We got another package of bare roots from Prairie Moon. One rattlesnake master (since we have one already, maybe they will make seeds), one Camassia angusta- they only had one left), and several Ohio spiderworts. Up front, the pineapple sage is blooming. Two slightly different looking seedlings in the Penstemon cobea pot. I’ll keep an eye on them. Winter greens looking good. The purple Salvia greggii are really blooming right now. The showy milkweed seems to be shutting down for the fall with some yellow colors. I had to use one of the Chef’s big food grade buckets to hold all the fruit from the 17 lb watermelon from a few weeks ago when I cut it open today.
The Chef wanted to see what was out this week so we took the UV flashlight and checked. Here’s a spider!It’s beige in regular light.I had no idea there were hairless bee flies. This one came to the porch light. We turned off the porch light once we went inside so all the critters could go back to their business.We found three glowing crab spiders. All of them were on insect pollinated flowers, so I wonder if they glow to blend in for pollinators who can see UV? Though on this Salvia greggii, presumably all the pollen is farther down the flower. But we found two on zinnias.The green striped cushaw squash looks melted!Escobaria missouriensis cactus spines glow!There’s a lot of sunflower pollen glowing. You can see how much has fallen off!This was my favorite picture of the glowing sunflower pollen: just the disk flowers glowing against the dark sky, leaves barely visible.
The accidental shot of the week. I didn’t notice this bee kicking a wasp off its foot until I looked at the photo later!The bumblebee is feeding on Echinacea purpurea.Front of the bumblebee face is yellow.A zoomed in shot. The short overall hairs, all yellow on thorax and head, smoky dark wings, and minimal color on abdomen have led me to think it may be Bombus griseocollis, the brown-belted bumblebee. I have entered the sighting and photos on Bumble Bee Watch’s community science website where they can verify or correct this identification. This would be our fourth bumblebee species for the yard if I have identified it correctly. 🤞🤞I found a second partridge pea plant blooming in the “prairie”!An all orangish solider beetle on a Rudbeckia flower.Shackleton the cat enjoyed hiding in brown crinkly paper. He has such big eyes!Paula is experimenting with kombucha fermentation thanks to a culture from Abby. This is the first sample and contains a garden strawberry for added flavor. It was good!Briar helps us observe bees out front. I’ll do a separate post with evening bees if any pics turned out.A baby moon and stars watermelon!!A baby praying mantis on the mint!Paula and I weeded the orange and red section of the rainbow garden. It has a lot of invasive grass in it.
A few marigolds are sprouting in Mom and Dad’s container garden.Went for after-dinner walk and Gracie was feeling alright!A bumblebee on Salvia greggii.Blue stars are blooming!These bluestars haven’t opened yet. This garden patch was transplanted from a patch up our hill a long time ago, to Mom and Dad’s garden. This is where mine in Norman are from.
We’re watering and fertilizing two straw bales to become potato growing sites. The one that we’ve watered and covered with plastic to keep warm is growing straw. At least it’s not got herbicides on it!!We trimmed the Salvia greggii back for bushiness and spring flowering. We also did the winter pruning for both new and old fruit trees but I forgot to take before and after pictures.Several seeds are sprouting in the hoops. If you can zoom in, you may see the two oil traps for earwigs. It is leftover fryer oil so it should excite their senses. We also planted two varieties of lettuce seeds we forgot before, and sprinkled leaves from the Salvia branches on the idea they might repulse earwigs. Finally, a few seeds are already up: purple lady bok choy, lacinato/dinosaur kale, Scotch blue curled kale, and French breakfast radish.The daffodils I moved from along the metal edging to among the Salvias are coming up! Hopefully the trim will also make these more visible if they end up blooming. They were previously overcrowded and in the shade, so maybe out here they’ll actually bloom.
I believe this is a Brazilian Skipper. It may be a new county record! It was SO BIG, just a little smaller than a sphinx moth. Apparently they are regular in central Texas and elsewhere south, but wander north in the fall.