Bamboo

“Frost Bitten, Twice Shy”

ESPatch Jan 11, 2010 10 comments

Oh yes we remain gripped in a Harry Potter craze in the Patch, can you tell?

Only this time the craze requires copious amounts of Ibuprofen upon completion of a reenactment.

The latest, and repetitive request in the ESP is to be repeatedly “flown” around the decomposed granite pathways whilst “the flyer” is playing a strategic fantasy game of Quidditch. I call it Rubbish Quidditch because apart from the obvious, there are no hoops to score a goal through, and my Nimbus 2000 broomstick does not seem to function like it does in the movies.

Unfortunately for us, this hobbit is getting to the size that this activity can give the parental unit an immediate hernia. It is ridiculous to watch though. See for yourself… Oh, and who said that the golden “snitch” is hard to catch, pah! – not in Rubbish Quidditch, it is the size of a gazing ball:

Music by the EastSidePatch Recording Studios, Austin, Texas. :-)

This player got a rogue bludger that knocked her out of the Quidditch field into this Variegated Pittosporum / Variegated Mock Orange. This shrub is about five years old, I keep it pruned up high.

Only another thirty five years to go until it hopefully turns into a monster like the one at Zilker Botanical Gardens.

This is a Pittosporum right?

“Raaarrgh”

Monsters, or “motners” as he calls them, are also not far behind Harry on the popularity scale, especially ones with strange hand shadows that is…

She found this sago stump in Zilker Botanical Gardens, here in Austin, I don’t even know what she had in her other hand, but she was having some eerie fun playing with her dinosaur claw shadows as you can see in the video, it really was quite effective, very film noir.

I love this ornate gate at Zilker.

Back in the now recuperating Patch…

It was time to access the true extent of the damage of the recent and continuous hard freezes we have experienced, damage that is only now showing its true devastating impact on our gardens. What was once a vibrant gerbera daisy is now a small and truly representative messenger of the damage the patch has endured. The frosts have hit a number of plants worse than others, though I think the damage looks worse than what it actually is (he says hopefully). I am just happy that CTG did not film the Patch this week, though it would have been rather funny with Linda’s calming voice: “ESP gardens with a keen eye for contrast, he loves the challenge of incorporating errr dead or decaying plants along side healthy ones and is never scared to adopt soft, decaying succulents in a mass planting scheme.”

My fingers are crossed for this Mexican lime tree that bore so much fruit this last year. The leaves, or what is left of them, are now looking like dead dragon scales. The trunk is still green so I think although it looks really bad, it will pull through.

All of my bamboos have taken a harsh cold beating also, here is my sad Buddhas Belly, looking as crispy as some Oscar Meyer’s bacon. Like the lime tree, the culms are still green which gives me some glimmer hope, hope that I do not share for my poor dwarf bottle brush shrub in the foreground of this picture.

Even my Giant timber foliage have turned a distinctive shade of silver, a first in the Patch.

My artemisia looking sufficiently “cool” with this winter sunlight hitting it. After the frosts and then all the rain it perked right back up. I left it a little while longer then took a deep breath and walked to the shed to get my pruners. I hate to cut this plant back because it is like Jekyll and Hyde. It looks fantastic most of the year until it comes to pruning time. I find that to get the desired look for most of the year you have to be quite brutal in the cut-back department a couple of times a year. When this plant gets leggy it really does get leggy and then it tries to hide the fact that it is even leggy at all. The above mound of wormwood consists of a mere six plants.

“Oh yeah…Looking good now ESP”

I told you it was a Jekyll and Hyde plant, look at it now. I just won’t look this way for a few months until it fills back in!

Now what did I do with my blinkers?

Even the sago palms did not escape totally unharmed, Jack Frost picking off what he wanted.

“I will have THAT sago palm leaf, and THAT one…some of that, and a little bit of that, or my name is not Jack irritating Frost.”

The rosemary did not even flinch, this one seems to thrive on the cold, blooming, at least a little, once again right now.

I not sure this little plant was going to pull through, then it greened up with central new growth. Now if I could only identify it! It is like a tiny sotol.

My ghost plants have shrunk back to the bare minimum, mostly stalk – very little plant, but they live, they live I tell you.

All the ivy has turned burgundy green, it really looks great at this time of year.

My pine-cone cactus fingers are now broken and appear to be pointing and gesturing as if they are trying to tell me something.

“Pssst..ESP, treasure from the Black Pearl they be pointin’ too”!

“They better not be imitating my nose?

Finally, and I could not believe this early-year sunbather…

a winter dragon metaphorically hanging on for its’ life after the frosts. This old man has one foot in the grave judging from his lackluster complexion and dull eyes. But here he his proving that warm weather life can still endure. I have my fingers crossed for some life returning to all my warmer weather green dwellers in the spring.

Inspirational image of the week:

A word from the designer:

Stay Tuned for:

“Put the Petal to the metal”

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intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

“Twelve ESP Days of Christmas”

ESPatch Dec 14, 2009 16 comments

On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me,

Twelve mother of millions,

Eleven pipers piping,

Ten blooms are blooming,

Nine ladies dancing, (what?…I had nothing!)

Eight stink horns stinking, (okay still struggling)!

Seven swans a-swimming,

The Botox Lady’s spraying,

FIVVEEE “precious” rings…

Four inflatable turds!

Three Naboo Men,

Two anoles in love,

And a Tahoe’s occupants did flee!

I have been feeling musically inclined of late, can you tell?

Moving on…Oh yes, we are getting well into the Christmas spirit here in the Patch. Our tree is up, our moth-eaten stockings are hung, and more importantly, there are a couple of excited hobbits that inspect both objects on a nightly basis, with magical childhood anticipation.

I know what this one wants… a new “amphibious” Thomas the Tank Engine, this one stopped running as soon as it’s wind-up engine hit this water feature, like he cared.

Looking like Hogwarts candles illuminating the main hall, these amaranth seed pods give the impression that they are under some form of enchantment, hovering in space.

The candles are hovering all around the patch.

This hall was the inspiration for Hogwarts in the Harry Potter movie. Only Oxford students of this Christ Church college are allowed to dine here. Staying on the Harry Potter theme…

“Almost got it”!

This seedpod looked remarkably like the Golden Snitch, albeit a little rustier. This rogue snitch must have left the quidditch field and got hung up on my back fence some time ago.

Southern Green Stink Bug.

Nezara viridula

I assume that this evil green chomper is eating nuts from my pecan trees, they love nuts, kernel spot of pecan is caused by the feeding of this stink bug. These guys will also munch on practically any food crop they can sink their nasty teeth into. This one flew off before I had time to hit it with an over-sized mallet. They remind me of the aliens in The Fifth Element.

Although it is not a welcome sight, the form of this bug is really quite something, with it’s wings nesting in a recess on the top of it’s low-profile body. It’s sculpted under-carriage. Perhaps what is needed to eradicate this pest is a rather over-sized, and extremely nasty looking brown tongue, to lick the bugs from foliage?

“Eeewww! Watch out for that sotol, giant tongue”!

You have got to be kidding me! (knees knock together, left leg flies uncontrollably upward, jaw involuntarily wiggles left to right, hands clench, you know the drill, right Germi?).

“ahhhhllghmoooocall that a tonguemooooo.”

Can you guess what this nasty looking cow looking tongue once was? Go on, I dare you…quite bizarre, it even had the texture of a tongue when I squeezed the edge of it…errrrr….Gross, well you knew I was going to! Touching this cold tongue sent me into an involuntary silly walk around my decomposed granite pathways, back to the relative safety of my Galleon ship home.

This giant timber bamboo is really visible now that the pecan tree that it is growing through has lost all of it’s leaves. The bamboo has now grown above the canopy of this tree.

This pecan is destined for the chop very soon, the sooner the better. It is really scrappy anyway, dropping this and a bit of that all throughout the year. If it isn’t dropping pecan husks it is dropping the droppings from the multitudes of web-worms that usually inhabit the tree. Have I said it is always dropping something?

I am continuously sweeping this concrete patio. I have another pecan to the right of this one that will also fall under the wood-cutters axe soon enough, when the three giant timber plants below it mature. I am under no illusion that this bamboo grove will also shed lots of stuff, but bamboo sheaths are much easier dealt with than the messier “products” that the Pecan trees drop.

Another tree that I am continuously hacking at is my Vitex. This tree was in pretty bad shape when we first move into our house. I have made it my goal to keep shaping and trimming this shrub-tree to raise it’s canopy to new higher heights. Here it is on the right after today’s most recent haircut.

Talking of hacking back…This red passion vine now resembles a mass of seaweed after our recent freezes. I wondered what manner of monsters were laying in waiting for me in it’s murky depths. I reluctantly went to the shed to get my gloves and pruners. This vine did not freeze at all last year and naturally it got quite enormous. As I approached it with my pruners a large tentacle lashed out of the undergrowth and encircled my arm.

Staying on the subject of sea creatures, check out Korean designer, chul an kwak’s dynamic tables…

Try sitting on one of these if you can, before they scuttle away and bury themselves in the mud-flats.

Sotols, agaves, ghosts, gophers and bottles all just swooned through the cold night temperatures with ease. I love this bed!

As did this new addition, Red Carpet Sedum.

Sedum spurium ‘Elizabeth’

“I hereby give this sedum my frosty blessing”.

Inspirational image of the week…

“I am not a lover of lawns. Rather would I see daises in their thousands,ground ivy, hawkweed,and even the hated plantain with tall stems, and dandelions with splendid flowers and fairy down, than the too-well-tended lawn”.

William Henry Hudson, author and naturalist.

(Thanks for this JuJu)

(1841-1922)