It was a nice surprise to find this sunny orange fella smack up against my rose bush this week. That's butterfly weed, or asclepias tuberosa. Unlike the other stuff that just wants to choke out my flowers so they can have all the dirt to themselves, this guy is handsome, and attracts bees and butterflies to the garden. He can stay.
There hasn't been a lot of them this year. Those happy garden surprises. It's been hot, a terrible drought year, and the garden that I started with all good intentions this spring is now limping along, drooping in hot sun except for the bindweed and purslane, which are trying to take over in their evil weedy ways. My container plants have fried up a lot even with repeated waterings, because it's been so hot their poor little root balls were just too warm to survive. My city is considering water rationing measures, and if that happens, they'll have to go too.
How's it been where you are living? Have you been able to have flowers and vegetables this year?
Hooray for happy garden surprises! :)
ReplyDeleteWe have some butterfly weed, too... something new for our garden. (Nick planted a wildflower mix last year and nothing sprouted, but all kinds of pretty surprises came up this summer!)
We have been watering our gardens -- the vegetable garden daily and the others a few times a week. If we hadn't, all our plants would be totally dead, I'm sure, just like our grass.