THE TROPICAL GARDEN AT THE END OF SUMMER

Turk's Cap grows wild in Houston, Texas

Long ago I fell in love with tropical plants. As a child, I would watch Tarzan movies and any show with mysterious jungles and steamy rainforests. Afterwards, I would climb my favorite tree and dream of far away places.

Houston is on the very northern edge of all things tropical. It's a nice place to push the boundaries of tropical house plants that can grow outdoors. 

Here's a sample of what I have right now in our Houston garden.

Perhaps even Tarzan would feel at home! :0)

Alocasia

Umbrella plant

Mexican fire spike

A species of gardenia with huge leaves!

Root beer plant

Our native sabal palm with lots of friends.

Pothos and airplane plants

Banana cannas

My last surviving coleus with a Sansevieria.

Air potato

"The Flamingo Trail"

That's the end of our tropical tour through the garden. All of the plants shown are easily grown outdoors in our Texas coastal climate. Tropical plants thrive in heat and humidity....two commodities Houston is famous for.

All for now. Happy Gardening!

David/:0)

WELCOME....COME IN AND VISIT!

Here's a window into my garden and a little tour of what the garden looks like

right now. 

I've been working on a new greenhouse this past winter. I thought this was a fun view.

The tropical garden with the opposite view of what's seen

from the back windows of the house. (Did that make sense?)

Clay pots on the back swing.

Cannas and bromeliads enjoyed the mild winter.

Another view of the tropical garden. I probably have too many plants, but they JUST KEEP GROWING. I must have good soil.

Lady ferns go well with our native dwarf palmetto.

I keep this one in the greenhouse all winter, but now it's out enjoying the sun.

It's a special tropical fig tree from Africa. I found it thrown away on the side of a neighbor's house, so I took cuttings and now it's enjoying life again.

(You would do the same if you found a cool, almost dead plant....right?)

One of the garden paths in the back.

Do you see what I see? This little opossum walked right up to me last weekend, then 

got spooked and climbed a tree. We have baby opossums every Spring.

Mamma raccoon is back and has some babies hidden somewhere in the area.

She is the most nervous raccoon I've ever met, but mamma raccoon and mamma opossum 

share the garden in peace.

I also found this white winged dove on her nest in the garden.

It's well hidden even from the other wildlife.

I'll end with a few of the flowers blooming right now.

This little beauty if from the zebra tradescantias all over the garden.

The loripetalum is such a wonderful plant. I highly recommend it for Houston.

Here's the foliage.

Here's my newest addition; a copper canyon daisy.

The scent from this plant is quite unusual. I would recommend you smell it a couple 

of times before growing it in your garden. If you like the scent of yarrow, you might actually enjoy copper canyon daisy.

Copper canyon daisy is famous because deer hate it and that's a plus. 

(No, I don't have deer, but some of you do!)

I'll end with these gazanias. I have to say they are the surprise of the year.

These short, ground cover-like plants are beautiful in their own right.

And when you add the flowers, they don't even look real.

But they are and they love Texas heat.

That's it for today.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

David/:0)

GBBD: MARCH OF THE WILDFLOWERS IN MY YARD

This will be the only time for so much sun in my shady garden, so the little wildflowers jump at the chance before the leafy canopy closes in from above. Of course, I'll appreciate all that shade when the temps hover around 95F !
These are tiny wildflowers, both native and and non-native that make their home at Tropical Texana. Since I have a wildlife garden as well, I figure some little insect appreciates the nectar.
To see some outstanding garden flowers popping up around the world, visit our host Carol at http://www.maydreamsgardens.com/. You'll be inspired!  Happy GBBD from down here in Texas! David :-)

We start out with Azalea 'Pride of Mobile'. It's not a wildflower, but its wild cousin grows in deep East Texas. The hard freeze last month did no damage, so all 3 of mine are putting on quite a show.

This is wild strawberry. It's one of my groundcovers. It behaves in shade, but can take over elsewhere.

This is Prairie Windflower....isn't that the best name for a wildflower?

This a tiny yellow clover that seems to think it wants to be my new lawn! After it blooms, it will get to enter my renewable resource program (nice way of saying compost pile).

Like many here in the South, I have fought this oxalis and lost the battle. I have made my peace with its ever spreading bulblets. What a pretty enemy, don't you think?

This native oxalis is called yellow wood sorrel. It is the well-behaved cousin. I like it so much more.

The trailing vetch has a tiny, but intricate bloom. VETCH is such an awful sounding word for a little plant. It sounds like someone is cursing. Example: Oh vetch, some weed is growing in those potted plants again!

It needs another name like Rambling Peavine.

I posted about this one already, but I just love these little violets. They are natives and all over my garden. I've even got some up in the rocky Agave beds. They seem to think that's OK even though I told them to stay in the woodland garden out back.

Well, that's the tour. If you find yourself crawling around on your hands and knees this week (hopefully in the garden, not at work), be on the lookout for tiny surprises. There might be a little wildflower waiting for you.

David/ Tropical Texana/ Houston

RELAXING BY STARING AT STUFF IN YOUR GARDEN ~ A not so Wordless Wednesday

We've had 9 overcast, cold (for here), rainy days when finally the sun came out for a moment yesterday afternoon. I was sitting outside in a chair staring at the garden. Most of the garden has an assortment of birds flittering around most any day, so I watch them. I also look for patterns. I find it relaxing after doing paperwork (right now I'm starting to do our taxes).
Here's what I stared at:

and....here's what I found...

click to enlarge.

I'm always fascinated when I find something like this to photograph. Isn't nature grand?

By the way, to stare, observe, glance at, or peruse some more photos, visit

Alicia at http://weloveiowa.blogspot.com/   and see a fine collection called Wordless Wednesday.

Thanks for stopping by Tropical Texana/ David :0)

GARDEN TRIALS ~ RESULTS PART 2

With high temperatures and dry conditions foremost on my mind, the plants for this garden trial have had an unfair trial period. I'm used to 90 to 95 with at least a little rain. This August, we've been at 96 to 100 (37C) and hardly a drop for almost 4 weeks solid! We did get .10" of an inch today and saw rain all around us. Yea!
ALL OF THESE PLANTS DID SUPERBLY THIS SUMMER. I WOULD SAY THEY ARE WELL-ADAPTED TO WELL-DRAINED, PARTIALLY SHADY SITES IN ZONE 9A OR ABOVE.

The Silver European Fan Palm has very small leaves and has a spiky look. It will take a year to tell how it fits in.

The Needle Palm is absolutely my surprise of the summer. I had no idea they were so beautiful and lush. They remind me of a fuller version of a lady palm. The leaves are shiny green with a pale underside. They are adapted to very low temperatures, so I'm not worried about freezes for either of these.

Needle Palm ~native to the SE United States

I've already raved about the Black Foot Daisy, so I'll mention the

Pink Muhly Grass. I bought this on sale for a dollar since Lowe's had almost killed it.

Obviously, it is very drought tolerant to survive such neglect. It looks great in contrast to agaves. I can't wait for the bloom spikes this Fall.

It is a Texas native, so it is adapted to our weather extremes.

Agave celsii is my absolute favorite new agave. I was delighted to find it on sale at Wal-Mart!

The Agave stricta is also a beautiful addition to the garden. I have never seen these for sale in Houston, so somebody is finally getting the message that gardeners would like plants that don't need endless watering.

I don't remember the name of this hybrid Coreopsis, but the foliage is outstandingly beautiful for a coreopsis. So far, it has bloomed nonstop in 97 degree weather with no transplant shock. Wow!

I'm guessing this is Zinna 'Prolific'. I went back to buy more, but they had sold all 20 in two days!

I'm not that fond of orange zinnias, but these seem to work well in the dry shady beds.

I'm going try to add about five more to give the area some pizzazz. It too had no transplant shock.

This is what it looks like here after almost 4 weeks without rain. It has rained all around us, but not in my area of Houston. It was 99 degrees when I took this picture. However, the news reported that we will only have a high of 90 on Saturday with possible rain. Yippee. We are on day 27 with barely any rainfall. I've take the garden through 40 days with no rain, but it's not easy.

That's it from Tropical Texana. Hope your garden is under less stress than mine.