Palms

“Vomit on my Gromit”

ESPatch Sep 8, 2013 6 comments

Things took quite a surreal turn the other day.

One of my kids was down with a fever, on the couch watching TV, dog asleep on floor, I think you know where I am going with this.

The quick vertical sitting motion immediately garnered my attention as it does with any parent…something was terribly wrong and it was about to get much worse.

“Are you okay?”

Was immediately followed by a good portion of breakfast being spontaneously deposited directly onto Kumo’s back from the couch. This involuntary action took us all by surprise especially Kumo who was now standing quite still (apart from the occasional but now intensified neurotic shiver that he always has) with an expression in his eyes that is usually reserved for panic-stricken horses.

Another dimension was added to the scene when Kumo, now thinking he was getting in trouble, started to nervously retreat into the doorway with his teetering cargo, or I hate to say it, in his mind, a potential future Michelin star quality meal.

Oh yes he would.

He actually turned to bite at his new and nasty “back-pack” numerous times as he was “escorted” extremely quickly out of the house to the garden hose.

Poor Kumo, his face says it all.

Moving a little less grossly along…

What?

I had the pleasure of meeting this huge roach as I was messing with the pump in my feeder pond. His timing and navigational skills were outstanding, the stuff of nightmares. I saw him in my peripheral vision swinging effortlessly around a Walska lily pad, gaining momentum before heading straight for my exposed arm almost at eye level.

Needless to say I ended up on my backside under my cypress tree muttering.

8820262078_03e09cc79c_h

I hate roaches.

Late afternoon thunderstorms have given sporadic rain around Austin and created some amazing sunsets and cloud formations this week. This one looks like Egypt with a shade canopy in the foreground making a great pyramid.

Unfortunately the only moisture the patch has received of late has been from my sprinkler. It was the first time I have used it all summer, but things were getting, shall we say, desperate in the Patch.

Baby loquats, lemon grass, bush sages and some fountain and feather grasses are looking like they now may be past the point of no return.

It does not take long in consistent upper 90 degree heat to put a stress on all things green, well, most things.

He never misses out on a sprinkler or hosing opportunity.

Considering this is the first time I have used this sprinkler this year the plants have held up well. I have hand watered struggling plants with the water I have sporadically collected in my “everything but the kitchen sink” water collection “system” but for the most part they have been left on their own.

I performed a quick fix on my leaning Buddha’s belly bamboo to at least get it to where I could walk under it:

A chunk of giant timber bamboo wedged behind this pomegranate tree did the trick.

With no additional watering and with the exception of a couple of gaura that look like they are now are pushing up the daisies, so to speak, (I always cut these back rather then pull them…just in case) the front of house is looking dry but is surviving.

The dry bamboo muhly matches our house color perfectly.

This esperanza adds a splash of color to the tortured trunk of this desert willow in the hell-strip:

“Its the yellow bells Esperanza”

I am a big fan of sabal major (and minor come to think of it) and agaves, the trunk of the sabal palm echoing the form of the agave.

This specimen was a pup when I planted it.

This next one is one of my favorites with its variegated leaves and painful extremities.

Agave Kissho kan

Agave pototarum ‘Variegata’ (I think)

Chocolatey, minty and seriously deadly.

Stay Tuned for:

“Waltzing Nitida”

All material © 2013 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

“Megasporophylls!”

ESPatch Jun 6, 2013 7 comments

school-out-for-summer “School’s out for Summer!”

And what better way to celebrate than a trip to Dave & Buster’s right after school.

As we approached the front door I naturally began eyeing up the two mature sago palms…hmm, I wonder?

After writing my previous post about my own strobilus exploits my awareness has been heightened to these ancient plants. I have stopped and peered into the hearts of multiple plants on my travels the past few weeks to look at their…ahem, organs.

I had seen numerous strobili but, as yet, no females / seeds.

I could see from the cone that the left hand sago was a male but I could not see anything in the right hand plant.

I held my breath, heart racing (okay not really)…

and…

There it was, sago palm coral, a heart of seeds.

It takes a couple of months for the seeds to develop and ripen in the feathery scales of the megasporophylls and about twice as long to learn how to pronounce and spell it.

As the female cone begins to disintegrate it releases all the seeds across the ground under the mother sago.

Now I need to cut off my own strobilus and buy a trench coat and trilby for dramatic effect, (not necessarily in that order) for the subversive nocturnal act that I now feel compelled to perform in front of D&B.

“Ello, ‘ello, ‘ello, what’s going on ‘ere then?”

I think I will stand less chance of getting apprehended if I perform the pollen shaking deed during the hours of darkness. The tricky part is going to be collecting all the seeds after pollination…

…”No, no, you don’t understand officer, you see I pollinated this plant some time ago and I was just climbing back in here to collect some of the seeds, you see cycads ar…”

I started to plan a better response in my head as we entered the building.

We played our usual games, won our usual 6K tickets and exchanged them for the usual array of cheap Chinese products that usually stop working somewhere between exiting the establishment and the opening of my car door in the parking lot, but they had fun, they were on summer vacation.

Moving On:

My potential annual Darwin Award activity took place last week on the roof of my house as I cut off some post oak limbs that had been scraping and banging above our heads every time there was a breeze. I was also not delighted to find an enormous and foul smelling pile of raccoon excrement waiting for me under the eaves, directly above the blocked gutter.

Well that’s just great.

My boots had zero traction on the metal roof so to get to the offending branches required a rather painful shimmy backwards down the length of the roof. I always choose an overcast day to get up here to avoid getting branded by the corrugated metal roof.

I should have taken some pictures up there.

A tiny grasshopper watching my rooftop kerfuffle.

Lots of humidity and lots of blooms this week,

tropical looking shell flowers emerging from the husk.

Shell-flower,

Alpinia zerumbet

is commonly called shell ginger or shellflower due to it’s shell pink flowers and buds that look like sea shells.

They remind me of the Coquina Clams she obsessively collected at South Padre Island:

http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2011/06/across-the-gulf/

Say ahh.

Opuntia in full swing,

and a new one for the Patch:

white shrimp plant,

Justicia betonica, J. pallidior

pink tubular blooms will eventually emerge from this spike of white calyxes.

This plant is zoned for 9, 10 & 11 so fingers crossed.

Coneflowers are popping up,

great against a dark foliage backdrop.

And the sunflowers

continue to attract a host of pollinators.

Talking of which, I have some business to attend to.