My Garden - Summer 2011

It is mid-summer now and it is HOT! The drought continues and worsens with little to no rain in many areas and record heat. Gardening for many people is very challenging this year. I have seen a lot less native wildflowers blooming and many going dormant or fading away early this year without setting seed. Around the city there are many brown yards, dried up flowers, and dead bushes and trees. Driving past Memorial Park on 610 there are many mature dead trees - mostly Red Oaks. It is a sad sight.

My garden is doing pretty well this year. Which is in part due to the fact that I planted many drought tolerant native plants. I mulched them heavily this spring and water them very little - about once a week or whenever they show signs of wilting. So here is what is blooming at the moment:

Bloodflower - Asclepias curassavica , I bought 3 of these from a native plant nursery but they are actually not historically native. I will switch them out with Asclepias tuberosa, Asclepias verticillata, or Asclepias viridis when I get some good seed. Hopefully I can find an Asclepias viridis roadside this year with seed. Either way, Monarch Butterflies use these as a food source and they are really easy to grow.

Prairie Blazingstar - Liatris pycnostachya, forming flower stalks now.

Missouri Ironweed - Vernonia missurica, has been blooming continuously since Spring and has seeds that are ready to be harvested. It attracts lots of pollinators.


Sneezeweed - Helenium amarum, a common roadside wildflower that makes a pretty nice flower for the garden. It is compact, has attractive continuous blooms, grows in poor soil, and is very drought tolerant. Can you see the small bee on the flower in the picture?

Mexican Hat - Ratibida columnifera, like the Helenium above this plant has many of the same characteristic but is larger and is a perennial. It also comes in half red, half yellow petal and an all red petal form - both of which are found around Houston. My seed came from Prairie Moon Nursery and are all yellow.

Black-eyed Susan - Rudbeckia hirta, I filled the main section of my front yard garden with these and they have been really showy. I have been dead-heading (cutting of the spent flowers) to promote more blooms.

Common Sunflower - Helianthus annuus, still blooming with lots of seed-heads ready to be collected or left for the birds.

Indian Blanket - Gaillardia pulchella, still have lots of blooms! They are loved by all sorts of pollinating insects (especially bees).

Scarlet Sage - Salvia coccinea, fills the shady portion of my front garden under a Live Oak tree. Very pretty flowers and spreads by seed, nicely filling up available space.

Turks Cap - Malvaviscus arboreus var. drummondii, is also growing nicely in my shade garden. With the red flowers from this and the Scarlet Sage above I have named this shady section my "red garden". Maybe I should add a Coral Honeysuckle - Lonicera sempervirens to this section?.... :)