Birder’s Lounge

Many of you will recognize the amazing flower in this photo. It is one of my favorites because of its intricate, exquisite beauty. It also smells lovely. I planted this Passionflower (Passiflora incarnata) vine about a year ago, it established before winter, and came roaring back this year. Now it has fruit!! I practically squealed with delight when I saw my first-ever, home-grown passionfruit! Cool!

This fruit is not yet ripe, but I will watch as it ripens, and be on the lookout for which birds or other critters decide to dine on them.

For some reason, I am drawn to this photo. I have seen these volunteer plants in my frog pond for about a year now, and have never tried to figure out what they are. There are several different varieties, all with those mesmerizing, pure-white flowers. I think I just described why I get lost in this photo. It is the contrast between the dark, mysterious water, and the white, ethereal flowers. All of this in a setting of what seems like a green mini-forest. When you are finished gazing, I have the real-world info for you as well!

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If you’ve ever walked through a field full of these native Gaura plants, you would remember their delicious, sweet scent as well as their beauty. There are several species and hybrids of Gaura, but I think this particular one is (Gaura biennis). Also known as beeblossom, this plant is native to North America.¹

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This beautiful flower is growing in my hummingbird garden, compliments of Mr. Green Thumbs. (Mr. Green Thumbs is my neighbor, and a recurring character in some of my stories.) As you can see, it is so very bright orange that it is almost fluorescent! The entire area behind his fence, running along the alley we share, is full of these gorgeous flowers. This plant is Cosmos (Cosmos sulphureus) and you guessed it, NOT native to North America. It does great here - SO great that it was declared invasive in 1996. (Wikipedia) Read the rest of this entry »

Yep, I said it - I found a PRETTY beetle:

Actually, my nieces and nephews found it while I was hosting my mother’s birthday party. We had family and friends in from out of town - and I dropped everything when the kids came to me with this “cool bug.” Read the rest of this entry »

Texas Thistle and adoring fans

Look at this mob of pollinators! I love the wee little green guy there on the left. This is a blooming Texas Thistle (Cirsium texanum). This was far from the only flower in the field, but for some reason all of these insects wanted to party on this one! Read the rest of this entry »

About two months ago, I wrote an article about my project to excavate the dirt around my pecan tree, since the root-ball was buried too deep. At the time of the post, I had plastic down around the tree to kill the bermuda grass in a larger area so that the pecan tree would not have to compete for water and nutrients with the grass. I never would have guessed that it would be another two months before I finished that project!

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I built my first frog pond in the hummingbird garden that has been the backdrop for many of the photos here at the Birder’s Lounge. You’re probably wondering how many frog ponds I have Well, as it happens, I have two, but will talk about my second one in a future article.

I know that this doesn’t look much like a frog pond, but this is how it started! These hippo figures are pieces of bronze artwork. I HAD to have a mom-and-baby pair and ended up Read the rest of this entry »

Most people can probably name two kinds of bees: bumblebees and honey bees. But I’ll bet that most people do not realize that there are about 900 species of bees in Texas alone! I learned about this whopping number of bee species from Kim Peoples Bacon of Texas Bee Watchers. In her speech at the Native Plant Society spring symposium held in Austin, Texas earlier this year , Kim went on to tell us that most of these bees are solitary - not the hoards and hives we normally think of… Read the rest of this entry »