State of the garden, post freeze

Wisteria blooms about to burst

Dead:

• Angel trumpet
• Butterfly weed
• Cigar plant
• Snail flower vine
• Bougainvillea
• Ficus
• Macho fern
• Coleus
• Mexican heather (most, not all)
• Pentas
• Night blooming jasmine
• Lantana (traditional "wild" type)
• Night blooming cereus
• Staghorn fern
• Arabian jasmine

Althea

Survived:

• Rosemary
• Louisiana irises
• Walking irises
  
• Lantana, recumbent
• Blue salvia
• Nasturtiums, coming back from self seeding
• Passion vine
• Fig tree
• Lemon tree
• Wisteria
• Flowering maple (3 out of 4)
• Ginger
• Banana trees
• Sweet olive
• Sky vine
• Plumbago
• Shrimp plant
• Bird of paradise
• Giant bird of paradise
• Oleander
• Christmas cactus
• Carolina jasmine
• Confederate jasmine
• Althea
• Gardenia
• Bridal wreath
• Hydrangea
• Yesterday, today, tomorrow
• Black eyed susans
• Cone flower
• Passion vine
  

Wondering about:

• Orchids
  
• Caladium bulbs
• Hibiscus

Today I planted:

• Coleus
• Dusty miller
• Impatiens
• Pentas
• Butterfly plant (Pink Gaura)
  
• Basil seeds
• Zinnia seeds
• Cosmos seeds
• Nasturtium seeds

My time slot

Today we had bagels and cream cheese at the bakery. After much back and forth in my mind for a few hours this morning, I finally gave myself permission to have a cup of coffee with breakfast (what I really wanted was an ice cold draft beer in a frozen schooner mug, even at 7:30 am) and it turned out I wasn't really interested in drinking it. Damn.

After running a few errands with Charlie, I was able to cash in on the promised yard work time slot.

He set up my spot....

Front and center for good viewing

...put on his $5 straw hat from Walgreens (lots of compliments from the cashier when he purchased it) and I gave him instructions. First was to tame the wisteria on the arbor trellises.

He followed instructions very well and really cut back the wisteria and flowering maple and a bit of the ginger. He went after the passion vine that was growing in the fig tree, sweet olive, and irises.

Attack of the passion vine

The cosmos got yanked as they'd had enough in the heat and he did a bit of weeding. He assures me he'll do a bit each day when he's out and about in the yard with the pooches. Somehow crab grass has made it's way into the beds.

See the bead of sweat on the tip of his nose???

Unfortunately, my time slot got cut short by one of those afternoon thunderstorms we have each day, but overall things are looking much better out there.

Hoping to be out there working with him soon, but in the mean time, I'll feel better looking out the kitchen window.

I heart hibiscus

I fed them today. I am hoping this will help them to bloom more. The blooming is so sparse with the heat, as the buds fall off. The same fertilizer, for plants enjoying acidic soil, was applied to the hydrangea, gardenia, and althea.

Nasturtium

Yesterday it looked like this...



And this morning...



Next year I will seed in a sunnier spot and maybe a little earlier. Many of the "cottage style" gardens I admire in the neighborhood have nasturtiums that have been blooming for weeks.

Irises in January

Dan Gill reported today that it's a good time to lightly fertilize the Louisiana irises for vigorous growth and abundant flowers.

I've given ours some osmocote. The irises from mom aren't growing as aggressively as the batch we got through the newspaper ad. I think they are all yellow, but we will wait and see what happens in late March.