| Author |
Message |
Dipo
Member
04-22-2002
| Friday, October 11, 2024 - 3:34 pm 
I am doing a Service Day tomorrow, to refresh the library gardens. Someone got 37 plants!!! Thank goodness there will be a bunch of people there to get them into the ground.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Friday, October 11, 2024 - 4:57 pm
Good Dipo!
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Saturday, October 12, 2024 - 12:24 pm
Everything is planted, all 43 of them. Still some beds need work if I’m going to plant more this year but even if I don’t plant more this year time spent now would not be wasted.
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Dipo
Member
04-22-2002
| Saturday, October 12, 2024 - 10:18 pm
LOL, we got almost everything planted. All the little kids were funny helping dig in the dirt and plant stuff. A great time was had by all.
Yeah! Mack, everything is planted, now you can just enjoy and spiff up any areas you think need it, LOL.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Sunday, October 13, 2024 - 7:29 am
Truth is I’m only about 1/3 through my final and still evolving vision for the backyard. Even though our growing season here is pretty long nurseries have fewer and fewer of the plants I want or need. Some plantings need to wait until the spring so the plants will have all spring and summer to establish themselves before the next winter.
One thing that is frustrating for me is our lack of topsoil in this part of town. We live north of San Antonio in what is the start of hill country so we’re basically on solid limestone rock. Digging even a 5” deep hole for a plant takes quite of bit of effort. What should take a few minutes in some locals takes 15-20 minutes here. Even then it often means adding garden and top soil to build up the beds. Add to that it has only “cooled off” to the mid 90s and it’s a challenge for this old man.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Thursday, October 17, 2024 - 7:25 am
OK the planted plant count is now up to 46. When I dropped Mrs Mack off at the airport Monday I drove past one of the nursery I use. Darn car pulled right into the parking lot. Wandered around and saw a few plants I wanted to add to the lot. Three made it home with me. 😬
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Dipo
Member
04-22-2002
| Thursday, October 17, 2024 - 11:00 am
Hahahahaha, that nursery has a tracking beam on you!
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Wednesday, October 23, 2024 - 3:34 pm
Updated plant count: 50. 🙂
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Friday, November 01, 2024 - 11:52 am
Updated plant count: 56. 😬
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Grooch
Member
06-16-2006
| Friday, November 01, 2024 - 12:43 pm
We want pictures! 
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Thursday, November 14, 2024 - 5:58 pm
Nothing is fully completed. Plus because of my soil depth conditions I had to go with smaller plants. Will take a season or more to buy the right plants and for them to mature to be picture worthy. Being early November not much will happen until next spring.
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Juju2bigdog
Member
10-26-2000
| Thursday, November 14, 2024 - 8:29 pm
Yeah, but I sorta recall spring beginning in February in Texas, when maybe the mountain laurels bloom? And the buttercups and Indian paintbrush, followed not long thereafter by the bluebonnets?
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Friday, November 15, 2024 - 5:11 pm
True that Juju. Turns out I went to HEB….a Texas giant grocery store….and they have a garden center with a small section of Texas native plants. I wasn’t expecting it and actually figured I was done until next year but they have a shipment of Black-eyed Susans that look pretty nice and they are on sale. Didn’t buy today but came home and figured out where I would plant them and how many. Looks like I’ll be buying more plants tomorrow. 😬
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Juju2bigdog
Member
10-26-2000
| Friday, November 15, 2024 - 9:15 pm
I love HEB and look forward to going there every winter when we return to South Padre Island, where we arrived on Halloween, staying until Jan. 31.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Saturday, November 16, 2024 - 12:14 pm
OK…..went to the HEB garden center and bought the plants. Actually three more got in the cart so came home with 11. That does not count a Christmas cactus for inside the house. Will probably plant them today or tomorrow.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Tuesday, November 19, 2024 - 7:21 pm
I think…I hope…I have planted the last addition to my evolving Texas native butterfly garden this year. Today I planted 13 more plants so my count is now 69 plants since I started. Not sure how many more I’ll plant next year but it easily could be close to that number based on the areas I still have room and need to plant. I also decided to plant in an area that is totally out of sight by my pool equipment. That will be my lowest priority and may or may not happen even next year.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Tuesday, November 19, 2024 - 7:52 pm
I should say this effort is not a plant and forget effort. I have to prune, dead head, mulch, water, weed, etc., etc. I kind of knew going into this that I was embarking on a more involved and somewhat labor demanding adventure than just sitting on my patio by the pool drinking adult beverages. My reward for this effort has been a visually slowly evolving more colorful and welcoming environment. I have also seen more humming birds and butterflies like monarches, queens, swallowtails, and others I haven’t identified. I am kind of surprised at how simple things like a hummingbird or butterfly bring me a smile and happiness.
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Juju2bigdog
Member
10-26-2000
| Tuesday, November 19, 2024 - 9:50 pm
Oh, Mack, welcome to geezerhood, where there is almost nothing more delightful than watching hummingbirds. Luckily where I live in coastal WA there are only two kinds, so I can expound at length on both of them based on my personal observations and a bit of book learning.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Tuesday, December 10, 2024 - 5:05 pm
Brought a couple of my potted plants in that are not cold hardy. Most of the native plants I planted this year are hardy in this zone for heat and cold but a few are marginal. Most of those are planted in the ground and heavily mulched for the winter so they should make it. I may throw some old sheets I’ve collected over them tomorrow just in case. The potted plants obviously fully exposed so in the garage they go. It will get cold in there but nowhere near to freezing. First time I’ve used the wheel barrow since my accident with it…..I was a bit nervous and very careful.
PS Juju - The hummingbirds and butterflies have migrated south for the winter. 😟
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Monday, January 27, 2025 - 7:15 am
Had a chance yesterday with slightly warmer weather to survey my garden. Looks like the freeze did some major damage to about 25% of what I planted last year. With my son’s help we did the best to protect the new plantings and it worked in some maybe most cases but not all. Kind of expected that. Time will tell which plants recover since spring typically arrives here in south central Texas sometimes in late February but pretty much fully by mid March. I got a late start last year when I decided to revamp our backyard and knew with a harsh winter some plants might not make it. Oh well….I’ll be on it much earlier this year and hope to finish my plan early this year.
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Grooch
Member
06-16-2006
| Monday, January 27, 2025 - 7:22 am
I hope your garden makes it! I enjoy reading your gardening stories and how it's going.
I realized yesterday that if I want to do a vegetable garden this summer, I need to start figuring out when I need to start seeds.
I also need to come up with a plan to combat the squirrels. Mine are more destructive than the deer. Grrrr...
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Dipo
Member
04-22-2002
| Monday, January 27, 2025 - 10:34 am
Mack did you get some of that snow?
I noticed yesterday that the tree outside my living room windows has started blooming those white blossoms that make it look like it's snowing when the wind blows them off.
I think my plants have made it thru the freeze warning because they are on a covered balcony.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Monday, January 27, 2025 - 12:44 pm
We got a dusting of maybe less than 1/2 inch of snow. It was the temperatures in the low to mid tens that did the most damage.
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Grooch
Member
06-16-2006
| Wednesday, March 12, 2025 - 5:42 am
Just got the phone call that the landscapers are coming to take down 2 of the 6 trees that we need to take down. They need a special machine that goes 75 feet up. There's only one place out here that they can rent it from and if they don't get it tomorrow, then they won't be able to get it for a few months. The rental place raised their daily rental cost by $300 a day. The daily rental cost is $1,200 a day.
So, with the friends and family discount I get, the cost to take down 2 trees is $3,000. Ouch!
Hopefully, the other 4 trees won't be as much. And it's going to be a whole day ordeal.
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Mack
Member
07-22-2002
| Wednesday, March 26, 2025 - 4:40 pm
Today I started Project Resurrection. What is that? I planted a bunch of young plants last year. We had a brutal but short freezing period and some of my plantings didn’t make it. Bought the replacement plants today so now will try to get us back to where I was at the end of last season. The total finished “plan” is not there yet but I’m not starting so late like last year. It’s only effort and money….I’ll get it done eventually. 😬
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Grooch
Member
06-16-2006
| Monday, March 31, 2025 - 8:32 am
Ugh. We finished having the trees taken done last week. 2 of the trees that came down were on the south side by the property line. It opened up the view to where the neighbors park.
I haven't even had a chance to decide what to plant there yet, and this morning, the neighbor's landscapers came and they are planting green giant arborvites there!
I hate! Hate! Hate! Green giants! That's what everybody plants around here now for privacy hedges. They grow to fast, get to tall (60 feet) and about 12 feet wide. And everyone has them planted way to close together because they have to have immediate privacy. It's going to block all the sun on my side and end up encroaching on our side of the yard. Well, hopefully, since the sun will be on their side, they will grow out more on their side, where they park the cars. He has maybe a foot from the property line to the edge of his driveway. What is he thinking? Probably not thinking, to be honest.
When I drive around and see all these stupid trees, towering over people's houses, I think about how much money it's going to cost these people to have them taken done because planting them 3 feet apart instead of 12 is going to make them weak and vulnerable.
And people think they're deer proof. Little do they know that deer are starting to eat them in areas where there's nothing else for them to eat. Maybe this winter I'll tie some deer food to the branches and train the deer around me to eat them. 
Not even 1 week were those trees taken down. Are me and my bf really that bad?
Ha! Ha! I just talked to my bf and he said if any branches grow on his side, he's cutting them off.
He also told me that our landscaper told him last week that the 2 pine trees on his side of the property line need to come down because they are dying. Oof! I just looked at them and they look horrible and 1 of them even has a point trunk. Meaning, it started as one trunk and about 15 feet high, it started growing as 2 trunks. Not good. Better not fall on our house.
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Grooch
Member
06-16-2006
| Monday, March 31, 2025 - 10:50 am
OK, the landscaper just came back with the trees. He used our driveway to pull up to the trench they dug to unload the trees. He has 8 trees! 8! 
They are scrunching them all up right next to each other. They're probably 6 to 8 feet tall and the tops of them don't look the healthiest. Huge rootballs. The trees look like they were dug up last year and balled, and spent the winter plopped back in the ground. But the burlap on the balls look new. Maybe they were reburlapped. Or maybe they were freshly dug up this spring, but the extremely cold winter made them look like crap. All I know is that they didn't come from where I work. That's for sure.
I wonder if the neighbors are going to add sprinklers where the trees are. They are going to need to be watered everyday for awhile.
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