Wordless Wednesday: Batty (bat-faced cuphea)

 

Reason to Blush

 

I don't know how many gardeners -- what percentage -- are like me.  I don't like cutting flowers for display indoors.  I love bouquets, but I always feel I am cheating the garden out of what rightly belongs to it.  A good friend of ours, florist and gifted gardener, protested my silliness.  "But you should cut them!  It's good for them; they'll produce more and everyone will be happy!  Enjoy them!"  I know he's right, but I still have a hard time forcing myself to do it. 

 

I don't, however, have any such qualms about picking fruit or vegetables from the garden for our benefit.  So what if a plant I grow for its blooms also produces fruit?  One of my favorite roses, Old Blush, produces large hips if left on its own.  I've always been interested in making rose hip jelly, but I am basically too greedy for blooms to give hips a chance to grow.  Knowing that the more I prune, the more flowers this nearly ever-blooming shrub will produce, I remove spent blooms as often as I can.

 

The flowers, while not the spectacular bourbons I favor, are pretty, abundant, and have a light, sweet fragrance.  

 

 

Pretty, ever-blooming flowers, sweet fragrance, healthy foliage -- what more could one ask of a flower?  But that's not all Old Blush is good for.  It's a fairly large, dense shrub, growing up to six feet, sturdy, disease-resistant, and makes a fine hedge.  It is also very easily propagated.  The first photo, in fact, grew from one of my own cuttings.  Which brings me to my point:  having two large, healthy specimans, I decided to finally try and let the hips grow.  They really are so pretty.  I won't pick them until they're nice and rosy (ha -- wish I could say that the perfect pun was intended).  Yes, I want rosy rose hips!

 

High in vitamin C, they are good for us.  I think I should have enough for two six-ounce jars of jelly and a little left over for tea.  I'm not sure, though.  I'll be happy with one jar if that's all I have hips for.  Either way, I'll save some for tea and I might just take some more cuttings.  A healthy hedge that both flowers and feeds us as well as provide habitat is my kind of hedge.  Old Blush has a lot to be proud of.

 

 

 

 

 

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday: American Beautyberry

 

 

Turk's Cap: For the Birds?

 

I love Turk's Cap, malvaviscus drummondii.  A member of the mallow family, its range stretches from Mexico through Texas, to Florida, Cuba, and beyond.  I am glad that it's conveniently native to Texas, a tough, drought-tolerant plant that was named a Texas Superstar back in 2011.  The flowers are beloved by both  hummingbirds and butterflies, and it also proffers small, red fruits that birds enjoy.

Turk's Cap can take most any soil, is heat resistant, and while it prefers some shade, can also thrive in the Texas sun.  Nevertheless, I've had a hard time growing it.  Only recently, in the last year or so, a plant actually thrived, then another, and now the birds have planted a few for me.  Their attempts have been more successful than mine; these photos are of a bird-sown specimen. 

 





In our area, it dies back in winter, to return usually stronger each spring.  I've read that the flowers and fruits and even the leaves are edible, but I've never personally tried them.  It took me so long to get the plants going; I'm not about to eat them!  But evidently, the fruits have a faint, apple-like flavor.  Perhaps one day, when I'm more confident, I will try a few.  I don't think the birds should mind; they have plenty.  Share and share alike!

Turk's Cap: for the birds?

 

I love Turk's Cap, malvaviscus drummondii.  A member of the mallow family, its range stretches from Mexico through Texas, to Florida, Cuba, and beyond.  I am glad that it's conveniently native to Texas, a tough, drought-tolerant plant that was named a Texas Superstar back in 2011.  The flowers are beloved by both  hummingbirds and butterflies, and it also proffers small, red fruits that birds enjoy.

Turk's Cap can take most any soil, is heat resistant, and while it prefers some shade, can also thrive in the Texas sun.  Nevertheless, I've had a hard time growing it.  Only recently, in the last year or so, a plant actually thrived, then another, and now the birds have planted a few for me.  Their attempts have been more successful than mine; these photos are of a bird-sown specimen. 

 





In our area, it dies back in winter, to return usually stronger each spring.  I've read that the flowers and fruits and even the leaves are edible, but I've never personally tried them.  It took me so long to get the plants going; I'm not about to eat them!  But evidently, the fruits have a faint, apple-like flavor.  Perhaps one day, when I'm more confident, I will try a few.  I don't think the birds should mind; they have plenty.  Share and share alike!

Wordless Wednesday: Queen