“Tulipomania”

ESPatch Mar 22, 2015 2 comments

Artist: Philippe de Champaigne

Tulip mania or tulipomania was a period in the Dutch Golden Age during which contract prices for bulbs of the recently introduced tulip reached extraordinarily high levels and then suddenly collapsed.

At the peak of tulip mania, in March 1637, some single tulip bulbs sold for more than 10 times the annual income of a skilled craftsman. It is generally considered the first recorded speculative bubble (or economic bubble).

Jan_Brueghel_the_Younger,_Satire_on_Tulip_Mania,_c._1640

A Satire of Tulip Mania by Jan Brueghel the Younger (ca. 1640) depicts speculators as brainless monkeys in contemporary upper-class dress. In a commentary on the economic folly, one cheeky monkey urinates on the previously valuable plants, others appear in debtor’s court and one is carried to the grave.

220px-Semper_Augustus_Tulip_17th_century

Anonymous 17th-century watercolor of the Semper Augustus,

famous for being the most expensive tulip sold during tulip mania. (10,000 guilders.)

(From Wikipedia)

We have had a little slice of mania pie ourselves..

We have them growing in containers:

We have them growing in the ground:

This should surely put the “Dad why don’t you ever grow flowers” conversation to rest once and for all.

(Thanks for the bulbs JJ.)

The green berries on this Fatsia Japonica have now turned black.

There is so much fruit the stems are under strain.

Surprisingly the birds so far have left them alone.

Another great naturalizing bulb with a really ‘cool’ color are the Spring Starflowers:

Ipheion ‘Rolf Fiedler’

is an electric blue color which really pops against a dark background and looks particularly psychedelic reflected in the Cactusman’s eyeglasses.

What is really odd is how his eyes have come to fit his facial expression.

Moving along to my Largus Bug Infestation:

This plague has been around the Patch for a few months now with no intervention from me, well until recently.

I have been kicking this ‘Macho Mocha’ mangave’s butt for weeks now, attempting to dislodge the critters every time I walked past it, a futile activity but it was fun to watch the bugs get airborne.

This is the only plant/agave that has sustained damage from the Largus, here is a group of them slurping away on their favorite tall mocha.

I decided I would add something a little extra ahem ‘topping’ to their favorite beverage in the form of some Diatomaceous earth…feeling thirsty now?…

…I just bet you are.

A few days later the bugs were mostly gone and to my surprise a flower stalk was on the rise,

a rather curvacious one.

The only time I go under this sabal major in my hell-strip is to cut off the occasional low hanging limb. Some time ago I tucked a handful of sedum in at the base of the palm and totally forgot about it.

“Spread well has the sedum”

While I was in here I decided to check up on the inebriated cactus who was still looking, well…

…totally inebriated.

Stay Tuned For:

“Bridge Over the River Why?”

All material © 2015 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

“Under the Knife”

ESPatch Oct 23, 2014 7 comments

Oh yes, we have been quite busy of late.

Meet Cactus Man Jr II, an intellectual currently working on his doctoral thesis “Humans Obsession with Opuntia Paddle Personification.”

The slots/wounds at the side of his head will heal over (and secure) the glasses over time…at least that is the goal.

crazy-clown-doctor

Cactus Man Jr II’s grandfather wasn’t quite so lucky when he fell under my knife a few years back.

As you can see, I was significantly less ‘invasive’ with my surgical procedures this time around so I have high hopes for a full recovery.

We each claimed a paddle and got creative,

or somewhat disturbing.

Mist flowers are one of my favorite insect attractors this time of year. They work really well along side steely blue basketgrass and artemesia Silver King, but any artemesia will do.

Just add a splash of Esperanza, a hint of rosemary and stir slowly over a number of years.

I have been performing enough yucca and sotol haircuts recently that my forearms resemble pin cushions.

joe-dirt11 I can live with this mullet-look for a while but then the control freak in me kicks-in and I reach for the Fiskars.

Ahh, it can breathe again.

I even had some pine-cone cactus growing at the base of the plant that I had forgotten about.

This sotol at a clients house was a monster, it must have had 10+ years of old growth at the base, some of it buried.

It took me about an hour to work around it, trimming its spiny locks. I was spiked, bitten by fire-ants, clawed at and by the time I was finished both of my ears were bleeding.

Next time I will were some protection. I think a couple of these with an iced turban should look significantly ridiculous.

Here is a before shot of the front area:

And after clean-up:

A fresh layer of Tejas black gravel was put down in the front of the house and a planter planted with…

a bonsai Juniper tree.

I think I will have to get one of these twisted trees myself.

Two additional steel planters were planted up with spineless sotol

Dasylirion longissimum

…if any plant can take the heat, this one can.

At another clients house I was called out to perform a postmortem on an agave that had recently gone into decline.

Here is the agave a few months ago:

and now:

There were some tell-tale signs; holes in the leaves, unearthly odor, it was a mess. A gentle tug released the heart of the plant confirming it was once again the work of the notorious agave villain:

Dum dum duummm…

Mr Snout-Nose…AKA: “The Evil Weevil”

Known to his inner circle as:

Scyphophorus acupunctatus

This time the sneaky villain had managed to clone himself.

This poor agave was full of his duplicates and a disturbing amount of the weevil’s grubs that were now furiously devouring the inside of the agave, causing it to turn to mush and collapse on itself.

It wasn’t a pretty site,

and it wasn’t a pretty smell.

This beetle is deadly for agaves.

I have lost many a fine specimen plant to the trunked-tyrant myself, particularly Agave Americana which, as I understand it, tastes like freshly baked pecan pie and cream to Mr Weevil.

If infected I take out the dying plant and cover the entire area with diatomaceous earth. I avoid planting in the same hole.

As for other plants that may be effected or at risk, I put a thick circle of diatomaceous earth around the base of the plants and replenish regularly.

Oh, and when I find a dead weevil or one journeying in the open looking for a host agave to decimate, I turn into Vlad the Impaler. I leave tiny clumps of them on ceremonial skewers to deter others…and I like insects.

“No Bear, it is not a waste!”

On a brighter note after retching a few times getting the rotted limbs of the agave into the bed of my truck, I did take some time to snap a few pictures of the landscape that I installed last spring.

Before:

Lots of linear lines, patchy turf and odd stepping-stone flagstones needed to be taken out.

There were some nice corten steel planters to work with though.

Here is the visual I generated for the space to communicate a more organic and naturalistic aesthetic:

Installation:

Linheimer Muhly grasses filling in well,

along with the gulf coast muhly.

No more grass to water and cut here.

Snapshots in the Patch:

Celosia is setting seed.

Mexican firebush threatens to ignite some crusty old inland sea oats.

Miscanthus grasses glow gold this time of the year,

and Salvia Leucantha just keeps on going…yes the Vitex is still there!

Stay Tuned For:

“Shelling Out”

All material © 2014 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.