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January blooms brightening the garden

I’ve been amazed at the lack of a freeze this late in the season, but Facebook reminded me with a photo of brilliant variegated shell ginger that we only had our first freeze here at the house on January 4th last year.

While there aren’t as many blooms as in the summer months, it’s still delightful to find flowers in the garden now, especially these coneflowers.

These Pam’s pink Turks caps start blooming late but keep on going.

The cape honeysuckle are a bright burst on the increasingly grey days.

Another late summer/early fall bloomer, Mexican bush sage is prolific.

As are the Mexican mint marigolds.

In the pots by the front door, these begonias are refreshed after some cooler temps and rain.

And next to the begonias, these Mexican honeysuckles are about to bloom for the third time.

This Royal Queen, or Iochroma, is stunning. Bar none, my favorite in the garden these days. It’s a mid-fall bloomer, but oh-so-well-worth the wait.

In the granite and flagstone path out back, the sweet alyssum are perky as can be.

Even the neighboring pink skull cap is starting to bloom again.

I posted these on my FB profile last week – this abutilon is bursting with blooms.

Unruly, but showing deepening purple colors, indigo spires salvia is tough-as-nails.

The lion’s tails are still showing off — I’ve brought them in and arranged them in vases with other late bloomers. You can see those arrangements here and here. They include many of these blooms.

As I write this post, I realize that I’ve left a few of these bright blooms out of those arrangements, so I’m feeling inspired to make another arrangement today.

THIS is what I love about living in Austin, Texas.

Are you making bouquets from your garden?

By Diana C. Kirby|2016-10-03T11:20:55-05:00January 5th, 2016|abutilon, alyssum, Blog, cape honeysuckle, Coneflower, garden art, indigo spires, Iochroma, lion's tail, Mexican bush sage, Mexican honeysuckle, Mexican Mint Marigold, Pam's pink Turk's cap, pink skullcap, Sharing Nature's Garden|0 Comments

In a Vase on Monday — still cheerily waiting for winter…

While our nights are now close to freezing temps, we still haven’t hit the hard 32 here at our house yet. My dad was here today and returned the vase from the bouquet of garden flowers I took them a few weeks ago.

Since it was a beautiful, sunny day here (60F) and there are still blooms in the garden, I refilled the vase and sent it back again – with flowers!

Today’s arrangement included lion’s tail, coneflowers, indigo spires salvia, celosia, rosemary and duranta seeds.

To see what other gardeners are putting in their vases, visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.

By Diana C. Kirby|2016-04-14T02:38:48-05:00January 4th, 2016|Blog, celosia, Coneflower, cut flowers, duranta, In a Vase on Monday, indigo spires, lion's tail, Sharing Nature's Garden|0 Comments

Propagating new plants for a new year…

Before we get our first official freeze here in Central Texas, I went wandering through the garden and gathered up a box of cuttings from some of my favorite annual plants and then spent a few hours in the greenhouse.

I got my tools and materials together and set about prepping the cuttings, trimming leaves, making long, clean cuts and giving everyone a dip into the rooting hormone.

Nice and toasty warm, with plenty of humidity and a controlled temperature, the cuttings should grow happily in the greenhouse over the next few months of winter.

When spring arrives, I’ll enjoy having some great little starter plants to replace the annuals I lost through the winter, or to expand planting of some of my favorites.

Can you tell what I planted?

Some plants are easier to identify than others.

This one is an easy ID, but also one of my faves.

Now let’s see if I can keep them all alive all winter. Fingers crossed!

By Diana C. Kirby|2016-04-14T02:38:48-05:00January 3rd, 2016|Blog, brugmansia, butterfly weed, Cuban oregano, Iochroma, Persian shield, Pride of Barbados, propagate, Royal Queen, Sharing Nature's Garden, Swedish ivy|2 Comments

Blooms bursting in my garden on a chilly December day…

It’s been chilly here in Central Texas. If you call 50s and 60s chilly, and we do. All the potted tropicals and succulents are in the greenhouse with night time heaters running.

But the garden is still full of flowers – invigorated by lots of rain and cooler days.

I’m not spending time in the garden right now, so when I went to water the greenhouse plants this morning, I decided to bring some of these amazing flowers inside so I can enjoy them more.

I gathered Lion’s tail, celosia, indigo spires salvia and coneflowers and made a beautiful bouquet for my kitchen island. There are many other blooms in the garden.

I might just bring in something else tomorrow.

By Diana C. Kirby|2016-04-14T02:38:49-05:00December 1st, 2015|Blog, bouquet, celosia, Coneflower, cutting garden, indigo spires, lion's tail, salvia, Sharing Nature's Garden|0 Comments

Fruit trees in the garden bearing fruit after recent rains…

A tour through the garden this week, after several significant recent rains, has me smiling. Several of our trees are bearing fruit, thanks to a change of seasons and the end the our drought status.

The Texas ever-bearing fig tree we planted this spring is perking up after the summer and producing a second crop of fruit. I can’t wait to taste them, as those from the spring were stressed by the transplant and heat.

It’s a lovely little tree, but I have had to put up a fence to keep Dakota, the fruit-vegetable-bulb-grub-eating dog away from it.

The pineapple guava is getting to be quite large for its spot and when it’s done fruiting, I will do some more pruning on it. I’d like it to be a little less multi-trunked so we can see the structural nature of the tree.

Dakota had eaten some of the guavas, but there are going to be enough for us as I’m keeping a closer eye on her!

The pomegranate tree is absolutely full of fruit. The birds and squirrels often get into these, and I usually leave some on the tree to split open and give them a treat. I’m going to try some different ways for us to enjoy the arils this year. They’re so good for you — their health benefits include helping to fight heart disease, blood pressure, high cholesterol. They have also been shown to help inhibit breast, prostate and colon cancer. We have many more than we could possibly eat, so I’ll be sharing. If you’re in Austin, let me know if you’d like to come get some — they’re not quite ready yet, but it won’t be long now. Just post a comment if you’re interested in coming to get some.

There is no fruit on the loquat, but it’s blooming all over, so that’s a promising sign for future production. Except that this fruit tree sits next to the Pom, so the squirrels usually have a field day with the loquats because they are much less work to eat. I’ll have to be the early bird to get this fruit.

What’s fruiting in your garden?

By Diana C. Kirby|2017-11-29T23:26:58-06:00November 14th, 2015|Blog, fig, fruit, fruit trees, loquat, pineapple guava, pomegranate, Sharing Nature's Garden, Texas ever-bearing fig|0 Comments

Frogs and toads and eggs in the garden — oh my!

We’re very fortunate to enjoy an abundance of wildlife in our garden. With an acre and a half – and about one third of it is natural woods — we see birds, deer, squirrels, foxes, road runners, coyotes and an abundance of lizards and frogs and toads.

I’ve enjoyed watching frogs and toads near one of our fountains and the pool over the course of this summer. I went out every day to see if someone was cooling off in the fountain. Last week, I let the dogs out at night and counted 16 Rio Grande leopard frogs in the pool at once! They jump in at night and are usually gone by morning. And I found a cluster of frog spawn in the pool. I scooped it out and carefully and slowly replaced the pool water with rain water from the tank over a period of about a day. Now I am refreshing the rain water daily.

They seem to be changing, the eggs becoming elongated as they begin the process of morphing into tadpoles. Several of my garden blogging friends with ponds want to adopt some of them, too! Fingers crossed that at least some of them make it.

Then last night I saw my first Green tree frog on the back wall of the house. This Hyla cinerea was just hanging out and didn’t move a muscle as Jeff took several pictures of him.