Patch once again to drink deeply form my algae laden feeder tank, I think it is addicted to it, my old cat used to like the the flavor too.

New blood-red growth has started on this flamboyant bauhinia corymbosa vine. This vine is one of my favorites in the patch and once established it will breeze through both frost and drought.

The name ” Bauhinia “ was a name given this genus by Linnaeus to honor the twin brothers Johann and Gaspard Bauhin, who were 16th century Swiss scientists – Johann was a botanist and Gaspard a botanist and physician.

A storybook vine if ever there was one.

Using the name of these identical twins is fitting as Bauhina leaves are composed of two identical lobes. Here is a picture of the vine taken last summer, it looks like thousands of green butterflies.

This sotol was showing off with a setting winter sun illuminating it, this is why we have sotols, this is what makes their flesh ripping antics worth while. That is a swath of ghost plants next to it, with some of that irritating clover that is really hard to get to… and out.

Here are the ghosts in all of their animated glory, and yes that is the Leaffooted bug, out of focus in the foreground. It was so large it was hard not to get it in frame, no-matter where I was shooting.

Other “almost” spring-like developments this week…

Tiger Aloe,

Aloe variegata

Looking like some old fashioned British sea-side rock (candy), I had a couple of these but only this one made it, not because of the freezes, oh no, but because the other one got sat on, you can fill in the rest. Pink-red flowers in winter, you can’t beat that.

I wanted to pull out this milk thistle so bad, but I did a double take on it, got drawn into the foliage coloration and thought I would leave it for a while longer. There is a legend that the leaves were formed by milk that fell from the breast of the Virgin Mary when she was suckling the baby Jesus. Apparently the leaves can be boiled like spinach. Has anyone tried this?
It flowers between June and August – under the purple flower, there are several stiff flower bracts, looking like a many-pointed star. Maybe I will leave it alone after all, curious I am (Yoda voice).

The first coneflower is on the rise. Horah!

And a round of applause to the copper canyon daisy on it’s return topside.

I have to show this next image as a follow-up to the creation of dirty “frosty” in my last post. Of course he melted, but she had a re-incarnation already planned for the dirty, slush man… a reincarnation in a bowl, it is just what he would have wanted…

I cannot believe that I have made it through this entire post without mentioning my…

And to finish, the tiny cooling flowers of an Ipheion, ‘Rolf Fiedler’ (Thanks for the ID Les). The best blue color!

Inspirational concept of the week…

geotube is a building proposal designed by the california based architecture firm, faulders studio for the
unique environment of dubai. the building features a large super structure which will, over time, grow
a skin façade on its own. the system utilizes a vertical salt deposit growth systemthat uses water from the
adjacent persian gulf. the water is sprayed onto the mesh of the superstructure using a gravity fed system,
allowing the skin to continually grow using nothing but local materials. because the persian gulf has the
world’s highest salinity for oceanic water, the sprayed water will evaporate and salt deposits begin to
form. ‘the tower’s appearance transforms from a transparent skin to a highly visible white solid plane.
the result is a specialized habitat for wildlife that thrives is this environment, and an accessible surface
for the harvesting of crystal salt.’ the water would be pumped in using a long underground tube, hence
the project’s name.

Stay Tuned for:

“Feather Hugger”

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

“Bottom of ze Barrel”

ESPatch Feb 5, 2010 10 comments

“foul is fair and fair is foul.”

I caught the ESP witches milling around this frost bitten shrub this evening on top of one of my mounds, (and YES, those are my citrus trees in the background!) Something had prematurely brought this foul trio down from out of my post oak. My heart immediately sank for I knew exactly what this signified…something or someone had once again died in the Patch, it was too early for the witches to stockpile gulf coast toads after all. I instinctively grabbed my wrist, and was relieved to find that yes, I still had a pulse… phew.

I decided to consult my own seer to see if she could shed some light on what had happened…

Esmeralda gazed deep into her sparkling rubber ball and pronounced in her overtly charismatic accent…

Must it always be a ridiculous Romanian accent? That is Romanian right?

I naturally added more coins for more wisdom, but as usual, Esmeralda’s impressive worldly advice wasn’t pertinent to anything at all that was going on in my life, or anyone else’s “journey” for that matter. I grumbled under my breath and read the random (most definitely not Romanian) “Engrish” phrases on the rear of the dispensed fortune card. One particular line towards the end caught my immediate attention…

“Death, ‘ries’ waiting at the bottom of ze barrel”.

On reading this, I immediately grabbed my camera and canteen and ventured down the steps into the Patch.

With Esmeralda’s cryptic, generic fortune telling, I strangely knew exactly where to start looking for a death in the Patch. My fears were confirmed as I honed in on this little barrel cactus after noticing a small something suspended in it…

…and no it wasn’t Bear Grylls, though it did “bare” (ahem) a remarkable sleeping resemblance…

Yes, this will make it into the “looks like” page of the ESP: http://www.eastsidepatch.com/visual-comparativies/

I climbed in closer, and realized that the suspended beast was a poor baby anole, laid to rest on a bed of thorns. My immediate thoughts wandered to the Naboo tribe, they had been awfully quiet of late after all… never a good sign. I came to the conclusion though that this poor little chap must have froze during our last freeze, his tiny feet were still defiantly gripping tight to the cacti spines.

“RIP, young anole of the barrel”.

I suppose the inherent armory of the barrel cactus had prevented anything from already snacking on his corpse, including Bear Grylls (well you know he would, given half a chance).

“You know me too well ESP, aang, aang, aang, aang.”

And RIP to this abomination, lurking in a brand new, yes, a brand new tray of purchased cherry tomatoes. More of a disgusting Santa beard than a tomato. Brrr!

Moving quickly on…

“Houston we have a go for launch”.

Engage the advil boosters…
for today, the conditions were perfect to hit my hell-patch.

I have been waiting for the right time…a long deep soaking from the rain, a nice cool sunny day with which to dig, and today fitted the bill perfectly. The ground in this strip is usually baked so hard it would require a pneumatic drill to even make a dent in it, but not today, oh no, today my pick axe lay off to one side, I didn’t reach for it once, today my shovel went through this soil like butter. Okay not quite, but you get the general picture.

The grade needed to be brought down quite a bit to get rid of the mounding and to allow for a decent future layer of decomposed granite. It was a royal pain working around this desert willow tree. The kid-size mattress in the background I curled up on every thirty minutes or so for a quick rest. That turned some local heads I can tell you.

I also went around the perimeter with a trowel to make sure it was clear of any hanger-on weeds, of which there were plenty.

Then a good over-lapping layer of weed barrier…

…a few bags of decomposed granite thrown over the seams and a few temporary rocks to stop the weed barrier from blowing away and I was done, at least for now. It will stay like this until another delivery of moss boulders and decomposed granite is in my future…Esmeralda? My plan for this hell-strip is a mass planting of transplanted and divided bamboo muhly to soften and hide the rectilinear shape, and some soft leaf yucca dotted around to create sharp, vertical contrast. I will cut holes in the fabric when I settle on the planting arrangement and drop in the plants. I will also hide the straight lines by creeping some of the rocks up onto the sidewalk before I back-fill it all with the granite.

Start to finish in these perfect conditions: five hours, that was the good news. The bad news is that…

…I still have the other side to go, and my right leg is now not quite right! Now, where are those epsom salts?

Other Patch notables this week:

Agave americana displaying a sharp array of teeth and great coloration.

Gopher plant getting ready to bloom…

…and a visitor rolls into the Patch.

Some fresh sand in the sandbox, life is good, at least it was for this hobbit until she was then dangled over our fish pond to clean off her feet in the icy water. Oh yes, she really liked that.

Image of the week:

One of my recurring nightmares.