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Originally Posted by ploddinTod
For those that don't have lantana in their garden or landscaping are missing a treat. It's a Texas native and very easy to grow in full sun. The ground cover that I have puts out lavender blooms and the butterflies love them.
I had to take a break from lawn maintenance to admire a couple of small yellow butterflies doing an aerial ballet above while a monarch was taking nectar from the blossoms.  |
You beat me to a Spring gardening post, Todd!
My knee is definitely doing well at 5 weeks and 1 day post-op -- I spent most of the day shopping for and then planting the first of my new additions to the garden. And raking all the oak leaves from our front lawn. Earlier in the week I mowed the lawn. I'm unsure where all this rates on my home exercise/Physical Therapy scale -- somewhere between using the rowing machine for an hour (the raking, especially) and walking 5 miles, backwards -- all the uneven terrain and squats with my right (non-operated) leg to get myself down on the ground without flexing the left (post-op) leg too much.
Needless to say, I'm
S-O-R-E, but it's an all-over soreness and it's one I'm familiar with and welcome because it means
A) Spring is here! and
B) I have new flowers and shrubs to admire, now! and soon, as you said, butterflies and birds and moths and other critters.
I didn't pick up any Lantana today; in fact, my garden has been Lantana-free for a couple seasons now -- not intentionally, mind you, I just never picked any up after my last batch died off (I had in it a pot -- we'd just moved into the house and I wasn't sure what I was doing with the 'garden' the previous owners' had left. Answer: I dug it up and started over!)
Today I picked up several
green cloud Texas sage for the backyard, to replace three that died of root rot last season -- in part due to the slope of our yard, and my erroneous thinking they were turning yellow due to
lack of water, rather than an over-abundance of it! Over-watering is about the only thing that WILL kill a Texas sage!
Let's see... I also picked up six
cigar plants -- hummers love them, and I like the splash of color and unique flowers; plus, they're hearty. I buy more and plant them around the survivors from the previous year. They go in the front yard around a young oak we have in the middle of the yard.
I purchased and planted a 3 gallon
salvia (I forget the exact variety -- bright red/pink foliage) for the corner of our driveway, to complement two well-established salvia bushes of the same variety I have in my main garden bed. Hummers and bees love these, and I love them because they're the first to flower (mine have been brilliantly blossoming since around the time of my knee surgery -- early February!) and they make it through the winter without any special care.
I also picked up a beautiful and, of course, fragrant
rosemary bush for an empty spot in the corner of my front yard. My mom has a long-lived rosemary bush that's absolutely taken over an old barrel, and I love the smell and lush greenery it provides.
I also picked up some kind of
boxwood shrub, I believe. That and the sage are the only plants I haven't put in the ground yet, so I haven't reviewed its "care & feeding" instructions. I actually mistakenly thought it was the same shrub we have in our front yard under our windows, but alas my memory's fading. I still can't recall the name of the shrub I
meant to buy. No matter, I'll find a home for it.
I filled up my little red wagon and it was heavy enough that my knee was hollering a bit (I wear a hinged brace for all walking for 3 total months post-op, otherwise I doubt I'd be able to get around as well as I do right now!)
Planting felt wonderful -- I don't think of myself as a green thumb, but I love working in the soil and I always get compliments on my garden (indoors and out), even though my standard answer is "Thank you, but what you see are just the plants I've learned I cannot kill! Anything that survives a season gets to stay!"
I need to go back for some more flowering plants; this trip was mostly to add some greenery back to places that went bare after the winter. I still have many pots that need new tenants this year (mostly in my backyard).