Middle Bed

“Purple Rain”

ESPatch Oct 14, 2009 24 comments

“Oh come on ESP…a REAL grasshopper”?

“That’s right ‘Hopper’, and I can pull that CAD face too, look! Oh, and if you bully those ants one more time”?

I caught the real thing lurking in the subterranean environment deep inside one of my large agaves. Is he squinting his beady eye at me?

This character jumped onto one of my decomposed granite walkways, this shot highlights his camouflage capabilities:

A master of disguise! I tried and tried to get the red flashing on his legs, his most distinguished feature, but to no avail.

These blue fingers allow no escape, can you guess who they belong to?

“Stay away from the fingers, don’t go into the fingers”.

Interesting how the color gradates through the lily…there, I told you.

Madame Ganna Walska, Nymphaea x, tropical water lily. I thought I would post these pictures as the plant is about to go dormant, it’s growth has slowed considerably, it’s flowers getting smaller. It is a matter of time now before the plant starts to shrink back into my ponds murky depths for the winter. It has served the patch well, albeit if a tad aggressively since the spring.

Staying on a similar color scheme…

Fall Aster is living up to it’s name and dominating the areas I have it planted with its cheerful blooms.

I like the Artemisia and fall aster combination, silver and pale purples always work well for the “Patch Palette”.

Here are the “Powis Castle” hills in the distance, I need a couple more asters dispersed in the artemisia to really make this scene work. See the little green succulent to the lower right?

This plant has now earned my full respect, breezing through our drought with no additional water, The patch has a couple of these vibrant plants, I want more. This is…

Limón talinum

…and it houses thousands of garden jewels that resemble a chemistry model. The plant is native to the West Indies and Central America and has common names of Fameflower and Jewels-of-Opar. Knowing that a plant has a common name synonymous with a mythical ancient city full of riches should offer a clue that someone thought very highly of this plant at some point in time. This plant made it through last winters mild conditions, I have my fingers crossed for this year.

If you are a fan of Tarzan, then there is a distinct possibility that you have heard the Jewels-of-Opar name before. Edgar Rice Burroughs mentioned the forgotten city of Opar in 1913 in his second Tarzan book, The Return of Tarzan, and then in 1916, he wrote Tarzan and the Jewels-of-Opar.

Opar is located deep in the jungles of Africa . Portrayed as a lost colony of Atlantis in which incredible riches have been stockpiled down through the ages, the city’s population exhibits sexual dimorphism caused by a combination of excessive inbreeding, cross-breeding with apes, and selective culling of offspring. Consequently, female Oparians are physically perfect, while male Oparians are beast-like brutes.

“MMUUSSTT GET MOORREE OF THIS PLAAANNNTT”

The ruler and high priestess of the city is Queen La, who on her first encounter with Tarzan falls in love with him, and subsequently carries a tikki-torch for him. Tarzan, already committed to Jane, naturally, spurns her advances with the most likely phrase “Me Tarzan, you not Jane”, thus endangering his own life, as the religion of Opar condones human sacrifice…poor Tarzan.

More purples…

Another purple taking center stage at the moment is the Mexican Bush Sage. The plant has taken a bit of a beating with all the Texas rains we have been having and it is flopping here and there, with a bit of dryer weather it should perk up, I hope.

This plant is full of life right now in the patch, bees, sphinx moths (too elusive to capture as yet) hover flies, anoles – you name it, it is on it. I have a fair amount of this plant, I love it’s naturalistic, free-for-all aesthetic, and who can resist the fuzz?

Here is some more Bush Sage planted in my front garden.

Another purple just now coming into the limelight, and one of my all-time favorites is Amaranth. This plant exists all over the patch and like the Mexican Bush Sage, it is a creature and insect magnet, and it will remain so for quite some time. Insects swarm this plant. I gather the seeds and distribute every year then allow the plants in the more “appropriate positions” to reach maturity.

There were three Gray Hairstreaks hanging around on the freshly emerged purple seed-heads.

Strymon melinus

as well as a multitude of other insects.

This line of amaranth lining one of the patch’s central paths, sprung up to great heights while we were on our trip to Scotland, it amazes me just how fast this plant grows with a little bit of moisture. This must have grown about three feet in less than the same weeks.

Rosemary in bloom This prostrate rosemary also has it’s fair share of the insect population, the bees are going wild over the blooms. It looks like it is covered in snow right now, it has so many blooms. Behind it is my small satsuma tree completely full with fruit.
This next shot or two I need your help with…I believe we have some new “little people”, smaller than the Naboos, much, much smaller, living in the Patch.

At first I thought these little Pixie Hollow baskets full of metallic rounded pebbles must have something to do with some tribal Naboo ritual or offering to the Gods, but the tribal member in charge of tribal relations, communicated via a series of elaborate mouth clicks that these had nothing to do with their tribe. Although this simple communication between us was brief, it took the best part of an afternoon. I was now even more confused.

Where had they come from? What will these seeds grow into?

I have checked all the adjacent plants but none of them develop seeds like this. Does anyone have any ideas what these are? (Apart from the obvious fact these baskets were manufactured by fairies in Pixie Hollow that is). Can you tell I have watched “A Bugs Life” and “Tinkerbell” 14.25 times (each)?

Here is a wider view of the area, there are loads of these rustic baskets.

I must say with the damp soil conditions, it has been perfect conditions for a pride of pixie’s to move in.

These were particularly colorful toadstools.

Moving on…

The emerging interlocking blood-stained jaws of this agave always demand respect.

Is that spinach?

All my purple heart is now blooming after the rains, and this tiny, super-shiny

Syrphid Hoverfly

wasted no time at all getting stuck into the egg-yolk goodness.

Here is another trying to stare the camera lens out, The wings on these little flies are spectacular in their iridescence. They look like cartoon flies.

“Bzzzzz…Utter nonsense ESP”.

Golden thryrallis

has been blooming steadily throughout the summer with only the minimal amount of supplemental water. A great deep shade plant for a splash of golden color. I have two of these planted under my large Post Oak.

And finally…

Greg’s blue mistflower,

Eupatorium greggii

which is about to pop, butterflies love this plant.

And behind the mistflower, looking like an old-fashioned Victorian Christmas tree, the most enormous ornamental pepper I have ever grown. This is one plant, and it is going to look great when all the individual peppers turn their many colors.

Fish petting area in the patch. My youngest cups the goldfish in his hands, I fear for them knowing that a toddler “squeeze” may be on the horizon for one poor fish, even though I keep drumming it into him to be gentle. He spends hours gazing and throwing things in this pond, you can see toy tractors, pans, cars etc, it looks like a wrecking yard on a clear-water day. The rock on the right has turned into his “pond perch,” he straddles it like Tom Sawyer while he whiles away many an hour in the Patch, tickling and naming the individual fish in his own two-year-old vernacular.

Stay Tuned for:

“Panic in the Patch”

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

Taro Roll

ESPatch Jan 10, 2009 0 comments

The other morning I walked outside and we had actually had some rain in Central Texas during the night.
I walked over to my “Callahan’s” rain water collection tank under my gutter and was surprised to see it full to the brim. I lingered at the rare spectacle, then noticed the dripping from the gutter…big drops. I went for my camera like a gunslinger, but could I capture the moment of impact, being the geek that I am?
I have to say this was one tough subject.

The top one is my favorite with the sunlight reflected in the middle of the explosion.
This one was like atomic shock waves.

Also sparkling after the rains like pink champagne were these succulents. They look good enough to eat, so I did.
I washed them down with a nice chianti. (More obligatory Lector noises).

Here is my new middle bed with its contouring. I was planning to wait until the spring to plant anything else in here, but as usual I could not wait. I had a thought this morning to raid my defunct waterfall area (to be a stonecrop waterfall this year) of all it’s remaining lava rocks, what I didn’t realize was just how many were buried in there. I found them under leaves, under a layer of dirt, under other stones…the sheer luxury. I had totally forgotten how many of these rocks I had originally picked up from a work colleague’s house some years ago. I love when projects are spontaneous like this, one thing leads to another, and before you know it the layers are coming off and the work (if you can call it that) begins…rocks were layed and some transplants were going in.

I managed to get a whole line of these sedums from one container
that I divided. I am planning large swaths of similar plants that
conform with the mound contours. That is the plan, I await
the reality.

Final moss boulders were placed around the perimeter to finish defining the bed.

Then on with the lava rocks. Many of these rocks already have small stonecrop plants growing from puddles of soil that, over the years, have gathered in their nooks and crannies. I think these will spread fast when the warmer weather hits this year.

It takes a while for stone placement to “feel right,” so I know I will be moving and generally fidgeting with a few of these boulders before all the limestone dust settles… ah, all part of the fun. The rocks will look a lot more embedded when the small plants grow and “naturalize” the landscape and the rock edges around them.

I finished the scene up with a couple of cedar carcasses and a gazing ball. Now I really do have to wait for the last frost to do my planting. In the meantime I will get some recycled tumbled glass for a shiny top mulch finish.

Okay, so I did transplant one soft leafed yucca – well it was looking really unhealthy trapped in it’s container, it was the humane thing to do, and anyway, I was sick and tired of it groaning and wheezing every time I walked past it.

“What is this place sis”?
“I am not sure, perhaps an ancient megalith? Lets eat before we absail off the nostril area”.
I have transplanted more of the champagne succulents around this megalith’s “botoxed” face
to look hopefully like a future bizarre hair-do.

What? You get the idea, this one is from the Lost Gardens of Heligan, Cornwall, England.
(Thank you for the link Monomom).

Here is a view of my new middle bed taken half way up the ladder into my post oak.

Some other backyard oddities:

I cut my giant elephants ears off about a week ago (a painful thing for all involved), and now look at it.
It looks like some abstract art piece…

Or perhaps a Taro sushi roll! A fried shrimp roll (courtesy, Wikipedia) Have you seen the full “Wolf” moon as of late. The wolf moon arrives amid the cold and deep snows of midwinter, a time when the wolf packs would howl hungrily outside native indian villages. Thus, the name for January’s full moon. Sometimes it was also referred to as the Old Moon, or the Moon After Yule. Some called it the Full Snow Moon, but most tribes applied that name to the next Moon.

“Dude look at that Wolf Moon! And get that man some Listerine, immediately!”
“Dude gargle”!

This was the disturbing scene I encountered at my Giant Timber Bamboo at the bottom of my yard…I am concerned.

Either a cat, a racoon or perhaps…

Angelina?
More likely…

“Arrrgh! Naughty paw, m-m-must stop scratching at ESP’s
Giant Timber bamboo”!
Bambusa oldhamii.

Dead Post Oak leaf lying on top of one of my red chairs. I shot this image a couple of months back on a barn in Salado, Texas.
Interesting use of old saws. I wish my shed was a little larger!

One more new arrival in the patch to finish. I have been looking out for this one for about a year. I first saw it at the Natural Gardener, (back toward the chickens). They have three of them that shroud some AC units. It makes a really great (and super dense) privacy shield, about 10-15ft high.

“So many saws, saws within saws, spiraling saws”!

The bamboo is called
Bamboo ‘Alphonse Karr’
Bambusa Multiplex ‘Alphonse Karr’

What caught my attention about this bamboo was the green on yellow
striped stems. Armed with a christmas gift card, it was most
definitely a must have. It is already in the ground.