Spring color

March 15, 2018 It’s Bloom Day, and Austin is abloom right now in Texas mountain laurel grapiness. Grapiness, you ask? Yes! Purple blossoms that draw comparisons to wisteria hang from every glossy-leaved branch and scent the air with the fragrance of grape Kool-Aid. It’s magical when Texas mountain laurels (Sophora ...

March 14, 2018 Honeybees are out in force, and gopher plant (Euphorbia rigida) is one of their early spring favorites. I’m abuzz over gopher plant’s chartreuse bracts and yellow flowers too — so sunny on these early spring days. Lemon-lime rules out front right now, with ‘Color Guard’ yucca, gopher ...

March 09, 2018 One of the few things I didn’t plant in my garden, the Mexican buckeye (Ungnadia speciosa) came with the house. When I first saw the buckeye-shaped seedpods dangling from its branches, I was excited to realize I’d inherited this small native tree. That first fall, its yellowing ...

March 02, 2018 ‘Sizzling Pink’ loropetalum is still sizzling in the lower garden and knocking my socks off every time I look at it. Yesterday the sun was lighting up those fuchsia blooms like a stained-glass window. The fringey flowers look like the pom-poms of a thousand cheerleaders. So colorful! ...

February 27, 2018 Just when I’d begun to stomp around, impatient for a little spring color in my shady garden (no daffodils, no quince, no plums, darn it!), Chinese fringeflower (Loropetalum chinense) burst into fuchsia bloom and saved the day. Hallelujah! Throughout my garden (even out front; deer don’t eat ...

February 25, 2018 Spring is coming along ever so slowly, although of course it’s still only February. But still — I’m so ready! Stepping out of my car in the driveway with a bag of groceries, I spotted this blazing color echo between flowering loropetalum in the island bed and ...

April 10, 2017 Live oak leaf and pollen season is finally over, and the patios are clean again, hallelujah! This calls for a spring garden stroll, so let’s go. I’ve been playing with a squid theme on one wall of the upper patio. A couple of tentacle pots from Tentacle ...

March 27, 2017 As buds began to swell last week, I’ve been eagerly awaiting the flowering of my pond iris. And this morning, three burgundy, yellow-throated flowers unfurled. They look especially picturesque as viewed against the turquoise shed doors. Several more buds mean more flowers to come. Jenny/Rock Rose gave ...

March 24, 2017 A wildflower photo safari is my springtime ritual, and I especially like to drive out to the Texas Hill Country to photograph wildflowers against the rugged hills, rocks, and prickly pear. This spring, thanks to a mild winter, Texas bluebonnets (Lupinus texensis) are carpeting roadsides a few ...

March 21, 2017 Happy Texas spring, y’all! I welcome your comments; please scroll to the end of this post to leave one. If you’re reading this in a subscription email, click here to visit Digging and find the comment box at the end of each post. _______________________ Digging Deeper: News ...

March 16, 2017 One of my favorite spring-blooming shrubs for bright shade features raspberry flowers and maroon leaves. It’s Chinese fringeflower (Loropetalum chinense ‘Sizzling Pink’), and its richly colored foliage contrasts beautifully with blue-green paleleaf yucca (Y. pallida) in a purple pot. Variegated pittosporum ‘Cream de Mint’ adds shade-brightening foliage ...

March 10, 2017 This vignette caught my eye in the lower garden as I was blowing a bazillion live oaks leaves (yes, it’s live oak leaf-drop season!): a culvert-pipe planted with squid agave, ‘Sizzling Pink’ loropetalum (I love that burgundy foliage), and a stepping-stone path leading up to the slabs ...

March 08, 2017 Regular readers know that my shady, dry, deer-infested patch of dirt is not a flowerlicious garden. And yet even I have, oh, at least 6 or 7 flowers in bloom as spring kicks off here in Austin. Like this sweet, nodding Chinese ground orchid (Bletilla striata). I ...

March 05, 2017 A week ago, my dad and I popped over to east Austin’s Mueller neighborhood for a springtime stroll around the Southwest Greenway. They have some pretty big spiders in those parts! I love this sculpture, Arachnophillia by Houston artist Dixie Friend Gay, which stands 23 feet tall ...

February 27, 2017 After speaking at the Native Plant Society of Texas Spring Symposium, held at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center last Saturday (and a big thank-you to the organizers and wonderful audience members!), I strolled the gardens with my dad, who was visiting from North Carolina. The early ...

June 16, 2016 The Brandywine Valley of Pennsylvania has been calling my name since 2008, when I passed through during a family road trip and fell in love with the rolling, wooded countryside, its charming villages and Revolutionary War history, and numerous estate gardens that make it a garden traveler’s ...