Rain

“That’s Just Not Blight!”

ESPatch Oct 1, 2012 6 comments

Disturbing forest Ents,

unconventional attire, the smell of kettle corn and turkey legs, the sound of distant doodle-sacs, it could mean only one thing.

We had arrived after driving our trusty steed down the dusty “old potato” road at the Sherwood Forest Celtic Festival

http://www.sherwoodforestfaire.com/

In the middle of Texas!

Guinevere wasted no time finding the hair braiding tent,

while Arthur (and Excalibur) held session at the round table.

But the stars of the day were so little you could barely see them,

ladies and gentlemen I give you the…

…Pignut Flea Circus!

Imaginations ran wild watching these highly trained Irish fleas performing acrobatics, trapeze and walking the high wire.

Oh and should you need a break for a while…

I intend to integrate a couple of these into my hardscaping.

Back in the Patch:

The harvest moon rose over more unsettled weather this week,

and another couple of inches of well needed rain.

This was the view from my computer table before the rain.

Note the Mex. bush sage in the foreground.

There is no hiding their legginess now! This had me laughing all the way to my truck.

Toadstools emerged overnight,

and nearly all of the blooms on this yucca were beaten off the stalk,

lodging in tight at the base of the crown…oh that’s just great.

Well I am not going in there.

Salvia is currently in fine form, and this Barbados cherry,

Malpighia emarginata

is filling up the entire back garden with its cherry/honey fragrance.

The rain has greened up the muhly in my Hell-strip,

and pushed datura into a flowering frenzy.

This next insect looked like it needed some of the nectar.

This is a Rustic Sphinx, and it is one very large moth in the Sphinginae family.

Manduca rustica

They are very fond of desert willow, moonflowers and petunia. I found this one crawling around on my front doormat, looking decidedly unwell.

The next character was very shy and required some coaxing which in turn made it difficult to get a steady shot.

What I need is a camera with a retractable fake finger adaptation, though that would surely get me into trouble.

Myrmeleontidae – Antlions

Although they resemble dragonflies or damselflies they are not related.

Finally some grossness:

Captain it appears that this sand cherry is under attack?

Stay Tuned for:

“Notre Dame it’s got Cold”

All material © 2012 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

“House Elf”

ESPatch Sep 16, 2012 8 comments

I was delighted to find out recently that our family had inherited a new house-elf…”Kreature-Kumo”.

On arrival at the Patch he made himself immediately at home roaming and grumbling down our hallway. He has kept himself quite occupied this past week dusting pictures, getting the kids up for school, cooking full-English breakfasts etc. In fact now I cannot imagine our existence without him.

Adorning some old rags and a particularly acute case of halitosis, it appears he has a propensity for devouring large amounts of small plastic toys, postmen and all manner of disgusting things at the bottom of the garden.

Naughty, stinky Kreature-Kumo!

Freshening rains, cooler temperatures and darkened days have provided a welcome reprieve from the Texas sun this week. Sad loquats perked up, a couple of burgundy fountain grass were flattened and poor cactus-man (jr) took one for the team from a rather flatulent and highly accurate bird…

The irony here continues, allow me to recap on this opuntia paddle’s tragic existence and amazing resurrection story:

http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2009/10/halloween-2009/

I spent 4 years pruning back a few opuntia paddles to enlarge them for a very specific and rather horrendous Patch experiment. Some of you may remember the endeavor.

I decided I was going to gouge eye-holes (and carve a mouth) in this opuntia paddle after seeing a picture of a successfully carved paddle in a popular gardening magazine.

After I had performed the “procedure” my massive cactus paddle went almost immediately into shock (I had apparently carved overtly enlarged features) as did the rest of his family (they shared a common root system).

Stress lines around the eyes appeared,

moisture seemed to be leaving his emaciated body on a daily bases, he grimaced and so did I every time I had to walk past him.

And then finally…

This is where it starts getting strange.

Some time later, after he was laid to rest, another cactus paddle mysteriously grew back from the roots at the exact same place and angle,

only this time he returned from his shallow grave with two “already formed” eye holes (evolutionary survival tactics…I am convinced), I couldn’t believe it.

I inserted a tiny glass monocle into the smaller of his “new”eyes (I have no idea why), and now, after enduring all of this, a bird goes and does this:

Poor junior.

I think he (the original paddle) may be trying to send me a message from across the veil.

“I have a “Cactus-Man” coming through for a gardening person on my left. I am getting an image of a green thumb and he is showing me three letters “ES..D?

He is communicating a horrible accident involving multiple family members…he keeps repeating Fis…Fisk…

Fiskars?

Errr…

Moving sharply along:

It is very sharp up here on this golden barrel plateau but well worth the hike, the cactus continues to put out these amazing flowers.

Here are the barrels shrouded behind Juniors resurrected family.

This is what is left of my hydrangea:

It took 6 months of steady decline for the plant to reach this minimalist /completely dead stage.

Giant timber bamboo always looks very tropical after rain,

if only my garden shed was an all-teak construction…

…exactly.

Imagine this structure with

some Alphonse Karr bamboo planted around the foundation.

My soft leaf yucca,

Yucca recurvifolia

is producing pups as fast as I can plant them.

This is its second asparagus-looking flower spike of the year.

Pride of Barbados have nearly finished depositing seeds from their dug-out canoes.

Seen any of these colorful velvet moths lurking in your salvias?

This is a southern pink moth,

Pyrausta inornatalis

and this is its larva:

Photograph by Donald R Riley

I have read that these polka dotted chaps can demolish a stand of salvia but I never have had this problem myself.

Finally:

Congratulations on your advancement from the daisies to being a fully fledged Brownie!

Now, back to the Patch with you,

you have Autumn chores to do if you want to get that professional metal detector.

“Chores!”

Stay Tuned for:

“Agavephobia”

All material © 2012 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.