FIRST FREEZE IN ALMOST 3 YEARS?

The skies are clear and temperatures are falling like a brick.

The weather guy used the term 'plummeting'. 

Why do I have so many tropical plants?

Why do they ALL have to be so beautiful?

And why don't I live in Miami or Key West?

We all tempt our zones and push the limits.

In my case, it's life or death....to the plants that is.

I've been studying weather and climate with my students for the past 12 weeks.

It's been fascinating.

For instance, here's a painting from Peter Bruegel from around 1550. Did you know that from around 1550 to 1850 most of Europe experienced a mini Ice Age?

It's reflected in many of the paintings of that era. 

Yes, I know it snows regularly in Europe, but during the aforementioned years it not only snowed, it SNOWED!

I also talked to the kids about the last ice age. It was difficult for them to imagine all of Canada buried in ice.

But what about Texas? What was going on here? It turns out WE had thousands of years of weather similar to Quebec or Manitoba. Everything shifted south thousands of miles and Texas was host to woolly mammoths and other cool animals.

We also had lots of spruce trees growing here 18,000 years ago.

I'm thinking a lot about cold weather because my garden is right on the FREEZE line tonight.

Talk about a nail biter. Everyone else is thinking about turkey and dressing and I'm thinking about green, mushy, frozen plants.

The latest wind map has some northerly winds moving the air around. That's good, because it means less chance of frost. 

There's also some high clouds in Mexico that could float by after midnight. This would keep the temperatures a few degrees higher. I can only hope!

In the meantime, I've brought in about 40 of my favorites, and packed my little garden shed with a couple of dozen more. 

I don't have my greenhouse ready this early in the season. I usually set it up the weekend AFTER Thanksgiving.

Oh well, pretending to be a tropical garden was fun while it lasted.

In closing, I do have a piece of really good news; one of my students donated a weather station to our classroom.

I'm babysitting it this weekend so I'll get to watch the carnage (or miracle) from a warm, cozy chair.

In the past, I had to run outside every few hours to view the thermometer. Brrrr.....

So, will I wake up to....

GREEN plants or BROWN plants? 

Tonight's weather will decide tomorrow's color scheme.

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That's it for today. 

Have a

Happy Thanksgiving!

Stay warm and enjoy your holiday....and thanks for stopping by.

David/:0)

NEXT MORNING: The color is still GREEN...a large deck of clouds came across from Mexico just after midnight and lasted most of the night. We landed on a low of 34.1 here at the garden and in the center of the city.

:0) Now I can get that greenhouse filled with GREEN plants.

P.S. I like our local weather service...someone has a nice sense of humor. (Read below) LOL

I'M THANKFUL FOR LAST NIGHT'S CLOUD COVER:

GOOD GUY, GOOD GUY, BAD GUY: HAPPY 3 FOR THURSDAY

When you go completely organic in regards to gardening, the beneficials have to step up to the plate and take charge of controlling the 'bad guys'. Beneficials appear like magic, but you have to look diligently to find most of them. 
To see another Three for Thursday, visit my garden friend Cindy at My Corner of Katy. She's over on my Blog Roll favorites. And join in, won't you?  Post 3 of anything  gardenesque and join the fun. :-)

GOOD GUY/GAL: Ladybugs have a voracious appetite for aphids. If you spray and poison the aphids, your ladybug population suffers. This one has some beautiful spots, doesn't it?

GOOD GUY: Assissin bugs travel alone, stink bug nymphs travel in groups. This one was so stealthy I could barely snap a photo. They love to get on the opposite side of a leaf and hide. They eat anything they can catch.

BAD GUY: But not really. It was all alone and nibbling a bit on the wisteria vines. Plus, he'd better watch out for that assassin bug. It was on the same wisteria! In the meantime, who can resist those snazzy black and white antennae and cute bug eyes? Click to enlarge photo.

Thanks for stopping by. David/

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY ~ THE GREENEST OF HOLIDAYS

Luck o' the Irish to ya. I'm not at all Irish, but my wife could be. She's a BOYD and there are Scottish, English, and even Irish people of that surname. I celebrate for another reason: it's officially the END of the winter season and even though we could get a freeze, it would be FREAKISH and historical. (Now, watch it happen...ugh!)
For this THREE for THURSDAY, I'm doing a SHAMROCK theme. I battle Oxalis all the day long and I've given up. So there's a million of these shamrock-shaped leaves all over the garden.
Visit my garden friend Cindy at http://www.mycornerofkaty.com/ to see the founding flowers of this fabulous format. I had the delightful opportunity to visit her wondrous garden last week and the blooms seem endless. Caveat: If she does not post her own Three for Thursday it's for good reason...she's out in her garden gardening just like I should be doing!

Thanks for stopping by Tropical Texana. David

FOLIAGE FOLLOW-UP FOR FEBRUARY ~ SURVIVOR: LANDSCAPE EDITION

Pam over at Digging invites gardeners to post foliage from their gardens the 16th of each month and The Lazy Shady Gardener over in Austin gave us view of his winter warriors that are down but not out.

I'm doing the same. Here are some of the ugliest photos you'll ever see on this blog. Will they survive? Or is this the end of the trail?  As the famous singer Enya tells us, "Only Time Will Tell."
Visit Pam over on my sidebar favorites to see other foliage with perhaps less carnage from winter winds.
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#1 Good News: The Chinese Fan Palms can stand 24 degrees, but not 21.

 The Giant Bird of Paradise will come back, but it MUST have a mild winter or it will fade away. The pygmy palms are gone and I'm not trying them a 3rd time. They can't stand much below 28 degrees.

 This confederate rose agave was covered by 3 layers of towels. It will survive and regrow quickly.

 This Agave desmettiana is probably gone for good. The others are in the greenhouse. 32 degrees will damage this plant.

 This bed of agaves looks untouched from the hard freezes. I like these plants a lot. All were left uncovered!

 Ironically, these Bromeliads go by the name "Happy Thoughts". Not so Happy, are they? They'll recover slowly.

 My precious Monstera deliciosa. Oh well, the books say that it's root hardy in zone 9. We shall see.

This is the saddest case. I had one towel left over and it was already dark. I could not recall which plant needed covering and I had covered about 15. It was this agave...Agave geminiflora. I think it will grow back, but isn't it a slow grower? I'm a bit depressed right now just looking at the thing.

 And finally, a lit bit of art.  This cardboard palm will recover. The Giant Monkey Grass knows no fear of cold.

 My wife looked out the back window last weekend and announced that the circus was in town. I told her no, it was a gypsy caravan passing through.   Will I need the towels again? Only Time Will Tell!

At least the cat's happy. Thanks for stopping by unTropical Texana. I'll be Tropical again once we hit 80 degrees. Today it was 74 and it's been mild all week.

David/ Houston Texas :0)

BOTTLE TREE IN THE WORKS ~ THIS TIME I FEEL CONFIDENT!

(image from: r3tta's free use photos. Thanks ;-)

We had a beautiful day here in Houston, so I was outdoors working on chores.  Our large waxleaf ligustrum died this past summer so I cut it down today. As I was snipping off the array of twigs and leaving just the secondary stubs I thought"'What a beautiful twisted form this old shrub has. It's such a shame to throw it on the compost heap."  Then it dawned on me...could this be the bottle tree I had tried so hard this past summer to create?

I found a few left over bottles from the former disaster and put them on. Wow! This is going to be good. So...maybe by tomorrow I'll have found enough old bottles to take a photo. 

I have no idea why I want a bottle tree so badly.  It just seems like the thing to do.  Plus, they don't need watering....and they can take a hard freeze. Maybe I should JUST have bottle trees. Maybe not. :-0