What some people won't do for a green lawn!

As I may have mentioned here before, my lawn (if one can even call it that) is certainly nothing to write home about - or even to write a blog post about. It is part Bermuda grass, part St. Augustine grass, part broadleaf weeds, with a lot of bare patches of dirt thrown in. Not a particularly lovely sight and much of the reason for that is that it gets practically no care. It gets mowed. That's about it.

I'm not really willing to foot the bill for what it would take to deliver water to the lawn part of my half-acre lot and so, right about now, after several months of virtually non-existent rainfall, my lawn looks pretty crispy brown. I'm fortunate, I guess, in that I live in an old subdivision that was built before Homeowners Associations became de rigeur in this area, so I don't have to worry about getting nasty citations in my mail for failing to keep a green look to my yard.

In many places in the country, though, including the Houston area, HOAs are powerful organizations that can dictate what you can and cannot do with your yard. So, what if you lived in a desert and your HOA insisted that you have a green lawn? Well, the ever-resourceful citizens of Phoenix, Arizona have come up with a unique answer to that question: They paint their grass!

Lawn painting services have sprung up all over the town. They use a vegetable-based dye to color the brown grass and a typical lawn-painting job costs around $200. The paint lasts pretty much for the whole season and doesn't fade, thus it is a fairly economical option if you've just got to have green.

Some HOAs in Phoenix actually recognize the reality that their city is located in the middle of a desert and they allow an option for desert landscaping (xeriscaping), but for those that require grass, it has got to be green or else. No crispy brown or bare spots allowed, so the lawn painting services are doing a thriving business.

If our drought continues, some of those lawn painting businesses may be opening branches in Houston.

Silent Sunday: First of the daylilies

St. Joseph's lily

It is amaryllis time in Houston area gardens. All those bulbs that we bought for Christmas color - the 'Red Lions', the 'Apple Blossoms', the 'Papillons' - and then planted in our gardens are blooming or getting ready to bloom.


'Apple Blossom' - a bouquet on one stem.

We are lucky to live in a climate where this is possible. A bit farther north, these exotic members of the genus Hippeastrum would not make it through the winter. Here, even with the colder winters we've experienced for the last two years, all of my so-called amaryllis (They aren't really. As noted, they are Hippeastrums.) bulbs have all survived, thrived, and multiplied.

There is one amaryllis that is definitely not a hot-house plant requiring any special care, even in colder climates than ours. It is known by two common names - St. Joseph's lily or hardy amaryllis. It comes by that "hardy" tag honestly.


St. Joseph's lilies are beginning to bloom in my yard and in gardens all across the area this week.

There is an interesting story behind this plant. It is reported to be the first hybrid amaryllis ever produced. It was hybridized in England in 1799 by a watchmaker named Johnson. It was produced by a cross between Hippeastrum reginae and Hippeastrum vittatum and was given the scientific name Hippeastrum x johnsonii in honor of its creator. Following that, it had a long run as a popular home garden flower, but it began to fall out of favor as bigger and showier amaryllis plants were produced. Today, it is difficult to find the bulbs except through dealers in heirlooms like Southern Bulb Company. That, in fact, is where I got my few bulbs a couple of years back.

The bulbs are often handed down from one generation to the next as heirlooms, a popular practice especially among Southern gardeners. If you are lucky, maybe someone will hand some down to you. If not, then they are definitely worth the effort to search them out in the nursery trade.

This is a very tough bulb that has stood the test of time in our climate and soil and is well-acclimated and adapted. It may not be a native plant but it has been here so long that it might as well be. It has everything, really - beauty, fragrance, and durability. Give it a try and I'm betting it will grow on you. I know it will grow FOR you.

Strawberry bush

We gardeners tend to be quirky people. Each of us gardens for our own individual reasons and we select plants for our gardens based on that individuality. We don't always grow plants because they are decorative or floriferous or produce a lot of tasty fruit. Sometimes we grow a plant simply because it is an interesting plant with some uses that appeal to us. That's my excuse for growing the strawberry bush, Euonymus americana.

This is a native American plant, a perennial shrub that can grow up to six feet tall. It tends to be a bit rangy in its growth. Its leaves turn dark red in autumn and my plant held on to most of those leaves throughout the winter.

Its flowers are minuscule and easily overlooked.


Here is one of its flowers, a five-petaled affair that looks like a spot of something on the leaf.

When the flowers fade, the shrub produces tiny red fruits that give the bush its common name.


Here are some of the "strawberries" on my strawberry bush. These tiny berries ripen in the fall and split to expose bright red seeds. These seeds are sometimes eaten by songbirds, although they are not as favored as some of the other wild berries.

In addition to its usefulness to wildlife, this plant has several uses to humans, as well. The seeds, for example, are a strong laxative and they have other benefits for various abdominal complaints. The bark, when brewed as a tea, is used as a diuretic, expectorant, and tonic. It has also been used in the treatment of malaria and liver complaints. The powdered bark, when applied to the scalp, supposedly eliminates dandruff!

I can't vouch for any of these medicinal uses since I haven't tried them, but I find it intriguing that one plant should have so many different functions in folk medicine. For me, though, the attraction is simply growing the plant itself as a part of a habitat garden, to observe how wildlife is attracted to it and uses it. That is the reason that I purchased my plant last fall on a trip to Buchanan's Native Plants.

So far, I'm enjoying having the plant in my garden. It bears close watching though, because it is rather unobtrusive. Thus, I walked by the plant today, glanced at it, and realized that it is in full bloom! If I had blinked, I would have missed it.

So forget about your hibiscus or azalea or that showy amaryllis. If you are looking for a quirky plant to fit your quirky gardening personality, a plant that will fit right in with a natural setting in your garden, you might consider the strawberry bush.

Native vs. non-native, redux

I wrote here a couple of days ago about the controversy of using native versus non-native plants and heirloom versus hybrid vegetables. Here's another take on the subject from the pages of The New York Times today. You won't have any trouble figuring out where the writer stands!

Blooms are bustin' out all over!

The blooms in my garden have been coming faster than they can be documented.


The insignifcant blooms of the variegated potato vine are really not what we grow the vine for. It's the glowing foliage that is the story here. The blooms look very much like the blooms of the potatoes in our veggie garden.


Foliage, likewise, is the main reason for growing this purple oxalis.


Blossoms are definitely the reason for growing 'Laura Bush' petunia.


And, of course, the poppies. Happy little flowers!


The 'Silky Golden' asclepias that I bought to augment my milkweed collection have started blooming.


And the white-flowered loropetalum is now in full bloom.


As are the Blackfoot daisies.


The columbines have been especially floriferous this spring.


The award for the first garden amaryllis bloom of spring goes to 'Apple Blossom' but several others are close on her petals.


All of the Salvia greggii in my garden are putting on a show. Leading the way is 'Hot Lips'.


Not to be outdone is 'Otahal' salvia, full of blooms that the bees love.


These pretty little blossoms are blooming in my tiny pond among the horsetail reeds. (At the moment, I am at a loss for the plant's name.)


FINALLY! The sweet peas are blooming.


And finally, the snowball viburnum has completely opened all its florets and is a true snowball.


The bluebonnets have been a bit sparse, but here is a pretty good stand featuring one lone pink bonnet.

And then, of course, there are the roses.


'Monkey Business' was an impulse buy from Jackson and Perkins last year. It is a floribunda and it has proved to be a real winner. Wish all my impulse buys turned out as well.


'Monkey Business', ready for its close-up.


Pink Knockout has been a real knockout this spring.


These 'Radazz' Knockouts bloom in a hedge along my neighbor's fence that extends into my front yard.


'Graham Thomas' offered up his first blooms this week.


So did 'Belinda's Dream'.


'Ducher', my purchase last spring at Antique Rose Emporium, has not been a disappointment.


A single 'Ducher' close-up.


Finally, along the back fence, 'Old Blush' has been blooming her heart out for about a month.

Even without April showers - yet - the blooms are truly bustin' out all over.

The generalist

Earlier this week, I moseyed on over to The Arbor Gate to listen to one of my favorite speakers on the subject of all things gardening, Dr. David Creech. Dr. Creech does his major botanical work at Stephen F. Austin University and the Mast Arboretum in Nacogdoches. I always enjoy hearing him speak because I usually find myself in agreement with him and he seems eminently sensible in his approach to gardening. (Well, I would think that since I mostly agree with him, wouldn't I?)

Dr. Creech's ostensible topic on this date was "Gardens that Work! Gardens that Don't" but, in fact, he didn't really stick to the subject. His talk sort of wandered all over the landscape - so to speak - and it was all entertaining and useful.

One thing that he said in particular that stuck with me though was in regard to native plants. He is a past president of the Native Plant Society so he has an appreciation of those plants, but he stated that he is not a purist on the subject. He doesn't believe, in short, that our gardens have to be planted entirely in native plants in order to be authentic. He's come around more to a generalist point of view that takes into consideration each plant's characteristics and uses.

As always, the main thing to be considered in regard to any non-native plant is: Is it invasive? If it is a bully that tends to take over the neighborhood, then it is best not to use it. For example, if you've got an ugly eroded slope, don't plant kudzu on it to hold it in place. Find some other more environmentally-friendly solution.

As I was thinking about Dr. Creech's endorsement of using non-native as well as native plants in our gardens, I came across a posting in one of the blogs that I follow, Gardening Gone Wild, on the related subject of heirloom versus hybrid vegetables. The writer Noel Kingsbury's point was that we accept technological improvements in other parts of our lives, why shouldn't we accept it when it comes to hybridization? Especially if the hybrid represents a real improvement in the vegetable.

In recent years, the use of native plants and heirloom vegetables has been the hot thing in gardening and orthodoxy has pretty much accepted that they are always superior to plants that have been tampered with by the horticulturalists. Now the pendulum seems to be swinging back in the other direction and I am seeing and hearing more and more discussions that essentially make the point that we shouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Yes, native plants are acclimated to our area and to the wildlife of the area and they are often very beautiful in the garden, but there are many non-native, non-invasive plants that can serve specific purposes in our gardens and can make our lives as gardeners a little more interesting.

Yes, heirloom vegetables often have more and better taste than the hybrids - especially heirloom tomatoes - but not always. Some of those hybrids have great improvements and still maintain great taste. I'm thinking of some of the stringless green beans, in particular.

Perhaps it is best not to deny ourselves any options as gardeners. Why should we limit ourselves to only native plants or heirloom veggies when there is a whole wide world of other choices out there and some of them may actually work better for us?

I guess on this question you can mark me down on the side of the generalists instead of the purists. At least, it looks like I'll be in good company.