Birds « Digging

February 7, 2010

Sculpture show enlivens Wildflower Center in winter

Filed under: Birds, Botanical Gardens, Garden art, Sculpture — Pam/Digging @ 10:05 am

Tweeet! Shaking his tail feathers and dancing to welcome spring, Pokey Park’s Midnight Serenade Pose 1 is just one of many nature- and human-themed sculptures on display at the Wildflower Center through March 7.

This bird will make you smile. He's dancing over a field of bluebonnet rosettes, and when that field turns blue (if it blooms before the sculpture show ends) his dance will truly seem an ode to spring.

We gardeners will be doing this when spring arrives in a few weeks.

Handsome Texas Jack by Marla Ripperda, framed by a window in a stone wall

7 Petal Fun Flower by Delbert Beckham. According to the price list, this sculpture was the most affordable at $450.

I think this is Guardian by Herb Long.

I like Hill Country Gemini by Peter Mangan.

Carin’s Offering by Barry George

Be sure to visit the Wildflower Center by March 7 to see the sculpture show. Many pieces are on display throughout the gardens, adding to the fun sense of discovery one always has when exploring a garden.

To see yesterday’s post about garden structures at the Wildflower Center, click on the link.

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December 28, 2009

Visit to Fort Worth Zoo

Filed under: Birds, Gates, Grasses, Travel, Wildlife, Zoos — Pam/Digging @ 5:12 am

Bundled up in coats, scarves, and seldom-worn gloves, we spent several enjoyable hours at the acclaimed Fort Worth Zoo yesterday before driving home to Austin, following a post-Christmas trip to Dallas to visit my DH’s extended family.

Among the many birds we saw at the zoo, these colorful flamingos were my favorite. An entire flock stood comically on single skinny legs, heads tucked into their back feathers, eyes shut tight against the sparkling light and blue skies.

The result of too much late-night reveling?

Or maybe just a peaceful way to soak up the warming rays of the sun.

A taller and more orange variety of flamingo preened and strutted nearby, not at all interested in taking naps.

This little burrowing owl had fluffed his feathers against the cold as he stood on one leg by his burrow, soaking up the sun.

Likewise, a fox lay curled up in the sun next to his hole and tucked nose to tail for a winter’s nap.

Another look

Unbothered by the cold, a pair of Siberian tigers were active and alert. This one posed majestically.

You can see a little snow on the ground at his feet.

Next door a pair of orange tigers rather more reluctantly ventured outside. The female promptly lay down and let the male lick her head.

He also snarled at her a couple of times.

She was unfazed.

I snapped a lizard mural on the wall of a building and accidentally inverted the colors when I was rescaling the image size. I like it better this way, actually.

More zoo art appeared on a gorgeous gate decorated with Texas scenery: live oaks, road runners, opuntia, agaves, etc.

Steel cut-outs like this owl on a tree make up the body of the gate…

…while bas-relief tiles of native animals decorate the upper portion of the gate. It really was stunning.

The wonderful Texas Wild! exhibit features native fauna from the different regions of Texas. Educational signs give information about the geographical features of each region as well as some of the plants and animals that live there. This sign about the Texas Hill Country and the Edwards Plateau, which reaches east to Austin, says that we have the largest white-tailed deer population in the world. Egad! No wonder deer are camped out in my front yard and my neighbors’ every night.

A surprise 3 inches of snow had fallen in Dallas and Fort Worth on Christmas Eve, and patches of it still remained as late as yesterday, to my kids’ delight. Snowball throwing ensued.

The zoo’s many palms were burlapped against the freezing weather. But plenty of other plants, like this ornamental cabbage, don’t require such pampering to look good in winter.

Miscanthus grass puts on a big show in fall…

…but also looks great in winter if left standing like this beautiful specimen.

We had a great time at the zoo and even relished the cold weather. But I’m planning to work all day in my garden today, trimming trees and thinning shrubs, so I’m hoping for a slight warm-up. I haven’t seen the forecast yet, but I’m feeling hopeful.

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November 8, 2009

Blogger field trip: San Antonio Botanical Garden

Filed under: Arbors, Bees, Birds, Botanical Gardens, Butterflies, Fall color, Garden blogging, Garden tours 2009, Grasses, Planters, Sculpture, Xeric plants — Pam/Digging @ 12:53 pm

A monarch and honeybee share space on a Mexican sunflower (Tithonia rotundiflora)

Twelve Austin garden bloggers caravaned to San Antonio on Saturday to visit San Antonio Botanical Garden and the Antique Rose Emporium, with a stop along the way at Madrone Nursery in San Marcos, a native-plant nursery open by appointment only. I had a great time getting to know new bloggers and seeing the sights with those who have become old friends.

San Antonio is an hour and a half south of Austin and shares a similar climate and geography. However, its gardens always seem much more tropical than ours.

I wonder if it’s really that much warmer there in the winter and whether they get more rainfall in the summer. Or maybe it’s simply the aesthetic of what they choose to plant, as Austinites can grow many tropicals as well.

Speaking of big and bold tropical plants, like these orange canna lilies, check out this terrifyingly large praying mantis. It’s part of the Big Bugs exhibit on display through January 3rd. A few years ago, Big Bugs came to the Wildflower Center in Austin; click for my pics.

The garden is located in what I think of as Old San Antonio, the lush, green oasis near the center of town, where the Alamo, the Riverwalk, the zoo, and other gardens can be found. This detail of a formal fountain (turned off, sadly, like all the others due to watering restrictions during the ongoing drought) reminds me of the city’s Spanish missions.

Red hibiscus

Succulents in a simple clay pot

A series of wisteria-draped arbors creates a shady tunnel near the entrance to the garden. I’d love to see this in bloom one day.

~~Firecracker fern or a penstemon? I’m not sure.~~ Update: Consensus is a penstemon of some sort, perhaps firecracker penstemon (Penstemon eatonii).

Here it is again (on the left), with cigar plant (Cuphea ignea), Gulf muhly grass, and a columnar cactus. What a unique grouping!

We all rushed over to snap pics of a flock of sparrows noshing on grass seeds.

I noticed a lot of chartreuse paired with dark purple or “black” foliage. I think this is duranta in front and purple heart spilling over a wall in back.

Wow, check out this black beautyberry (Callicarpa acuminata). I love the dark wine-colored berries of this variety.

Appropriately named butterfly Clerodendrum (Rotheca myricoides ‘Ugandense’).

What passes for fall color in central Texas appeared to advantage along a small lake. The bald cypresses were turning rusty orange.

Another look

The Japanese garden is smaller than Austin’s Taniguchi Garden at Zilker Botanical Garden, and the pond is dry due to the watering restrictions (were there no fish?). But this expressive vignette of a yellowing Japanese maple and stone lantern caught my eye.

The woven fence that surrounds the garden is beautiful.

Elsewhere in the garden, another Japanese maple in a pot gives a little fall color.

Of course, cacti are perhaps better suited to San Antonio’s climate than Japanese maples, and the garden showcases plenty of them, including this non-native columnar giant.

Looking at this image on my computer, I noticed the bee impaled on one of the spines. I wonder how that happened.

How I love ‘Ruby Crystals’ grass (Melinis nerviglumis).

It grows only about 2 feet tall and is reputed to be drought-tolerant and a heavy reseeder. But I had three little ones in my old garden in full sun that struggled and never did much. Maybe I’ll try it again one day.

Texas sotols shimmer and capture the light.

I’m not sure what kind of cactus this is, but the yellow fruit caught my eye.

They look like miniature pineapples, don’t they?

Yucca leaves

Tender succulents and cacti as well as tropical plants are displayed in several conservatories.

Agave

The botanical garden showcases a number of beautiful palms.

Garden sculpture

In one conservatory I noticed this lovely red euphorbia flower.

Persian shield’s gorgeous purple-and-silver foliage adds rich color to a shady garden. This is an annual in Austin.

Like ‘Diamond Frost’ euphorbia, white spiderwort provides an airy, bright border for a shade garden.

Aloes were in bloom in the Old-Fashioned Garden. Aloes are old-fashioned? Funny, they have such a contemporary vibe in Austin.

Tithonia is a favorite of the migrating monarchs.

After seeing the botanical garden we headed over to the Antique Rose Emporium (click for my post about it), where this picture was taken. From left to right, front to back: Jenny of Rock Rose, Laura of Some Like It Hot, Diana of Sharing Nature’s Garden, Caroline of The Shovel-Ready Garden, Meredith of Great Stems, Eleanor of Garden of E, Lori of The Gardener of Good and Evil, MSS of Zanthan Gardens, Rachel of In Bloom, Amy of Go Away, I’m Gardening!, and myself right here at Digging. Not pictured: Jenny of Morning Glories in Round Rock, who had to leave early. Thanks, everyone, for coming along and making it such a fun outing!

If you’re curious about last year’s blogger field trip to Peckerwood Garden, click here. And if you’d like more of the San Antonio Botanical Garden, click for my post about a late-summer visit in 2007.

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September 4, 2009

Mysterious night garden

Filed under: 2nd garden--2009, Birds, Wildlife — Pam/Digging @ 6:01 am

Datura metel

Late last night, I opened the front door to water a wilted plant on the porch and heard a mysterious rustling. Peering into the shadows I spotted the armadillo that’s been digging under my fence nearly every night to dig up my new plants in his search for grubs and worms. I ran for the flashlight and returned to chase him off, but I caught only a glimpse of his tail disappearing around the corner of the house, and then he was gone. Off to rampage in someone else’s garden, or looking for another way under my fence? It’s a mystery until the morning light reveals the answer.

Deciding to check on the security of my fence, which I’ve lined here and there with stones to block digging access, I heard a strange whinnying sound in the trees. Wondering what kind of animal it could be, I shined my flashlight up but saw nothing. It suddenly occurred to me that it was a screech owl. Is a pair nesting in the owl box at last? (The squatter squirrel seems to have moved out.) Another mystery. Later I confirmed that it was a screech owl I heard by listening to a screech owl’s call on the Internet. That’s exactly what I heard. Isn’t the Internet grand?

Wondering about the owl but satisfied that the armadillo was not currently uprooting my garden, I turned to go back inside but stopped short when I noticed the trumpet-shaped blooms of the Datura metel glowing in the flashlight’s beam. It seemed worth the trouble to get out my tripod and set up a shot that reflects the mysterious nature of the garden at night, under a full moon.

Are there any nightly mysteries occurring in your garden?

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