Autumn light and a morning garden stroll
October has arrived early in Austin. Since Saturday we’ve all been thrilling to temperatures in the 80s and low 90sF, with a dry, northerly breeze. While those temps may sound summery to some of my readers — those who do not live and garden under the Death Star — they’re downright autumnal to us. It’s hard to spend any time indoors.
The first fingers of sunlight were stretching over the east side of the garden when I shot these photos on Monday, adding golden highlights to the dwarf papyrus in the stock-tank pond and gilding my neighbor’s trees.
As it touched the blue pot fountain, the water shone like a newly minted dime. The golden ‘Color Guard’ yuccas in the background began to glow as well.
Those yuccas have really grown this year. I’m very pleased with this section of the circle garden around the pond. It used to be such a mishmash of plants, but the simplicity of the yuccas and bamboo muhly (Muhlenbergia dumosa) is better.
I tried to grow silver ponyfoot as a groundcover beneath the yuccas, but the live oak leaves smothered it. I’m not as tidy a gardener as I could be.
Moving up the hillside path, I’m startled to notice how much my ‘Sapphire Skies’ Yucca rostrata has grown. This section of garden is hit by several hours of hot, blasting sun, and since it’s located along the side of the house I tend to ignore it during the summer. Over the weekend, I spent a few hours cutting back overgrown vines and moving some plants around. I also trimmed off the brown leaves at the base of the yucca, revealing the first hint of trunk. I really love this Koosh-ball plant. Cosmo the dog is pretty adorable too.
A wider view. I’m standing by the ‘Blue Ice’ Arizona cypress, which smells like a Christmas tree. See that tiny, orange circle in the upper left of the photo? That’s one of two — count them, two — pomegranates on my ‘Wonderful’ tree. That’s double the number I had last year. I feel like Forrest Gump when he starts shrimping and only catches five, and the old shrimper chuckles and tells him, “A couple more, you can have yourself a cocktail.”
The morning light bathes the front garden in a golden glow. The Berkeley sedge lawn in the background is studded with crimson oxblood lilies — do you see them? Only a few this year, but next year there’ll be more. A garden will teach you patience.
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Upcoming talk: Please join me this Thursday, 9/26, 7:30-8:30 p.m., for my Garden Club of Austin presentation about getting rid of your lawn and designing a lawn-gone garden. The talk will be at Zilker Garden and is free and open to the public. I’ll be signing copies of Lawn Gone! after the talk.
All material © 2006-2013 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.
You garden looks so fresh and not as spiked as the Bancroft garden. To my eyes it looks more spring like than autumn and the light is wonderful.
It’s getting spikier all the time, Helen, as those plants seem best adapted to our increasingly hot and dry summers. 😉 Autumn is often said to be our second spring for gardening in central Texas, when the garden greens up again after the long summer. —Pam
Your garden looks so lovely (and your puppy is so cute)!
We’ll be traveling to Austin for a June 2014 wedding. I’ll be in touch as we get closer to scheduling our trip. If you’re around and we can squeeze in extra time in Austin, I’d love to visit your garden. Is your Dad still living in Fearrington? Richard and I so enjoyed meeting you and your Dad when you came to my garden.
I’d love to see you if we’re around, Freda. Do let me know. My dad is still in Fearrington but, as it happens, only until their house sells. They’re planning to relocate to the Charlotte area. —Pam
Your garden looks great. I see Cosmo still thinks he’s in charge out there! Loving this weather, though our AC went out yesterday afternoon. At least it’s a little cooler today – they are supposed to fix it today.
Cosmo was thinking about digging a hole in the soft dirt where I’d recently transplanted some plants! Sorry to hear about your A/C woes. It’s way too soon to be without cool air. —Pam
What soothing and beautiful pictures of your garden. I’m all about BLUE – so especially like the blue accents…
Blue always works in a garden, doesn’t it? —Pam
Love the stone planters with the foxtail ferns … what are they resting on?
Those are cantera stone columns, Becky. They were a gift from a friend. —Pam
Autumn light there is so very different from our gray autumn light in the PNW. Your garden looks beautiful shimmering in the sun. Glad you’re getting more comfortable temps to garden in, although you’re right, to us that’s the height of summer.
Then no wonder you PNWers love summer so much. 🙂 Austin doesn’t really do gray, with approximately 230 days of sunshine a year. It means living under the Death Star in the summer, but from October to May it’s pretty blissful. —Pam
Your garden looks great.
That rostrata really has grown. I knew they got pretty good size….just thought it took longer.
I agree, that garden helper is pretty adorable
I’ve had this yucca for about four years. It gets irrigation (though it’s still very well drained on a slope), and I’m sure that’s speeded up growth. I was expecting it to take several more years to get to this height. —Pam
Everything looks great (despite what I’m sure has been a miserable stretch of heat)! The ‘Color Guard’ yucca are perfectly placed and the sedge lawn is filling in nicely. And I know how you feel about those pomegranates – I’m similarly proud of the one intact persimmon on my tree (which I should probably get a picture of before the raccoon finds it).
Yes, you should get a photo! Last year my single pomegranate split before it fully ripened. Easy come, easy go. —Pam
Your garden looks so beautiful. This is a great time of year and I enjoy being out and moving plants around the garden too.
Isn’t it lovely to be outside gardening again? I love this time of year! So much promise. —Pam
Your garden is looking beautiful for all the hot weather and lack of rain. I am particularly taken by those golden yuccas in the circle garden. I think I need to branch out! The mornings are wonderful but the afternoons are still brutal, especially with the clear skies. I’m not complaining though.
Do you not have any ‘Color Guard’ yuccas yet, Jenny? You must be the only one in Austin — ha! Yes, I was surprised by how hot it got this afternoon — 97F! Good thing the humidity is still low. I think we’re getting another cool front this weekend though. —Pam
I’m really digging the contrasting foliage between your Sapphire Skies and your Canus cosmo. 🙂 Echoing what others said: your garden looks so fresh and lovely for late September!
Canus cosmo — hee hee! He’s definitely a cute addition to the garden, with lots of fuzzy foliage. —Pam
Your garden is dazzling, Pam! So much more developed since I last saw it. As far as neatness goes, you’re as neat as nature itself, which is just right. BTW, I understand about pride in two pomegranates. We moved in summer 2011, and I brought my kumquat with me and planted it in a sunny corner of the new garden. This year it is full of fruit! There must be at least a dozen on the 5 foot tree. It’s exciting!!!
Congrats on your kumquat, Peter. Sounds like you’ll have a big harvest this year. Yes, the back garden is between 3 and 4 years old this fall, and it’s really starting to fill in. —Pam
The autumn sun does put your garden in beautiful light. I always have plant envy when I see your kooshie plants. That bluish color looks so good in the garden.
It’s quite cold-hardy, Lisa — to zone 5, I believe. But Indiana’s winter moisture is probably what would make it hard to grow. If you could keep it dry all winter… —Pam
Ah, so you are entering your blissful period…Enjoy!
Well, I thought we were — and then it got up to 97F the last two days. Yikes! But, yes, the blissful phase is coming. 🙂 —Pam