The pictures you see here were shot a couple of days before Christmas, 2012. Check out those one year old rose bushes. No blooms all summer but as soon as the weather cooled off, BAM !. They look good and smell great.
Gardening has it's educational and environmental benefits as well. I'm learning about the little critters that come to visit the garden. The Bees, the Butterflies and the Hummingbird to name a few.
I was wrong about the roses. Just because they can survive the brutal summers of south Texas does not mean they thrive in the heat.
I've learned of the need for human intervention on behalf of several smaller species. Specifically I am talking about the honey bees, the hummingbirds. the firefly and the butterflies.
For those of you who don't know, bees are important to human survival. Without bees crops don't survive and we don't eat.
No wheat equals no bread. No bread means no McDonalds. No McDonalds means, well you know the rest.
I've also learned the Monarch and other butterflies migrate long, long distances from the northern parts of the United States all the way down to the Monterrey, Mexico area.
The distance is so great butterflies require two life spans to make the journey. The first butterfly stops off in south Texas exhausted.
They lay eggs on milkweed and then die. The eggs hatch, go through a growing transforming process become a caterpillar, eat the milkweed and become a beautiful butterfly.
Without the milkweed all the butterflies would die out. When old enough they become a butterfly and begin feeding on other flowers which provide nectar in their bright blooms.
They share these nectar plants with the honey bee and the hummingbird. After the Butterflies are grown they take off for Monterrey. Once they arrive at the winter headquarters they locate the tropical milkweeds and repeat the life and death process. In the spring the return trip begins and the process is repeated on their way home.
The Hummingbird shares the affinity for these plants and at least a part of the migration pattern with the butterflies. I have to admit I am hypnotized whenever hummingbirds are in the garden. I don't believe in feeding them sugar water. But I do try to provide their preferred indigenous plants.
Last summer I decided to help butterflies, hummingbirds and honey bees with my Johnny Appleseed garden. I am waiting for more information on what to plant for the fireflies.
In October I built a long raised bed planter along the east wall of our backyard. Additionally, I added two 14 foot diameter raised bed round gardens. All three are in the shady area of the yard.
I bought lots of nectar pretties and about thirty tropical and Texana White milkweed. The Texana is indigenous while the tropical comes from the Monterrey destination area. They both do well in the San Antonio area. I picked up a few sun loving plants and mixed them into the rose beds. As the winter moves on I am finding several of the roses are struggling. I thought the sun had been too harsh but apparently they were not getting enough sun. I may attempt to transplant them to sunnier spots.
By the end of October I had finished the back yard and began construction on the improvements in the front. The pictures in this blog are of CHRISTmas 2012. The Corkscrew Sonora rock I picked for the front raised beds matches our neighbors much better than the chopped limestone in the back yard projects.
The four little red plants under the dining room window are called Turk's Cap and will grow to about five feet wide as well as five tall. The plants around the trees are a mix of host and nectar plants. The covered plants in the back yard circle are four bromeliads I picked up down in Captiva. I don't know if they will make it through the winter but they were so darned pretty I had to try.
Please stay tuned we have two more beds to dig out and fill. They are the two former nandina and boxwood on the left side of the front. Once we dig out the roots and fill with a form of compost dirt we plan on adding more butterfly, hummingbird and honey bee plants. I hope to update these garden blogs as we finish the beds and the plants start to grow. I guess I am hoping other folks will get interested in the Butterfly gardens and follow suit. It's a small thing but it's something.
This article and garden brought to you by:
John Boykin
"The Hard Hat Photographer"
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