jumping spider Archives : Cast Iron Garden

October 29, 2023October 29, 2023

10/29/2023 first freeze forecast tonight

Piles of vegetable greenery on a concrete front poor with a black double door in the background — So, in spite of rain all day and temperatures in the 30s F, I went out and cut all the plants. That’s the giant pile of cut basil on an overflowing Rubbermaid tub and assorted cut off pepper plants nearby. The rest of the day was getting basil leaves off the stems.

An inch thick basil stem cut off, with my hand nearby for scale. — The basil stems were so big I had to use the loppers to cut them at the base.

A blue-gray rubber made plastic tub almost full of bright green basil leaves — 3608 grams of basil leaves. This is 7.95 pounds. Yes, we did tare the tub weight. Yes, it is a lot of basil. No, I don’t even know what’s going to happen.

Close up view of a red and blue striped leaf hopper. Its legs and tip of snoot grade to yellow. It has tiny hair like antennae. — Leafhopper

A small true bug nymph on my fingers. It’s small enough that you don’t see around my whole finger. The brown colors are speckled — Leafhopper

July 16, 2023July 16, 2023

07/16/2023 pest control

Green basil leaves with dark greenish-black insect frass pellets resting on the leaves. The edges of the leaves are chewed in. — Paula saw insect droppings and holes in the basil.

A fuzzy brown and beige patterned jumping spider sits under a canopy of big green basil leaves. The spider is facing downward, holding a caterpillar twice as long as the spider. The caterpillar is covered in long white hairs. — Then she saw this jumping spider eating a caterpillar! A healthy yard ecosystem leaves room for some chewing on our food plants because the herbivores have natural predators.

September 5, 2022September 5, 2022

Wild Poinsettia (Euphorbia sp.)

The Wild Poinsettia is really buzzing with bees and other tiny friends lately over the past few days! It’s a very enthusiastic unsolicited volunteer but it seems to get a lot of customers now that the weather is cooling down into the 80s and 90s. It is a native plant and hosts also the very fun Euphorbia bug which has little pompoms on its antennae.

A jumping spider hoping to snack on a visitor to the Euphorbia!

July 31, 2022July 31, 2022

07/31/2022 garden and neighborhood

A Texas dandelion was open in the backyard prairie after a refreshing 1/10th inch of rain!

We stopped to look at the vegetables on the way out to walk and this magnificent little jumping spider was on guard!

On our walk today, near the sidewalk there’s some unmowed area near a creek. Around this beautiful and native silver leaf nightshade you can see a lot of non native and invasive Johnson grass.

An American bumblebee was visiting the nightshade.

It has a lovely flower. Mom has one that volunteered in her garden area.

The plant has pretty flowers as it crept onto the sidewalk, but turned out to be a non native invasive species called Tribulus terrestris.

June 12, 2022June 12, 2022

06/11/2022

The Chef made no bake lemon curd/ cheesecake layered parfaits with homemade whipped cream, farm share blueberries, and homemade granola for a garden tour.

Prepared the night before in the fridge.

Two Texas dandelions from home! White specks are elderberry petals.

A second *Coryphantha sulcata* seedling came up!!!!!

Lace bug (Tineidae) on giant ragweed leaf.

My keeled treehoppers have a big family!!

Shackleton and Briar disagree about social distancing.

It’s on a houseplant that is outside for the summer.

June 5, 2022June 5, 2022

06/05/2022 indoor/outdoor

I learned today that spiderworts are self-incompatible, so these buds didn’t have any seeds in them. Oh well. It was worth a try! Thanks Mom for sending and prompting me to look this up! It explains why we only have the one. 🙃

I repotted the aloe vera (not shown) and added some more dirt and another succulent to this pot, which lives inside in the entryway shelf.

Milkweed beetle! It’s standing on a dayflower and moving over to a nightshade, though.

*Linum rigidum* from home still blooming. It’s annual so I hope it seeds!

A lightning bug resting on a native poinsettia (*Euphorbia*) leaf.

June 5, 2022June 5, 2022

06/04/2022 unexpected excitement

Saw a great little jumping spider on the ironweed leaves.

An interesting bee or velvet ant male or something, on white avens leaf. It was one of the nervous kinds who keeps flicking their wings constantly.

The rain of the last few days prompted the Missouri fluttermill primrose to bloom again!

The Chef and I cleared leaves off the patio. In several places they were up against the wood siding which is not great as they are essentially composting. Here Briar holds down a leaf pile for us. We leave the leaves in the rest of the yard as that is best for a healthy woodland environment!

The worst offending area of leaf collection next to the house. This is after I pulled out the bulk of leaves. Our compost pile should be happy now!

An extremely tiny planthopper that the Chef found on the outdoor work bench.

The last round of tepary beans I planted are coming up.

The big thrill of the day… The horse crippler cactus in the rock garden has bloomed!!!! I imagine this means it’s either happy here or thinks it’s about to die. Hopefully the former. Since I just planted it this spring I wasn’t expecting it, and its flower bud was not obvious, or grew in really fast the last few days when I wasn’t looking with the rain.

November 12, 2021November 12, 2021

A neighbor ecosystem

On Tuesday this week, Mom and I visited the Dixon Water Foundation’s property near Leo, TX (north of FM 455). Mom has been blogging it all week! Have a look starting on her Nov. 9th post (opens in new tab) and keep going to the next post through Nov. 12. She took a lot more pictures than me.