Water gardening

August 23, 2009 Cousin Itt has a new home. I brought this potted Texas nolina (Nolina texana) from my old garden right before we leased the Unsold House, and it has been sitting on a wheeled cart in the back yard for a couple of weeks as I pondered where ...

August 23, 2009 Cousin Itt has a new home. I brought this potted Texas nolina (Nolina texana) from my old garden right before we leased the Unsold House, and it has been sitting on a wheeled cart in the back yard for a couple of weeks as I pondered where ...

August 20, 2009 First, the screaming yellow of Rudbeckia hirta ‘Irish Eyes’. My son sowed these from seed at the end of March. They’ve been blooming for several weeks. While these are nice for a change, I still prefer the classic (not boring, no siree) black-eyed Susan from my old ...

August 20, 2009 Pollinating and making honey must be thirsty work. Every day the bees belly up to the cattle-trough container pond to quench their thirst. This one found a convenient pollen source in the pond. The goldfish must be wondering why the bees are staring in their windows. All ...

August 15, 2009 The stock-tank container pond is looking good It’s all doom and gloom in Austin right now because of the drought and ongoing heat wave. More severe watering restrictions will go into effect on the 24th (thanks, Iris, for the heads-up). But I didn’t feel gloomy in my ...

August 03, 2009 I can’t resist showing off some more pond beauty on this Monday. Here’s ‘Colorado’ water lily, as lovely as a sunrise in her namesake state. And here’s our blue dragonfly again, standing out against the blurred background of lawn grass. Another look. Thanks for stopping by, dragonfly, ...

August 01, 2009 The floating flowers of ‘Helvola’ Nymphaea shine like pale yellow stars with buttery centers. A constellation of them have opened recently. A hardy dwarf water lily, ‘Helvola’ is the perfect size for small container ponds. Its diminutive flowers are about 2 inches across, and the cloven leaves, ...

July 31, 2009 Two weeks after installing my new 717-gallon stock-tank pond, the water has cleared to a soft green, which I actually quite like. I can see the fish clearly, but the water is not so crystalline that the underwater pots and cinderblocks stand out. If I’d waited another ...

July 27, 2009 Living in a drought for three years, now classified as “exceptional,” a gardener can get a little soul-weary. A still pond, I’m finding, has healing powers. The surface may be starred with the most beautiful of flowers, the water lily. This one is ‘Colorado.’ Orange and red ...

July 23, 2009 It’s been just over a week since I installed my stock-tank pond, and the water has, predictably, turned mossy green from algae. No worries though. It’ll clear up pretty soon. The triple offense of submerged, oxygenating plants, algae-eating fish, and surface-covering water lilies will work their magic ...

July 15, 2009 How do you attract dragonflies to your garden? Simple. Build a pond and put a vertical plant in it. This red dragonfly, which I spotted on a strappy leaf of the pond lily, skittishly flew away when I approached. But after buzzing back and forth across the ...

July 14, 2009Over the years of blogging about my stock-tank ponds (a 100-gallon container pond in my former garden, and this new 717-gallon one), I’ve been asked many times how I constructed them. I finished the new pond yesterday evening, so I’ll explain how I did it, from start to ...

July 08, 2009 The unfinished stock-tank pond was making me feel lazy. So this morning I got out a measuring tape, level, shovel, gloves, bug spray, and sun hat, and got to work. My vacationing husband helped me measure and dig the trench for the retaining wall, and then he ...

July 06, 2009 If you’ve been following my saga of the unfinished stock-tank pond with furrowed brow, wondering why I don’t get off my butt and finish it, take heart. My helpful husband went to the stoneyard with me this morning to help me haul home a trunkload of limestone ...

June 22, 2009 The first bud on my new ‘Colorado’ water lily opened this morning, the day after I bought it at Hill Country Water Gardens‘ “Night at the Ponds” event and sale (click here for Gardening at Draco’s post about the pond event). Isn’t it a beauty? Now you ...

May 13, 2009 As I was gazing down on the circle lawn one afternoon… …I realized that the bit of lawn wasn’t really floating my boat. Wouldn’t it be more fun, I mused, to have a big ole stock tank pond in the middle? Oh yeah!! It was time to ...