“I Caught a Live One!”

ESPatch Dec 22, 2010 4 comments

In 1977 NASA’s Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft launched into space carrying phonographs called the Golden Records containing pictures and sounds meant to show extraterrestrials a glimpse of life on Earth and where we are located in space. Credit: NASA

“This is a present from a small, distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours”.

President Jimmy Carter

clack…click, click..etc.etc.

(“So that’s where they live! Buckle up lads, “beaks” at the ready, these humans are almost all liquid already so save your enzymes!”)

What are the chances?…Last week I found a dead wheel bug on the Patch steps, then, who did I see slowly (and I mean slowly) walking across a new pathway I was laying at a client’s house?

No wonder that “beak” is so painful if it spikes an unsuspecting hand, look at that thing, lethal…a fact I was very conscious of, as my camera hand almost touched this very “Alien” looking assassin bug.

“Game over, man, game over!…”

It was also using it’s beak to probe the ground as it walked. If you look really carefully you can see the 2nd set of eyes behind the main ones, oh yes, with a creature as bizarre as this, two eyes would just be way too normal? I was happy though, to finally get to see one of these insects in motion…slow motion.

“And that’s all I gotta to say about them wheel bugs Jenny”.

“That’s a good thing Forrest…we were all kinda tired of hearing about them assassins anyways.”

“Jeennny”!

Moving On:

Ornamental grasses have their brown and purple winter clothes on, even though we touched the mid-eighties this week in the Patch. (Sorry all my UK readers).

The brown and purple colors in this dwarf miscanthus contrast well with the silver of artemesia.

The seed heads form many different shapes,

and look great set against shady areas, in areas they can catch the sun…Texas snow.

With the warmer temperatures this week, my Madame Ganna Walska decided to throw out what has to be the final water lily of the year (I keep saying this, I know I do). The purple on the lily is much more pronounced at this time of year as it is on this…

…oh, I don’t need to tell you by now! I really should put these fallen celosia on the compost pile, but there are seeds in there, seeds I tell you…

“Hey, get off that swing seat…there is shelling to be done”!

We have all gathered so much celosia seed this year I now use the prospect of more shelling as a threat, that and the ever vigilant Santa, naturally! …“Clean up your toys NOW, or do you want to shell a tray’s worth”?

…Works every time.

This festive was a pass-along from Bob at Draco Gardens, it has grown into quite the snow drift. Behind it is…

…one of three basket grasses I have planted in the Patch, this is the oldest one. I like the way this plant looks flanked with prostate rosemary, the rosemary looks great in bloom set against this succulent, it’s pale blue flowers are almost the same color.

Nolina microcarpa

Nolinas are actually members of the Agave family and they are native to the Southwestern U.S.

They easy to grow, heat & drought tolerant, evergreen, deer proof, not fussy about soil & hardy down to 10 degrees F, what more can we ask for? It is amazing how underutilized these succulents are in our landscapes, they look excellent when planted in raised beds and allowed to “spill” over the edge like this one. Nolina microcarpa requires absolutely no Summer water once established. The leaves were used by Native Americans for weaving baskets & mats, hence the common name.

After last years prolonged freezes I was sure these unprotected barrel cacti would be for the compost pile, but I was wrong. They had a little discoloration on their marginal edges but other than that, they were surprisingly just fine, even the little ones. These leaves are going to be a joy to pick up.

Finally:

“Winter” in the Patch:

Stay Tuned for:

“Ho Ho Ho-ja Santa!”

All material © 2010 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant) 14th century planet Earth techniques.

“Android Assassins”

ESPatch Dec 17, 2010 7 comments

“Golden brown texture like sun
Lays me down with my mind she runs
Throughout the night
No need to fight
Never a frown with golden brown”

Japanese maple, cattail, inland sea oats and Mexican fire bush.

The song holds up a lot better than the 80’s video, naturally, though part of it does make me reminisce about summer iced turbans.

Never a frown from me either!

The golden browns emitted from these inland sea oats at this time of the year is quite something, this plant just keeps on going, it looks fresh in the spring and just keeps looking better into it’s autumn and winter years.

Chasmanthium latifolium

Chasmanthium latifolium or Uniola latifolia has many names including Nothern Sea Oats, Inland Sea Oats, River Oats, Creek Oats, Wild Oats, Indian Woodoats, Broadleaf uniola, Broadleaf sea-oats and broadleaf spike grass. This showy perennial is one of the first native grasses used for landscaping purposes. This great ornamental grass grows in shade or sun, though it prefers partial to full shade, hence the name Woodoats. It is tolerant of all soil types, mine grow well under the fringe cover of my large post oak.

I have a small dedicated bed for this plant but I have never found it difficult to control, if it pops up somewhere it shouldn’t, it is quite easy to pop the offspring out of the ground. If you have a west facing garden this plant will supply plenty of light smoldering and movement throughout the winter months…a must have ornamental grass.

The seeds of this grass, when mixed with pond water “stock”, a little rosemary for flavor, and some datura seeds have also been made into countless winter “stews” that should it be devoured,

imparts a profound effect on the diner.

This poor little anole ingested a little too much of the lethal stew.

Yet another Pompeii victim found Patch petrified.

Moving on…

I followed this butterfly around way longer than a rational person probably should, but I was determined to get a shot in. This butterfly was extremely small as you can see from the size of the decomposed granite it alighted on.

Dainty Sulphur (Nathalis iole)

or Dwarf Yellow. It finally landed on this rosemary where it stayed still long enough to get a couple of shots in. These butterflies are present year round in peninsular Florida and South Texas. After overwintering as adults in the South, some migrate north in spring and summer, every summer they re-colonizes through the Great Plains to southeast Washington, southeast Idaho, Wyoming, and Minnesota.

Intruder Alert…Intruder Aler…

I had a mechanical looking assassin perpetrate the perimeter defenses of the Patch this week…

I naturally called on the services of my resident private eye to investigate the breach further…Like Dr. Watson, he was right on the case with his discerning right eye!

“He needs the abrasive silica qualities of horsetail reed to improve the optical resolution of that lens!”

There are some mighty strange insects in Texas, and this mechanical looking cannibalistic bug has to rank high up on the list. This is off course an assassin bug, or to be more precise, a wheel bug. Its name derives from the prominent crest, which resembles a cog or gear. This is the only insect species in the United States with such a crest.

Arilus cristatus

It is the largest species of assassin bug in Texas, and this one was a monster. Okay granted, it was lying dead on my back porch steps casting a long film noir shadow, but it was still a large and very formidable bug. The assassin bug slowly prowls with slow, and almost robotic movements across leaves looking for a victim to drain, and I have no shortage of leaves as you know…

I really don’t want to talk about it.

When it finds a suitable meal, it spears it with its long and very sharp hypodermic beak, whilst pinning down its victim with its long front legs. It then injects enzymes through this beak, paralyzing it, within 30 seconds its preys internal body parts essentially turn into runny porridge, it then proceeds to drain all of the victim’s bodily fluids through the same straw beak. Brrr.

“Yes…yes…draining…beak”

Oh stop it Jeff!

The wheel bug can be more than 3.5 centimeters (1.4 inches) long, and its perfectly capable of taking on a bigger grasshopper.

There are nearly 3,000 species of assassin bugs. While they come in a wide variety of colors and sizes, they all are recognizable by their geometrically shaped abdomen, their tiny head and the long beak folded under their thorax. Because assassin bugs consume so many insects, they are widely viewed as beneficial insects and can keep your garden and your shrubs free of pests.

The bite of a wheel bug is painful and may take months to heal (sometimes leaving a small scar), so caution is advised when handling them…after all, who wants a mechanical looking bug sucking out your internals through a straw-beak, oh no, not me.

Back into the garden:

This has to be the largest Fatsia Japonica bloom I have ever had, and the flies have already found it even though it has not yet fully opened up. This will be a mass of insects when the flowers fully open.

Although it is attracting them quite well already.

Celosia continues to perform, appropriately adding some fire and brimstone to my extremely parched Hell-Strip.

Finally:

These agave parryi kept me on my toes as I attempted to extract yet more leaves that always insist on burying themselves deep into this plants lethally protected heart. I am not sure why I think I will never get flesh punctured performing this sort of picking activity without gloves.

Kindergarten’s out for Christmas!

Stay Tuned for:

“I Caught a Live One!”

All material © 2010 for eastsidepatch. Unauthorized
intergalactic reproduction strictly prohibited, and
punishable by late (and extremely unpleasant) 14th century planet Earth techniques.