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New Spring Growth: Gregg’s Mistflower
I planted a Gregg’s Mistflower (Conoclinium greggii) last fall in my front pollinator garden. It grew well, flowered for months, and fed many insect visitors. This is a plant that I may need to trim back later if it starts to overgrow other things, but for now its vigor is welcomed. I see a lot… Continue reading
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Volunteer: Prickly Sowthistle
Note: I originally identified this as a Common Sowthistle, but I have been corrected by others in iNaturalist who know more than I. Various kinds of thistle are common volunteers here, and often invasive (meaning non-native and aggressively populating). My approach differs according to where I find them. In the front yard I pull thistles… Continue reading
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Volunteer: Curvepod Fumewort
This colorful and early blooming plant is a volunteer, but a welcome one so I will allow it to stay and seed. Curvepod Fumewort (Corydalis curvisiliqua) has also been called Scrambled Eggs, although I haven’t been able to find out why that name. You can buy seeds for this plant, but I don’t need to! Continue reading
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New Spring Growth: Fall Aster
I introduced a new small Fall Aster (Symphyotrichum oblongifolium) plant last year in my front pollinator garden. Over the winter, it froze back, but I am already seeing vigorous growth from the ground. I just love seeing plants wake up in the spring! Continue reading
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Not A Vegetable Gardener
I have never been a particularly successful vegetable gardener. The principle reasons for that have included ignorance, a lack of sunny growing space in my last garden, and poor interest on my part. Once I became more aware of nature, I was much more motivated to generate spaces that encouraged wildlife, and that meant sharing… Continue reading
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Digging The Swale Deeper
At more or less the lowest point in the back yard, I dug a shallow hollow, or swale, to temporarily capture water during heavy rainfall. I would rather have water sink into the ground than run off the property and into the street. I still haven’t decided whether this will be a permanent feature of… Continue reading
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My New Favorite Weeding Tool
For years, my favorite weeding tool has been this one (photo above). I’ve used it so much that I’ve significantly worn the prongs down. Its thinness means that I can push it deep into the ground to pry roots out without too much disturbance of other plants nearby, and it is strong enough that it… Continue reading
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A Rain Gauge With Accuracy And Capacity
In November last year I enrolled with the CoCoRaHS (Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, & Snow Network) citizen science precipitation monitoring system as a volunteer. I bought one of their required manual rain gauges and installed it in my garden in a location where there would be no interference from other structures. As station number TX-GP-173… Continue reading
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Standing Cypress
When I was new to Seguin, whenever I met a native plant gardener or naturalist, I would ask what was their favorite plant or tree and several of those suggestions are now in my garden here. One of those early recommendations was Standing Cypress (Ipomopsis rubra). Not only is this a beautiful drought-tolerant plant that… Continue reading
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Short-Term Effects Of The Freeze
In the past week we have had five nights of below freezing temperatures, with the lowest recorded here of 16.0 F. I expected to see some wilting, blackness, or loss of leaves and we certainly had that. With native plants, that is almost never a concern, and it’s just a part of nature cleaning up.… Continue reading
About Me
Nature Lover.
Inquisitive Observer.
Student Gardener.
I invite you to join me on my journey to convert my sterile (from a nature point of view) new house lot to a healthy and diverse ecosystem, as I make discoveries, mistakes, and hopefully progress. I am not an expert or professional. The project started in February 2023 and the location is Seguin, Texas, USA.
Rewilding My Lot 