December 2007 Archives

The Chinese tallow is an invasive species in the southern parts of the United States.  It spreads prolifically from little seeds which it drops in late summer, and its seedlings can sprout up for miles around. 

It is a fast-growing tree, which used to be commonly used in landscaping new neighborhoods, much like the old ubiquitous Arizona ash.

It drops seeds and branches in the summer time and little green squigglies in the spring.  It's toxic and has few natural predators.

For a few weeks every autumn and winter, the leaves change color and fall, blanketing the ground with brilliant fall foliage.  In a place where it's hard to find much fall color, it is a lovely sight indeed.  I suppose this is, in part, why it was so popular to begin with.

Our house came with a Chinese tallow tree in the back yard.  It isn't long for this world, since we intend to chop it down soon.  I won't miss it, but I wanted to record the beautiful blanket of yellow that it dropped upon the back yard.  By the time the leaf-dropping was complete, the grass was nearly impossible to see.

Carol at May Dreams Gardens invites us to tell her what’s blooming in our gardens on the 15th of each month.

In Austin, the talk of most of the gardening websites I've seen the past couple of days is centered around preparing for tonight's "big" freeze -- it might get down to 30°F or so.  While the number of blooms in my garden is substantially lower than it was last month, it doesn't look like a garden in danger of a freeze tonight.  Like many others, my rose bushes are still blooming today.

 

The winds have picked up today, and while the skies are a gorgeous clear blue, the breeze is chilly, and many heat-loving central Texans are starting to complain about the winter.

I missed Bloom Day in November.  I took pictures belatedly, but they never got posted.  I think the end of Daylight Savings Time (and the ensuing early evenings) has thrown me for a loop.  In Standard Time, during this time of the year, it's entirely dark by the time I get home at 6pm.  In fact, pretty much every daylight hour is spent either at work, or taking public transportation between our far-north Austin home and work.  Such is the life of a one-car household, I suppose. 

I found myself planting asparagus in the raised bed at about 7:00 one morning this week before work, because it was the only time I could find!  What do people do about this? Should I invest in a headlamp and just weed in the dark?  Maybe we need better lighting in the back yard.

I've been doing most of my gardening on the weekends, when I have some daylight to use.  Our vegetable garden is chock-full these days with cool-weather crops, and I've been planting in and around it with flowers and herbs, both for aesthetic purposes and to attract bees for pollination.   This time of year, we've got lots of plants, but not a lot of flowers.  The goal is to keep the puppy out of all the plant beds until the plants have had some time to establish roots and grow big enough that a bit of gnawing won't hurt them.  Mixed results on that front, so far.