The Sun is Killing Me: Last Hurrah

Monday, November 1, 2010

Last Hurrah

The flowers in my garden are starting to peter out. And since I missed last bloom day because I was sick, I wanted to post what is blooming right now before they are all gone.

Morning glory and turks cap:

Chili Pequin and cuphea:

Sternbergia Lutea (yellow autumn crocus):

Passionflower:

Rainbow and batface cuphea:

The Firecracker Vine(Spanish Flag vine)is absolutely stunning right now:

Closer:

Too bad all the hummers are gone for the season, they would have LOVED the firecracker vine. The last hummer left my garden about 2 weeks ago (right on schedule!):

Gulf muhly, mexican mint marigold, russian sage:

Moonflower:

Butterfly on Milkweed:

The Lesser Goldfinches have been hanging around eating sunflower seeds:

And here is a pic taken last month, I never got it posted, but it was so pretty I am gonna go ahead and post it up now :)

Butterfly on Pride of Barbados:

1 comment:

Lisa Carroll-Lee said...: Wow, you still have so many flowers! Mine are finished -- last of the Turks Cap, last final push from the roses, Morning Glory decided not to flower this year, Pride of Barbadoes finished weeks ago. Central Texas has lots of microclimates!; November 2, 2010 at 1:33 PM

Zone What?

Seattle to Olympia is Gardening Hardiness Zone 8.

Zone 8: -12 to -7 C (10 to 20 F)

Austin is Gardening Hardiness Zone 8-9

Zone 8: -12 to -7 C (10 to 20 F)
Zone 9: -7 to -1 C (20 to 30 F)

The USDA map was updated this year - 2012. Some zones have shifted from the previous version.

See the current map here:

http://www.usna.usda.gov/Hardzone/ushzmap.html

Although both Austin and Seattle are in similiar zone hardiness, their climates could not be more different! Temps top out in the 80's in the summer in Seattle, where in Austin they can top 110 and stay in the 100's for months on end. The same plants that enjoy the Seattle maritime climate will fry in a second in the semi-desert that is Central Texas.

Learn about the heat zone map here:

http://www.ahs.org/publications/heat_zone_map.htm

Check out the AHS Heat Zone map here:

http://www.ahs.org/pdfs/05_heat_map.pdf

Past Garden Quotes of the Month

"The fair-weather gardener, who will do nothing except when the wind and weather and everything else are favorable, is never master of his craft."-- Henry Ellacombe
"The trouble with gardening is that it does not remain an avocation. It becomes an obsession." -- Phyllis McGinley
"The way of cultivation is not easy. He who plants a garden plants happiness." --Chinese Proverb
"A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in." --Greek proverb
'Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.' - Albert Einstein
"Unemployment is capitalism's way of getting you to plant a garden." ~Orson Scott Card
"I never had any other desire so strong, and so like to covetousness, as that one which I have had always, that I might be master at last of a small house and a large Garden." ~Abraham Cowley, The Garden, 1666
"A weed is but an unloved flower." ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox
"Last night, there came a frost, which has done great damage to my garden.... It is sad that Nature will play such tricks on us poor mortals, inviting us with sunny smiles to confide in her, and then, when we are entirely within her power, striking us to the heart." ~Nathaniel Hawthorne, The American Notebookse
"Half the interest of a garden is the constant exercise of the imagination." ~Mrs. C.W. Earle, Pot-Pourri from a Surrey Garden, 1897 (Thanks, Jessica)
"When one of my plants dies, I die a little inside, too." ~Linda Solegato
"In gardens, beauty is a by-product. The main business is sex and death." ~Sam Llewelyn
"Plant carrots in January and you'll never have to eat carrots." ~Author Unknown