Rewilding My Lot

Texas Mountain Laurel (Dermatophyllum secundiflorum) was the first tree that I planted here, in spring 2023. This year it was finally established enough to bloom.

This first bloom cycle gives me a chance to observe that process. At the end of February the tree was covered with fragrant colorful flowers.

Those blooms were popular with many pollinators, like these Black Swallowtail butterflies.

All too soon, the blooms were gone and now seed pods are beginning to form. On a stalk that previously held a cluster of flowers, I see several seed pods, but also some empty spots. Perhaps that is an indicator of whether blooms were successfully pollinated (seed pod) or not (gap). Here are examples of both crowded and sparse pod stems:

Once mature, the pods will turn brown or gray with dark red seeds inside. A couple of years ago I experimented with methods to germinate Texas Mountain Laurel seeds and found one that worked well.

Here is what the seed pods currently look like. This article from Central Texas Gardener suggests that seeds that are not yet red may germinate more easily, but I have not tried that myself.

At the same time as all that flowering and seed pod production, my Texas Mountain Laurel has been producing a lot of new growth as well. This is one advantage of being an evergreen plant — once spring arrives you don’t have to manufacture new leaves and you can quickly get going on other things.

Among that new growth are structures that I recognize as early bloom buds. Assuming they don’t get eaten by caterpillars in the meantime, these structures will remain all the way until next spring, at which time they will swell and develop into flowers.