Cactus saga continues

I am remiss in updating my blog on a neighborhood cactus that I thought was gone for good. Back in March 2012, I shared a photo of the beautiful cactus that grew behind us on a neighbor's property. Our sweet neighbor, who's in heaven now, told us to dig it up and plant it on our land. But I wanted it to live in peace right where it was. Then in September 2019, I noticed that the cactus was dying so I rescued the remaining pieces and potted them up. Later they went to live at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center. 

Fast forward to October 2021. Imagine my surprise and joy when I found a cactus descendant in our yard! How in the world did it get THERE? When I showed it to our late neighbor's son, he chuckled. "Looks like a bird planted it," he said. DUH, Sheryl! Yes, a bird sat on the fence and did its business. VOILA! – our own Missouri foxtail cactus (Escobaria missouriensis)!

October 2021

October 2021

 

April 2023

April 2023

 

Eve's necklace close call!

In October 2021, James painstakingly planted and caged an Eve's necklace (Styphnolobium affine) that was gifted to us by Matt Murrah. The tree was doing pretty well, although one large branch had recently turned brown and died. Then came February's ice storm. We lost some branches in our yard but not that many. In the Meadow, we noticed that a limb on a neighboring live oak had cracked. Sure enough, in March it fell...right on the Eve's necklace and its cage! As you can see from the photo, the huge limb fell in the middle of the tree. The Eve's necklace's dead limb is on the ground to the right. Its surviving half is to the left. We'd thought maybe we could leave the tree uncaged. Nope. Neighborhood deer have been nibbling on the leaves.

Yesterday, James worked more than an hour to put another cage around the young tree. When Matt got an update on our Eve's necklace, he texted back: "Just think: if that sucker can make it through drought, oak branch attacks, and deer nibbles, it can make it through anything!" I'm sure hoping so, Matt!

A high-rise dilemma

Have you ever seen prickly pear growing high in the bend of tree? I have. Several times. But imagine our surprise when we looked up last year and saw a HACKBERRY growing in one of our big live oaks in the back! This is not good. It has to be at least 15 feet up there! I was hoping the recent ice storm would have killed it. Nope. James says he gonna pull it .... I'm not feeling too good about that either.

Notes to myself

This morning, we dug up rocks from the western end of this bed to the arrow. I remembered that when we added on to this large front bed between the two live oaks, we didn't take out an existing rock border. Through the years, leaf debris had covered them up really well! There are still more under the mealy sages.

Front yard fun

Texas kidneywood

So we had two yard volunteers that we wanted to keep and plant somewhere. This morning, we were looking at beds in the front yard and from there .... the work began!

Above is a volunteer Texas kidneywood (Eysenhardtia texana), which we centered in a large bed of turk's cap, flame acanthus, rock rose, red galeana salvia and fragrant mistflower. We bought the parent tree in April 2015, and it's growing really well. Pollinators love the white flowers. Below is an evergreen sumac (Rhus virens), which I spotted in the back yard. We planted the parent plant in April 2014 also in the back yard. The February 2021 blizzard took a toll on it. Then James decided it needed to go becase because – alas! – it was growing too close to the house. I'd said I'd like to get another one and plant it somewhere else.... Then this little one showed up last year!  

So we ended up joining two beds and planting the sumac there. We also spruced up an area where we put an iron bench. Fun!

Evergreen sumac

Salvia 'Victoria Blue'

This is the best year EVER for our salvia 'Victoria Blue,' which we purchased from the Arnosky Farmily Farms in 2008 or before. And it's in our front yard, which is frequented by deer.

Salvia 'Victoria Blue' (circa 2008)

(THIS WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN MAY 2008; I tried to edit it and messed it all up) 

 

In the front yard, our little salvia 'Victoria Blue' is blooming.

 

 

 

 

 

Salvia farinacea
'Victoria Blue'

I love rain lilies

This is a neighborhood native that has grown for as long as I can remember in our side yard – Hill Country rain lily (Cooperia pedunculata). I afraid for a year or two that the deer might eradicate it. But nope!

A maybe sad bee story UPDATED

Do you remember the eastern carpenter bee that I found before the Master Naturalist class toured our yard last Thursday? She was very legarthic and hardly moved. I carried her around in my hand for an hour, then I released her in the damianita. I assumed those were milkweed pollinia (pollen sacs) on her front legs.

Yesterday, trainee Karen B. emailed me: "...I took a photo of the bee and forwarded it to my biologist daughter, who then forwarded to her friend who has a PhD in parasitic insect fungi. After looking at the photo, her friend believes the bee is infected with Laboulbeniales. I thought you might be interested to hear this. Thank you for sharing your paradise!"

Yikes, that's a new one to me – an insect-associated fungi! I'll keep a look out now for that. Thanks, Karen!  

UPDATE April 19, 2023 – I shared this photo on iNaturalist yesterday. @michieldg responded: Yeah, they're pollinia. As far as I know, there's no Labouls on bees, and typically they're one constant elongated shape attached to the animal, rather than the thick-then-thin that these are." 

When I Googled Labouleniales images, I noticed that mostly infected ladybugs turned up. So this is good news for our yard. But I'll still watch out for that fungi.

New additions

Last Saturday, we headed to the Blanco square for the monthly Market Day. Bonus: The Blanco County Master Gardeners held their spring plant sale (to which we donated a lot of plants). I came home with two Maximilian sunflowers (Helianthus maximiliani) – last year's drought decimated all but two of ours – and one blue phacelia (Phacelia patuliflora). The phacelia came with a tropical sage. And I've been able to collect seeds already. It's related to blue curls (Phacelia congesta), which has nearly taken over our back yard this year. Lots of blue curl seeds to collect in the very near future!

Me by some of the plants I donated.

Blue phacelia seeds

2023 TMN class visits

Patty and Stephen Harrell

 

Yesterday I presented my "Spiders of Central Texas" program to the 2023 class of Texas Master Naturalists with the Highland Lakes chapter. Later, everyone came to tour our gardens. Just before they arrived, I found an eastern carpenter bee on our driveway. I scooped her up and carried her around. See the pollen sacs on her legs? That means she visited some antelope horns flowers. It was a beautiful day to be outside! I wish I gotten more photo, but at least I got these. After everyone left, I gently placed my bee friend on our damianita flowers. 

Before I gave my spider presentation, Patty Ritchie Harrell gave me the BEST introduction ever before my presentation. So personal! That's because she, her sister Claire, and I grew up on the same street in Calallen (Corpus Christi). To top that, she married Stephen Harrell, whose younger brother graduated with me from Calallen High School. If you'll recall, my husband James also graduated from Calallen. THANK YOU, PATTY!