If you build it, they will come….

Posted on June 4, 2009 by Meredith

School got out for the summer yesterday, and the boys look forward to a summer of relaxing and doing whatever. But I do want to encourage them to work on their writing skills — with all this era’s wonderful computer and Internet advantages, the good old-fashioned “sit with a pencil and write” seems to have been lost, at least with my kids. So this summer, with journals in hand, we are going to write a little each day. Stories, poems, books, thoughts — whatever inspiration leads us to. Remarkably, the boys haven’t groaned too much about it!

And after school let out yesterday, we welcomed new visitors to our yard. We’ve seen many a toad in the yard from time to time, but yesterday the male toads found the new pond. Three of them set up at strategic spots on the pond rocks and croaked. And croaked. And croaked. We saw two of them — the third was clever enough to croak AND stay out of sight. We didn’t witness any mass migration of female toads to them, but those males sure tried to entice them. I really like how all three toads croaked at different pitches. I fell asleep with the window open, just listening to them…

For our morning journals, we decided to all write garden poems. I’ll admit we were all sort of groggy when we attempted this…

Call of the Summer Wild,

by Meredith

Sun rising
Birds chirping
Good morning, summer, all

Kids running
Playing hard
Will their mom stay sane

Dogs wrestling
In the yard
Splashing in the dog pond

Butterflies
Flutter by
Flowers growing tall

Grasshoppers
Get off of
My zinnias RIGHT NOW

Sun is hot
Ack, more weeds
Compost, cactus happy

In the night
Bull-toads croak
Seeking their true love

And eating mosquitoes. YAY.

Garden poem, by Nolan

Birds, birds flap their wings
Birds can do almost anything

Our pond is great
We found toads that might mate
We cannot wait

Butterflies, butterflies everywhere
But we care

My backyard, by Logan

Birds flitter past,
While my dogs run fast.
The garden’s filled with plants,
The perfect home for the
common ant.
When the dogs meet a skunk
it really
Sprays them well,
And when the dogs do come in
I really hate the smell.
My backyard’s a habitat
For animals thin and small
But watch out when it’s dark,
For the dogs might startle you
With a sudden bark.

Today’s Green Smoothie

Posted on June 3, 2009 by Meredith

Bananas

Organic strawberries, with the tops still on

Rice milk

Soy yogurt (blueberry, with live cultures — but almost any flavor yogurt will do)

Organic carrot greens (the tops)

A bit of agave nectar

Use whatever quantities suit your taste. Blend together — drink! Be sure to buy organic strawberries — or grow at home — conventional strawberries are right up there in pesticide retention! Bananas are safer for conventional because of the rind, but why accept pesticides? I’m not sure about carrots, but I’d have to think that because of the greens being above ground, the pesticide level would be similar to the strawberries. So… ORGANIC!

Something’s fishy about our pond

Posted on June 3, 2009 by Meredith

Aquatic creatures now call our pond home — yesterday I added four little goldfish, which cost me a total of 82 cents. They seemed a bit stunned at first about the new pond, but within moments they rediscovered each other and checked out the pond. Today they are quite active, so I have high hopes that they will thrive and grow. Supposedly they will grow fast when not cramped in a tank with a thousand other fish.

I was distracted from the fish by movement in my peripherals…

Two queen butterflies were busily dancing around each other and visiting our newly blooming Gregg’s mistflower (Conoclinium greggii). I tried to linger long enough to get a close-up, but it was noon, and the Texas sun was beating down on me. Would that I had a zoom lens for my camera (hubby, read this)!

Still, it gave me a chance to show how our butterfly garden is growing. It’s come a long way since the first fall digging of earth and the first little plants of spring. The colors are a garden in and of themselves.

Pond plants at last!

Posted on May 31, 2009 by Meredith

We’ve waited so long for this… we finally finished the pond enough to get plants in the water! Among the selection, I chose the water lilies Pink Sparkle and Perry’s Baby Red, along with a fun Fiber Optic plant. In the filter falls, I placed Ruby Red Runner and Lemon Bacopa. My friend Kim gave me another baby lily, a Pickerel Weed, and an umbrella plant from her Houston pond (thanks for transporting them all the way here, too, Kim!), and a Taro plant came from, I think, the guy who gave us all the rocks — the plant was kept alive for months by my dear neighbor Jan.

But we are thrilled — the pond looks so different with the plants. View the latest details on the pond contruction here.

My son took a picture of his baby bell pepper, along with pictures of two of our dogs. That’s the puppy’s snout pushing up from the bottom of the pic, like Jaws.

Bugs, blooms, and visitors

Posted on May 28, 2009 by Meredith

The butterfly garden is growing like crazy. New blooms appear daily, including lovely Purple Coneflowers and Zinnias, and there is soon to be an open bud on one of the Flame Acanthus. The Winecups that once attempted to take over Earth, however, have finally died back with the oncoming Texas heat.

After wanting soaker hoses for a long time, I finally purchased several for the butterfly garden and other areas. The butterfly garden alone took four, but already the plants are happily growing faster in response. I’m in the process of covering the hoses in mulch, at least until a pelting rainstorm exposes them again. No complaints here — I’ll take the rain anytime!

This Zexmenia (Wedelia texana) really stands out near the Blackfoot daisies (Melampodium leucanthum).

One of the fall-planted drought-tolerant Society Garlics (Tulbaghia violacea) has its first bloom, which means I must have done something right. What a beautiful lavender color.

The Spineless Prickly Pear Cactus (Opuntia ellisiana) seems to love our old heavy soil — it has already doubled in size since I planted it this spring. Maybe I exaggerate, but it certainly is bigger.

I don’t know the name of the insect below, or whether it is friend or foe, but it was quite fond of this young Purple Coneflower this morning. (Edit: It appears to be a Longhorn Beetle, genus Strangalia. Larvae bore rotting wood, while adults eat nectar and pollen.).

But nearby I did find definite foes. My Zinnia leaves have been getting eaten up a bit — upon closer look, there are several baby grasshoppers feasting away. Sure, they might look all cute and stuff UNTIL THEY EAT YOUR PLANTS! I’m worried about the grasshoppers — as an organic gardener I see them as difficult to get rid of. Time to do some research!

But still, the zinnias are stunning. Two blooms so far. The other ones need to catch up!

The pond progresses, and I’ve begun planning the plants for inside and outside. The inside is easy — I have a few plants from a friend in Houston (thank you, Kim!), and I’ve chosen a few others for inside the filter falls and in the pond. But the outside is the real challenge — what I plant will help turn this “volcano-like” pond into a beautiful limestone pond to admire and enjoy all the more.

The pond is attracting wildlife already — there has been a hawk hanging out near the backyard the past two days, more dragonflies are zipping by, and I saw a toad hopping along the ground near the pond. The problem with wild creatures is they don’t want to stick around while you go get your camera!

We got our composter a few weeks back, finally. After much research online, I selected the Tumbleweed composter for its easy turning. I chose the “prettier” green one, thinking that I didn’t need the black one for heat absorption, given that we live in Texas. It’s nice to have a place to put our green food bits other than in the garbage. My big complaint about the composter, though, is that it is not made of recycled materials, for the most part. I seriously considered switching to another composter just for the sake of using recycled materials, but I decided that I was more likely to appreciate and use Tumbleweed’s design. I do hope they will revise their product at some point, or offer an alternative. It’s possible that over time the recycled composter will break down sooner (not meaning long-term decomposition) — I’m not sure.

When I planted this Texas Esperanza (Tecoma stans), rainstorms threatened to drown it. Apparently it liked it, and it’s thriving in its little corner by the fireplace wall.

As I take close-ups of the pretty blooms in my garden, I’ve become quite aware of how much dog hair floats about my yard. Some people have to pull up weeds. I have to pull up weeds AND dog hair in my garden. Here’s Gregg’s Mistflower (Conoclinium greggii), complete with dog hair.

Ah well, at least the outside of our house is consistent with the inside!

We have waterfalls!

Posted on May 11, 2009 by Meredith

Progress continues on the pond, slow but most definite progress. The waterfalls are wonderful — the flow was perfect from the get-go. The Rihas were over for dinner when we first turned it on, so they got to partake in the exciting moment. We still need to mortar rocks around the filter fall area and begin placing the rest of the edge rocks, but we are already getting to enjoy the very pleasing sound of running water down the rocks, splashing into the pond below.

I’ve begun a separate webpage detailing the steps we’ve taken on the pond. View the Pond Project here, but know that it is not finished!

Backtracking — The Shade Sails, April ’09

Posted on May 11, 2009 by Meredith

We’ve been busy with home improvement projects, seemingly nonstop since spring began. In April we finally covered our back porch with some shade-giving sails. To do something fancier was pretty pricey, so we opted for these fun and not-so-common shade sails. Here Grover distracts Michael from his hole digging.

What we thought was supposed to be relatively quick turned out to be an all-day process — starting with the holes. Stepan came over to help hold the posts, but as it turns out he also got to help dig through bedrock, lift 12-foot cedar posts, climb ladders, place plumb lines, mix and pour cement, etc. Hey, at least we fed him!

Of course, rain and hail threatened over the next few days, so we didn’t actually set up the shade sails until days after the cement cured. The dogs began laying in the shade before the first sail actually got completely hung up.

But we are very, very happy with the shade sails. They add shade when it counts but also allow enough morning sun to grow plants around the posts and in containers on the porch.

I already have crossvine growing up the posts — I’ll post pictures of the lovely tangerine flowers sometime later. You can tell by the photo that painting is soon to be in our future!

Happy Earth Day!

Posted on April 22, 2009 by Meredith

Though I’ve truly been going green for some time now, today being Earth Day made me really want to focus on doing as much as I could. Our family decided to go vegan for a day, and we really enjoyed it. Aside from the horrors of slaughterhouses and living conditions for livestock and poultry, livestock are responsible for a huge percentage of greenhouse-gas emissions, and add to it that the acreage required for livestock has contributed to the mass deforestation of rain forests. So… we went vegan today. I can’t say we’re ready to not eat meat at all, but I know that we’ll have more all veggie days in our future (to this plan a friend called out, “Plant killer!”). I also have been trying to purchase more local and humanely raised meat in the meantime. I’m there in principle, just not yet there in financial commitment, since we live on a budget and price often dictates what we can do. So far we’re there in… eggs.

Back to Earth Day. This morning, Nolan was particular wonderful about making sure no unnecessary light was left on, and if natural light sufficed, he wanted everyone to not turn on a light at all. I made sure to not waste any water, and though I had to water my baby plants in my garden, I did so in the early morning hours to minimize immediate evaporation.

My neighbor Jan and I visited a plant nursery, and I picked out two Crossvines, Texas native plants with tubular flowers that provide food for hummingbirds, butterflies, and bees. They are now happily twining up our cedar posts by our back porch. I think that they will really be spectacular when they take off. I also managed to get more plants planted from the stock of baby plants that have been waiting for me to prepare the next bed. This includes herbs, which means that not only will I have fewer herbs to purchase (ouch, expensive), but I won’t be contributing to excess packaging cluttering our landfills.

From the nursery, we headed down to Lady Bird Lake (Town Lake) to participate in a lake clean-up with Keep Austin Beautiful and the National Wildlife Federation. We even made it on News 8 Austin — yep, that was me in pigtails, a garden hat, and gloves pulling trash from among the shore plants. It was fun, and we rewarded ourselves with a bubble drink from Coco’s.

I would have been happy to have been able to ride my bike or a bus to where I needed to go today, but we did have to travel across town. At least Jan and I went in the hybrid!

Back at home, we made progress on the pond, too. We had to hire some men to help us dig our trench, as Michael’s knee has been really bad with all digging through rock, and today the trench was completed. So Michael’s now working on the next step for the pond. The men also dug out big roots from our tree stump, and so this evening we were able to rip the stump out of the ground via our mini-van and a long rope. It turns out the old hackberry has become a haven for all sorts of bugs, including this strange, large creature, an Eyed Click Beetle.

We plan to move the stump to our bird habitat in the backyard (or at least the stump in parts for easier moving). Also, I already have a tree to plant in its place (one that also provides berries for the birdies).

The rest of the day was spent getting plants planted. The only thing that I didn’t get to do was order my composter, but that was due to money. I hope to get it soon. We have to get a tumbler-kind because there’s no way we’d be able to keep the dogs out of any homemade composter. They at least help us mulch by chewing up any stick or root lying around the yard.

Oh how the garden grows

Posted on April 3, 2009 by Meredith

Spring is at last here, and we are back in the yard. It took a few days to get all the weeds out of the butterfly garden. I had great fun going shopping for plants, and once again I only managed to fill half the garden. Plus I still have many more beds to prepare. So much to do! But all the family has been helping some, even our young puppy Grover.

I look forward to all these plants getting big! The butterflies are already fluttering by from time to time. I’ve found earthworms, snakes, centipedes, and spiders — such a change from the beginning of this garden, when we were working with scorched, unhealthy soil. The wildlife cometh!

Not So Keen

Posted on November 2, 2008 by Meredith

Well, I went out into the backyard and discovered that my favorite shoes, my normally-expensive Keens that I got for free in a raffle and wear just about everywhere, had been mostly destroyed by one or both of our monster dogs, who apparently were “keen” on enjoying a classic dog-eat-shoe scenario. Grrrr.

While it means that we’ll need to fork over the big bucks to replace them (because yes, I want another pair), at least this unfortunate pair can officially become garden shoes, because as it turns out that having no ankle straps means they slip on and off fairly easily, like a nice garden clog except more comfortable. It doesn’t mean the dogs aren’t on my bad side, though!