Summer Doldrums

I'm suffering from cabin fever.  It's been too hot to do much of anything outside for most of the past week.  I've gotten in an hour or so of gardening during the early morning and the early evening hours now and then but my activities have been largely limited to hand-watering container plants.  I started one project I hadn't planned to tackle until cooler temperatures return but I've made minimal progress.  Since temperatures soared into the mid-90sF and above I haven't even walked the neighborhood in several days.

With the exception of delivering emergency water rations on a periodic basis, I've spent too much time staring out the window thinking about what needs to be done in the garden.  Over a two-day period I was briefly diverted by spying on the garden activities of a homeowner in the neighborhood across the canyon from us.  This homeowner (who I've never met) has demonstrated an obsession with his lawn over the ten plus years we've lived here.  I've seen him change out his sod twice.  The second time, I thought he must be replacing it with artificial turf, only to witness a crew installing new sod.  When another crew showed up, I assumed he was doing that again but I was wrong.

I didn't see them remove the sod but, when they brought in a small mountain of gravel, I thought maybe they were creating a patio extension

The next day I saw a team unrolling what looked like a large rug.  They spent hours cutting it to fit the space and rolling it flat.

It's great that they're saving water by eliminating the lawn, although I couldn't help thinking they could have done better with natural groundcovers.  However, for all I know, the owner uses that flat surface to practice his golf putt.

 

On my brief forays outside, I've collected a variety of insect bites.  The spiders are out in force and, every morning when I clean up Pipig's catio, I carry a big stick, waving it in front of me to take down any webs I'd otherwise walk right into.  I didn't anticipate I'd have to contend with webs inside the house as well but an ambitious spider managed to hitchhike in with flowers I cut on Sunday.

For a relatively tiny spider, overnight it'd created a large web stretching from the top of my sunflower bouquet to the dining table below.  According to my cell phone's ID function, this is some kind of orb weaver.  (I enlarged the photo to show more detail.)

 

Staring out my office window, I've seen butterflies, including giant swallowtails and cloudless sulphurs, as well as hummingbirds, but I repeatedly failed to get photographs of them every time I've hustled outside with my camera.

The lazy pace of the bumble bees makes them easier to catch on camera

and the fiery skippers were more accommodating as well

While I missed out on hummingbird photos, I caught photos of finches at the feeders from inside the house.  The 2 birds with brown backs are spice finches, aka nutmeg mannikins or scaly-breasted munia (Lonchura punctulata).  These birds are native to Asia but are thought to have escaped into the wild as pets.  Sightings were first recorded in Southern California in 1997.  I first saw them in December 2022

 

On the bright side, the seed-sown sunflowers in my cutting garden are now bursting into bloom one after another.

The majority of the sunflowers in this bed are Helianthus annuus 'Joker'.  As a side note, filling the backyard bird feeders has not stopped the finches from pecking at the large sunflower leaves.

 

I also noticed that bulbs planted in the area next to our garage are starting to bloom for the first time.

I planted 5 bulbs of Hymenocallis festalis 'Zwanenburg' (aka Peruvian daffodil) in March 2022.  They produced foliage but not flowers last September.  I'm guessing that the recent tropical storm may have prompted the blooms.

Even though I created three floral arrangements earlier this week, I felt compelled to cut more flowers while watering my raised planters on Monday morning rather than risk losing them to the heatwave.

The mug contains Dahlias 'Lavender Ruffles' and 'Mikayla Miranda' as well as Zinnia elegans 'Benary's Giant Purple' and the foliage of Prostanthera ovalifolia 'Variegata'

Today, temperatures are expected to drop as much as ten degrees from yesterday's high of 97F, then fall again on Thursday, settling into the mid-70sF for the following week.  I'm hoping that forecast holds.

Pipig could care less

 

 

All material © 2012-2023 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Things are looking up

During the so-called "dog days of summer" it's hard for me not to look askance at what's wrong with my garden.  I looked up the origins of that expression and found that, according to one source, the ancient Greeks and Romans believed that the period from July 3rd through August 11th was particularly hot and uncomfortable because that was when the Earth drew closest to Sirius, the "dog star."  Based on that description, it would appear that the "dog days" end today; however, the same source went on to state that, in actuality, Sirius doesn't rise until mid-August, which suggests we're not out of the woods yet. Nonetheless, I found several bright spots in my garden this week.

 The local pollinators are active.

Butterfly activity has noticeably increased since the Zinnias began to bloom.  I've seen a handful of different species but the only one I've captured in photos was the the Gulf Fritillary.

Bumblebees have suddenly become more prevalent too

Anna's hummingbirds are here year-round.  This one perches on the Ginkgo tree when resting, while keeping an eye out for intruders in its territory, which includes a nearby strawberry tree (Arbutus 'Marina').  Callistemon 'Cane's Hybrid' is currently getting a lot of hummingbird attention too, along with Grevillea 'Superb'.

The lesser goldfinches have been hanging around my cutting garden and I haven't been at all clear why.  I feared they were up to no good but I've chosen to believe that's not the case based on the following photos.

Using a telephoto lens, I stayed a suitable distance away in an effort to get a handle on their activity in the cutting garden when I'm not around.  I'd noticed a lot of ragged sunflower leaves.  When I examined the leaves after catching them on camera pecking at them, I concluded that they may be picking tiny insects off the leaves, battering them in the process.  I'm not sure of that, though, so I'm going to refill the feeders that usually stay empty during the summer months.

The dahlias I've been waiting for seemingly forever are finally starting to flower.

Dahlia 'Catching Fire' is the first to bloom

I've found buds on most of the dahlias but they aren't in a hurry to open.  This is Dahlia 'Mikayla Miranda', classified as a late blooming variety, but then all mine seem to be late bloomers this year.  Granted, I planted the tubers about 6 weeks later than I did in 2022 due to the unusually cool temperatures that stretched into June.

Unlike the dahlias, my Amaryllis aren't keeping me waiting.

Stems of Amaryllis belladonna (aka naked ladies because the flower stalks appear after the foliage dies back in late spring) are suddenly popping up all over.  This is a true Amaryllis, not to be confused with the Hippeastrums commonly referred to as Amaryllis.  I have pink and white forms, although the white variety usually lags weeks behind the more common pink variety.

 

With some help from my husband, two of the three agaves that bloomed this year, Agave mitis 'Multicolor' and Agave vilmoriniana, are now gone.  However, I've held off on cutting the bloom stalk of Agave 'Blue Glow' in the hope of getting bulbils.

It appears my patience is bearing fruit, or rather plantlets.  At least 4 bulbils have formed near the top of the stalk of this agave, which isn't known for pupping heavily, if at all.  I'm giving it until at least the end of the month before cutting down the stalk.  The mother plant shows no sign of decline to date.  A neighbor had a similar experience and now, months after cutting the stalk on hers, another bloom stalk is developing from a pup poking out the side of her mother plant.  My plant also has side pups.

We even got a tiny bit of rain on Wednesday and again on Thursday.  It wasn't measurable but it brought down our temperatures.  As I walked the neighborhood in the late afternoon, raindrops kept falling on my head and I spent the twenty minutes it takes to complete two rounds of the area trying to remember the lyrics to the song from the classic movie 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid' that came to mind.  If that reference hasn't triggered your own memory, you can find the lyrics in the following YouTube video.  Warning: it may take some time to remove the ear worm from your head!

For the record, I'd be happy to have raindrops falling more heavily on my head but that's not likely to happen until October at the earliest.  Still, the change of seasons, cooler weather, and the opportunity to get planting again isn't all that far off.  As the song says: "It won't be long till happiness steps up to greet me."

Best wishes for a pleasant weekend!

Dueling hummingbirds and sleeping bees

Unlike so many areas of the country, our summer here along Southern California's coast hasn't been particularly awful.   We haven't had any temperatures over 100F (yet anyway).  We haven't been flooded with rain (or had any rain at all for that matter but then that's a normal summer for us).  Still, the garden and the gardener are feeling at low ebb.  Under normal circumstances, I'd be hand-watering my garden a lot more but, presented with constant reminders of how dire our drought is, I'm doing very little of that.  Several of my roses look close to dead but, rather than provide them with emergency water rations, I'm seriously considering whether I should just replace them with succulents.  I'm trying not to overreact - there's always a chance we'll get something like "normal" rain this winter - but I don't think I can stand looking at their flowerless stems another year if we don't.

Luckily, even with bare spots and brown foliage seemingly everywhere, there's life in the garden, like the hummingbirds constantly dueling for territory.

I think the combatants were Allen's hummingbirds but I'm not positive of that ID

Rest breaks between battles were common but brief and on most occasions, by the time I focused the camera, the little guys back into the fray

Male or female they're always alert to intruders in the vicinity

Their focus in the front garden are Grevilleas 'Peaches & Cream' and 'Superb'.  'Superb' (shown here) is loaded with flowers year-round.

On the other end of the activity scale, I found bees sleeping in flowers early on one cool, damp morning when the marine layer was thick and persisted until noon.

Completely motionless in Zinnia 'Benary's Giant Purple'

This one fell for Zinnia 'Benary's Giant Carmine Rose'

I cut 2 stems of white Amaryllis belladonna for In a Vase on Monday's floral arrangement and discovered this one buried in the center of a flower.  As it was bedraggled anyway, I cut the flower and left it and its occupant on the patio table.

 

I was a little worried that the bees were dead when I first saw them and felt compelled to gently blow on them to check.  Two reacted but one did not; however, within an hour all had flown away.  Cute as they were, I'm afraid I like my bees as lively as my hummingbirds.

Bees drawn by a recently opened Magnolia grandiflora flower

 

All material © 2012-2022 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Wednesday Vignette: Winged Visitors

A good stretch of rainy weather and the resulting explosion of flowers brought hoards of visitors into Southern California.  I'm not referring to the humans streaming into our desert areas to see the "super bloom" wildflower displays, although that's still going on.  Unlike that event, the visitors I'm talking about didn't cause traffic jams or crush plants growing in delicate desert ecosystems.  The visitors I'm referring to swarmed across the border from Mexico unencumbered by walls or border patrol agents.  And, according to most reports, they numbered as many as one billion.  The migration in question was that of the painted ladies, a species of butterflies, Vanessa cardui, that took advantage of favorable environmental conditions to disperse far and wide in search of food and mates.  I noticed them in my garden before I heard anything about their mass migration on the news.  They grabbed the attention of the media and that of almost everyone I spoke with last week as we watched them flutter along roadways, in parking lots, and just about everywhere.

This shot was taken in my backyard

and this one was taken in one of my front garden borders.  I saw what looked like a funnel cloud of them at my local botanic garden but didn't have a camera on hand.

That good news story was followed by another, one that hasn't received any news coverage that I'm aware of.  Last weekend, I noticed what I initially thought were tiny hummingbirds flitting through my garden and even buzzing our living room windows.  On closer examination, I realized that they were representatives of one of the so-called hummingbird moth species.  I've seen these featured in the posts of bloggers in other states but this is the first time I've seen any of them in my own area.

This hummingbird moth is also known as a hawk moth and as the white-lined sphinx moth (Hyles lineata).  Like the painted lady, its wingspan is 2-3 inches and it hails from Mexico.

It flaps its wings so rapidly, even when siphoning nectar from flowers, it was hard to get a good photo.  I saw a lizard leap in an attempt to capture this particular moth when it was hovering mere inches above the ground but he failed in his attempt.

My last winged visitor is a regular returnee.  Like the butterflies and the moths, he was particularly attracted to the blue flowers of Echium handiense.

This is the common bumblebee (Bombus), not known as a big honey producer but one of the best pollinators we have

My coverage of these wonderful winged visitors is my Wednesday Vignette.  For more, visit Anna at Flutter & Hum.


All material © 2012-2019 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Foliage Follow-up & Wednesday Vignette - May 2017

The blooms in my garden are very distracting at the moment and frankly I find it hard to see the foliage for the flowers but I took a look around and identified a few foliage specimens that I could get excited about, even if I've featured some of them before.  The first were the Aeonium arboreum cuttings I planted on the front slope, originally as filler after removing several of the Ceanothus shrubs that made up a hedge in that area.  As more of those shrubs failed and were removed, I filled in with more and more Aeonium cuttings until they became a feature.  All originated from a few cuttings a friend gave me soon after we moved into our current house almost six and a half years ago.

All these plants came from a single source of cuttings and all are planted in partial shade on the front slope.  Some are currently redder than others but I expect that's due to slight variations in the timing and degree of sun exposure.

Another early introduction to my garden was Acacia cognata 'Cousin Itt'.  My first specimen went into a pot but, entranced with its wispy foliage, I bought more and soon I was trying them in a variety of locations.  I lost one or two along the way (including the one that spent the first part of its life in a pot) but I currently have six of these plants.  After two and a half years, the last of those is finally bulking up nicely.

According to my records, this is the last 'Cousin Itt' I planted, circa November 2014

My oldest specimens, planted between October 2012 and April 2013, are more impressive.  I've featured them before but I thought I'd share before and after shots to show how far they've come.

The photo at top was taken in September 2014.  The photo on the bottom was taken this week.

The next plant that deserves mention is my much maligned mimosa tree (Albizia julibrissin).  I inherited this tree with the house and, were not for its size, its placement atop my back slope, and its overall presence in my back garden, I'd replace it.  It's an extremely messy tree and for almost half a year it's bare of foliage.  Its blooms are pretty but they begin littering the patio and garden as soon as they appear.  The flowers are followed by seedpods that perpetuate the litter for another six months and produce seedlings everywhere.  However, when the foliage emerges and before the flowers appear, the tree is attractive.

Flowers will begin to appear within the next month but I'm enjoying the tree for now

It's unusual for me to say I prefer a plant without flowers rather than with them; however, the Albizia isn't the only instance in which that's true.  I'm no Morticia Addams* but I will cut flowers off certain plants.  Here are two examples:

Helichrysum thianschanicum'Icicles' with flowers (left) and after the flowers were removed yesterday (right)

While I don't mind the flowers on the green Santolina, the bright yellow blooms on the gray form (S. chamaecyparissus) bugged me so they got clipped this week too

This brings me to the end of the foliage follow-up portion of this post but visit Pam at Digging, the host for this monthly feature, for more foliage highlights as I segue to my Wednesday Vignette.

My one hesitation about cutting all the flowers off the Helichrysum and the Santolina was that it might disturb the pollinators in my garden; however, the bees seemed to have plenty of other plants to keep them happy, from the Hairy Canary Clover (Dorycnium hirsutum) growing next to the Helichrysum to the Salvia argentea growing near the Santolina.  If I had any remaining concerns about impacting the bees, the following scene unfolding in my garden on Monday afternoon put these to rest:

Early Monday afternoon, I received a message from a neighbor warning me with some alarm that she'd spotted a swarm of bees near the top of the stairs of my back slope.  I went to check and saw this mass of bees, as well as others flying all around the area.  Although the bees showed no interest in me, I still kept about 5 feet away.  I told the neighbor that I was going to leave them alone for the moment but promised that I'd continue to monitor the situation.

When I checked the area four hours later, it looked like this.  Although there were a few confused bees still flying about, there was no other evidence of the earlier swarm.  If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn't have known anything at all had happened.

The swarm is apparently a common spring phenomenon, arising when a bee colony divides, which may be the result of overcrowding.  If you're unfamiliar with the phenomenon, as I was, you can read more about it here.  The bee swarm photos are my Wednesday Vignette.  Visit our Wednesday Vignette host, Anna at Flutter & Hum, for images that caught the attention of other bloggers.

*I belatedly realized that I'd featured two members of the Addams Family in a single post - Cousin Itt and Morticia.  Cousin Itt was related to Morticia by marriage through her husband, Gomez.  I'm holding 'Cousin Itt' accountable for my temporary Addams Family fixation.

All material © 2012-2017 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Wednesday Vignette: More Pink!

Pink is not my favorite color but a look at my summer garden might suggest otherwise.  The Lisianthus (Eustoma grandiflorum) I've featured in my vase posts for weeks are mostly pink.  Now, Callistemon 'Cane's Hybrid' has produced a fresh flush of pink blooms.  When I purchased the plant in 2015 I'd convinced myself that the flowers were more peach than pink - but they're pink.  They're very pretty, though, and the plant is a bee magnet.  It's a last minute choice for this week's Wednesday Vignette, the meme hosted by Anna of Flutter & Hum.

Photographed from this direction, the Callistemon blooms don't look particularly abundant.  (Some of the remaining pink Lisianthus insisted on photobombing the shot.)

The majority of blooms are on the east-facing side of the plant

We've got a strong breeze going, blowing the branches this way and that.  This was the best close-up of a flower and a bee that I could manage but most flowers have 2 or 3 bees buried in the blossoms. 

Visit Anna to find images that resonated with her and other gardeners this week.


All material © 2012-2016 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Wednesday Vignette: Stalking a bumblebee

Although I'm lucky to have a healthy population of honey and mason bees, I rarely see bumblebees anymore, which is why I got excited when I saw that fat yellow and black creature buzzing about my massive Lupinus propinquus.  I ran in and grabbed my camera and was happy to find her still flitting from flower to flower when I returned.  My first couple of photos weren't great but I captured one pretty good shot before she grew too irritated with me and buzzed off.

Not the best shot but unmistakably a bumblebee

A good shot of the pollen sac she was carrying with her

This was my best shot I think, as well as my last - it's my Wednesday Vignette

The lupine appears to be a hit with both the bees and the birds.  The birds like to land on the plant's stiff stems and survey the surrounding area before taking a dip in the fountain.

House finch resting on the lupine's stem.  That house in the background is actually on the other side of the canyon that separates my neighborhood from the one to the east but the distance was foreshortened by the camera.

A male house finch entertaining 2 females in the fountain alongside the lupine

I found a few aphids attempting to set up shop on the lupine but I sent them packing (I hope).  Otherwise, the plant seems to be settling in nicely.

Although I continue to deadhead spent flowers, the lupine's branches continue to stretch further and further

For more Wednesday Vignettes, visit Anna at Flutter & Hum.


All material © 2012-2016 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Wednesday Vignette: It's the little things

For this week's Wednesday Vignette, the meme hosted by Anna at Flutter & Hum, I have a miscellaneous trio of photos taken within the last few weeks of some of the little things that make the garden a wonderful place.

I was taking a photo of a plant when I noticed this little guy sitting calmly on a sprinkler head right next to me.  This tiny western fence lizard - barely 2 inches in length - was not at all perturbed by my presence (until I stroked his back, at which point he took off).

I noticed bees clinging to the edge of the fountain in search of water to sustain them during one of our recent heatwaves.  Although I have a bee-ball floating in the fountain (a generous gift from Alison of Bonney Lassie when she visited earlier this year), the bees insisted on clinging to the rough concrete sides of the fountain.

The birds are regular visitors to the fountain.  They drink and splash about, especially when the heat spikes.  Oblivious to the upheaval in the former lawn area just beyond the fountain, this photo captured a lesser goldfinch, a house finch, and what I think was a sparrow hanging out in harmony.  I narrowly missed a shot of the scrub jay that chased them all away so he could enjoy the fountain by himself.

Visit Anna at Flutter & Hum for a look at the images she and other gardeners found compelling this week.


All material © 2012-2015 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party