Irrigation SNAFU

Posted on December 11, 2014 by Tina

You can’t pick your neighbors.

A pithy statement, to be sure. While it might be true, another saying I’d like to introduce–Friends don’t let friends over water–also appeals to me. I don’t live in a neighborhood that is particularly, um, progressive in the realm of home gardening. Especially for a neighborhood in a region which is experiencing severe drought conditions. Each of the mostly sterile, water-wasting landscapes throughout my neighborhood showcases a blank slate of water-guzzling St. Augustine lawn as the major “garden” feature and many are situated in full Texas sun. These properties require loads of mowing, edging, fertilizing, and irrigating.

There are a couple of folks who understand the value of home gardening and landscaping as a low-maintenance, water-conserving, perennial and wildlife friendly endeavor, but not many.

And I don’t live next door to either of those folks.

This is the result of over watering a Soft-leaf Yucca,Yucca recurvifolia, compliments of a neighbor who is an enthusiastic St. Augustine lawn waterer.

Beginning in early August, this poor thing developed spots on its straps, which quickly spread, rendering each strap a mottled mess, which then died. I couldn’t figure out what the cause of the diseased foliage was, but I pruned the disfigured and dying foliage, strap by strap.

Damage from an insect infestation? I searched and couldn’t find any offenders. Some sort of disease of Soft-leaf Yucca? Always a possibility, though literature doesn’t suggest this species has any real disease problems. Additionally, I have eight other Soft-leaf Yucca plants thriving in my gardens, from full sun,

…to deep shade,

…and everything in between.

There were and are no disease issues with any of those other yuccas. The only variable with the sickly yucca that differed from the others was the weekly irrigation courtesy of the neighbor. I don’t water often–primarily my gardens are watered only with rain. I pruned the mottled and dead foliage in hopes of stopping the necrosis and eventually the yucca sported a tree-like shape which was fun and quirky. I thought the yucca might survive.

One morning though, I found a rotted and toppled-over yucca.

Yuck-ah.

Well, there wasn’t much I could do, except to cut my losses, or rather, the yucca, toss the mess into the yard waste can and stand there, hands on hips mulling my next step. I considered digging up the whole root, but alas, the yucca root is too large for that. Of course it is. It’s a xeric plant and its xeric-ness comes from the massive root system, really a type of rhizome, that the mature plant develops. Also, there were pups growing,

…and rather than disturb them, I left the yucca root in place with its new, seemingly healthy growth.

My neighbor, Mr. I-Gotta-Water-Every-Week-No-Matter-What, watered his St. Augustine grass. Every week! You could set your clock by his schedule. I couldn’t really complain because he watered on his assigned day, during the accepted hours, and though more water than necessary ran down the curb, it wasn’t horrible. Trust me, I’ve seen worse. What I didn’t realize during those months was that the yucca was probably watered every week. I never thought to check if his overhead sprinkler was watering my garden, which borders his property. Because of its massive root, the yucca doesn’t require much irrigation. Once I connected the rotted yucca with weekly summer irrigation, I realized the cause of the once-healthy yucca’s demise. The hardy Soft-leaf Yucca had received much too much water for its needs.

I should add that Y. recurvifolia is not native to Texas, but to the Southeastern part of the U.S. I doesn’t mind a little irrigation from time-to-time, but certainly doesn’t like wet feet or require regular watering.

That’s why I plant what I plant–so that I don’t need to water often. There are many benefits to using native and well-adapted, drought-tolerant plants in a home garden, and conserving water is certainly at or near the top of that list. But the prevalence of St. Augustine grass, especially in full sun and as a primary landscape feature, is not a regionally appropriate choice for Texas. To look good, it requires more water than should be wasted on a landscape.

I left the little pups that were emerging,

…and they’ve grown. I’ll talk to my neighbor next summer to explain why I don’t want extra water on my garden. With our lakes (the prime water source for Austin and surrounding areas) down to about 30% capacity and heading toward a historic low, he might not be able to water anyway because of tighter water restrictions.

His grass will struggle with those restrictions, but my gardens will continue to blossom and boom.

And my yuccas and other xeric plants, will be happy.

Tree Following: Retama in December, 2014

Posted on December 7, 2014 by Tina

Meet my tree, the Retama, Parkinsonia aculeata.

I’m new to the Tree Following meme, having joined last month, but my tree is native to Texas (where I’m also a native), as well as other areas of the southwest United States, Mexico, and parts of Central and South America. Last month, I profiled this lovely, small tree in a general way and this month? Let’s see what’s happening, shall we?

Mostly, it’s dropping its foliage,

…all around its immediate vicinity. But then again, so are other trees. Here lie the slender stalks that are the leaves of Retama.

Co-mingling on the ground along with the turned and fallen brown leaves of a nearby Red Oak tree, this interesting foliage resembles little sticks.

Not sticks though, these are leaves, commonly referred to as “stalks.” The leaf structure of the Retama is unusual–a botanist would describe it as bipinnately compound; there are two stalks from an axis and each stalk has series of tiny leaflets arranged on either side of the stalks. Most of the stalks and leaflets from my tree have dropped, but you can see remaining ones in silhouette against the sky.

As days shorten and cooler temperatures reign, the remaining stalks and leaflets will exit from the tree. Retama is dormant in winter, though during a prolonged drought, the same defoliation process occurs and the trunk and stems carry on the photosynthesis function of the foliage.

The Retama is a valuable medicinal plant. In Brazil, where it’s also a native, parts of this tree have been used as a traditional remedy for hyperglycemia. In 2011 an article was published about the antidiabetic properties of Retama in Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine journal. Using “aerial” parts of the Retama (parts that are above ground), these researchers dried and combined a powered form of the plant parts in a suspension which was administered to rats (yeah, sorry about that…). Simplified, the results indicated a decrease in both blood and urine glucose in the rats, without accompanying toxicity or negative side-effects related to the use of this plant during treatment. Diabetic rats showed improvement in kidney, adipose tissue, and skeletal muscle tissue when ingesting the Retama suspension just before a sugar load.

The researchers concluded that the use of P. aculeata, (what I like to call Retama) is an appropriate treatment either alone or in conjunction with other medications for the treatment of diabetes mellitus.

That’s very cool.

If you’d like to read the full article, click here. This is the full citation: Ana Catarina Rezende Leite, Tiago Gomes Araújo, Bruno de Melo Carvalho, Maria Bernadete Souza Maia, and Vera Lúcia de Menezes Lima, “Characterization of the Antidiabetic Role of Parkinsonia aculeata (Caesalpineaceae),” Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine, vol. 2011, Article ID 692378, 9 pages, 2011. doi:10.1155/2011/692378

Interestingly, the article indicated that the area where the Retama, P. aculeata, grows in Brazil is a “semi-arid” region–much like that part of the United States where Retama is native–for example, here in Texas.

I planted my Retama because it’s pretty.

I planted Retama because it’s a hardy, drought tolerant native Texas tree. I also planted it because the bees and the birds like it. I’m fascinated though, that this lovely tree helps people in a far away place and that they’ve known its value (for more than its good looks) for a long time.

Maybe nurseries should advertise: Retama: it’s pretty and it saves lives.

This coming year, we’ll be learning lots of interesting facts about this extraordinary little tree.

Thanks to Lucy for hosting Tree Following–please pop over to Loose and Leafy and check out trees being followed by garden and tree enthusiasts from all over the world.

And…They’re Off!

Posted on December 5, 2014 by Tina

I released the last two Queen butterflies this week. I brought a total of nine caterpillars into my house, mostly Queens, and one Monarch. You can read about why I would do such a thing here and here. Three of those, all Queens, metamorphosed in the house and at least two, outdoors.

Two of the caterpillars died in the larval stage, but I’m not quite sure how many died as chrysalides. I watched all of them for longer than the 10-14 days that is the normative time for the process and decided to remove two stems with four chrysalides to my compost pile, assuming that the very darkened chrysalides were dead. Since I tend to be a rather lazy composter, I don’t routinely dig in new compostable material underneath the old, but rather, I dump on top. In this situation, that was a good thing. I checked the stems-with-chrysalides, just out of curiosity, a day or two later, and the two chrysalis shells I located were broken–not squishy as if they’d died, but actually broken as if a butterfly had emerged. My hope is that they did survive and emerge. That’s what I’m choosing to believe and there’s nothing like a good rationalization to get through the day.

I couldn’t locate the other stem with chrysalides though. They may have actually died. I now know that one must be careful in handling caterpillars because bacteria can damage, but I wasn’t aware of that before this little save-the-butterflies project started. All of the chrysalides that I assumed were dead had darkened,

…and two of them were very dark and unhealthy looking, indeed. So I pinned my hope on the last two chrysalides, one on a stem and the one above the window.

Window chrysalis opened early Monday morning and Sir Queen unfolded from his cozy pupa.

Buddha-fly was female, Sir Queen is male. Note the two dark spots on each hind wing? Those are scent spots indicative of a male.

Monarchs sport similar markings–both Queen and Monarchs are in the.butterfly subfamily of Danainae.

It was cold earlier this week and I decided not to release him. Once I was confident that his wings were dry, I invited him onto my finger and placed him in a protected makeshift butterfly cage–I have cats (the feline sort) so, yeah, I think that was the responsible butterfly nanny thing to do. Using instruction from a December 3, 2013 post by Texas Butterfly Ranch, I attempted to feed him, but he never showed interest. Butterflies won’t eat in the first 24-48 hours, but Sir Queen never ate in my presence.

It was an instructive and remarkable experience, hosting this handsome fellow and his lady friend the week before. I observed closely his beautiful markings, how he’d turn his head toward me when I was near, and the intricate patterns throughout his wings, thorax and abdomen. One can’t appreciate a butterfly in nature like this–they fly away! And eat! And do other butterfly related things!

Though it continued chilly and cloudy this week, I decided on Wednesday that it was better for him to be out there instead of in here. It was warmer and I placed him on some still blooming Henry Duelberg Sage, Salvia farinacea, ‘Henry Duelberg’.

He didn’t seem all that impressed, but there wasn’t much more I could do, except hope he eventually unrolls his proboscis and gets to work, sipping nectar.

He was still there when I returned later in the afternoon, not having moved much.

I hope he’ll be okay.

Yesterday afternoon I lumbered into the butterfly room, formerly my son’s room to, ahem, pack up more stuff and…Wow!

Another boy butterfly!

And a beautiful one at that!

Sir Queen, the Second!

I’d noticed that the chrysalis, while darkening, developed clearly defined dots and lines and I wondered if the adult would appear–I’m glad I didn’t banish it to the compost.

I quickly ushered him outdoors as it was late in the day. Here they are together in a nice bed of Gregg’s Mistflower–Sir Queen the First and Sir Queen the Second.

May both fly high, nectar much, mate with abandon, and prosper.

Would I do this again, snatching caterpillars and raising them in the house? I’m not sure. Considering that our weather hasn’t been all that cold, coupled with the questionable survival rate of “my” caterpillars, I wish I’d left them outside to take their chances. Their bodies would have slowed down with the lower temperatures, but they wouldn’t have been disturbed. At least not by me. Maybe they would have become bird food, but that’s part of the cycle. NOT part of the cycle is a crazed, OCD gardener snipping them and their food source out of the garden and plunking them in a room with two bright pink walls and two neon green walls–and a Jimi Hendrix poster.

For myself, it was a gift to observe the process so intimately–larvae, pupae, adults. This business of metamorphosis is awesome–in the true sense of that word. The beauty of each stage and the intricate changes throughout–I’m fortunate to have had the time and awareness to witness this common, but remarkable, natural event.

Maybe one of the Sir(s) Queen will find Buddha-fly and they’ll cruise off together, wings entwined, into the sunset.