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Wednesday, March 25, 2009

AFTER THE DRIZZLE

After the drizzle yesterday morning the sun finally came out in the late afternoon. This swallowtail butterfly, which is the largest I have ever seen, spent over half an hour flitting among the flowers. I managed to capture it with wings open. 
I thought it was a good time to capture the spring flowers in the vegetable garden before they were pounded by the storm that the weather man promised for today. It came at rush hour this evening.  In parts of the county baseball size hail fell, no doubt smashing plants to the ground. We were lucky. No hail but not much rain either. The rain gauge measured on 3/10" Oh well better than nothing.

15 comments:

  1. Gorgeous photo! Makes me feel like I'm in another country, sort of. Thank you.

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  2. Glad you missed the hail - I was on the phone with my Austin daughter when the storm blew in. It looks like it was a doozie. So happy your beautiful flowers were spared.

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  3. Beautiful photo! A pity you didn't get more rain, but glad to hear you guys managed to miss out on the bigger sized hail.

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  4. What a beautiful garden and butterfly. I'm glad you didn't get the hail that I'm seeing on other Austin gardeners' blogs!

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  5. I envy you having butterflies already. I'm just a little too far north to have them this early.

    Glad you didn't get the hail, we didn't either, and only 3/8" of rain. It's better than none at this stage.

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  6. Hi RR.
    I cannot believe how far on your wildflowers are!..you must be feeding them some sort of kryptonite / manure concoction, come on, tell us your secret!
    That is a great spring image.

    Here at the ESP we were watching the Fox weather hype, seeing the same picture approx. 200 times of a hail broken rear window of a car, expecting some great rain... like you, not much materialized. The front had passed through in 15 minutes!
    Still, cooler temps, that is something...all hail no hail!
    I agree, we will take what rain we can get at this point.
    Regards,
    ESP.

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  7. Thanks for all you comments. We are lucky we didn't get the hail. This mornings news showed examples of the golf ball sized and sometimes larger hail that fell last night. Windows smashed and cars dented and no doubt gardens with severe damage. You would not believe it but these wild flowers are growing in my vegetable garden in a gravel area. Underneath is just some kind of fill. I have this weakness about pulling out plants- just can't do it. It did make for a pretty picture I have to admit. If only these plants would grow on the septic field- which of course is a major hangout for the deer. They are passing through at least twice a day. I think it is the only green area around.

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  8. No hail in my NW Austin garden either, though the Arboretum just up the road got some. I felt lucky. We did a quarter inch of rain. Maybe there'll be more today.

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  9. An eighth of an inch, I meant.

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  10. Your larkspur and poppies are in full flower and mine are hardly open. Lovely. Glad the hail missed your garden. Looks like we're getting a more civilized rain today.

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  11. I thought of you Pam, knowing that the bad weather was to the north. Glad it missed you. We are getting some pretty good rain right now. No gardening today,
    mss- This rain will work wonders on your meadow. the only thing I notice is that everything will bloom smaller this year. It completes the cycle in the same time frame. I missed seeing your meadow last year- I'm truly sorry about that.

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  12. If I hadn't seen your garden in person, it would be hard to believe such a perfect combination of annuals really happen in Austin, Jenny- how lovely!

    Good thing those flowers weren't growing up here in the NW corner of Austin- they'd have been trashed by the 2 and 1/2 inch hail we had yesterday. Well, at least melting hailstones turn into water!

    Annie at the Transplantable Rose

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  13. Great photo, both of flowers and butterfly. Maybe you got just enough rain to help with a spectacular flower display later. Did not happen for us this year.
    Aiyana

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  14. Absolutely fine. Just got back from Big Bend National Park. Watch out for the post!

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