STANDING CYPRESS

Just look at the standing cypress, Ipomopsis rubra, reaching for the sky. Isn't it a stunner? Worth the wait for this biennial flower. It's just a beacon for hummingbirds and is lapping up today's temperature in the high 90s. That's because it has a very long tap root which not only helps it tap into moisture deep within the soil but also allows it to grow to 5' or more and sway in the wind without being uprooted.

 This is one plant that likes my poor rocky soils and manages well with a minimum of water. I will cut it back after blooming in the hope of another round of flowers in the fall. Seeds germinate in the fall when the temperatures are in the 60s and need light to germinate. They found good spot here as I see several seedling plants in the same area which will provide me with a good showing next year. In the past I have had plants with yellow flowers but this year they are all red. Gone are the days when I would have banished red flowers from the garden. They re certainly a match for our current fiery weather.

This is how the plant looks in its first year of growth.

 This one has seeded just at the foot of the steps going down into the veg. garden. I won't be able to move it for fear of not being able to get out the whole of the tap root. Not a good location but I will let it stay. I'm certainly planning on having more if these next year. 
Look for the small ferny plants in 4" pots in the fall.

WALK YOUR GARDEN EVERY DAY

Let's look at the really rewarding part of gardening; the walking around and taking in what you have achieved and then those, somewhat rare for me, moments, just sitting and enjoying the sights smells and sheer loveliness of nature.

On Thursday, I went out, camera in hand, to see if there was anything new. Wow! The Echinopsis was blooming. Three gorgeous pink flowers on what I believe is Anastasia. Isn't she gorgeous? It is a fleeting flowering with the buds opening during the night and closing by lunchtime. Their job over.

I can't tell you the number of times I have missed that fleeting moment, but not this particular day. Thank goodness I walked around in the morning because I could so easily have missed the open flowers. You can see another bud between the two flowers and that one opened on Friday. One of the withered flowers is visible to the right.

I don't know if there are night-time visitors. Maybe they don't exist here because this is not the natural habitat for the Echinopsis which comes from South America. The only visitor I have ever seen is a tiny bee and he was there again today rolling in the pollen. In fact there were two of them.

That was not the only cactus to be blooming on Thursday. Along the outside edge of the walls I found another cactus in bloom. This one is the Nipple cactus, Coryphantha sulcata, a Texas native. The flowers last a little longer, usually a couple of days. I'm happy to say that the rains last summer have prompted number of babies to pop up around the base although it will be years before ti forms a good sized clump.

There was another surprise in the front Bluebonnet( currently bluebonnet less ) meadow.

A single stem of standing cypress, Ipomopsis rubra. Where did that come from? It was right next to the clump of lace cactus and I had never noticed its feathery foliage before. The one standing cypress I did have in this bed, and which I had been watching for weeks, had had its top nipped off. Deer!!! I must think about getting some seeds to plant in this area in the hope of more flowers.

I was surprised to see the first Mexican hats, Ratibida columnifera, blooming. I wonder how many different colors of flower will show up this year?

That prompted me to go up to the top meadow and see if there were any more colors. A little disappointing this year.

But I did observe all this activity on the milkweed pod.

I left them to it and walked down the culvert where I saw these tiny beauties.Mountain pink, Centaurium beyrichii, and the tiny yellow, ubiquitous daisy. I must try to collect seeds from the mountain pink because I think I have a place for it inside the garden.

And returning through the gate there was the anole waiting for a photograph.

Even if you don't take your camera with you take a walk around your garden every day. You may find some surprises.

GARDEN BLOGGERS' BLOOM DAY . JUNE 2015

Rainy skies are once again hanging over central Texas on this bloom day. Our recent strange weather pattern is making for some anomalies in the garden. Flowers that would normally bloom in the fall are blooming now and some that finish their bloom cycle in the spring are booming again. These are the flowers blooming in my Central Texas garden at the moment but photographed before the rain started.

Standing cypress, Ipomopsis rubra, is a biennial and reseeded in my garden this year. Although they grow in dry sandy soil it would seem that the unusual amounts of rain we had in May are responsible. The hummingbirds love this plant which is usually around in the fall when the hummingbird migration begins. A June appearance is very early for my garden.

And how unusual to see another crop of California poppies. I am thinking that many were beaten to the ground by the hail we had in April and were determined to bloom.

This is the first blooming of these rescue, nameless day lilies I bought several years ago. This year I moved them into a better spot and they like it there. I am thrilled with their rich, deep color.

They are growing in front of a spineless prickly pear cactus. Is that scale I see on some of the pads. This is a common problem with prickly pear and easy to miss.

Another hummingbird favorite is the Dicliptera suberecta, sometimes called the hummingbird plant. But be careful about using a name like that because there are quite a few plants with this common name.

Another late bloomer is the columbine, Aquilegia chrysantha.

Scabiosa was another rescue plant that has continued to perform for several months. Battered by hail it has come back again.

An Agapanthas  I nursed back to flowering this year, along with the foxgloves.

Small flowers often go unnoticed but how could you miss these. The plant on our outside table sends out these long shoots which stretch right across the table in all directions. Then produces  the tiniest of flowers.

 Many thanks to Carol at May Dreams Gardens for bringing you here. I hope everyone is enjoying a wonderful bloom day in their garden.

STANDING CYPRESS STANDS PROUD

Last year on a garden tour one of the gardens had a magnificent display of standing cypress, Ipomopsis rubra. I think I had shied away from this plant because it is a biennial and its feathery first year growth would get lost among my garden bullies.

Then the removal of several branches of my Spanish bayonet yucca left me in need of a plant that would grow tall among the remaining yucca stalks.

I didn't actively seek out the standing cypress but found their pretty rosettes of green feathery leaves in 4" pots in the fall. I bought 3 and planted them in the newly opened space. I wish I had been here a few weeks ago when all the spikes were in flower. Most have now gone to seed.

Among the stand of reds is one yellow spike. Apparently this is not unusual and in a field of reds there will always be a few yellows. Out of three plants I think I got lucky.

With all those seed heads I wonder what my chances are of them showing up again next year.....or will it be the year after that. In any event I think I will look for plants in the fall and may scatter some of the seed heads outside.

IT'S EASY TO GIVE THE WRONG IMPRESSION

It is all too easy to make it look as though your garden is nothing but perfection. The tight shot of that beautiful blooming plant belies what is going on around it. The same is true of wider shots of the garden. They may not be all they seem. At least to the owner/gardener.

Take this shot of the dry creek taken from the driveway. Your eye might pass over all that green growth in the gravel. It is a mixture of zexmenia, feather grass and oak sprouts with a few rain lilies thrown in. It will probably take a whole morning to clean up to my satisfaction. If you have live oak trees you know the oak sprouts just keep coming back and have to be trimmed time and time again.The granite area you see at the top of the picture is another story.

When we took out the two large Texas sage bushes that had seeded in the granite I felt quite relieved. I loved the cleaner look. Well, I learnt something new about this plant. If you leave a little piece of root behind it will grow into a new plant. So there were 15 new Texas sage growing up, clustered together. I should have just taken a few pieces of root and stuck them in the ground in a place where I would like this bush to grow. Of course, I have potted them up until they make a good root mass and I can put them where I want them. It took an hour of my gardening time this morning.

I have mixed feelings about this scenario. Bluebonnet seedlings. Do they really have to clump together like this. I feel the need to save them from strangling each other. There are so many other places I would like to see them. The good news is that I am going to need some extras having discovered this morning that the decollate snails have a taste for the the seed leaves. They have eaten every one in my front garden. So having discovered this I spent an hour searching and removing every snail I could find. It's rather difficult for a snail to dig itself in in the gravel. Its broken cone is always sticking up in the air.

Down on my hands and knees I noticed this little plant beneath the Weber's agave. Is it a ghostly Eryngo? I have never grown this plant so I have no idea where it came from.

I also spotted something else growing and I am hoping it is standing cypress, Ipomopsis rubra. Will it send up that gorgeous red flower stalk next spring?

I couldn't possibly remove this frost weed, Verbesina virginica, even though it is crowding out the rose and spineless prickly pear at the back of the pool. You don't get to see the wide shot! In previous years it was on the berm outside the walls. I may never get to see the frosty stems when we have our first freeze because by then it will be long gone. For now the bees and I will enjoy the pretty white flowers.

The potager may look reasonably tidy but you should see all the weeds. It's a nightmare!