The Texas Dip - Garden Style

In Texas, we have something called the Texas Dip. Google it for your entertainment, but basically it's a curtsy unique to Texas debutantes. It's also a fairly accurate way to describe the central Texas relationship with freezing temperatures. We flirt, approach, and occasionally "dip" into them, but rarely sink and stay down. So, it is with increasing dismay that I watch the thermometer reach 17°F and fail to regain its footing on a cold but just above freezing norm. I know a lot of our garden blogger friends are used to this - and that their experience over the past week of this winter's record breaking storm has been so much harsher than we've seen in Austin. But we don't plan(t) for this. I mean, does anyone in Austin think they're going to need a pond de-icer?

MSS at Zanthan Gardens tweeted earlier this week about her frozen pipes, and it's a good bet a lot more of us will find out we've joined her as the temperatures climb and our previously frozen pipes leak their unpleasant surprises into our walls and yards. I also heard that friends who keep "backyard chickens" are using their heat mats to keep the water bowls from freezing - move over tomato seedlings! My own garden looks pretty dismal - even supposedly "cold season plants" like parsley and antique roses look damaged. It makes me tired just thinking about it. I'd sit down and rest if I could only find the bench...

Comments

Caroline said…

My parsley and roses looked sad this morning, but they seem to be perking up nicely as the snow melts, along with the chard. I peeked under my row covers and the broccoli, onions, strawberries and lettuce look fine, but the lime trees, mmm, not so much. I think the limes might have handled 24 hours of subfreezing temps but 48 hours may have been too much for them. We'll see what spring brings.

February 4, 2011 at 2:21 PM

vbdb said…

You're right, Caroline. Some plants did look a bit less done for by this afternoon. It's easy to forget how resilient Nature really is when faced with so many pitiful looking plants.

February 4, 2011 at 5:07 PM

Unknown said…

I got so tired of putting out the plant covers. But I got home just in time from Dallas to put it on for this last round only to find that they were all frozen solid where I had folded them in the corner outside. Now that is a problem I haven't encountered before!!

February 11, 2011 at 3:31 PM

Ho-hum to Habitat: My Path to Native Bees - Resources

San Antonio's Festival of Flowers will resume this Saturday, June 3, 2023, after a break of three years. I've been given the opportunity to share how I garden, as well as a general overview of our native bees. A link to a Google doc containing my handout (the info dense slides from my presentation) follows this list of resources. Note that if you didn't attend, some of the handout pages may not make complete sense. Hyperlinks to more resources: https://www.wildbeestexas.com/ https://w3.biosci.utexas.edu/jha/research/native-bee-communities https://www.wildflower.org/collections/collection.php?collection=TX_central https://www.pollinator.org/pollinator.org/assets/generalFiles/BeginnerBeeFieldGuide_11March2022_LowRez.pdf https://tpwd.texas.gov/huntwild/wild/wildlife_diversity/nongame/native-pollinators/bumblebee-id.phtml https://www.pollinatorphotos.com/ https://www.homegrownnationalpark.org/ https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yOIlJFjzgAlhc5nfTXkqrVutPxWHLwfQ/vie

A Plant with Purple Leaves

There are a couple of groups on Facebook where I lurk and occasionally dip my opinion into the fray. They're places where people with knowledge of unbelievable scope can be observed, deftly identifying this obscure native plant or that scraggly left-behind orphan found in the backyard of a newly purchased home. One such backyard orphan recently was posted in need of identification. If it were a native plant, two people on "Texas Flora" would've named it within minutes. Even the taxonomy of those impossible grasses is typically put to rest in seconds. Not so with this poor guy. At first I was fairly certain it was one of the purple leafed basils, maybe 'African Blue'. It's fairly impossible to find it still thriving in a Texas January, but two plants in my yard are still hanging in there. They even look like they'll come back if we don't have a deep freeze before spring. BTW, this basil has one heck of a botanical monik

Ho-hum to Habitat

For lack of a better way to reach everyone in person and online who attended my presentation to Williamson County Master Gardeners on 08 May 2023, I'm posting a handout here. These are only the slides that were particularly info dense, so forgive the lack of context if you weren't an attendee. Note that the list in the handout is only suggested for Travis and Williamson Counties - the Wildflower Center will have suggestions tailored to your specific location, and NOT just in Texas! These are live links to some of the items shown: The Wildflower Center , The Jha Bee Lab , NPSOT's plant lists by Texas region , NPSOT Wilco , and finally, Lynne & Jim Weber (their books are available at your local bookstore & on Amazon.) T here's a world of other resources, too! Check out Sam Drogge's incredible photography at the USGS Bee Inventory , follow Heather Holm on Facebook and read her books, follow Carol Clark on her blog "Carol's World" . Seri

Playin' Outside

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