So, in the vein of, it is all a learning experience, I have decided to track when and where I plant stuff - in the hopes that in, say, ten years or so, I may have actually learned something.  :o)

May 20, 2011

●●● North Corner Bed

I have always felt the back corner was a bit of an eye sore.  The grass never really grew there, it looked barren and unhappy.  The week before Mom came, Dave purchased a plumbago for me for Mother's Day.  He knows I absolutely love the plant, but have killed so many of them, that I refuse to buy anymore.  We thought about where a good partial shade spot would be, and decided the northern back corner might work.  It gets a couple hours of morning sun, then the overhanging trees shade it. One little plumbago didn't do much to improve the eyesore however. 

When Mom was here, she offered to buy me a bird bath for my birthday.  We went to Natural Gardener (waaay to expensive) and the Home Depot (three concrete ugly ones) and then Lowe's.  Lowe's had by far the best selection, and we picked out an awesome bird bath.  It was very large, which is necessary for the hot summer temperatures here (so the water doesn't evaporate in an hour).  While shopping, I also purchased two Cannas of a variety called Tropicanna.  This is a new variety with orang-ish varigate leaves.  We put all of these in that same bed, and transformed it from an eye sore to a really peaceful corner!  I am so thrilled with the results!

●●● Porch Bed

All of the plants in my porch beds are perennials.  Many are just a year or two old, so they are small, but I know they will eventually grow (unless I kill them first!).  I asked Mom was she would do to the bed this year, and she suggested adding some annuals to fill in the places where the perennials would eventually grow.  We went shopping at Lowe's and found very few annuals.  We did pick up six or so of an annual variety of red salvia.  But since there were so few annuals, we also purchased some more perennials.  We added a Stella de Oro daylilly (a plant I have been wanting for awhile), one small Rudbeckia called "Becky Mix" and another called "Yellow Becky" (I don't think we realized we picked up two different varieties)  These are both low to the ground plants with a daisy like flower.  We also added two Arizona Sun Blanket Flowers.  With the addition of these plants, my bed looks really beautiful.  (the wire fencing is to keep Domino from eating my plants!)

May 1, 2011

●●● It's alive!!

Every year in mid-April, I look at all my beds with the green spikes of all the returning plants optimistically poking their heads through the ground.  And then I look at my Pride of Barbados, and it looks like a dead stick.  And I think, oh no, she didn't make it through the winter this year.  Even Dave was suggesting I dig it up and put a new one in.  But right around May 1st, I saw the first green shoot appear.  And a few days later, a new shoot appeared.  And by mid-May, it looks like a real plant.

It just needs a little patience.  Don't we all ;o)

April 1, 2011

●●● There's something 'bout the Southland in the Springtime!

I love this time of year, when everything is just starting to come back.  The temperatures are wonderful, so the heat isn't yet a threat to plants.  This year, we had some late snap cold fronts.  I am pretty sure that everything that was going to come back has come back, but you never know...

Back beds - Old Favorites My true workhorses are the lantana, ruellia, flame salvia, esperanza and black foot daisies.  These are all in year three, and they look wonderful.  All three roses are alive and flowering!  My knock-out rose will have to be severely trimmed, as it is taking over the bed!  My dwarf pomegranate is just starting to put out new shoots also!  It seems to me that it took much longer to return last year, as I feared it was dead for awhile.  Unfortunately, my Jethro Tull coreopsis seem to not have made it through another year.  I have purchased two new, to replant, as they are a favorite of mine.

Back Beds - Second Years A whole lot more died last year then came back, but a few have perservered.  My whirling guara has returned, and looks pretty healthy!  The tropical milkweed and other plant beside it (will have to get Natural Gardener to identify it once it blooms, as I mislabeled it originally.) have both come back.  And my $0.50 fall asters are returning.    I truly just bought them because they were cheap and brightened up my fall garden, but all six have returned.  If they can just make it through the hot summer, these may just make it into the old favorites.

Not sure if it counts as a second year, or old favorite, but the ruellia I transplanted (first attempt), has come back!  So, I think I will try and separate a few more this year.  This is one tough plant,  in my south bed, one even survived a Domino dig up! Some goners that I tried last year, but didn't make it to round two include the Nierembergia Starry Eyes (I bought replacements to try again this year), the verbena, and, of course, my plumbago. I have decided to give up trying to grow plumbago... as much as I love it, I just don't seem to be able to keep it alive! Back Beds - Newbies So far, I have bought two dwarf coreopsis to put in the south bed, two Jethro Tull coreopsis to put somewhere, three small Starry Eyes, and I am going to plant two of Dave's Pride of barbados.  (I planted two earlier, and Domino dug them up within an hour.  This time, I am going to put temporary fencing around the beds for a month or so.)  I would also like to purchase some pretty bush for the South bed.  The north bed is starting to really fill in, and look mature, but the South bed is still pretty empty.  I also may try and transplant some of the lantana, as it seems to be a little lantana heavy... and I'd like some variety.  Not sure yet.

North Beds - It has been awhile since I've spent much time on the North Beds.  Around four years ago, we bought some coral honeysuckle plants, and planted them along the fence.  Over the years, a number of them died, and only two originals remain.  However, Dave took the seeds from thse plants, and started some new vines.  These vines are now starting year two, and are doing great.  Also three years ago, we planted some blackberry vines.  We have never gotten much fruit off of them, but they are still hanging on, and look better this year than they have in the past.  So, here is hoping we might actually get a little fruit from them this year! And, as a complete surprise, when pulling out all of the weeds from this bed, we found one little old strawberry plant hanging on, complete with red strawberry!  I tenderly uncovered it, so maybe it will keep growing? And on the south side, our cross vines are doing wonderfully.  If only they looked this way year round!  Fortunately, the morning glories seem to take over right around the time the flowers fall off of these plants, and they look drab again!

October Garden

●●● Pride of Barbados!!

After three years of watching my poor Pride of Barbados limp along, barley tall enough to rise above the surrounding Lantana, my plant finally came into its own.  This year it grew straight and tall and had many blooms!

●●● My front bed

My front bed is filled with Lantana, both the Spreading Yellow and the Dallas Red.  We planted them soon after we moved into the house, so the plants are about four years old, and they have just filled the front bed with color.  They are one of the few plants that don't seem to mind the hundred degree heat.  In fact, they have done so well, that I decided to add a pile to the bed in front of the garage.  I figure, they get about the same amount of light, so maybe they will do as well... We'll see in about three years :o)

●●● My backyard bed

Some of the things I planted in my backyard bed are doing really well, though a lot have perished. 

You can see below how much the garden has grown.  My esperanza is now over 8 feet tall!  The Tropical Milkweed and Guara are 3 feet tall and both the blackfood daisies and the lantanas have grown quite a bit!  Unfortunately, the verbena and tick seed coeropsis perished at the claws of Domino soon after I planted them.  The other coreopsis has also died, but I am hoping both it and the freesia will come back in the spring. I really tried to get the starry eyes to make it, but it just kept dying.  My plumbago is hanging on, but I doubt it will make it through the winter :o(

●●● Roses

My knock out rose, has been jsut that, a knock-out. It has bloomed all spring, summer and winter.  It has at least doubled in size.  What a winner!  And the other two roses that I received as gifts are doing well.  Since they were labeled as "cold tolerant" I felt for sure that the hot Texas summer would kill them, but they have grown and bloomed and I am hoping they make it through another year!

●●● Even the weeds are in bloom!
Right outside our fence is a wild non-maintained area.  For most of the year, this area doesn't look like anything special.  But at this time of year, the weeds burst into bloom and add to the beauty :o)

Sunday, May 14, 2009

Below is a look at the bed when I first created it!

Monday, May 11, 2009

●●● How Does My Garden Grow?

Look below to see how much the garden has grown in a month!

Right now, my garden is growing incredibly well.  It is so out of character for me, that I am just waiting for the descending horde of starving locust, or a poisonous mold attack!  So far, I have harvested one zucchini and one jalapeno.  While not all that impressive a harvest, all of the plants are growing very well.  My cantaloupes are huge, taking over the entire lower left hand portion of the garden.  And the watermelons are growing over the sides of the garden into the yard.  I haven't seen any melons yet, but we do have lots of flowers! My beans have all sprouted and are beginning to wind themselves up their trellis.  I have a number of green tomatoes growing.

We still don't know if that huge plant is okra.  It feels like okra, and looks like okra, but we have not had any flowers yet.  I am going to take a portion to the Natural Gardener to see if they can help ID it for me.  It may just be the largest weed known to man!

Here are my tomatillos.  I did not plant these, they are freebies from fruit that fell to the ground last year!  No husks yet, but lots of flowers!

My corn is just getting started, about a foot tall. We have planted corn many times in the past and never gotten any ears, so I am holding my breath for these little guys!

The Zucchini seed package recommended planting them four feet apart.  After seeing these monsters grow, I now know why!

Thursday, April 2nd, 2009

●●● Yellow neck squash and beans!

We had a huge blast of rain last night.  This morning, I noticed that all three of the spots of yellow neck squash that I planted have germinated.  I realize that I probably only want two plants of squash, so I will weed out one and replace it with an eggplant. A few of my pole beans are up also!  But I have seen no sign of my okra and cucumbers yet.  Nor of the edamame.  I also just realized that I planted my two new cantaloupe plants right on top of my watermelon seedlings.  Ah well, we'll see what comes up!

Also, in the front right corner of my bed I have some unidentified plants coming up.  Last year, this was where my tomatillos were.  In the past, they have reseeded very well, and I am hoping that those tiny plants are new tomatillo plants.  Tomatillos seeds are pretty hard to find, and it would be great if I could just scavenger some left-overs from last year!

I also changed up the bed by digging rows.  The rows really help the kids know where to plant their feet, so I went ahead and dug out dirt between my rows of plants, and piled it up around the existing plants.  I may have accidentally pulled up my cucumber seeds.  Next year, I will make my rows first, and then plant stuff, because the walking path is a bit too narrow...  Ahh, another lesson learned.

Tuesday, March 24th, 2009

^{●●● Planting the garden}

Better late than never.  I planted our garden today.  Ideally, I would have planted it last week, or the week before.  But since we were out of town on vacation last week, I felt it was safer to just wait until we got back.  Last year, our garden was planted haphazardly.  And I am hoping it will be a little more organized this year.  For one thing, I tried really hard to keep things in rows.

In the row closest to the yard I planted two Black Beauty Zuchinni plants, three sets of Early Yellow Crookneck Squash seeds and two piles of Marketmore cucumber plants.  I probably should have planted more cucumber than squash, as our family is not a huge fan of squash.  However, I am hoping that Natural Gardener will have some cucumber plants on Friday, and I'll plant one more plant of cucumber.  I am also hoping they have some egg plant plants, though I am not sure where they will fit right now.  Everything wound up taking more space than I expected.  Both the zucchini and the cucumber plants suggested 4 foot spacing!

The next row is mostly tomatoes (I don't think there is a such thing as too many tomatoes).  I picked one generic Better Boy, and a new variety - Marion Fast Tomato.  I am hoping they produce first.  Natural Gardener had two different varieties of Heat Wave, so I picked up two of each.  Historically, Heat Waves have performed the best for us in the hot Texas heat.  At the end of the tomato row, I planted one pile of watermelon seeds and one watermelon plant.  Again, the package stated to space them many feet apart.  They are about two feet, which may not be far enough.

My third row has peppers, okra and bean plants.  That huge tall plant looks like an okra plant to me, and may be left over from seeds from last year?  I will leave it until I am sure whether it is a weed or plant.  Next to it, I planted two piles of Emerald Okra seeds.  Then two Bell Boy Pepper plants and two Jalapeno plants.  At the end of the row, I planted a line of pole beans, and then planted some Edamame at the end.  (The one vegetable that both boys seems to like!)

I am still hoping to plant the following: some tomatillo seeds, if I can find them, and two egg plants, one cucumber plant and two rows of corn.  I am not sure where I will put them all.  One thing I'd like to discover is how spaced the plants really need to be. 

All told, I spent around $30 on plants for the garden.  Let's hope it produces at least an equivalent harvest!

^{●●● Another visitor}

^{We had another visitor in our yard today, and this one wasn't quite as cute as the armadillo.  He is a checkered garter snake.  Virtually harmless, he eats frogs and toads.  He stayed in our fence for the whole evening, despite me watering plants very close by.  He might be stuck.  I'll know tomorrow if he is still there, or gone.}

^{●●● My one success story}

I have one gardening success story.  I don't why, but my pot of Gerber daisies is thriving.  I bought them in October of last year, and potted them in a large pot (left over from a deceased fern).  While I kill everything else in sight, this one pot continues to grow and bloom.  I water it when I think of it, bring it in when it is due to freeze, and that is about it.  But still, this is one happy plant.  I don't know how long it will last, but I'll enjoy them while I can!

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

^{●●● Texas Mountain Laurel}

^{I tilled in a 10 gallon bag of revitalizer compost (bag-in-yourself at $3.85) around each of the mountain laurels.  I had to pull back the weed cloth to expose enough of the area around the plant to till in the compost.  Next year, I will probably remove even more.  I didn't dig down too far, because I wasn't really sure where the roots began.  But the helpful person at Natural Gardener told me that even laying it on top would do good.  I also applied 1 cup of Ladybug Organic 8-2-4 fertilizer, spread amongst the six plants.  I think this bed is ready for spring.}

^{The very last bush in the bunch, closest to the road, looks like it might actually have buds for flowers - but it may be just new leaf growth.  I'll watch it to see!}

^{●●● Primrose Jasmine and Nandina}

Sunday, February 22nd, 2009

^{●●● Corn gluten}

^{I spent about an hour laying down three bags of corn gluten on the front and back yards today (just the right amount).  The corn gluten is supposed to be a natural herbicide as well as a fertilizer.  We've put some down in the front yard before, but I don't think we've ever put any in the back.}

^{●●● Pruned peaches}

^{Dave also pruned the peach trees today.  I couldn't find my trusty picture showing what we were supposed to cut and how we were supposed to prune, so we kind of winged it.  I guess we'll know how we're doing later this year.  I don't think we pruned at all last year.  My handy dandy calendar said we needed to prune before the buds appeared, and I think we made it.}

^{●●● First casualty - Strawberries}

^{We have our first casualty of the spring season (and it is not even spring yet!).  Some hungry animal (I'm guessing deer, though it may have been rabbits) came along and munched our strawberries.  One is almost all gone, the other mostly untouched.  I guess next year we plant them inside the fence in the garden!}

^{●●● Update on berries}

^{No growth is visible on the berries.  Dave and I worked on the drip system, and added hoses for each individual plant.  Unfortunately, afterwards, for whatever reason, only the first couple of plants were receiving any water.  Dave thinks maybe the connectors we have are not large enough, so I will go to Natural Gardener this week to see if we can find some better ones.  In lieu of our drip system, I put a large amount of water down on all the berries.}

Monday, February 16th, 2009

^{●●● Getting my garden ready}

^{●●● Blueberries}

^{I hadn't planted the blueberries last week, because Dave wasn't sure what requirements they had.  Personally, I don't think blueberries even grow in Texas :o)  But, he had bought them at Home Depot, and leaving them in their bare root containers was certainly not going to help them grow, so I picked a spot for them just past the row of berries.} 

Saturday, February 14th, 2009

^{●●● Wildflower Seeds}

I threw a pile of wildflower seeds into our wildflower garden this week.  Two envelopes of Cosmos that we've had lying around for over a year.  I'm not sure if they are still good, but they certainly weren't doing any good lying in their package in the garage :o)  I also bought two packages of delphinium and threw them out there.  A bit late, but

Friday, February 13th, 2009

^{●●● God's oddest creature}

Today, shuffling and snuffling in our wildflower garden, I saw one of my favorite Texas creatures, the armadillo.  It's top speed is 1 mile per hour.  It can't see or hear very well, and too often, the only evidence we have of these bizarre animals is road kill.  But, as the boys and I ate breakfast this morning, I saw one wandering around outside.  It must have been there for awhile, because a large section of the garden was torn up.

Apparently these animals eat grubs and insects, but gardeners still are not a big fan of them, as they do tear up the garden looking for the bugs.  But they are suck ridiculous creatures, that I can't help smiling when I see them ambling about.

Tuesday, February 10th, 2009

^{●●● Strawberries, Blackberries and Grapes}

Today, I planted two Arapho blackberry bushes, two Sequoia Strawberries, One Champarel Grape and one Venus Seedless grape.  We planted them up close to the north side fence.  We have planted berries here before, but last year we had a small soaker hose installed, that will hopefully result in more success than previously.  I used Miracle Grow Garden soil to supplement the soil the berries were planted in. I also purchased 5 bags of compost to supplement the soil in my vegetable garden.  After pulling them out of the back of the van, I realized that I need waaay more than five bags.  At least 15.  I am thinking about calling Natural Gardener to have them deliver a load, rather than purchasing another 10 bags of soil.  At the same time, I could have them deliver a huge pile of mulch, and mulch in all of the beds.

Monday, February 9th, 2009

^{●●● Planting seeds}

I have never had much success planting seeds - but hey, I have never had much success with any gardening, so why not give it another go, right?  About a week ago, I planted two little pots of basil, two of cilantro and one of thyme.  I also planted two small rows of Cosmos flowers.  I planted them in pots that can be brought inside when we get a freeze.  Unfortunately, last week I did not take them inside during the wind, and they blew over, knocking out all of the dirt and seeds.  Today, I planted some more seeds.  Hopefully these won't blow over!  We should see some sprouts in 7 days for the basil, and 14 days for everything else.

Friday, February 6th, 2009

^{●●● Purple Martins}

I finally have my purple martin house completely installed and ready to go.   Maybe a little late, but after sitting in my garage for nine months, I had lost two snaps to hold the pole up.  S&K, the designer of the house, kindly mailed me replacements!  The pole can go another 10 feet higher, but with our strong winds here, I thought I'd try it at this level first.  Here's hoping some homeless purple martin flies by and decides to make herself a home!

Monday, February 2nd, 2009

^{●●● A pruning I will go}

Having opened up my Texas Gardening Calendar, it told me I should prune back Lantana after the first hard freeze.  I figure we've probably had as much freeze as we are going to, so I went ahead and pruned them back.  I also pruned back my Esperanza, and summer / fall flowering bushes as well.  In a spirit of pruning, I also decided to prune back those hideous bushes along the front of my garage (my worst bed).  They are spring flowering, and I shouldn't have pruned them because I pruned off the flower buds.  But I just couldn't resist, they had gotten so overgrown since mom and I pruned them when she was here last year.

My winter bed, all pruned, but not yet weeded or mulched!