Wildlife Wednesday May 2015

Wildlife Wednesday is hosted the first Wednesday of each month by Tina at "My gardener says...." as an opportunity for bloggers to share wildlife sightings in the garden.

April brings sightings of beetles, flies, bees, and butterflies

A number of these shiny beetles with light markings were active in the garden during April.  They particularly liked the Clammy Weed.  Attempts to identify were inconclusive.

Solitary Bees have been working the garden all spring.  When I am in the garden they buzz over to check me out and then go on about their business.  There are several different types:  Carpenter, Mason, Digger, Plasterer and even Sweat Bees.  Which one this is I cannot tell for sure.

Irredescent pollinator on Pomegranate blossom, very pretty but struck out when trying to identify.  Is it a fly or a bee?

A black-chinned "bully" hummingbird, has taken up residence on a bare live oak twig.

He doesn't care about nectaring the flowers because his goal is to keep the others away.  He has even gone after butterflies.

Butterflies, now this is easier.  Red Admiral on Mexican Flame Vine.

Queen Butterfly on Verbena Bonariensis.



Those are a few of the visitors in my garden over the last month.  For more on wildlife in the garden check out the comments at Tina's blog.

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.

Late Spring Garden Walk-Through

This has been a most amazing spring.  After several years of drought we've had plenty of rain and cooler than average temperatures.  Everything looks so good it's time for another tour before it all fades in summer's heat.

We'll start out at the street where the Salvia greggii are beginning to fade and the Yucca 'Color Guard' will bloom soon with the skeletons of Yucca recurvifolia bloom stalks in the background.  Last year each plant had only one stalk this year there are three on one, two on another and just one on the front plant which seems to be struggling to bloom again this year.

Revisiting Rushing Street Garden

Visiting gardens on tour is always fun, but they are not always at optimal bloom time.  I was thrilled to be invited back for a spring visit a few weeks ago to this peaceful garden I toured last fall during the Watersaver Landscape Tour.

Spanish Lavender is a spring bloomer as is the phlox in the lower right.

Favorite plants in the garden for April

Linking up with Loree at Danger Garden to share a few of my favorite plants in the garden for April.  These also happen to be some of the newest plants.

Echeveria 'Black Knight' from a recent visit to The Antique Rose Emporium in Brenham, Texas.

Wildflower Wednesday April 2015: Wildflower Walk in the Park

It's Wildflower Wednesday when bloggers are invited by Gail at Clay and Limestone to post on wildflowers in our gardens.  I'm pushing the rules a bit this month with flowers from a local park.  On Monday I joined members of the Gardening Volunteers of South Texas for a wildflower walk in Phil Hardberger Park led by Wendy Leonard, park naturalist for the City of San Antonio.

While the masses of wildflowers lining Texas roadways in the spring are legendary, Wendy focused on the smaller flowers growing in restoration areas of the park.

One crowd favorite was the Pincushion Daisy (Gaillardia suavis).  It's a (mostly) petal-less flower with a wonderfully spicy fragrance that lends it another common name of Perfumeballs.

The Perfect Day to visit Rock Rose

Jenny already called it in her Rock Rose blog post:  a perfect day in her garden.  Way back in June of 2014 when I asked Jenny to be a docent for my garden club's tour of the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center she also invited us to tour her own garden.  All of us.  Of course, I jumped at the chance and added it to our agenda.  Garden club meetings are the second Wednesday of each month so the date was fixed no matter the weather or Jenny's recent hip surgery.

It couldn't have been a better day.  We were greeted with masses of Bluebonnets at peak bloom.