Good rain, bad break

It's nearly 7 p.m., and we're still getting rain from Tropical Storm Hermine (probably 4+ inches of rain so far). Which is good. Real good. However, when I looked out a front window this afternoon, this is what I saw....


...a bad break. A huge limb had broken off and fallen onto our garden beds. It was a very sad sight, like losing a piece of a dear friend. Right away, I e-mailed our county biologist with the Texas Forest Service, asking about whether we'd need to worry about painting the wound (a preventative measure against oak wilt).

Right away, Robert Edmonson responded: "Are you planning on sawing off the broken part and making a proper pruning cut? If so, paint it then. If not, I wouldn’t worry too much about it. It is best to paint all wounds; however, this time of year is the least likely to get oak wilt introduced into the tree via spore-carrying sap beetle."

That made us feel better. Because the break is WAY up in the tree. It'd be hard to find someone who help us get up there and get the cut painted.

When the rains let up some after supper, James ventured outside with his camera and got these photos. The picture below shows the INSIDE of the limb that fell. It was hollow and evidently a long-time squirrel den (complete with bathroom).

Snow in September and June, too

A few weeks ago, James noticed a very pretty, variegated plant growing happily in a front bed, right next to our big common sunflower. "Do you know what it is?" he asked me. No, I said, "I'm going to wait and see how it flowers." That's all it took–one bloom–and I figured it out. "That's snow on the mountain," I told James.

If you're out and about driving, you'll see LOTS of snow on the mountain in bloom right now, especially in fields and pastures. I guess some bird dropped off some seeds in our yard because I've never seen it growing around here.


By the way, see if you can find the three critters in the photo above (click on it for a bigger view)...I didn't see the eight-legged one at first. She was lurking under the flowers.

In the meantime, our welcome rain of 1+ inches two days ago must have our resident green June beetles into action. They're flying and buzzing and bumping into everything right now. Maybe they just pupated?

Native plant search engine

Here's a neat resource: the Native Plants of Texas Search Engine.

"NPOT was built by my husband and me," Josephine Kenney wrote me, "because we love native plants, and at the time there wasn't much to search on."

Good job, Kenneys! And we love our native plants, too!

Caterpillars and a ladybug

A few days ago, I spotted our first queen caterpillar on the butterfly weed. It was already pretty large. Then, while James and I were mulching mulching mulching Tuesday, I looked and couldn't find it. "Darn, a bird must have found it," I lamented. "So we're just raising caterpillars for the birds?"

Yesterday, however, good news! I found the caterpillar again! Figured I'd better take a photo this time. It didn't care. It was too busy chowing down.


In the back yard, I found another twice-stabbed ladybug (Chilocorus stigma). Isn't this species pretty?

I also checked on all the crimson patch (Chlosyne janais) caterpillars on the flame acanthus. They're getting BIG. So far, there is plenty of leaves still left.

Beware of dog NOT

Look what I did! This old metal sign has been hanging on our chain-link fence for YEARS. I think it used to say "BEWARE OF DOG." Our neighbors, Dan and Marcella, yesterday told us that yes, the Bendeles (Henry and Bonnie, who built and lived in the Pink House before us and are now in heaven), did have a dog at one time, but it was pretty much harmless. Anyway, I decided I'd take down the sign and redo it! I think it turned out very nice, if you don't mind me saying.

First, I sanded the metal a little. Then I painted it white. Over that, I painted the green (a color we used to paint our home office). I used Sharpies to fill in the text, flower and little "buzzing" butterfly (my friend, Martha, loaned me the stencils and white paint). Finally, I applied a protective gloss. Two hours or so later–voila!

Family time!

Yay! My 10-year-old nephew, Brandon, and sister-in-law, Laura, from Katy, Texas, along with my mother, Marcelle, visited this past Tuesday! Brandon has grown A LOT! Pretty soon, he's gonna outgrow his mother AND me. It was just great to see them both.

Naturally, we toured them around the Wildscape and introduced them to everyone...

I looked for Gulf fritillary caterpillars on the passionflower vines in the back yard (above) but couldn't turn any up. I did show Brandon my green friend, the praying mantis on the Jerusalem sage (below).



And I did manage to find one big fritillary caterpillar on the passionflower in the front yard (above). I think Brandon was impressed. Thanks for coming, #1 Favorite Nephew!

Corn crop

Remember our surprise crops? How I found corn planted around the Wildscape by our furry friends, the squirrels? I forgot to post some photos that James took of our "harvest" last month.

After he picked the two ears, James put them both in our squirrel feeder.

Way to go, squirrels!