Dragonflies

“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”

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

“Down the Rabbit Hole”

ESPatch Dec 8, 2009 11 comments

Quite literally!

Rabbit holes have a very different meaning to me than the average person, why? Well first of all, as a kid, I spent a lot of time around them, inside them, or digging through them. I would invariably find myself at dusk, high up on an exposed Scottish fell with an arm extended “James Herriot” fashion inside one. I was trying to feel for anything that had fur, or that moved, because this meant I would be able to return to the light and warmth of my home and some dinner.

I hated doing this, it was like the endurance box Paul Atreides was tested with, by the Bene Gesserit Witch in the movie Dune. You just had no idea what was waiting for your hand round the next corner, it was the dark unknown… a rabbit, badger, chucky, a hungry troll with gnashing teeth?… Oh no, you could not let your imagination get away from you, especially as the light faded.

Now why would I subject myself to this you ask? Well it was usually to extract one or both of my pet polecats “Bonnie and Clyde” from a rabbit hole where they had caught a rabbit, ate it, then selfishly decided to take a long underground sleep (they always do). You never want your ferret to catch a rabbit below ground ever.

When this annoyance happens there is only one course of action to be taken, that is to dig through the hill-side and extract the ferret. First you have to locate the ferret underground, to do this we used beepers attached to the ferrets collars. Once located, then you dig, and you dig, you take the Bene Gesserit test a few more times, and then you dig some more, until you finally grab a hold of some fur. I am pretty sure I developed a lot of my current shoveling techniques during this period of my life.

Ferreting when executed correctly goes something like this: Locate rabbit warren, cover holes with fish or purse nets, put ferret in hole, wait for rabbits to bolt, jump on rabbit in net, (the next few bits you probably don’t want to hear about), sell rabbits to a local butcher, obtain pocket money…done!

A bygone pie?

Now before you all boycott the patch in support of these furry long-eared rodents, there is something important you need to know.

There is a disease in the UK, the most hideous of diseases that turns rabbits from the lovable creatures we know into mutations that resemble creatures in “The Thing”. The disease is in the US but it effects the European rabbitmore severely. I wish I could say I was exaggerating or joking when I say this, but I am not, okay perhaps just the tiniest bit. These mutated creatures are truly disturbing to witness first hand, and I witnessed a lot where I grew up, in fact I even jumped on a few ferreting…a memory I would very much like to rid myself off…

The disease is called Myxomatosis, as kids, we called it simply myxi, and the jury is out on whether it is a man-made or a naturally occurring virus . Certainly man knowingly spread this heinous virus into new countries and areas.

The virus was deliberately introduced into Australia in 1950 in an attempt to control rabbit infestation and population there. It was devastatingly effective, reducing the estimated rabbit population from 600 million to 100 million in two years. It was also deliberately introduced in the UK to try and reduce the rabbit population after World War II. By 1955, about 95% of rabbits in the UK were dead, a staggering statistic. The disease is still common in the UK today,and it is not uncommon for shooters (and drivers) to specifically target infected rabbits, viewing the act as being merciful. I will not go into details about the specifics of the disease for fear of giving you nightmares, but where I grew up, keeping the rabbit population in check helped to keep the disease in check.

Bonnie and Clyde both eventually entered a rabbit hole and were never seen again, returning back to the wild where I had initially found them. Myself? I don’t care if I ever see one more rabbit hole, or one more myxi rabbit, as long as I live.

I know you are now ready to move onto some more traditional seasonal cheer…

…but I am afraid you will have to wait a little longer…

I scooped this dragonfly out of my pond after one of our recent frosts, I thought it was dead as I took these shots. My eldest decided that she wanted to take it to school for show and tell. We placed it in a zip-lock bag where it proceeded to “reanimate”. I could tell it had reanimated by the screams emanating from inside the house, it turned out a leg had apparently moved, I was skeptical. I decided to keep it locked inside the bag, yes I was performing dragonfly euthanasia, it was not going to live after all, even if it’s leg had indeed moved. Did you spot the hitchhiker on it’s wing? What IS that?

Moving on…

This dwarf papyrus

Cyperus papyrus!

was packed with tiny water droplets the other morning. I have this one paired in a small container with horsetail reed which works well as they are both about the same height.

Some more water jewelry mimicking what is left of the seed pods on my “Jewels of Opar” plant.

Really attractive now!

I think I can safely say that this will be my final post on this plant for this year! I cut these jewels back to the ground and made sure that I gave these tiny round seeds a good shake in various places around the patch. I could hear all the tiny seeds hitting the ground…like music to my elephant ears.

Perhaps some music might cheer them up a little…a drooping elephant ear, a soggy reminder of a good freeze.

It is amazing what a difference one hard frost can make in a garden. Here is a vibrant before and frozen after image of the same view taken last week.

What a stark difference!

Sedum nussbaumerianum

or Coppertone sedum, has turned a tell-tale frost-bitten pink color. It looks like there is still life at the base of the plant. I really want this plant to make it through the winter.

My Salvia leucantha also took an icy beating and is now cut back to the ground.

Even the hobbits have been scuttling underground to escape the cold via their container trap-door. They tell me that this passageway leads to a forest in Canada?

Inspirational images of the week…

Images by Free Spirit Spheres

These forest orbs are available for overnight rental or purchase on Vancouver Island. Tom Chudleigh, the conceptual designer behind these hobbit houses in the sky, developed the idea for his own need to meditate in the wild. Tom was also searching for a concept that would allow people to move into the forest without having to take it down first by chopping trees to make room for houses.

So if you are ready for a lifestyle change, get out of the rat-race in one of these enchanted pods…they are also quite interesting on the inside…

What a great place to read Lord of the Rings.

Is that a microwave?