The two leaf senna is getting more and more flowers every day! It has at least 2-3 green seed pods. The second plant hasn’t got any flower buds, but has some new pairs of leaves.
The two leaf senna had at least two seed pods! The second plant doesn’t have any buds but is growing new leaves.This sprouted after another surprise rain this morning and I don’t know what it is. Cowpen daisies I bought are sprouting!The scurf pea (Psoralea/Pediomelium latestipulata) from Mom has its first adult leaf!Little seedlings sprouting. Could be what I planted (Scarlet globemallow), could be volunteers.More cowpen daisies in a pot where I put them and some Rosa sp from Mom from Fannin Co TX.Tiny seedlings in the soil from Jeanne that contains the annual Sedum nutallii!Little seedlings sprouting. Again, could be what I planted, could be volunteers. This hope is Verbena halei.
I tried cantaloupe in my oatmeal this morning, hoping it would be magical like peaches, but I think they’re best eaten cold and alone. The melon, not the person doing the eating.Gram is too tall to stretch under this chair.He came out from under the chair to stretch, then went back under the chair to continue observing his Doggie.Two new blooms on the two leaf senna!!I think one of the juniperleaf cuttings had some nearly ripe seeds on it and they sprouted!!! I kept them in standing water in the shade for the first few days as a cutting, then moved them to a dry spot but still in the shade, where they are now. Still watering every day. This is additionally interesting because the seeds I collected from the original juniperleaf in the winter have not sprouted anywhere I put them. I was reading today in Nokes’ germination book that sometimes fresher seeds don’t have such an impermeable seed coat.A few little grasses in the backyard where I sprinkled the native grass mix from Plants of the Southwest! The mix was blue grama and buffalograss.
The two leaf senna had a second new flower today! The three leaved legume around it is Strophostyles bean, a native volunteer.I’ve seen several Bell’s roadside skippers lately in the backyard.
Tuesday started off sleepy before work.On my way out I saw the two leaf senna blooming for the first time! I’m so happy it’s doing ok. There is a second plant too but it has no buds yet.The Chef and Briar picked me up from work. When we came back, we discovered Gram waiting.He was waiting for his Doggie. “Hello Big Sister!”. Once she came back in the house all was well again.Fajita salad by Paula and The Chef. I am informed there were garden onions and at least one garden tomato involved.The first cushaw squash just keeps growing. We think it is almost ready as the rind is getting pretty hard now.The purple beauty peppers are inexplicably red. I wonder if it’s too hot for the purple color.The mystery pumpkin vine made a second bit of Halloween. It’s the slightly more yellow one above. The vine itself seemed to be dying of squash vine borers so we went ahead and removed it.
Fall obedient plant is thinking about blooming! I think over the winter I’ll move it to closer to the bird bath to get more water.One of the two leaf sennas has buds!!The fluttermill primrose in the rock garden just keeps blooming!!This “live forever” from Judy is budding.I thought this was a plant hopper.It’s insect poop. Technically this is called frass. 😏This fuzzy plant came with some wild onions I got at Mom and Dad’s. I am hoping it might be snow on the prairie!Paula said the mysterious pumpkin was ready.While we were outside, we checked out the cushaw squash. Already longer than Paula’s arm to the elbow!!Shackleton was neutral about the pumpkin.Tuqu was interested in the pumpkin and smelled it carefully.Shackleton was repelled by the fragrant Madhu ras cantaloupe. Tuqu tried to touch it.Today’s two harvests plus the watermelon from the farm share.
The greeneyes is starting to bloom in the backyard prairie! This grew from seeds that I put out a year, maybe two years, ago.Hmm… What is this brown lumpy thing on the butterfly milkweed?An exciting, dare I say unexpected, find by Paula… The Unexpected Cycnia moth caterpillar!I spotted this second Unexpected Cycnia caterpillar on a different plant a few inches away. Apparently they only eat milkweeds, so we are very pleased to find one in the orange butterfly milkweed section of the rainbow garden. It’s also our 150th yard species on inaturalist!A dead cicada. No fun buzzes but Briar hoped.Watermelon in the farm share this week. Yum!!
Plant A: the volunteer. It has generated two fruits and Paula wants to eat them. I want to know what this plant is first. Help me not let Paula get sick.Close up of plant A leaf.Close up of Plant A young flower. A more mature flower a few months ago (see below) has more brown/purple on petals but not I think on the anthers?The north central Texas flora keys out to two main groups by hair type. These, on Plant A, appear to be simple, and possibly retrorse (curving down). No hair joints eliminates P. heterophylla.Plant A: the leaf and the two fruits. The fruit calyxes are five angled.I zoomed in on a picture of the previous flower, same plant A. I believe the anthers are yellow. I would like help with that, as it’s been a while since I’ve tried to confirm anthers. Yellow anthers and simple hairs get it to P. longifolia or P. virginiana in the NC TX Flora. The leaves for both species are are ovate to lanceolate, which seems inconsistent with Plant A. Longifolia also is said to often have purple stems. This one has stripes but not fully purple. The NC TX Flora says these two are possibly toxic. The new Foraging Texas book says all the Physalis are fine. Other sources claim virginiana’s fine or may need a frost. One of the sources is this book about Physalis and relatives so I may get it via interlibrary loan.This is the underside of Plant B. Plant B should be a cultivar of Physalis pruinosa based on its location and what I have planted there. It has similar simple, possibly retrorse hairs. Plant B is not flowering yet this year. I had a really hard time finding flower pictures for P. pruinosa, as most people sort of reasonably are interested in the fruit. It does appear to have yellow anthers. Plant C. This is from a probably perennial wild Physalis (I have never planted any Physalis that made it to fruiting in the backyard). Its hairs are distinctly stellate. None of the individuals in the cluster of 2-4 Plant C individuals were flowering, but the hairs seem to narrow it to P. cinerascens or P. mollis. I think P. cinerascens seems more likely on leaf shape, but both are edible and neither have simple leaf hairs.Plant C leaf (left) and plants A (upper right leaf, bigger) and B (lower right leaf, smaller – it’s from a younger plant), and plant A fruits.
So, am I missing anything obvious here? Is this identifiable? Have any of you consumed P. longifolia or P. virginiana and lived?
Update: Mom showed me a few other keys and they get it to P. virginiana too. None of the keys contain P. pruinosa. P. virginiana is also a perennial while P. pruinosa is an annual, so maybe next year will also provide a clue.
Baby cushaw squash!Recovering from removal of benign sebaceous cysts is more complicated than either of us expected.Purple hulled pinkeye cowpea.I really like the little signs Paula got me for Christmas. They stand out well.A gray hairstreak on a Madhu ras canteloupe flower.Paula’s Coryphantha sulcata is blooming!In fact, it has two. She says it had six earlier this year too.New tiny moth – a spotted thyris!Bee butt in loofah gourd.Paula made Thai green curry for dinner. It contains last year’s garden white currant tomatoes (from frozen, so that works well), garden onions, and garden walking onions.The Texas buckeye is very angry. I put a hose out to soak there. Jeanne has let me know the wild ones do this too, so maybe it will recover.Possibly purple prairie clover from free packet from prairiemoon.com?A second round of standing cypress flowers on a different plant.A volunteer Carolina snailseed in the front yard.Will Rogers Zinnias are looking good in the rainbow garden.Briar loves escorting Shackleton for a walk.Shackleton doesn’t know why we have to ruin a good thing by bringing the dog.We were about to go back inside, but she got up and scooted closer. He turned to glare while she got a treat for laying down.Shackleton says no eye contact.Here you can pretend there is no dog, only lush, succulent grass and corn.
Partridge pea blooming.A big skipper caught my attention this morning.I think it may be a Confused Cloudywing or an Outis Skipper. The pale ish area below the antennal club is why I think maybe Outis Skipper, but I also get the impression that one is rarer, so I wonder if I’m missing something obvious that makes it a cloudywing. Both have been recorded in Cleveland county, Oklahoma though.Saw a two spotted bumblebee on mealy blue sage again!The juniperleaf cuttings have started to perk up and poke at the plastic wrap, so I am unsealing them a bit to see if they can handle less humidity yet.Silly sleep
