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“Wilson”

ESPatch Aug 21, 2010 14 comments

I have been developing a design for a client in which I have found myself saving file names like: “Wilson_1, Wilson_2” etc. It just seemed to be a fitting and natural file naming system for a scheme that was to incorporate a tree house, a focal island bed, tropical planting and sandy (okay decomposed granite) weaving jungle trails. Oh yes, I have been in my howler monkeying element.

“Jane…Look, ESP is really going for a jungle look this time, me thinks boy will like this.”

“It is about time Tarzan…call cheetah and the elephants!”

To get further into the spirit of things, I decided to emulate Tarzan by constructing a rudimentary loin cloth by recycling one of my iced turbans (significantly easier to tie). The hobbits put on their Swiss Family Robinson outfits, then, with the light fading, we all huddled up in my children’s sandbox where I attempted to get a fire going, for ambient purposes you understand, it was still 95 degrees after all! I would also suggest that you have an established perimeter planting around your property for privacy reasons before adorning such a garment.

Just in case.

Like a true castaway, my fire was to be created from violently rubbing sticks on top of some cattail fluff on top of some post oak bark, (just to further enhance the Robinson Crusoe charade)…Ohh, but how the mosquitoes immediately began to strip our flesh!

(obligatory Lector noises)

We all took one more swig from my “Whole Foods” coconut and ran quickly inside for cover. I decided a loin cloth, although initially liberating, should not be a garment choice for a summer evening in Texas… (a stark contrast to the extremely practical and revered iced turban). I don’t need to mention how my fire-starting escapade went.

The rear garden of this new scheme is quite large and is predominately sloped dead ground, devoid of grass…just how I like it. Almost slap bang in the center is a stand of live oak trees that the client expressed a desire to be the future home of a magical tree house for her grandchildren (can it get any better?) Around these trees was a raised, semi-defined “island” that is currently covered in ivy and rocks…my imagination began to race…islands, rope bridges, tree-living, basically a perfect Naboo habitat came into my minds eye, a Gilligan’s Island in south Austin.

Most of the back garden is in either shade or semi shaded from the upper oak canopy. I wanted the island to be the focal point, all tropically planted under a tree house worthy of the “Black Pearl’s” crows-nest.

Savvy?

I shrouded (and visually diminished) the shed with two Bambusa multiplex alphonse karr bamboos, with another positioned on the left side of the tire swing to make it more of a destination point, privatizing the area. Jungle pathways were formed to create a better flow through the space which in turn consolidated a lot of fighting mediums and preexisting enclosures and beds.

Strong foliage plants were introduced for perimeter height and to soften up the new perimeter corrugated fence, loquats and fatsia japonica adding evergreen interest.

For the front of the house I decided to open up the doorway area by removing the existing, rather claustrophobic bed. I also introduced an additional sweeping pathway to the side of the house for alternative access to the rear jungle scene. The materials and tones are consistent with the new rear design, visually referencing the existing stone of the house. A new home color scheme punches out some curb appeal, creating a more contemporary, less Tudor aesthetic. What design would be complete without some mounding artemesia, an evergreen wisteria climbing over a simple arbor for some porch fragrance, and a few metal chickens?

Installation begins in a couple of weeks!

Back to the Patch…

…and some very eerie yellow light conditions.

Talking of very eerie things. Remember my disgusting rotten elephant ear that sprouted some side growth? Well, I was giving it a drink this morning when I happened to notice a rather dark hole where the bulb used to be that rotted. Thinking it was just the cavity left behind where it had rotted out I filled it with water from my hose. The strange thing was, the water never pooled up, it just kept immediately draining almost instantly? Odd I thought.

I put the camera in the cavity and took some pictures with the flash on, these shots do not do the tunnel justice…it was deeper then I could see. A Naboo mine shaft perhaps?

Worm sign?

Moving quickly along…

The diagonal fibers on this soft leafed yucca were so perfect that it looked manufactured.

Is that a spider in there? Brrr.

Some plants just go and keep going through our hottest months:

Pride of Barbados…Okay, I promise this will be the last time I blog about it this year.

Evergreen wisteria still as fragrant as it was in June, though it has looked better.

Illuminated by a setting sun, purple fountain grasses offer great late summer / fall color and movement. I treat this grass as an annual and generally use it as a gap filler in the patch, it really works well with purple heart, and set against a shady backdrop it takes on a life of its own.

Finally…

Happy birthday, birthday boy!

“To infinity and Beyond.”

Did you recognize the time / space defying tee-shirt, the one that keeps showing up throughout Earth’s history?

Stay Tuned for:

“Spitting Seeds”

All material © 2010 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant)
14th century planet Earth techniques.

“Nose Boulder”

ESPatch Jul 24, 2010 18 comments

“Gross Alert”…”Gross Alert…Condition Red”… Don’t say I didn’t warn you…

The other day we were having a late lunch / early dinner accompanied by our hobbits. We had the usual “musical chairs” kerfuffle as we always do facing the simple, but apparently daunting entity…a rectangular table with four chairs surrounding it! It is like we all have to subliminally agree who sits where like a family of dogs battling to get pole position in the basket. The despair on our twenty-something waiter’s face was tangible, I was him in another life. Once finally settled, the same waiter came back to take our food order, as he approached the table, I noticed him, noticing my youngest, extracting a rather stubborn… (I had no idea mining had prematurely started…it wasn’t scheduled) “nose boulder”, a boulder that, if frosted, would not have looked out of place on the North face of K2, oh yes, it cast a sinister dark shadow over the table on its rather ungainly and secretive birth. My appetite receded.

With the substantial “ore” now presenting itself proudly on his unsanitary stalagmite finger, my wife was on it before I even had chance to move in slow motion toward it, moaning a long drawn-out Hollywood “Nooooooooo!”

As fast as the unmentionable was was smothered by a napkin, a reaction ensued that nobody, including the restaurant kitchen staff, waiters, front of house, could ever of anticipated…we had apparently unleashed the…

with our nasal-prospecting denial…with one final desperate lunge across the table he tried to re-obtain his “precious”, out of nowhere he screamed out…

“Hey!…I was gonna’ eat dat!”

A silence fell over the establishment.

Moving quickly on…

I walked around to my stock tank early this morning, optimistically hoping that perhaps it may have showered during the night. Not yet quite awake, (pre-coffee), I walked up to the tank to take a look.

As I peered inside, this fledgling blue jay erupted with a horrific scream that could have woken the

I was amazed how such a small bird could deliver such a decibel level. I scooped it up into a bucket and quickly released it before it could gather itself and emit the ear bleeding racket once again. The bird’s parents immediately flew into a nearby tree and started to call for it.

After my shattered morning nerves had returned to normal, I wandered to my papyrus stock tank. I had recently added a couple of canna lily transplants and wanted to check in on them.

This worm has a winter tree-lined avenue scene on the side of it, complete with white fluffy clouds.

Canna lilies are mostly pest-free, but like these recent transplants they sometimes fall victim to the Canna Leaf Roller, a particularly disturbing and destructive olive worm. This is the larva of the Brazilian skipper butterfly

Photo by the Massachusetts Butterfly Club

Calpodes ethlius

also known at the Larger Canna Leaf Roller. The worms cut the canna leaves and roll them over to live inside the cozy domicile while pupating and scoffing down on the leaf, and can they scoff! Look at my new cannas!

It has been a week of finding new insects in the Patch, three to be precise, the next one was waiting for me as I turned over one of my rotating compost bins…

Perhaps a long horned beetle of some sort? Check out those front feet.

And finally…

A Squash Vine Borer,

Melittia cucurbitae

found where else, but on one of my squash plants. The adult squash vine borer are active during the daytime and rest on the leaves in the evening, different from most moths that are active at night. The borer is a caterpillar as a nymph and a moth as an adult.

The moth is often mistaken for a bee or wasp because of its movements, and the bright orange hindleg scales. The females typically lay their eggs at the base of leaf stalks, and the caterpillars develop and feed inside the stalk, eventually killing the leaf. They soon migrate to the main stem, where they will reap complete havoc on the plant, eventually killing it.

World Exclusive…

A Naboo tribesman has been captured on camera, and you will not believe who captured this never before seen tribal member. On a recent visit to the ESPatch, Ivette Soler… http://thegerminatrix.com/ took this spectacular photograph, a photograph that will go down in the horticultural historical records as the first ever glimpse of this reclusive, sometimes cannibalistic tribe member.

You have to zoom in on this infamous discovery…I could not believe it myself…a warrior peeking out of the amaranth stems, is that a tribal headdress on the right?

You didn’t really think I was making them up did you?

After all of my moaning about my tomatillo plants, getting huge and just sitting there…doing basically nothing. Imagine my surprise when I was greeted by this scene today! It seemed like this happened over night, small lanterns were hanging all over the plants, and there were lots of them, all different sizes.

And to think I almost pulled them out. With the now forming tomatillos has come another curious creature that apparently likes to eat them…

…and quite aesthetically apt for this post title.

This is either the larvae of the Three Lined Lema Beetle, or the Three Lined Potato Beetle, it is really hard to tell unless you can find the eggs and so far I haven’t.

Yes folks, you guessed it, these tiny slugs with their swollen bodies and black heads have an annoying habit of piling their own excrement on their backs…they really do. What an extreme defensive measure (involuntary gag reflex).

Note to self: Must never try mimicking this larvae, no matter how threatened I ever feel.

Other exciting news on the vegetable front:

I have a pole bean, I have a pole bean!

And a few egg plants.

And one or two caterpillars! Annie, they love your sunflower!…I have never seen such a hairy congregation, any guesses as to what they are? I did try to pick the brain…

of this dragonfly, but he appeared to have already had his brain removed? Brrr.

My pokeweed fruit has matured to indigo, the stems turning quickly from green to this crazy pink. It appears the birds have already found them.

And Finally…

I have a new resident in one of my water lilies, sporting a sort of full-face, Hitler-esk mustache. Some unsuspecting insect is in for a bit of a scare, when alighting on this bloom. Oh yes, this image did make it to my “Looks like” page:

http://www.eastsidepatch.com/visual-comparativies/