Productive Day!

My day may have started rather unproductively (sleeping in until noon!) but i ended up getting a lot done!

Here's the list from last time:

• Fix pipe <-- Done! It ended up being very easy...
• Trim acacias & uncover agaves in the front <-- Done! i did create an entire garbage can full of trimmings, but the little agaves can breath again

Still left to do:

• Clean up the 'stone pond' bed in the front garden <-- i did clear out a bunch of grass and removed a bunch of gopher mounds, and cleared all the dirt out of the rocks. Now i just need to figure out what to do with this bed!
• Trim up Palo Verde tree <-- No progress yet on the tree itself yet, but i did finally break down a giant branch that broke off a few months ago. To be honest, i'm a bit worried about pruning the tree!
• Clean up right back patio bed <-- no progress yet!

I didn't take many pictures today, but here is what the acacia looked like before:

It's now about half that size. I'm not sure this one will stay long term, although i love the easy green it provides, with cute yellow flowers...

I also seem to have a new friend/permanent resident:

That's a bad picture, but there's a new, small, purple-headed hummingbird (looks like a male Costa?) that's decided my garden is it's home. Hummingbirds show up all the time, of course, but generally they don't really care much for humans getting near.  This one is happy to sit above my head on the patio, or in the branches of various bushes and let me get really close. He will also buzz me if i'm getting in his way. He's territorial in a strange way too - happy to share the feeder and some of the plants, but aerial battles ensue if another hummingbird tries to sit on his perch or drink from one particular aloe bloom. I'm hoping he'll stick around for the winter!

Next time, i'll try for better pictures! Hopefully renovating the beds will make for more exciting pictures than hacking my way through the bush!

Hummingbirds!

It's been a busy few weeks. I finally gave in to the nice weather and started planting last weekend. While out weeding and planting, I was buzzed several times by the resident hummingbirds, wanting their picture taken, I think.

The first one looks like the one that has been hanging around my garden all winter, primarily feeding from 'Orange Sceptre'. It must be happy now that the sages are starting to bloom again:


caught at just the right moment!

right before it noticed me and buzzed off

 I think this might be an Anna's hummingbird although I'm certainly not good enough to be sure!

The next hummingbird that showed up is definitely a Rufous Hummingbird though:



because he's orange!

 According to allaboutbirds.org, Rufous Hummingbirds are "...are pugnacious birds that tirelessly chase away other hummingbirds, even in places they’re only visiting on migration". In my case, this one is also happy to chase away humans if they get to close to their nectar sources, apparently. Rofous's don't stay year round in the desert, so I will enjoy this one's visits while they last...

Back to the Grind...

It was dark when I left my house for work this morning.


I like the strappy green foliage, even with no flowers

 It was dark when I left work for home this evening.

Most of them are almost done blooming, but I like the way the old flowers look

As far as I know, there could have been no sun today at all...

Look at those roots!

This is why I grow houseplants. Today's offering: blooming paper whites. I should look up whether these can re-bloom next year - it would be nice if they could.

Some of the last blooms

Hopefully your Monday involved more sunshine than mine!

Unknown Garden Visitor

I'm always very excited when some kind of wildlife visits my garden, even if it's likely to eat my plants. Like this guy:

The camouflage isn't working so well...

I have no idea what it is (a cricket? a grass hopper of some sort?) but it's so cool. It was sitting on my (what I think is)  Senecio cineraria. It's a dusty miller of some sort, and that seems the most likely candidate. It needs to be pruned/shaped - right now it has one main stem, that this guy was sitting on.

He didn't do any damage I could see....

It was still there a day later, sitting on the ground. I should do some research to find out what it is. Part of the reason I'm always excited to see bugs is that it tells me stuff is going OK with the garden. When I first started, there was nothing except maybe some ants - now there are all kinds of pollinators, praying mantis, and earth worms. Hopefully they'll eat all the spiders, ants, and pincer bugs!

More Garden Wildlife

The birds are enjoying the left over sunflower heads in the pipes - there were three of them on one plant in the morning, trying to get at the seeds:

This involved a lot of being upside down...

 I'm not sure what kind of birds these are - at least one of them had a yellow breast, and they were all busy chirping and pushing each other of the flower heads...

The one on the lower right found a flower head hidden under the leaves...

I'm very glad I left these flower heads on, because the birds have been enjoying them for weeks now. I did manage to cut off one head before they got to it, and it's hanging to dry. We'll see if I get some seeds!

In addition to the sparrows, my back garden has been claimed as this particular hummingbird's territory. He (she?) surveys "their" Salvia greggi bushes from the top branch of my Cersis canadensis 'Forest Pansy':

It sits there basically all morning and in the late afternoon, watching for other hummingbirds

 Every once in a while, it will grab a drink off the Salvias:

 Or, it will chase away other hummingbirds, in crazy aerial battles! I'm still trying to get some decent pictures or video of these battles, because they are epic. What's really funny is that while the two are fighting, a third hummingbird will usually come over to drink from the plants...

After the battle is over, he returns to his perch:

Coming in for a landing

And any slow human how gets in the way of either the nectar or the battles is of no concern to the hummingbirds! I was buzzed twice one morning. I'm happy the hummers have found the plants (I think they're Anna's hummingbirds, judging by the size, color and area) and I wonder what would happen if I put up a feeder? I don't think they would share...

Pollinators in the Garden

With the hot weather cooling off just a bit, I took a look outside to see what was buzzing around the garden. I used to be scared of anything that looked like it could sting, but most of the buzzing creatures seemed happy to have their picture taken.

I did see some things that I did not expect, like this blue-striped bee/wasp?

sitting on the white butterfly bush in the back garden

 There were more on the Coreopsis, along with bees and wasps of the yellow-variety:

The blue ones did not like sharing, and were big enough to push the smaller wasps off.

This shows  how distinct the blue markings were. They might be mason bees?

I thought this picture came out rather interesting - the wasp (?) is making a bee-line for the Coreopsis verticillata 'Route 66' ...

It's free!

what look like three different species on the same plant.

 This big black bee (a carpenter bee, I think?) was buzzing around the Salvia greggi. At first I thought the sound was a hummingbird, it was so loud...

The best picture was blurry - the thing would not sit still, except on the other side of the bush!

 But the award for the biggest thing buzzing around the garden that day went to this guy:

Sitting on the back of a bloomed-out sunflower, eating?

It was LOUD, and kind of bumbly, but when it finally stopped moving, it looked more like a giant beetle than anything else. I tried to use both Bugguide and What's That Bug to try and id this guy, but I'm still not sure what it is...

For more (and better!) pictures  of pollinators, there is Alan's post at It's Not Work, It's Gardening. His pictures are gorgeous!