Seeing Familiar Friends in a New Light

While bicycling recently on the beautiful Withlacoochee Trail, I was treated to the spectacular sight of masses of native dotted horsemint in full bloom on either side of the trail, which runs 46 miles through the Withlacoochee State Forest. When it blooms in such profusion, horsemint is a showstopper. Ironically, I hardly even notice it the rest of the year, even in my own garden.

Muhly grass in bloom is a thing of beauty

The same is true for many of the fall bloomers in my yard. Take muhly grass, another native readily adaptable to home landscapes. Without its spectacular feathery pink plumes it just looks like a rather unkempt clump of tall grass. Handsome, yes. A head tuner? Not so much.  But when it blooms, as mine is finally doing, it demands your attention! I have been looking forward to its debut for weeks.

Ditto for my cassia shrubs, which are just now setting those bright yellow flower clusters that will keep blooming right though winter. Or the native yellowtop wildflowers shown below, also resplendent with golden crowns.

Even the very drab native poinsettia, which pops up unbidden all over my butterfly garden, looks truly lovely with its delicate red face. This Florida version of Indian paintbrush brings some early holiday cheer to the garden!

But this year's award for impressive fall color has to go to my narrowleaf (swamp) sunflowers.They are at glorious peak bloom right now, helped by last weekend's slow, soaking rains, and they are fully 12 feet tall. Indeed, in the many years I have grown this native wildflower, I have never seen it reach such towering heights. Giant sunflowers, yes, but this native wildflower species, no. Perhaps its astounding growth is a result of the abundance of rainfall at my home this summer. Maybe it's my compost-enriched soil. Who knows? But these yellow flowers are soaring above my 6-foot back fence like giraffes. 

Narrowleaf sunflowers towering over my 6-foot fence

I have even had neighbors walking by my house comment on them. I had to stake and tie them to the fence just to keep them from toppling over!

I like to cut the sunflowers and put them in vases in my house -- although short-lived, they brighten up any space. As you can imagine, I practically need a javelin to reach them this year. 

A nursery grower who raises swamp sunflowers told me I can keep them from getting so out of control next fall by pruning them in mid-July. This will limit their growth to a reasonable 5 or 6 feet, while still allowing plenty of time for the flower buds to form.

Definitely a game plan for next year. In the meantime, I'll continue to marvel at my "sunflowers on steroids" and hope that my back yard isn't cited for interference with commercial air space! 


What familiar friends do you look forward to seeing anew in the fall in your garden?

Tour of Native Landscapes

This past weekend I went on a tour of native plant landscapes sponsored by the Pinellas Chapter of the Florida Native Plant Society. This annual event is a self-guided tour of homes featuring all or mostly native plants. The tour is two days -- with South Pinellas homes on Saturday and North Pinellas locations on Sunday. Last year I did the South Pinellas tour -- this year I decided to see what homeowners in North Pinellas are up to, figuring that their climate, soils and plant selections would be more similar to my Tampa landscape.


On any garden tour, It's always inspiring to see what clever, creative ideas other gardeners are implementing that I might want to "borrow" myself. I always take photos to jog my memory later when I'm looking for an interesting planting scheme or a new way to use yard art.


This tour has the special twist of featuring an amazing variety of native plants -- most of which, sadly, can be only be purchased from a native plant nursery or grown from cuttings or seeds bestowed by generous native-loving friends (which is how I got most of my more unusual natives).


I tend to prefer landscapes with structure and design, and I found plenty to like on the North Pinellas tour, like this inviting natural path in a Clearwater back yard lined with firebush, beautyberry, tropical sage and ironweed.

I was also captivated by the charming seating area at this home, framed by an arbor bursting with coral honeysuckle, a favorite nectar source of hummingbirds.

Water features were present at almost all the homes. I loved this waterfall cascading down to a quiet pool bordered by ferns, salvias and other overhanging plants that give it a lush, tropical feel.

Or this large, beautyberry-fringed pond at a Safety Harbor home.

At the tour stop in Oldsmar, I admired the way the owners blended the natural vegetation -- pines and palmettoes -- with unusual natives like Lizard's tail and even exotics like crinum lilies and orchids. The landscape islands were bisected by a beautiful, curving brick walkway.

Who wouldn't want to sit here and just enjoy the scenery?

Or wander down the brick walkways and explore some more?

Yard art aficionado that I am, you know I honed right in on these whimsical little slippers planted with lovely native wood violets.

I don't think my own yard will ever be entirely native -- there are just so many wonderful non-native but Florida-adapted choices available -- but I love mixing the natives into my garden. They can't be beat for toughness and resilience, and our native butterflies and birds often prefer or even require them. As time goes on, I am bringing more natives, especially wildflowers like this dotted horsemint, into my landscape, joining the tropical sage, scorpion tail, mistflowers and narrow-leaved sunflowers in my Bay-Friendly plant palette.

Natives Gone Wild!

When we first embarked on our landscape makeover in January 2010, we wanted to create a yard that would inspire others to step outside the traditional Florida landscape box -- a large expanse of lawn with a border of shrubs around the house, and a palm tree plunked here and there.

Beach sunflower is a colorful summer favorite

Working with landscape designer Lisa Strange we decided on a mix of native and non-native, but Florida-compatible plants. And, of course, as you all know, no grass. I asked Lisa to include plants that anyone could readily find at their local nursery or home improvement store.Thus our landscape features familiar friends like liriope, shell ginger, flax lily and African iris -- all of which I love and recommend highly.


But as time goes on I am drawn more and more to our resilient, adaptable natives. One that was slow to grow on me (pun intended) was the Ocala anise, a shrub we use as a foundational plant along our back fence.  Last year when we planted them, I had to water them literally every day for months. I think I would have ripped them out if not for the the fact that I invested so much sweat equity in getting them in our root-infested back yard to begin with! 


The anise have been amazingly carefree and drought-tolerant this year.I  haven't given them any supplemental water since May and they look very happy. 


Likewise with the coontie. I now realize that there is some point during every year when the coontie looks like it is at death's door, then it just bounces right back.


This summer I have added a few native wildflowers, with the emphasis on "wild." Some have grown so large and so abundantly they appear to be on steroids. The two narrow-leaved sunflowers planted last year have become multiple plants this year -- and they are nearly 9 feet tall! I had to stake most of them up to keep them from toppling over from sheer bulk, and they haven't even bloomed yet.

The distinctive Scorpion Tail

Another champion wildflower this year is the delicate, leafy scorpion tail, with its distinctive curly white "tail." Again, I started with two plants. Those two spread so rapidly and became so large I've had to prune them 3 times already to keep them from literally taking over my butterfly bed.

Mistflower can become invasive, and requires reining in occasionally

Not far behind is the dainty mistflower, with its fuzzy, pale blue blossoms and leaves that look much like a salvia. I purchased one plant last year, it didn't impress me much and then disappeared completely over the winter. To my surprise, it returned this year, with a vengeance. I now have a large beautiful clump of these pastel beauties and will have to keep it under control through pruning and pulling. 

A close look at dotted horsemint
reveals its exquisite beauty

Tropical sage with GIANT
narrow-leaved sunflowers in back

Tropical sage has reached near-invasive status in my yard. It grows to more than 4 feet high and spreads so readily that I am constantly yanking "strays" up and trying to pawn them off to friends, neighbors, total strangers -- anyone, please take them!












I have been noticing lovely dotted horsemint blooming along roadsides and in wild areas, and am hoping the lone horsemint planted this year in my garden will morph into a whole family next summer. I've left it some room to roam in anticipation.


Other natives I have just planted this year include spiderwort, blue-eyed grass, iron weed, greeneyes and elephant's foot.  Most were given to me by friends who are just as enthusiastic about these True Floridian as I am becoming. With many natives so hard to find except at specialty nurseries, sharing extras from your garden is a great way to promote their increased use in residential landscapes.


I'd love to know what native wildflowers have caught your fancy this summer! 

The Nursery is Open

Is there anything more beautiful in nature than a butterfly? These fluttering slivers of stained glass are easy to attract to your garden all summer long.

The Gulf fritillary is a frequent visitor to my garden

Passionvine is a fritillary favorite

Butterflies need host plants (where they lay their eggs), nectar plants and shelter. Provide these and they will come!

Monarch laying eggs on milkweed

I am a butterfly novice, but there are so many wonderful references available from people who are true experts in the subject. For those who want to delve deeper I recommend these for starters:


http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/uw057
Butterfly Gardening in Florida
(University of Florida IFAS publication: an excellent overview!)


http://www.afn.org/~afn10853/butterfly.html
Florida Butterfly Gardening


http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/uw311
Native Habitats for Monarch Butterflies in South Florida
(A must-read for all who love monarchs because of the concerns it raises about scarlet milkweed, the milkweed species most commonly sold and which most of us rely on to attract monarchs. Without a readily-available alternative, I am going to keep my scarlet milkweed, but I'll be on the lookout for other varieties too.)


http://lepcurious.blogspot.com/2011/01/preparing-for-caterpillar-season.html
A wonderful Blog about the Butterfly Garden at the Museum of Science and Industry in Tampa.


In my garden I am learning as I go (aren't we all?). Last year we so enjoyed all the monarchs that came to our milkweed that I decided to see what else we could entice. This Spring I planted parsley for black swallowtails and cassia for sulfurs. Our first black swallowtail cat is now dining on the parsley, but the cassias have so far been ignored by the sulfur,.

Our first black swallowtail baby

My passionvine, which had just been getting a growth headwind after dying back to the ground over the summer, has already been stripped bare by the first batch of Gulf fritillary caterpillars. No worries -- it will come right back. Plus, I transplanted some a month ago to another section of fence and the fritillary scouts haven't yet found that one.


I'm also making more of an effort to learn about and provide a variety of nectar plants for butterflies of many species. I have really boosted the number of native wildflowers in my garden, thanks partly to gifts from friends, and now have mistflower, salvia, ironweed, elephant's foot, purple coneflower, horsemint, scorpion tail, blanket flower, narrow-leaved sunflowers, yellowtop, greeneyes and ironweed. Listing all of them has made me realize how much I seem to be trending toward native plants in my butterfly gardens.


Many of our native trees also are excellent nectar sources, including the Chickasaw plum and Walter's viburnum. I don't really see butterflies on mine, but the bees are crazy for the small white Viburnum blossom each Spring -- and the even smaller, but equally irresistible East Palatka holly blooms.


While on vacation recently in coastal North Carolina, I saw a lovely little butterfly garden in a boutique shopping village, with a sign identifying it as a "Certified Monarch Waystation." When I got home and looked this up, I discovered it is a program of Monarch Watch, sponsored by the University of Kansas. The program encourages homeowners, schools and businesses to create an oasis for monarchs during their long migration to Mexico.  You fill out an application stating which of the monarch essentials you have provided and, if you qualify, you receive a certificate designating your habitat as a "Monarch Waystation." The certification costs $16 and there is an additional fee if you want the very handsome aluminum sign to place in your garden. My cynical husband views this program as just another way to part silly old me from my hard-earned money, but I think it is a great way to draw attention to the beautiful monarchs and show that you are giving nature a hand.

Our newest monarch chrysalis, draped in raindrops

 What are your favorite butterfly plants? And, how many of you are seeing zebra longwings (our state butterfly) in your yards? I have not seen any for more than a year in mine. Am wondering if the severe winter of 2010 had anything to do with that.

Winter Garden Amusements

The second unseasonably cold winter in a row is testing the patience of every gardener I know, and getting us all to think about COLD-HARDY as well as drought-hardy plants for our Florida yards. Our Bay-Friendly landscape is holding up very well so far and the winter is giving us a great opportunity to see which plants do well in near- or below-freezing temperatures, and which don't. This will help us make some modifications this Spring so that we truly have an all-weather landscape that doesn't require major replanting each year. After all, reducing the amount of time we spend on lawn maintenance was a major motivation for our landscape makeover.



Not quite in time for Christmas, but this cactus beauty a friend
gave me last year is putting on a January show.



I can truly say that the foundational plants in our landscape -- the small trees, shrubs and groundcovers -- are sailing through the cold, with the exception of the firebush and the wild coffee in the back yard. The firebush, especially, has been really whacked by the cold but there are still green branches at the base of the plant so I know it will bounce back. The wild coffee has plenty of green left so it will recover too. The other backyard natives -- the coonties, anise shrubs and muhly grass -- are totally unphased, as we expected. I can't say enough about the non-native, but Florida-tough bulbine, flax lilies and liriope. "Winter? What winter?" appears to be their attitude. The bulbine just keeps blooming.

Not one single plant in my front yard has been more than slightly singed by the cold. Rick and I attribute this to our mighty, much-loved live oak, whose canopy provides a natural insulating blanket over almost the entire front yard. Big trees are an incredible garden asset in so many ways.



The butterfly bed in our side yard has taken the biggest hit. The full-sun exposure that is so beneficial to it in the warm months has left it very vulnerable to the cold. The pentas, salvias, cat's whiskers, mistflowers and milkweed are downright crunchy. Some will come back -- salvia could survive the apocalypse, I think -- and some will need replacing. That's OK -- I love puttering in the butterfly garden anyway.



Until the danger of frost has passed, and I can get started pruning and tidying, I am satisfying my green urges with gardening on a micro-scale: making little dish gardens for my friends out of tea cups, toothbrush holders, ramekins, bowls and other household items. I saw  these at a craft market and immediately thought, "I can do that!" Apparently lots of other people had this same thought, because there is a wealth of information about this on the Internet. I bought a diamond bit for our electric drill to drill drain holes in the ceramics, started experimenting and -- voila! -- it works.



I scour thrift shops for the ceramic items (cheap, cheap,cheap and lots of fun) and then buy miniature plants to plant in them once I have drilled the drain holes. A friend recommended a wonderful exotic nursery in Bradenton called Tropiflora (http://www.tropiflora.com/) that actually carries dwarf, miniature and terrarium plants. I order online and they ship right to my home. The plants arrive in perfect condition, all wrapped in damp newspaper. You can also buy small container plants at Lowe's and Home Depot too, but Tropiflora has some really unusual goodies. I love giving my little planters to friends as a thank you for their friendship and support.



I must give props to my husband Rick who remains incredibly tolerant of my gardening madness, and helps me with my winter garden amusements, holding the ceramics for me while I drill and even spelling me when my hands get cramped. I guess he's thinking that anything that distracts me from another, more expensive hobby of mine -- shoe shopping -- is a good thing!



Our Own Personal Nature Documentary!

The newest addition to our front yard is our brand-new "Florida-Friendly Yard" sign. That's right -- we are now an official Certified Florida Yard! The certifications are done through the IFAS Florida Yards & Neighborhoods Program, and practically every county in Florida now has an FYN program based out of its Extension Office. I've included a link to the yard recognition program so that you can check to see if your yard qualifies. It's a wonderful way to advertise eco-friendly landscapes.

More good news: Rick and I were recently notified that we won the 2010 Community Water-Wise Award for residential landscapes in the city of Tampa. This award program, sponsored by Tampa Bay Water and the IFAS FY&N Program, recognizes water-thrifty landscapes in Hillsborough, Pasco and Pinellas counties. There are separate categories for homes, businesses, industry and government, and site judging is done by a team of water conservation experts from area utilities and extension offices.  This program usually only receives a handful of entries for each community, so please enter your home next year if you have a water-conserving landscape, rain-harvesting devices like rain barrels or cisterns, or low-flow  irrigation systems like drip hoses or micro-jets. The deadline is June 30 of each year.

We haven't yet received our Water-Wise Award: a beautiful engraved stepping stone. When we do, you can bet I'll post a photo!

Our female Black-and-Yellow Argiope

OK, awards and recognition are great -- can't deny that -- but our biggest reward continues to be our beautiful yard itself, and the many amazing wild creatures it supports. Rick and I aren't sure whether we truly have more wildlife than before, or we're just noticing more critters because we spend so much more time in our yard now, just enjoying it. We prefer to think the new, more diverse landscape is attracting more wildlife. We now have all the essentials -- food, water and places to hide or nest -- and it is paying off. Our yard is like a living nature documentary! I'm even beginning to get over my fear of spiders, thanks in part to this beautiful black-and-yellow argiope who spun her web underneath an eave on our back deck. What a gorgeous creature!

 Passionvine bloom

Gulf fritillary sipping verbena

More Gulf fritillaries have visited our yard than ever before -- in fact, we've never had as many.  Early in the summer we were treated to their acrobatic courtship flights, followed by the appearance of dozens of orange caterpillars on our passionvine. The caterpillars completely stripped our passionvine of all leaves in a few weeks, and we have since brought in two more pots solely to feed caterpillars. I'm still seeing a few fritillaries flitting about, but their mating frenzy has abated considerably and the passionvine growing along our deck railing is starting to recover.

Monarch caterpillars in a tug-of-war
 over a milkweed leaf

Now we are watching a late-summer batch of monarch butterflies emerging from their gold-rimmed chrysalis cases. Just two weeks ago, we counted 15 of the beautiful little cases, hidden among the shadowbox panels of our fence or dangling from a leaf or branch. The newly emerged adults are gorgeous -- wet-winged and vividly colored and quite unsteady at first in their new bodies. Once they've stretched and dried their wings in the sunlight, and have made a few short test flights, off they go - inevitably to return a week or two later to sip nectar from our flowers and lay eggs on our milkweed plants. The caterpillars that will hatch shortly from these eggs are likely to produce the final adult monarchs of the year, and we are rooting for at least or two of these monarchs to make the winter migration to Mexico. We read that it is only the last generation of monarchs each year that survives long enough to migrate, winter over in a semi-hibernation in Mexico and return in the Spring to begin the cycle anew.

Rick keeps looking at the monarchs and wondering how they even know to go to Mexico in the first place, since none of them have ever been before. Do they follow a magnetic field? Are they born with this knowledge imbedded in their genetic code? Even scientists don't know how the monarchs make their amazing journey. We're just glad they have found our yard, so we can share their incredible odyssey.

Monarch laying eggs on our milkweed

Where It All Came From

As promised, here is a list of where we acquired everything for our landscape makeover fro all who have asked:

Landscape Design

Plant-Wise Landscapes (Lisa Strange)
www.palmwisenursery.com

In our opinion, hiring a professional landscape designer with experience in Florida-Friendly Landscaping is the single most important investment you can make. Like so many of you who have contacted me, Rick and I wanted to do the right thing with our landscape but we just weren't sure how to go about it. Lisa's knowledge and eye for design gave us a landscape we can be truly proud to show off, as well as one that benefits the environment. 

Mulch, Shell, Pea Gravel and Weed Mat

Cypress Creek Landscape Supply in North Tampa
http://www.meetuatthecreek.com/

Plants

Native Plants, Trees and Shrubs
Tree-Mart (Tampa)
Twigs n' Leaves Native Nursery (St. Petersburg)
Wilcox Nursery (Largo)


Non-Native, Florida-Friendly Plants, Trees and Shrubs


The Home Depot (North Florida Avenue, Tampa)
Kerby's Nursery (Seffner)
Manny's By The Bay (W. Hillsborough Ave.,Tampa)
Tree-Mart (Tampa)


Wholesale Nurseries (can only purchase from these if you are working with a landscaper or landscape designer who has an account with them)

Myers Wholesale Nursery (Thonotosassa)
Robert's Wholesale Nursery (Seffner)


Edging
Lowe's

 As you can see, we spread our money around! I tried to spend money on businesses within my own neighborhood (such as Manny's) as much as possible, but I also had to roam far and wide to find some of the plants in our design. I love plants and I especially love shopping for plants, so I looked at the search as a botanical treasure hunt

Common plants like liriope and African iris are available at every mainstream nursery. This year, I was pleased to see bulbine and Flax lily also widely available at these general nurseries, and pleasantly surprised to find a few native coonties at my neighborhood Home Depot. But, in general, I had to go to nurseries specializing in native plants  to get those trees, shrubs and groundcovers. Maybe that will change if more of us ask our local Big Box nurseries to carry beautiful natives like beautyberry and muhly grass.


I'm going to continue with this blog, so I can keep you updated on our landscape as it matures. I'll also be honest about any problems or special challenges we encounter as time goes on. And I'll report on the success of our yard over time as a wildlife habitat. 


Please don't hesitate to ask questions about what we did or how we did it. We love sharing our experiences, and we hope that you too will share your yard makeover adventures with us.

The Front Yard Finale!

After laboring for 2 1/2 months on our back yard makeover, we completed the entire front yard in just 3 weeks! This whirlwind pace wasn't a result of any superhuman effort on our part, but simply because the front yard is much smaller and had only a few tree roots to slow us down. You cannot imagine the relief we felt when we began planting and our shovels actually went down into the soil WITH NO RESISTANCE. Let me tell you , I was practically dancing. In fact, I was so energized by this unexpected miracle that I singlehandedly planted nearly every plant in the front yard in one day. We laid them out according to Lisa's design, and I went to it like a possessed Ms. Greenjeans. The rapidly rising heat and humidity certainly provided extra motivation for me to finish quickly.

Rick was not idle. While I planted, he measured our pathways and auxiliary parking area and installed edging, shell and pea gravel. We have discovered during this project that we each have unique skills. My talents are better suited to planting and overall design/aesthetic decisions. He excels at math, measuring and putting things together. Together we make a successful home improvement team.


Unlike our back yard, the front has only one pathway and we chose pea gravel for that to make it less visible. It intersects with a large auxiliary parking area covered with washed shell which gives us a parking space for visitors, further prevents any rain runoff from leaving our property, and buffers our planted beds from the dust and dirt of the road.

The rest of the yard is a combination of native and non-native plants, with many shrubs that will eventually grow large enough to really take up some space. Lisa put several plants with reddish foliage or berries in our front yard to complement the brick red trim on our bungalow. That's another benefit of having a landscape designer -- I never would have thought to color-coordinate my home and yard!


Following is a list of the plants we used. I have noted plants I am especially impressed with or think are especially attractive with a "Love It!" remark. 

We're on TV!

We were pleased to host Leigh Spann of Channel 8 for a yard tour last week. The segment will air Wednesday, May 26 twice between 5-7 a.m. and maybe again during the 5:30 p.m. slot (for those who aren't early birds).

Leigh and her cameraman were at our house for about an hour, interviewing me, Rick and our landscape designer, Lisa Strange. We love showing off our beautiful Bay-Friendly Backyard and hope that the publicity will inspire others to "Do Something Different" with their landscape. 

In other yard makeover news, we actually finished our front yard landscape last weekend, after two very long days of work in the heat. Still, compared with the backyard, which took about 10 weekends of labor, the front yard was like a downhill sled ride! Start to finish, including edging the borders and pathways, creating an auxiliary parking area of shell, cleaning up and trimming our existing hedge, and planting and mulching some 50 new plants, we were done in just two weekends! Now if we can just get some rain....

Stay tuned for photos and a video tour of the front yard. In the meantime, we are taking a much-needed break and going on vacation for a week starting this Friday. Whew -- we need to go fishing!

Introducing our new Bay-Friendly Backyard!

Drum roll please... Yes, we are done with the backyard, after nearly three months of hard work. Was it worth it? Oh yeah! Look at the photos and tell us what you think.

In trying to adequately describe the new backyard, two words come to mind: interesting and peaceful. The diversity of plants, with their varied textures, scents and colors, makes our yard so much more interesting. We enjoy just looking at everything. And the shady walkways surrounded by these gorgeous plants give us such a feeling of peace. Rick and I have been sitting in the yard every night and just admiring it. I told him last night that this is the first time in my home ownership memory that I have ever been able to look at my landscape and not see it as just a list of chores waiting to be done -- you know, weeding, edging and mowing. This yard enhances our quality of life, instead of interfering with it.

In Florida, one billion gallons of water is used every day just to water St. Augustine grass. It was that eye-opening statistic that started us on this landscape makeover back in February. I am so proud that we decided to buck the norm and Do Something Different! We can now say we are truly practicing what we preach, in our own little way and in our own little world.

 Our urban wild critters seem to enjoy the transformed yard too. We have seen our resident black racer on a regular basis, and the backyard birds are coming in a steady stream to our feeder and birdbath. The supply of "customers" to our butterfly garden is increasing every day, and last weekend we spotted our first swallowtails.  

Of course, we still have the front yard to make over, and Lisa has given us another beautiful landscape plan for that. But for just a few days, I think Rick and I have earned the chance to sit back, drink a cool beverage, and admire the results of our labors.

 

Dare We Say It? We're Almost Done!

We have completed all the planting in the backyard -- more than 120 individual plants.  I singlehandedly planted 34 shrubs and groundcovers in one day a week ago and am very glad I got that task completed before the humidity descended on us last weekend. It seems like our gorgeous Spring has fast-forwarded straight to August!

We put in a very productive weekend despite the heat. I planted the last of the new plants, and finished mulching the beds with pine bark, while Rick completed installation of the edging. The FINAL task, occurring this week, is bringing in washed shell for our pathways. Then we will truly be done with the backyard, and ready to move to the front.

Many of the plants have been in their new homes for more than a month now, and they seem to be settling in and expanding. The lovely bulbine plants are spreading already and blooming constantly, attracting a steady supply of bees to the delicate orange and yellow blossoms. And the little shade-loving iris that I transplanted from the backyard to the side of the house are also producing gorgeous flowers -- white blossoms with blue centers. I have been having a great time getting up close and personal with them with my macro lens on my camera.

We already have butterfly customers in the butterfly garden, and this morning I counted three monarch caterpillars munching away on the plants. Spotted our first Gulf fritillary too.

Saturday morning, we enjoyed watching a sleek black racer and a beautiful glass lizard checking out our plant beds. We've uncovered several glass lizards hiding in the leaf litter during our yard makeover. These fascinating animals are legless like snakes, but have a lizardlike head and really are considered lizards. They are called "glass" lizards because their tails break off if grabbed by a predator, so they can escape. The tail will eventually regrow.

 



Rick and I are so pleased with the way the yard looks. In trying to find the best word to describe our new yard, I keep coming back to "interesting." Our landscape is so much more interesting with the incredible variety of plants we have now.  And it is truly becoming the peaceful oasis we hoped it would be, so peaceful that even the "Foreman," our cat Belle, has been napping on the job.