its our own field of dreams story. we planted a butterfly weed plant (asclepia tuberosa) in the hope of attracting monarchs. what a joy it was to walk outside and see two, three or four of them fluttering around the plant and stopping for nectar and apparently more...
we have had multiple caterpillars so we know now that those butterflies did more than just flutterby, they made more butterflies!
oh so pretty!
when we went to florida last month, we wandered around pensacola and saw the largest crepe myrtles ever! to get an idea of how big those trunks are, look at the next photo
the trunks are larger than a fire hydrant and they are single trunks. most crepe myrtles are multiple trunks growing in a cluster. not these!
one of our favorite finds was the garden gate, 3268 fordham parkway in gulf breeze (FL). the little house is very inviting and the owner/staff are some of the nicest people we have met. they spent so much time with us answering all of our questions, showing us many plants and helping us to decide what to buy so we would have success with it in our garden.
so many beautiful plants to choose from!
more plants to check out
a funky mushroom in a fruit trees pot. we finally settled on a goldenrod and an iron weed for the big border bed we are building and a small selaginella (golden fern) for the front shade bed.
my beautiful roselle plant.
a close up of the roselle
wow-what a show the basil is putting on in the temporary bed!
the whole bed is bursting with herbs
they are hard to see but if you look closely at the rock, at about 10 oclock you will see the ironweed in the patch of dirt that touches the rock and at about 1 oclock is the goldenrod. these are the plants we bought on our trip. the little group is part of a larger bed that will eventually make a border between our yard and the idiot next door who will not mow his yard.
another cluster of plants and an interesting tree stump that are part of the border garden