POEM ABOUT RAIN AFTER A DROUGHT

RAIN AFTER DROUGHT
by Dora Sigerson Shorter
Irish poet ( 1866-1918)
All night the small feet of the rain
Within the garden ran,
And gentle fingers tapped the pane
Until the dawn began.
The rill-like voices called and sung
The slanting roof beside;
'The children of the clouds have come;
Awake! awake!' they cried.
'Weep no more the drooping rose
Nor mourn the thirsting tree,
The little children of the storm
Have gained their liberty.'
All night the small feet of the rain
About my garden ran,
Their rill-like voices called and cried
Until the dawn began.

It already looks like this in our area parks...and it's the START of summer. Our last good rain was in January.

After good summer rains here along the Texas Coastal Plains

Visit the Original Garden Poet, Carol, at http://sweethomeandgardenchicago.blogspot.com/ for more verses.

And may we all get rain down here in the South very soon.

David/ Tropical Texana

BUGS! HAPPY MACRO MONDAY

Dig those crazy legs. This beetle flew up and landed on me while I was gardening.

I took this photo quickly. I wasn't sure if it was a blister beetle.

Anyone know the name of this beetle?

A grasshopper seems annoyed that I woke him up. He looks like a character in Alice in Wonderland.

The dreaded Agave Weevil hangs precariously on a twig. They've since been eradicated. (I think)

Visit our host, Lisa, at http://lisaschaos.com/ for more.

A VISIT TO THE MY CORNER OF KATY GARDEN

My friend, Cindy at My Corner of Katy, has a delightful garden and a wonderful garden blog. This was my second time to visit and once again she had over a hundred flowers in bloom. It's nice to talk to a fellow gardener who knows so much about local conditions and the plants that can grow here. She aims for a cottage garden look and handily succeeds. Wildlife is a welcome sight and with the small pond, abundant nectar plants, and birdfeeders, the whole garden is abuzz with life. Biodiversity is the catch phrase these days and I'd say Cindy covers all the bases. Most Botanical Gardens would be envious. :-) I had time for only one photo....but a photo is worth a thousand words blooms.

         You can visit her garden on my sidebar favorites to see for yourself. There's always something in bloom and thanks, Cindy, for the visit.
                              Happy Gardening to all and may we all get rain.....in Texas! David :-)

A PLEA TO KEEP THINGS WILD: HAPPY MACRO MONDAY

We read, "Keep a portion of your garden wild for this attracts wildlife. "
These are just words, until you actually do it. And when you do, your little bit of wilderness will be filled with surprises.
So what does that actually look like? Here's an example.

Do you see the tiny insect?  This is wild morning glory vine along my back fence. To many gardeners, it can be quite a nuisance. It can scamper up a tree in weeks and choke out a favorite bush. But.....It also harbors lots of insects for my garden wrens to eat. They have a nest of babies on our back porch and this is keeping both mom and dad wren VERY busy these days. They need the bugs!

A closer look at wild morning glory vine.

Visit our morning glorious host, Lisa, at http://lisaschaos.com/ for more.

It's been 3 years of hard work, but the wrens are happy to nest in our backyard.

The wild morning glory vines. Do you see the green lizard on the fence? It's mealtime.

Let's see...5 leafhoppers per leaf times 100 leaves...that's 500 leafhoppers for someone to eat.

Surprisingly, the leafhoppers stay on the wild morning glory and seldom bother my other garden plants.

Hope you'll consider some wild plants. If you don't know what to do, start with butterfly weeds (milkweed).

You'll have Monarchs in no time if you live in North America.

Thanks for visiting. David/ :-)

Quote from Thoreau found at Hermann Hospital / Houston, Texas

THE DROUGHT BUSTERS: HAPPY FOLIAGE FOLLOW-UP

Pam at DIGGING (over on my sidebar favorites) gives us foliage follow-up the 16th of each month. Yes, I've watered to keep things alive all these months. But for the last couple of years, I've skipped by these front beds on my daily watering rounds. They get water once a week until summer hits. In summer they get two waterings a week.

Windmill palms and  cycads along with newly planted Plumerias. The bricks hold them upright while roots form.

Agave beds take dry conditions with no fuss. These can all grow in the Houston area as long as they are in well-drained soil during the winter months.

                                          Agave geminiflora is recovering well from a 24 degree freeze.

                                      A new agave with banding like Agave zebrina (but it's probably not)

                                                  

Artemesia "Powis Castle"

Yucca gloriosa with blue-green and cream variegation. This Yucca endures both heavy rains and drought as long it is on well-drained soil.

Thanks for visiting. David/ :-)

MAY DAY MAY DAY! ~ GBBD AT TROPICAL TEXANA

Yes, and what's that May Day! May Day! distress signal about? RAIN! At 113 days since a 1" rainfall, this part of the South is still in the grip of a record breaking drought. Still, with heavy mulching and choosing plants that can take extremes, I have my favorites to share for this month.
Thank-you, Carol, at http://www.maydreamsgardens.com/ for creating this wonderful monthly tradition!

Clerodendrum bungei

The jungle garden in the very back of the yard attracts many butterflies such as swallowtails. They love this plant.

The unusual blooms of our native dwarf sabal palm

The lovely row of impatiens in the front yard are at their peak. Curcuma gingers are just starting to emerge.

An exotic Vriesia bromeliad bloom. (It was a gift with no label, but I'm guessing V. carinata)

Daylily 'Tuscawilla Tigress' has a visiting bee.

Scutellaria Pink Skullcap came back from a hard freeze and steals the show in the front Agave garden.

The dry weather has few 'winners', but the Four O'clocks are having their best year ever with tons of blooms and almost perfect foliage.

Since our last GBBD, we've added a small flock of pet garden chickens to our place. My wife is holding our oldest. Her name is "Hoot" since she looks like a baby owl. Hoot is now so tame that she sits in our lap. She has a sweet personality and her feathers are downy soft.

Finally, a little abstract art. The shadows are cast on the many shades of a fading palm frond.

Thanks so much for visiting Tropical Texana. I'm a school teacher and can't wait to get a bit more time to visit the many gardens on GBBD. Hope to see yours soon.

David & Melanie :-)

THE STRANGE CASE OF A PARALLEL UNIVERSE IN A SINGLE GARDEN

I was watering the front yard today during this HIDEOUS DROUGHT when a strange thing happened: a very nice person with a dog walked by and said that my garden looked awesome. Seems she's a landscape designer who just moved here from California. I told her about my blog and then told her NOT to go look at it. She should try out some of those other great blogs instead.
           Why? Because I don't think my garden is so awesome. Yes, it has nice designs and nice plants and it's actually a fun garden because of all the unusual agaves and such. But the plants are all different from what's in my memory. It's a dry garden now and I just have to be happy with that and enjoy what I've got. Still, I do wonder what she would have said if she had walked by in May 2004. Seems like a hundred years ago and a parallel universe. It's so weird to see these pictures, but they are in fact the same garden when I had rainy summers and lots of new plants in the works. I have to tell you the truth, I really wish I still had these plants and it makes me a bit depressed to look at these pictures. But it's too dry and hot most summers.

These were all taken in May 2004...a mere 7 years ago. Most have died out since then from heat, drought, too much shade or from canna virus or daylily rust.

But we must move on.

It's Day 104 without significant rain. I'm worried about what's in store for Texas gardeners this summer.

David/

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY FROM TROPICAL TEXANA

I was up on the roof when I found Mama Dove with the baby. These are native white wing doves in our orchid tree. It's a favorite tree since it has lots sticks for building nests.

Bird's eye view of the front garden. The designs are about 3/4 complete. I'll do the rest this summer.

Bird's eye view of the backyard garden designs.

Happy Mother's Day! David/ :-)

ANSEL ADAMS MEETS TROPICAL TEXANA: 3 BLACK & WHITE PHOTOS

What if the famous photographer of black & white photos, Ansel Adams, came to visit your garden? What he photograph?  I have another blog devoted to just black and white photography and let me tell you, it is FUN! It changes your entire perspective about light and textures.
Here are 3 photographs of my garden with that in mind.  For those of us over 50, our entire childhood was mostly black and white photos so it's not an altogether foreign concept. For the artist sort, you know serious museums and collections still have a section only in black and white, so there must be something to it.
Happy 3 for Thursday. Please visit others such as my friend, Cindy at http://www.mycornerofkaty.com/ to see other 3 for Thursdays. And please join in!   BTW: If you care to, tell me your favorite of the three below:

A sycamore seed floats in my rainbarrel

The tropical walkway casts palm shadows

The rustic fence flows with vines

WORDLESS WEDNESDAY ~ HOW TO PERK UP THAT BROMELIAD!

VODKA?

During this drought, I've run out of rainwater so I'm using this.

uh......just joking....

I was moving around my blue bottle tree and saw the bromeliad hanging there.

I'm certain Vodka is not good for bromeliads. But rainwater is very good for tank bromeliads. In fact, I go out of my way to use rainwater whenever I can. It's their natural drink...no chlorine added.

Pass this along to anyone who needs a smile during this horrible drought.

BTW: I found the bottle along a street. I zont drrink Vahd-ka.

David/ :-)