This flower needs no introduction. During my first-ever gardening escapade, I sowed Texas wildflower seeds all over my bare back yard (in January!), and native Purple Coneflower was among them. They never came up but the next year I sowed the seeds in a prepared bed in fall. By spring it seemed like hundreds came up. I discarded many and potted many others, giving some away to friends that summer. Since the seeds germinated in spring, it would most likely be another year before they bloomed (since many perennials take about a year to reach blooming stage from seed, a...…

Today I was reading some blogs and articles online at Sunset. It's my new favorite magazine to read about gardens and design. Although it's meant for "living in the west" which mostly means California but there are occasionally articles on landscapes in the western states like Arizona or even New Mexico. It stops just short of Texas but then so do most gardening magazines! I dig this magazine because the designs in California are just so darn free-thinking, creative, inspiring. Landscape design in Texas tends to me much more straightforward and practical and so (as I've learned) are its landscape...…

I've slowed down on keeping my garden journal, both on paper and here. What precious time I have to devote to my garden is unfortunately not in writing, but in keeping it alive. I must sound redundant now, since my last 2 posts have been about heat and storms and heat. Since May 15, we have had record-breaking temperature and little to no rain. My poor garden looks on in desperation. It is at points like this that a gardener wants to throw in the towel. The tomatoes which I had so carefully nursed from seed, pushed them under lights...…

This past week, I've been trying, in little bits and pieces, to get the garden ready for summer. Finish mulching, finish planting. I still have some potted annuals and even a few perennials lying about ready to be transplanted that I'm watering sometimes two times a day to keep them from completely drying out. This is the time of year when I start wondering why I like plants in containers at all! I really adore beautiful ceramic containers and last year added some metal feeding troughs and painted a few cheap wood and ceramic containers I got at home depot....…

Growing vines can be addictive. They're instantly satisfying to an inpatient gardener, as some of them can grow to monstrous sizes in just months. I've been reticent to grow vines until I'm sure I won't be spending my days getting rid of their seedlings (see my woes on the trumpet vine below), but I have so many fences, bare walls, and things just in need of green and lushness. I just love how quickly vines grow and cover a wall, a trellis, a fence... instant green, instant color (and sometimes, as in the case of sweet peas, loads of flowers...…

Also called purslane, or its latin name portulaca, Moss Rose is really popular around here as a summer annual. It grows like mad, cares not for overwatering or underwatering, and I've had far more success with it than "ice plant". This plant would root on your finger if you let it, so be careful to dig it out where you don't want it to spread. It doesn't matter anyway, since it doesn't live through the winter. I bought this particular variety trailing beautifully over a hanging basket one late summer, then brought it indoors, where it promptly dropped all its...…

Do I love, love, love this vine. And I am so proud that something this ridiculously showy could be native to Texas. It has proven to me that wildflowers don't have to be rustic (and I do like rustic). After my failures with the Passionflower 'Incense', which was repeatedly chomped on by caterpillars, I decided to try another type. This is definitely the more frequently-grown kind, and the showier. Passionflower incense--i.e., passiflora edulis--has smaller leaves, and smaller flowers which are pale purple whose petals sort of fly backwards, rather than splay out. Passionflower incarnata, however, takes over with just a...…

Otherwise known as Vinca, I happen to like the name "periwinkle". When searching for some kind of annual flower that would possibly make it through the summer--through heat and drought--there were very few possibilities. The two options pointed out to me at my favorite nursery were zinnias and gomphrenas. I went back a couple weeks later and the tables were scattered with periwinkle, which I had read would take the heat. (The periwinkles in the photo below are from the "Pacifica" series.) I gathered up a tray full of light pinks, some with lighter centers and others with a bright...…

When I received my first wildflower seed catalog, gaura (also known as "Appleblossom Grass") was the first plant I fell in love with. I sowed the native Texas variety from seed last fall (which is showing leaves in various parts of my yard now). "Siskyou Pink" is the first variety I planted, in spring of 2006, in my very first garden bed, which has now become my wildflower bed. It is supposed to be a hardy plant in summer but many perennials disappeared in the summer heat of August and September which still have not reappeared. I was surprised to...…