Butterflies

“Milk, Cookies and Spells”

ESPatch Dec 23, 2009 22 comments

It was getting late in the Patch, and some major spells were being cast on me from deep within the amaranth. Horsetail reeds make for excellent wands it appears, though my eldest hobbit insists she got hers from Diagon alley.

Expelliarmus!

Some of these spells take an immense amount of concentration it appears. Now will you please get that reed out of my face!

This budding wizard just wanted to talk to me about Christmas and Santa and ask a thousand questions about why Muggles celebrate this holiday, and how Santa gets into houses and the global logistics of accomplishing such a gift-giving feat, all in one night? These discussions tend to last quite some time.

What a fine horsetail wand.

Come early Christmas morning, and it was early, our wizards were glad they had Muggle parents. Hands tore through wrapping paper as fast as their small fingers could find the ends of the tape. Santa had devoured the home-made “Santa” cookies we had left out for him, and had washed them down with some milk…

…we wanted to leave out a nip of whiskey for him but it was decided, (not by the Muggles,) that he would prefer milk.

This “Happy Van” was a total hit…a van filled with small candies…he was in hog’s happy heaven with two of his most favorite things in the whole wide world!

Going back to the amaranth, it was time for our annual harvest of the seeds, though the seeds were not nearly so abundant as last year, but nevertheless we got quite a few. The seeds also were reluctant to separate from their husks, I think they were less developed due to the earlier frosts we have had this year. Clearly some form of incantation was being muttered by this wizard in an attempt to make the seedpods magically shed their seeds into the bowls.

It was good to give the nimble fingers a break from tearing at wrapping paper! The clouds of dust that arose from these buckets smelled like the barnyards where I used to play as a kid, it is amazing how a smell can teleport you back to a specific place. It was all-hands on in the patch, and I knew my “everything but the kitchen sink” rain water collection “system” would come in useful for more than collecting water.

Talking of serious rainwater collection endeavors, this has to be one of the big ones…

http://dracogardens.blogspot.com/2009/12/last-tank-is-in.html

Amaranth harvest.

I also cut down My Papyrus “toupees” today. I could no longer convince myself that they still carried any “Winter form”. No, they now looked like a seriously bad episode of the Muppets, or perhaps…

Oh yes, this one will be going into the “Looks Like…” page!

These cattails are also in the process of popping.

Millions of tiny seeds will shortly be catching the ESP thermals. Climb in here for a good nights sleep.

At least a better night’s rest than you would have here.

My largest sotol. I am about to get shredded once again by this beast, still, it has to be done. The lower branches are once again laying flat against the ground, skewering the odd ghost plant (like they care, they are already ghosts).

Huh uhuh huh.

Like my agaves, I try to trim up these plants as high as I can, at least so that the bottom leaves are not resting on the ground. It is a personal preference, but I think it looks better and creates less of a jumble of plants at ground level. It also makes weeding a little less painful, I have to weed a lot more regularly than I trim these plants up after all.

Here is the Patch all cut back for the winter…store all that energy roots! You can see the frost damage on the top of my Mexican lime tree on the right. It feels good to have all the scraggly amaranths pulled out.

The top third of my lime tree has taken a good beating, but it will quickly recover in the spring.

There are still a couple of butterflies moving ever-so-slowly around, so slow in fact, it made them an easy catch.

Battered and torn are they .

And still the Gerbera daisies continue to send out new blooms.

Inspirational wintry image of the week…

Moonlight is a German company that makes these glowing garden orbs. The polyethylene spheres have been around in Europe for a while and they’re making their way to the United States via a new company called Moonlight USA. I think an icy-blue version would be appropriate for our warmer Texas nights, but you will not find one in the Patch…I need the space for more plants!

Stay Tuned for:

“2010”

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

“Baggins and Tape”

ESPatch Nov 21, 2009 12 comments

“In the event of a water landing, I have been designed to serve as a flotation device”

And even more rain in Central Texas…and even more mosquitoes, although I have noticed that they are getting slower, their desperation for the red matter making them easier to swat. There are also some mosquito-monsters, what is that? Is that a? You have got to be kidding me… some are so large, getting stung is like getting stabbed with a knitting needle. Hey, everything is bigger in Texas.

The rain had beaten down this swallowtail butterfly to the ground, along with some Mexican Bush Sage. When I approached, as if on cue, the bird moved a wing ever so feebly, like a surrender flag. It was a tragic scene.

I managed to get the butterfly on a small twig where I then placed it up higher, next to one of my gazing balls, to get a breeze and dry it’s wings off. As soon as a breeze hit it’s wings, it immediately struck a pose.

Like a huge flying mantra ray, or a solar sail in orbit around an alien sun, it sat in that spot for hours, slowly fanning it’s wings. The next day it had gone, perhaps an anole ate it? Perhaps it dried off and flew away? I will never know.

Uhh ohh…(sirens go off)

NERD Alert, NERD Alert, NE…

It seems as though my Giant Timber Bamboo has developed barnacles, bamboo barnacles!

Small ones, large ones, exploded ones, If you have Giant Timber, the chances are you have some of this, a US import from the East.

Asterolecanium bambusicola Boisduval

Try saying that one at a party to ensure everybody looks at you like a freak for the rest of the evening! The Asterolecaniidae, or pit scales, are an unusual group in which many members can cause “pits” to occur on their host plants, usually Bambusa.

Many are considered as damaging pests on their hosts, sucking the sap from the culm sheath and stems. (Adjusts glasses) This is one of the more common pit scales. The coloration of this scale is light green to light brown with a cream colored to orange margin. It has a waxy covering making it difficult to eradicate…I don’t even try. Snort

My front porch has been consumed and I mean consumed by this Passiflora Coccinea or Red Passion Flower this year. The vine escaped its usual winter die-back fate last year due to the particularly mild winter we had. This years growth on top of the old growth has created a vine of monsterous proportions, it is attempting to engulf my entire front porch. If we do not have a cold winter this year I fear my front door may become unusable.

It is like the carnivorous Mexican vine in the movie “The Ruins”. It is even trying to get into the windows! I will let it for now because in the mornings when the sun shines on it, it creates the best shadows to wake to, very jungle like, and I do like jungle. I am just happy that it is not planted on the side of our house with the Tahoe hole in it, or I firmly believe it would already be inside the house, covering the TV and our Lazy Boys with it’s green tendrils.

House of Vines, originally uploaded by: jasohill

Could this be the fate of the Patch should we not get a good freeze this winter?

Staying on the subject of rather large vehicles, driving at high speed into the sides of houses, this is the current scene in our living room right now. The recent cold fronts we have been experiencing have created the need for some creative improvisation, oh yes when the colder wind picked up recently it was whistling through here. It made watching a movie feel more like an outdoor retreat. What was our creative improvisation? Well as you can see, it involved copious amounts of Duct Tape and some plastic leaf bags to achieve this deconstructionist aesthetic. I have to mention that these bags are constantly sucking in and blowing out, it is like living inside of bellows. The Botox Lady had a really strange look on her face when I walked past her from the shed carrying the roll of Duct Tape.

Another over-achiever that has really sprung this year (its third year) is this Buddha’s Belly Bamboo,

Bambusa tuldoides ‘Ventricosa’

I am thinking of taking out the white pomegranate shrub on the right of it to offer the scene some more breathing space. I have never really cared for this shrub, it has a scrappy curled look to it’s foliage, like it is perpetually thirsty. Apart from the white blooms it develops in the spring, it mostly just sits there, bothering me, yes, I am afraid the woodcutter will return with his sharpened axe in the very near future, what do you think? Do I just hate “curly foliage”?

It is not like the Belly Bamboo does anything more spectacular, but the foliage just works for me as an imposing tropical backdrop to these variegated agaves.

I cannot describe how many insects are on this Amaranth at the moment. It has rendered my center pathway almost unusable. Clouds of moths,wasps,hoverflies,wasps,butterflies,bees surround you should you sweep past the colorful plant. It is quite staggering.

This one was particularly large and spiky, the body of the fly glowed ruby red.

The insects seem to get drunk on the Amaranth necter, not caring at all about the camera.

Arrooooooo!

Lots of fall color right now in the Patch courtesy of Amaranth, cigar plant, Philippine violet and Mexican bush sage.

We went to the Mueller playground at the weekend and spotted some of Austin’s very own Monk Parakeets, they were everywhere! As were their feathers that kept falling out of the tree as I took this photograph.

Somebody got to work immediately collecting the colorful feathers.

Myself?…Naturally I was hunkered down next to this amazing specimen of Umbrella Plant

Cyperus alternifolius (Unbrella Papyrus)

I may just have to bury yet another rather large rubber container and get this one going. It would look great buried in the middle of a bed as a center-piece with an under-planting of…wait, I think I know just the place!

Finally…

A freshly emerged damselfly?

The Bog Cyprus in my main pond has started to brown and shed, so it is out with the net…

“Let the boring scooping begin!”

I hope you will check out the new ESP “character listings” at the top of the green side-bar under “Pages”. Let me know if I have missed any important details or if I have excluded anyone you think should have a presence there.

Cactus Man, Cactus Man where art thou?

Stay Tuned for:

“The Leaf, the Witch, and the Water-feature ”

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