Texas Hill Country Garden

Donkey ear has pups. So many that I shared most of them. The pups are at the end of the leaves. So neat! Nature finds a million different ways to do the same thing. God is amazing!

This plant is growing in a hanging basket. It started from a 2 inch piece of a leaf from a plant growing at a nursery. I did obtain the owners permission before taking the piece. In the nursery, this was in a very large hanging plant.
Update: I thought it would eventually hang down like in the nursery, but as of January 2020, this plant is about 4 feet high. I may need to research this a bit.

This old house was falling apart, but still popular. I bought a new one and my hubby replaced it this year. I hope to post a picture of the new house with birds in it soon!

Do not own this, but it is on the wish list. Only time will tell. Opportunity cost…

One thing we are working on is creating spots in the garden where we can sit and ‘smell the roses’. Here is one spot. We often sit here and drink water and catch our breath when working in the yard. The older we get, the more rest spots we seem to want. ha.

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Someone gave me a couple of pieces of dragon fruit plant. It grew and grew. It flowered. We got up in the middle of the night, climbed up on a ladder to hand pollinate it. My husband held a flashlight, while I brushed pollen from one flower to another. Not. One. Fruit.

Now I know a lot more about dragon fruit. There are self-fertile varieties that do not need another plant to pollinate. There are varieties that do not need another plant to pollinate, but do need help spreading the pollen from one flower to another. And then there are those that need another plant to produce a fruit. I think I have the last kind. Oh well. Always learning…

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We had lots of rain earlier in the year which helped the plants get off to a good start.

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I thought this birdhouse was just for decoration, so I hung it on my potting bench, which is located inside a screened in porch. I guess I need to make sure I close the door all the way because this is what I found one day…

Now that is the end of the pretty side of having a bunch of baby birds in a screened in area. Oh I was so happy when I discovered them at first. Over the next several weeks, I had to leave the door wide open and the hatch-lings still had trouble finding their way out. Thankfully, they all made it. Needless to say, the garden room was filthy with all kinds of excrement by the time it was all over. Never. Again.

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Love love love it…made by my husband.

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Bluebonnets have faded. Next wave is full of poppies, lemon mint and salvia…

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Need to add plants but it looks like there is a little lizard who already likes the new area. I’m not sure what kind of lizard this is, but very happy to see a new species! Natural wildlife habitat is working! Woohoo.

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Started lettuce seeds late last year and kept the tradition going with our spring seeds. It has been a busy year, but better late than never!

Growing the usual plants: Thai basil, watermelon, cantaloupe, morning glories and long beans. I usually give a lot of these to friends because you plant extras planning for the worst. I am also trying out zinnias and cosmos from seed for fun.

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Also included below is a picture of the veggie garden from both sides. On the inside, growing lettuce and cilantro still. I will let these go to seed. Planted bean and cucumber seeds. Have a volunteer dill plant. I’ve also planted tomatoes from transplants: sweet 100, solar fire, and early girl.

On the outside of the garden, I grow asparagus and rue, blackberries, garlic chives and of course more cilantro. In the background you can see a vitex tree. It blooms a beautiful purple flower and provides lots of color in the heat of the summer. Unfortunately, we found out this year that it is an invasive plant, spreading and crowding out natives in our nature preserves…so we will be removing it this winter.

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There is so much going on in the garden right now. It is a great time to have your morning coffee outside. First the bluebonnets emerge, followed by the poppies. God is everywhere.

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Cilantro is still flowering and attracting pollinators to the garden. A fun fact about Cilantro is that it can come back year after year. If you let it flower, it will produce seeds that you can plant the next fall. We find cilantro everywhere, near our compost pile, near our burn pile…It smells like salsa when we mow some areas.

Experimenting with growing roses on an arch. This is not so easy. I selected blush rose to grow on the arch and there is a white Lady Banks rose in the background. It is coming along. I think we have rabbits that eat the blush rose so it is having to fight to get up the trellis.

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This little guy is planted under a red oak.

I did not get a good picture of this vine, but this plant is too good not to mention here. It attracts hummingbirds! Its long tubular flowers are the perfect length to let hummers in and keep others out. I’ll get a better picture next year. This year I did not capture March, except this one photo.

Everything starts to come to life this month. Our peach trees bloomed and now is when we start praying for pollinators. I let the cilantro and some broccoli go to flower to help attract early pollinators.

It is also time to pray that there will not be another really hard freeze this year. But, nature knows best and we have learned to live with whatever happens. Here is a picture of a peach tree in bloom. It smells beautiful.

Unfortunately, it is also time to prune your peach and pear trees. This is a lot of work, but it is a good workout. You can place the blooming branches in a jar or vase and enjoy the blooms inside.