2nd garden–2016

January 01, 2017 January Happy New Year, everyone! Following Jean’s example at Dig, Grow, Compost, Blog, I’m recapping 2016 with a single photo from each of the past 12 months in my garden. Poring over my old blog posts, I was reminded of the fleeting charms of the passing seasons ...

December 29, 2016 ‘Vertigo’ pennisetum is singing the blues beautifully after three nights of hard freezes (mid 20s F) before Christmas. While other plants just look bleached and sad (variegated flax lily, I’m looking at you), this towering, dark-leaved grass still looks pretty, even though it’s now dormant. The TerraTrellis ...

December 28, 2016 A few days before Christmas, the front garden endured a major change: a fatally diseased live oak near our front door had to be removed. I’d had an arborist out the week before to give me a bid on general tree trimming, and he immediately spotted the ...

December 18, 2016 Austin plummeted from a high of 80 F (26.6 C) yesterday afternoon to 26 F (-3.3 C) this morning, and today the Japanese maple is clinging shiveringly to far fewer leaves than yesterday, when I took this photo. That’s Texas winter weather for you. In preparation for ...

December 16, 2016 I’ve been celebrating a belated fall here at Digging and on Instagram this week, as our Japanese maple flamed into orange and then red. Although it’s a little odd to see brilliant fall color at Christmastime, we deprived Texas gardeners happily take it whenever we can get ...

December 14, 2016 I’ve been out front gazing up at the Japanese maple again today (see yesterday’s pics for the rapid color change), enjoying those beautiful, blushing leaves. I believe we’re at peak redness, folks. I expect the leaves to drop this weekend during the predicted Arctic blast. But until ...

December 13, 2016 Just a couple of weeks ago I wrote that fall color is a dud this year in Austin. That’s still true, but as if in defiance of that observation, the Japanese maple (Acer palmatum) at the front corner of our house is flaming orange and red in ...

December 12, 2016 Add this western slimy salamander to the list of crawly critters that have fallen into our swimming pool. We spotted it at the bottom of the shallow end after our recent rains. David got the net without much hope of it being alive, but it moved when ...

December 05, 2016 It’s been raining since last Friday, so I thought I’d share a few garden pics taken before the deluge. This is one of my favorite combos for winter and indeed all year long (clockwise from top): ‘Soft Caress’ mahonia, Everillo sedge (Carex oshimensis ‘Everillo’), and ‘Sparkler’ sedge ...

December 01, 2016 I’m drinking up this grapey, effervescent combo of ‘Grapes’ gomphrena and variegated flax lily (Dianella tasmanica ‘Variegata’) in my garden right now. The tiny purple blooms of ‘Grapes’ look like miniature pom-poms, and it certainly cheers its way through autumn, its spindly stems supported by white-striped flax ...

November 16, 2016 Today is Foliage Follow-Up, a day to celebrate great foliage after the flower celebration of Garden Bloggers Bloom Day. Let’s take a spin around the back garden for my foliage faves this month, starting with the stock-tank pond garden. No flowers here since the water lilies slowed ...

November 11, 2016 Two months ago Moby, my big whale’s tongue agave (Agave ovatifolia), bloomed and sent up a tree-sized flower stalk, on which hundreds of bulbils (baby agave clones) eventually formed. You can read all about that here and here. I kept them misted through the last weeks of ...

October 13, 2016 It’s back-to-the-garden time in Texas, and it’s also garden-talk season! I’m making a few appearances around Texas this fall (see below), and you can also catch me this weekend on Austin’s own Central Texas Gardener TV show. Last fall, right before my garden was on tour, CTG ...

October 13, 2016 It’s back-to-the-garden time in Texas, and it’s also garden-talk season! I’m making a few appearances around Texas this fall (see below), and you can also catch me this weekend on Austin’s own Central Texas Gardener TV show. Last fall, right before my garden was on tour, CTG ...

October 05, 2016 Check out my neighbor’s beautiful blue rose of an agave, which I planted for her several years ago. Yes, you guessed it: it’s a whale’s tongue agave (A. ovatifolia), and it’s quickly grown into a truly stunning specimen. Surrounded by minty-leaved autumn sage (Salvia greggii), it has ...

September 29, 2016 Wow, what gorgeous weather we’ve been having: sunny, low humidity, and perfect for getting outside, whether to plant, doze in a chair, or just gaze at the garden as it moves into its second spring. The showiest plants in my garden this week are the oxblood lilies ...