Toads

“The Good Life”

ESPatch Apr 14, 2011 11 comments

I happened to witness the Patch witches harvesting their annual cull of gulf coast toads the other evening with their wretched smelling hessian sacks.

I could see their protruding moles and dark silhouettes stumbling up the ladder with their ladened croaking bounty, dragging it up high to their treacherously positioned home in the upper canopy of my recently leafed-out post oak tree, no doubt for use in some horrible disfiguring spell.

Naboo rumor has it that the warty trio are very close to signing a major contract with Whole Foods Market to commercialize one of their herbal remedies, if this happens they have apparently expressed interest into moving into a downtown condo! Their preferred form of transport being the broom negates the pothole issues we humans face driving in the downtown region…(Oh yes, I am not stopping with my “state of the Austin roads” rant).

I love deep shadows in a landscape, they add so much depth and intrigue to a space though I must say we have all stayed well away from this dark cavern between the feather grasses, below my Arizona ‘blue ice’ cypress.

Painting: “Once Upon a Time” by Henry Meynell Rheam.

My feather grasses are now entering their Patch prime and putting on a great late afternoon light show with their newly formed panicles. These plants are a couple of years old and have been through some vigorous experimentation and a couple of Brazilian blow-outs:

http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2010/05/knotty-dreads/

Imagine my surprise when I recently lifted the lid on my trashcan.

“Yeah Nassella tenuissima Baby, yeah”!

And then who popped up with his dry British wit from my neighbors trashcan?

“Hairstyle Plagiarism, that’s what that is!”

…I quickly slammed down both lids before anyone heard the chat-up lines begin, I looked around and listened nervously for a big white van drawing up to the front of the Patch…I apparently got lucky this time.

Enough nonsense…

I said enough!

If you are like me and have this little abomination popping up all over your garden you will totally relate to this next segment and my mentally unstable relationship with it.

Melothria pendula?

(anyone know what this weed is called?)

I cannot describe to you how deep the level of my hatred goes for this incredibly obnoxious weed…perhaps even deeper then Bermuda grass, yes I said Bermuda grass.

This aesthetically strangling plant loves nothing more then tucking itself in tight to the base of plants, in this case my artemesia, (of which it appears to be quite fond, I imagine due to the delicate nature of this plants stems). Pulling it is completely futile, and nearly always results in an emotionally demoralizing “snap” leaving the roots to shoot up foliage once again the very next day.

This abomination of nature is also very fond of sprouting between bricks, Mexican bush sage and rosemary, okay practically anywhere it can inhabit. Snap. It seems to know if it grows like this, snap, the gardener can not, and will not, attack it with RoundUp in fear of destroying the “host” plant it is cleverly growing under and through, snap…

…“a most cunning plan…t”

Scrambling along:

Stonecrop is blooming everywhere right now,

it is amazing how it casts down these long red ropes over the sides of my Texas holey rocks in an attempt to scale down and propagate the new terrains below.

“I could do with one of those red lifelines right about now!”

This garden snake gave me my first full-on conniption at an install I am working on. It came out waving around on me at waist height from a retainer wall I was clearing out. In usual fashion I recoiled and almost stumbled over another lower wall, another foiled Darwin Award!

It slithered around for a while trying to find cover, it eventually took refuge in this small hole between the boulders.

The scales were quite something.

Finally:

The candy blooms on this aloe vera look good enough to eat.

Gaura is in full bloom,

as are larkspur.

(Thanks for the seeds M) http://www.zanthan.com/gardens/gardenlog/

Moody datura is once again blooming,

An unusual moment of Zen for him…

and a moment of excited expectation for her…the tooth fairy (her very first loss) she also lost some blood this week and required a couple of staples in her head after a playground accident.

And to finish, some classic old English comedy:
We had our own “Good Life” moment this week when we gathered around to pull up a test carrot, a major family event.

unfortunately,

It was more carrot top then actual carrot, but she enjoyed it.

Stay Tuned for:

“The Rock”

All material © 2011 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

“Squeezing Lanterns”

ESPatch Sep 3, 2010 18 comments

I have been scouring the local nurseries of late with an expression that I am convinced must resemble “Mad-Eye Moody”… I have been reading tags, mumbling and grumbling under my breath at the prices while ignoring the side-way glances from nursery staff. Oh yes, better not get in my way, I was on a mission, hunting down a new vine to cover up my pink jasmine vines that died in our freezes last winter (see previous post about sweeping things under the carpet).

I have found one that is new to me, but already…

“I like it a lot!”

As an added bonus, the color of it’s flowers and funky seeds work perfectly with the color scheme of our house:

That is a post oak on the right. Post oaks are so difficult to transplant that very few nurseries will even stock them, oh and they hate to be tampered with: Roy Bedichek: http://www.bedichek.org/roy/ a noted nature writer quotes General Beck, who was in charge of landscaping at UT for years…“The more you trim a post oak, the unhealthier it becomes”.

The vine I settled on is Yellow Butterfly Vine.

Mascagnia macroptera

It is the seed pods that give this plant its name (but it does attract butterflies as well) . During summer, chartreuse ‘wings’ unfold on the seed pods that resemble butterflies.

The papery pods turn from tan to brown as they mature, and along with the contrasting yellow flowers, it offers the illusion of two, no even three different plants! The pods can also be harvested and planted, which is a good thing as I plan to propagate a few more of these vines against this tall fence over time. In mild winters, the vine will retain its glossy green foliage, but if we have another cold winter it will die back and re-sprout in spring…no big deal,

as the other great news is that it is a very fast grower and incredibly heat tolerant, being virtually impervious to the baking sun and also reflected heat – great attributes for survival here in Central Texas, interestingly, it also grows in partial shade…I cannot believe I do not see this vine more often!

The plant recently was renamed; it previously was classified as Stigmaphyllon ciliatum, I would love to hear from anyone who has any experience with this.

Staying with the same color palette, a quick update on my ahem, swelling tomatillos…

The paper lanterns just get better looking and more fall-festive as the year draws on.

The husks surrounding the sticky pepper (and it is very sticky) that is developing and growing inside, have gone from bright green to yellow to tan…

…and as the actress said to the Bishop…I squeeze my lanterns daily, just to see how they are progressing, right now there is still a gap between the pepper and the husk, but eventually the pepper will grow to split this protective paper shell. I could have inserted a few double entendres here, but I managed to keep my Benny Hill demon at bay.

Tomatillo plants are self-incompatible (two or more plants are needed for pollination).

Moving on…

The skeletal structure on the spine of this fatsia japonica caught my attention today, one of my favorite plants (can you tell) for deep shade.

Staying on a sculptural slant I planted out a couple of my pups from my agave that bloomed a couple of years back in my hell-strip early this year: http://www.eastsidepatch.com/2008/06/gardening-in-a-furnace/

And with absolutely no attention from me, they are now starting to take on the same swirling good-looks as their mother…very satisfying to see the next generation take root, grow and prosper.

Live long and prosper my young agaves. This one will look great in maturity, set against the dark backdrop of this large hell-strip sago palm.

Finally…

The snaking seedpods on this year’s mammoth amaranths are larger than usual for this time of year. It looks like this year will be a good seed harvest.

In contrast, the tiny jewels are only now just forming on my jewels of opar plants. I am now up to eight new plants from the seeds that I spread all around the Patch last year.

The camouflage on this camera-shy Texas spiny lizard was perfect against the trunk of this evergreen wisteria.

Gaura just starting to put on a fall show…

…and I will not tell you as to why these two unsavory characters were lurking around on our street this week, trust me…you really do not want to know! Brrr (x10)