A Weekend at the Farm October 12 - 14, 2012

I believe this is a Bordered Patch butterfly.  I tried for a long time to get a photo with its wings spread out, but I never could do it.  I also saw a Julia butterfly this weekend.  Julias look similar to Gulf Fritillaries, they are orange, but they have no black markings on the wings, the undersides of the wings have much more subtle markings than the Gulf Fritillaries do, their wings are longer.

Went up on Friday after the Bulb Mart.  Went to a wedding in Conroe on Saturday night, returned to Burton that night.  A lot of driving!

• Planted 60 Rolf Fiedler Ipheion bulbs in the Rose Garden that I bought at the Bulb Mart.
• Planted a Pink Vitex agnus castus, also from the Bulb Mart, in the Star Garden.
• Planted a red Passiflora coccinea from the Bulb Mart under the arbor that leads into the Long Border. 
• Planted 9 Galactic Gold Bearded Iris at the entrance to the Star Garden and 3 in the front bed.
• It rained a lot this weekend.  We got some good rain.  It rained at some point during the week also.  I was worried about my newly planted shrubs from Woodlanders, but they were fine, the rain was helpful.  My husband and I woke up before day light on Sunday and sat on the porch and watched the rain in the dark until it became light.  
• I finished my Circle Drive landscaping project on Saturday.  Looks great.  Had some rock left over and repaired a few spots near the front of the house.
• I used the last of my compost that was in the compost enclosure that my husband built while I was planting the plants I bought at the Bulb Mart.  But I have a long pile of rotting material outside the enclosure against the Vegetable Garden fence.  So I scooped it up and threw it into the enclosure so it doesn't completely rot out the fence.  It was one big fire ant pile.  Very tricky to fork it all up into the wheelbarrow and dump it into the compost enclosure.  I got more than a few ant bites.  But mission accomplished.  The pile has been totally turned over which it needed. And it has been moved into its proper spot.  Of course later that day I started a new pile along the fence...
• Watched butterflies.  
• Pulled weeds. 
• Sprayed herbicide in the Orchard on Saturday before the rain.  Hopefully it had time to absorb into the leaves before the rain began.  I'm sure its fine.
•  Picked okra and green beans.  I've got a bunch of both!  Gallon baggies full of both.
• Came up on a small snake while rooting around in the green beans.  He was wound around one of the plants.  I cut off his head with my scissors and kept on going.  No problem!  Texas women kill their own snakes.