Day at the Farm August 26, 2023

I worked on Friday from the farm.  Saturday I spent the morning working in the gardens.  Headed home in the afternoon for Dad's 90th birthday party at The Annie Café.

This is a little purslane wilding that showed up.  I decided to dig it out of the path and plant it as a border.  I'm hoping it will multiply.  The other purslane with yellow flowers certainly multiplies, but it is not as pretty.  This one is barely pretty, but better that plain dirt.

These are cockscomb.  Another example of seeds that I spread from one garden to another last fall. I love when that happens.

This pop of hot pink color is a Passalong Verbena.  

I watered the Mangaves around the pool.  

I finished laying gravel in the Medicine Garden, the whole area has been freshened up.  Weeded and watered while I worked.

I cut away plants leaning into the long front path at the front of the Star Garden and laid down gravel in a thin layer.  Weeded as I worked.  

I cut back all my basil and salvia in the Rose Garden.  I didn't cut it all the way to the ground, but I cut off all the flowers and buds so that I will have fresh flowers and buds for the wedding.  I left all the debris just lying on the ground, I will have to rake next time I'm there. I also trimmed back the trailing purple lantana so that it was clear of the path.  I clambered into the Noisette bed and weeded, I had made some progress on that bed a few weeks back, so there was not much to do.  I'm going to get Bert to removed the cedar barrier that has been there for many years.  It's really not needed anymore, and it makes it difficult to get in there.

Watered in the White Garden. and all the little native trees that surround it.

I weeded for a bit in the Vegetable Garden.  Most of the sunflowers have popped up.  I will wait a bit longer to see if the seeds that I sowed too deep will pop up.  If not I will sow some more.  The arugula, parsley and marigold seeds have sprouted as well.

Re-set my sprinklers.  Headed home.

Alamo Vine August 20, 2023

 The more time I spend growing this vine the more I love it.  Pretty leaves, pretty pods that turn from green to a fascinating star shape.  And white flowers with a pink eye that open in the afternoon and close by sundown.  This is a perennial, deciduous vine that spreads and gets more robust each year.  It has 4 large seeds in every pod, and they sprout easily.  It performs beautifully in 105 degree, dry weather.

Weekend at the Farm August 18 - 20, 2023

 

I worked on Friday.  Bert arrived in the afternoon after golf.  Another scorcher, no rain in sight.

I watered here and there.  My Fragrant Mimosa ( Texas native small tree / large shrub) has a bloom on it, the first I've seen.  And true to its name, it smells wonderful.

After work I went outside to the Vegetable Garden and worked in there until about 7:30.  I pulled weeds - the entire garden was choked with weeds, I haven't touched it since my surgery.  But it was pleasant outside (that is a relative term, of course), and so I got a lot done.  I sowed Maya sunflower seeds in 2 4 x 4 beds and the big bed in the middle and an 8 x 4.  I sowed some arugula, a little bit of cilantro and lots of red marigold seed along the edges of the beds.

Saturday, up before dawn and outside at first light.  It's back to the same old heat.  So much for our cold front.  I worked in the Star Garden pinning down landscape cloth, shoveling and laying down gravel.  I watered here and there.

Two women that rent our place on an annual basis each June drove up from Shiner, Texas to pick beautyberries.  They grow wild here, and they asked me if they could harvest berries.  Beautyberries can be made into jelly.  They are going to send me a jar.  The drought has made most of the berries un-harvestable, but they managed to find a bagful. 

Bert carried the granite rocks over to the pool where I am trying to make a step with stepping stones and gravel.  In the evening when the weather cooled down I filled in the landscape strips around the stepping stones (that Bert put in the ground - a huge help) with gravel.  It gives that area a little definition, makes it more appealing looking.

Sunday, up before dawn again and outside at first light.  

I turned over the soil in the 16 x 2 bed in the Vegetable Garden and sowed Maya sunflowers.  I sowed parsley in one of my feed buckets.

I continued working in the Star Garden laying down gravel.  I dug up all the flagstone where the sculpture is and laid down landscape cloth and gravel.  Watered here and there in the Star Garden while I worked.  I put the flagstone back on top of the gravel.

I weeded in the bed with the tall vervain and cut it all down to the ground.  Hopefully I will get a fall show, but this is only the second year I have grown it, and I don't know if it will respond to being cut back.  

I cut down most of the cannas and watered.  I'm hoping to have a good show of cannas in October.  If I keep them watered I think I can get all new stands of them by then.

Pulled weeds here and there, but it's too dry for the weeds to be rampant, and so I'd rather make that effort when the date gets a little closer so I don't have to do it again.

I laid down gravel in the Medicine Garden for a bit, but it was dangerously hot.

Set all my sprinklers up.  Headed to Houston in the late afternoon.

Weekend at the Farm August 11 - 13, 2023

 

Strawberry Smoothie Althea really performs in this heat and drought.  Very impressive.

Arrived on Friday and worked. Bert drove up separately after golf.

Saturday.  I was up by 5:00 drinking coffee, out before 7:00.  I spent the morning shoveling and spreading gravel.  Bert and Max had loaded cast-off rock from Max's yard into Josh and Amy's truck.  Bert drove it up here.  I can always use landscaping rock.  I used 7 or so at the top of the path that leads to the pool from the house.  I plan to make a step there with landscape edging.  I used some of the rock to outline the curving path that leads to the Greenhouse Gardens.  That's it so far. 

I laid down some landscape cloth on the ground where the curving path meets the arbor and laid down gravel over that to spruce it up.  The rock and the fresh gravel are right where the people will be congregating for Max's wedding reception.  

I also laid down landscape cloth where I dug up the flowerbed last week.  Covered it with gravel.  More to do in that area.  I'm going to decrease the size of a nearby bed so that the path is wider where the people are going to be walking to the ceremony area. 

Inside during the hot part of the day.  

I went back outside about 5:00 and pulled weeds in the Kitchen Herb Garden.  That was a task where your heart is in your throat.  The bed was choked with weeds, so not easy to see snakes.  I was betting on them liking a more cleared out area.  I didn't run into any.  I planted 3 Chili Pequin next to the half dozen or so that are already growing there.  

Sunday.  Up at 5:00, out by 6:30.  I shortened the bed (which widened the path) in the Star Garden along the path everyone will walk on to get to the ceremony.  I pinned down landscape cloth from the gate next to the air conditioners and past the open space by the propane lid.  I cut down and poisoned a beautiful blue mist plant growing next to the propane tank because I didn't want to dig it out (too close to the propane tank).  Shoveled and spread gravel.  

I pulled out a wheelbarrow full of ageratum in the Dining Room bed.  It was smothering my Rudbeckia.  Did some weeding and trimming away from the path.

Watered in the White Garden.  Watered in the Rose Garden.  Everything is barely alive.  It's so depressing.  I sweat buckets throughout the day.  I changed clothes 5 times because everything got so sweaty.  I swam in the pool, rarely do I swim by myself in the pool, but it was so hot.

 

Weekend at the Farm August 4 - 6, 2023

 

This is Obedient Plant.  It blooms in the dead of summer, so it is very useful in the garden.  Most things have given up the ghost by now.   

It has been over 100 degrees for weeks and weeks with no rain at all.  The Gulf Coast road trip with Nan, Josh, Sam and Koy, my surgery, and then a series of Airbnb guests have kept me from beginning my preparation for Max's wedding in October.  Until now.

Friday morning before it got too hot, I began shoveling and spreading decomposed granite.  I've had 10 yards sitting next to the arbor for weeks.  I am concentrating first on the area around and near the pool.  That is where most of the foot traffic for the wedding will be.  I got most of the path in the Medicine Garden done where the infinity sculpture is.

I fertilized the little bit of St. John's Wort that I have left and watered it in.  I used to have gorgeous stands of a tall variety of St. John's Wort - gorgeous spring flowers -  all along both sides of the path in the Medicine Garden, but 2 drought-y summers in a row have all but made it disappear.  I am going to try and bring it back since I have not seen that variety in any nurseries since I initially planted it many years ago.

I pulled up lots of basket grass along the paths because it is crowding out all my Selfheal.  I wish I'd done it sooner, but at least the basket grass hasn't gone to seed yet.

I cut away Turk's Cap and Elderberry in the Medicine Garden that was leaning into the path where I was laying down gravel.

Watered in Mom's garden.

I pulled weeds here and there in the Star Garden, but I went inside before it got too hot. 

I went back outside around 7:00 after the sun went down.  I spread a few wheelbarrows of gravel, but didn't do much else.  I stuck a half dozen or so seed heads of gomphrena in the ground in the Star Garden that I collected last year.  I did that last weekend in the Rose Garden, and they have already popped up.  When you plant a whole seed head about 100 seedlings sprout, so I have to cut away most of them.  

Saturday.  I wanted to get up at 6:00 but I slept right past that until 7:00.  Straight outside to shovel and spread gravel.  I began working in the area between the deck and the Medicine Garden.  I put down 2 green strips that I had laying around and 4 pieces of flagstone that I got from Max.  The side of that area closest to the Greenhouse needed some definition.  While I worked, I spot watered in some areas.  I watered 3 Beautyberry shrubs in the unfinished area nearby that were gasping.  Might as well keep them alive.  

I pulled up some chicken wire that I laid down some years ago across the beds where the Barbados Cherries grow.  I was trying to deter armadillos.  But, those areas really don't get a lot of armadillo activity since they stay mostly dry.  I cleaned out the beds and planted 7 Gregg's Mist ageratum.  Watered them in well (so here come the armadillos...)

I watered a neglected Beautyberry in the shady part of the Star Garden.  I watered it with the hose connected to the cistern.  So, I stayed over there clearing basket grass out of a bed because I knew I would forget about leaving the cistern hose running if I left the area.  I fertilized the Firespike in that bed.

I did some first aid to my potted succulents in the Medicine Garden.  I moved 3 pots to a shadier area, added some loose soil so that they would root fresh sprigs, and I fertilized them.  

Bert and I drove to the Thames' place, and I bought 3 chili pequin and 5 Beebrush.  I'm very excited about the Beebrush.  Anne Thames thinks I'm crazy to be gardening in this heat.  Well, most people would love their high summer gardens if they ever went in them.  But it's so hot, most folks retreat to the air conditioning.  I don't have that luxury this year.  Max's wedding is driving me forward!

Then inside for several hours to avoid the hottest part of the day.  Back out at 6:00, and I worked until 8:00.  I dug holes for my smooth prickly pear plants over by the pool.  Bert pulled out the dead Hawthorn shrubs that used to be there.  I poured water into the holes to moisten the hard, dry clay in that area.

Next I went to the Star Garden to plant 2 Forsythia Sage next to the Firespike in the bed I cleared out earlier in the day.  They are both fall bloomers, so that should be pretty.  If I get motivated, I will dig up a clump of ferns from the Dining Room bed and plant it in that bed as well.  That should be pretty - ferns, Firespike and the sage.  This is the shady part of the Star Garden, and I don't spend much time in there, it needed some loving care.

I am going to make the area next to the back gate a bit bigger, so I pulled out the cedar edging of a bed that has never really done well.  All the sprinklers miss that bed.  I dug out the soil and threw it in the bed where the Forsythia sage was just planted.  And I basically evened out the soil so that it was the same height as the paths.  I will lay down gravel there and make a  large-ish area to walk in un-molested by plant branches.  

I spent some time pulling basket grass out of one of the nearby beds and cutting back white Turks Cap and Mystic Spires salvia.  

I moved 2 pots out of the Star Garden.  I put one next to the pool because it was a mangave.  And I planted some fuzzy pink and green Wandering Jew that Anne Thames gave me.  I've never seen it before.  I hope it makes it, it was really striking in Anne's garden.

Sunday.  Out the door by 7:00.  I spread gravel for a bit.

Watered in the Rose Garden.  I stuck some gomphrena seed heads in the ground here and there.  I finally staked my little althea that has been laying on the ground for the longest time.  I planted a Velvet Leaf Senna next to it.  

I pulled up all the struggling zinnias in the bed at the front of the Rose Garden and planted 3 of the Beebrush.  Watered them in well.

I planted the other 2 Beebrush in the White Garden.  Watered them in well.

I got the 2 smooth prickly pear plants in the ground.  Fertilized them and poured some water over them.  Then I spread gravel over the whole bed so that they look very desert-y.  

Watered in the White Garden.

Watered my St. John's Wort again in my pursuit of rejuvenating the gorgeous stand I used to have.

Fertilized my pinecone ginger.

I harvested seeds from Alamo Vine and sowed them in the White Garden.  They have a red throat, but they are basically white.  Alamo Vine has been a champion all summer long in the Rose Garden.  The intense heat we have been suffering does not seem to slow it down.  Very impressive.

I cut back to the ground all the Indigo Spires salvia in the Star Garden.  It was after noon and extremely hot, but I got it done.  Spot watered while I was doing it.  I watered the white mist flower under the oak and several other beds.  

Set up all my sprinklers.  Put away all my tools.  Dumped my debris in an erosion spot.  Headed home.