Now that's better! Changing out the stock tank garden

Remember that mesmerizing spring display of Mexican Feather Grass from a few weeks ago?

By early June the grasses in the stock tank garden were a matted, unsightly mess.

Spring rains and good soil grew them into the biggest specimens I've seen.  But those same rains and "too good" soil led to an early demise plus they were smothering the rest of the plants anyway.  Not a good look.

Mexican Feather Grass (Nasella tenuissima) can usually be rejuvenated by grooming out the brown strands allowing the green to sprout again.  I gave it a try to no avail since all the plants were toasty brown through and through.  It was time to yank them all out and start over.

Much better already without the dead grasses

I could have left it like this for the summer but Mexican Feather Grass reseeds freely and I needed to thin them out from the front garden.  With a ready supply of new plants why not just put a few back to fill in the spaces.

The grasses won't grow nearly as fast the rest of the summer.

There, now that's so much better!  

As seen on Pinterest: The Stock Tank Garden 2015

My Pinterest account has over 3,000 pins on 90 boards.  How many of those thousands of potential gardening projects have I put into action?  Several, including last year's crevice garden, an idea I originally pinned from other blogs like Danger Garden.  This year's stock tank garden was inspired by photos on Pinterest.  The results have exceeded expectations.

Last fall I decided to tackle an idea which kept turning up in my Pinterest boards--soft ornamental grasses mixed with violet-hued perennials.  If I pinned so many similar ideas then it's a concept I must like a lot.  That why I planted Verbena bonariensis and Mexican Feather Grass in my tank garden last fall.  A happy surprise is the appearance of Larkspur in analogous shades of violet to add an extra dimension of color.

Combining perennials and ornamental grasses isn't a new idea, it's been employed by the world's most celebrated landscape designers for years.  That's why my inspiration photos aren't in this post.  I hesitated to write Bury Court or Piet Ouldolf for permission to use their photos.  Instead my Pinterest board is linked for you.

What was my design approach?  With so many local variables it's best to adapt the concept instead of directly copying an idea.  Several of the photos showed allium which are not reliable in my climate and the short bloom season means the effect would be fleeting.  Verbena bonariensis grows well in my climate as does Mexican Feather Grass.  Even better, both were existing in my garden.  Verbena bonariensis had problems with powdery mildew in its previous shadier location and needed to be moved.  Now with all day sun it never wilts and didn't die back even after several light frosts this past winter.  It will bloom continuously all summer with occasional deadheading.

Before, this is how the garden looked in Fall 2014.  The grasses shown here are not in the stock tank. 

As a bonus, towering flowers and flowing grasses are mesmerizing in the wind.  We had wind gusts last week providing an opportunity to post another of those Awesome Motion photos.  I especially like how the Verbena bonariensis stays upright and sturdy in the wind.

Love the greens and violets together.

Larkspur is an annual and when it goes to seed, I'll probably move blue-violet Henry Duelberg Salvia over to keep the analogous color theme working.

Unless I decide the slightly red-violet of Salvia Amistad works better.  Then again, I could combine both colors with the verbena.

And to think this all happened because I needed to cover up a dead spot in the lawn.

I love it when a plan works, especially this well.

Garden Tour with Reality Check

When I attended the San Antonio Watersaver Landscape Tour as both volunteer and tour goer last weekend it was with the idea in mind that my yard might be on the tour next year.  We've turned down requests the last two years and it does seem my gardens are getting closer to where I would feel comfortable opening them to the public.

The big challenge is the timing, the first Saturday in October makes it tough to prepare a garden for the tour.  San Antonio gardens are usually still recovering after hanging on through the August heat and September is often too hot for plants to do any serious blooming or for the gardener to get much done.  My garden is at its autumn best later in October or early November.  To see how things might look this time next year I took some photos around the tour date as a reality check.

The narrow driveway landscaping looks good even without the sage in bloom.  There are no guarantees on these blooms since they need rain to bloom and sometimes that doesn't happen for months.  Pink muhly grasses are just now sending up a few tentative plumes which will not blow open for a few more weeks.

End of Month View July 2014

A big surprise during this summer of 2014 has been the weather.  In my End of Month View for June I wrote about our relatively cooler temperatures along with rain, and that weather pattern continued into July allowing plenty of time to finish up a few projects.  It's time for a walk through the gardens to see how things are going, so in this post I'm joining Helen at The Patient Gardener for the End of Month View to look at the progress.

Most days still begin with a cloudy sky that burns off through the morning as the sun casts shadows on the east facing front of the house.

Re-gardening: Tanking the Inner Circle

It seems we do a lot of re-gardening.  I just can't seem to leave well enough alone.  What fun would that be?  So after a garden area has settled in for a year or so it's time to make changes even before addressing other areas that have yet to be finished for the first time.  The circle garden was fully planted in 2012 and looked great for fall that same year.