The Garden Thread that two people wanted

[LilyBLily]

That's interesting. Usually, we have both males and females at our feeder, but this year up to five females have been vying with each other to get at the nectar.

Beautiful gardenias. 

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

The cycad in our retirement village is in fruit. It has been there for many years and is in the original garden on the land that was used to build the village. Fortunately it is mostly hidden from view as they are quite valuable.

"They are also one of the most threatened groups of plants in the world. In South Africa almost 70% of our cycad species are threatened with extinction, with four species on the brink of extinction and seven species with fewer than 100 plants left in the wild."

"Do you need a permit to own a cycad in South Africa?
Because cycads are protected by the national and provincial legislation, as a buyer you must ensure that you know where your plants come from and that you have a permit for owning the plant. Various permits are needed for any activity that relates to cycads such as possession, transport, growing, buying or selling."

[Jeff Tanyard]

There's some creeping cucumber growing here and there as weeds.  I'd never tried the fruit before, so I decided it was time.  I picked a few berries and ate them.  They do indeed taste like cucumber.





Here's some of it growing up on an azalea.  I'll eventually remove it.

[LilyBLily]

That cycad looks amazing.

I think the woolly aphids are back, but only in very small quantities. I've seen some bits of fluff supposedly floating around--and then veering sharply to land on something. I haven't been close enough to investigate, but I am suspicious. 

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

Never heard of creeping cucumber. Do you use it in a salad?

I've got some tiny c*cktail tomatoes growing from my compost heap. I left them to do their own thing and they started creeping up the bottle brush tree. I've sort of helped them by hanging them over the branches. Should have been nipping off the ends but left them to wander. They are now so high up I have to stretch to reach the ripe ones. Next thing it will require a ladder to reach them.   I see they are also growing in various parts of the garden where I put compost. Might have to cull a few.

[Jeff Tanyard]

Never heard of creeping cucumber. Do you use it in a salad?

Some people do, according to the internet.  I've never tried it before this week.

[Jeff Tanyard]

Picked and ate a few more creeping cucumber berries.

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

Picked and ate a few more creeping cucumber berries.

Make an interesting addition to a salad.

[Jeff Tanyard]

Still getting the occasional canna lily.





Here's a Joro spider munching on a grasshopper.  Notice the mass of silk strands just above her.  I think this might be a stabilimentum, though that's just a guess on my part.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stabilimentum





This Joro is a fully mature female.  You can tell by the color pattern on her back.  The juveniles have a different pattern.

Call me a weirdo, but I really do think they're handsome critters.   

The black and yellow patterns on the spider's sides and underside remind me of Ambassador Kosh's ship from Babylon 5.  None of the spiders have yet tried to communicate with me by spelling out words with their coloring, but I'm still hopeful.  If I can succeed in making contact, I'm going to change my name to Kosh and start wearing an encounter suit.

[Vijaya]

Really striking photos! Love the yellow silk.

[Jeff Tanyard]

Well, the "stabilimentum" is gone now, so I guess it wasn't a stabilimentum at all and was instead just clutter in the web that the spider decided to remove during her nightly remodeling session.  The grasshopper is also gone.

In another Joro web, the owner was munching on a stinkbug.  This is good.  Stinkbugs suck.

[Jeff Tanyard]

Some mid-October flowers for y'all's viewing pleasure:











For anyone who likes "hoary ancient forest" type imagery, here's a moss-covered dogwood:





Here's a Joro spiderweb I had to take down.  It was in my way, so it had to go.  The spider escaped to safety, so maybe she'll rebuild elsewhere.

You can see a male Joro a few inches above the female.  The males have been lurking in the webs since early September.  They're small, drab, and unremarkable, so I haven't mentioned them yet.  This is the first male Joro pic I've posted.  From what I've been able to observe so far, the female sits in the center of the orb part of the web while the males hang around on the outer "cage" part of the web. 

Also, you can see a tangled mass of silk just above the female.  A few days ago, I speculated that this sort of thing might be a stabilimentum, but then I changed my mind and decided it was just clutter.  Well, I've changed my mind again.  I'm seeing similar silk masses in several other webs, all just above the center of the orb.  Too many to be coincidental.  It's not clutter; whatever it is, it's there on purpose.

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

Lovely flowers. We are into Spring/Summer and also have lots of flowers coming into bloom.

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

This baby Jatropha was really determined and came up through the newly tarred pathway that had been dug up to fix a leak. 

[Jeff Tanyard]

Spring has definitely sprung here.  New leaves have appeared on the trees and bushes.

The big question that remains is whether or not we'll have a killing frost in the coming weeks.  I really hope not, because we've had a few of those in recent years, and I'd like to enjoy a spring without blackened frost-killed leaves and shoots.

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

A large (10 cm) snail has decided to roost in my pawpaw (papaya) tree. It moves about - at a snail's pace - 😛, but so far I haven't ascertained what it is eating. Should I find bite marks in my pawpaws it will be removed to another location.😀

[Vijaya]

What a pretty fellow!

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

What a pretty fellow!

We seem to have quite a number of them and often find their empty shells. One of our residents paints the shells in various coloured patterns and places them throughout our retirement village. 

[Jeff Tanyard]

Some of the flowers have bloomed.  Azaleas and bearded irises.  If you look carefully, you can see a dusting of pollen on the petals of the irises.








Only the purple irises have bloomed so far.  The other colors have yet to appear.

Black cherry tree has flowered.  Expecting fruit again in a couple of months.

Holly trees and presumed-to-be-Rubus plants have buds on them, so they should bloom in the coming weeks.

[Jeff Tanyard]

Holly trees are in bloom.  The air is tinged with the wonderful scent of holly flowers.   





The flowers don't last long at all, maybe a day or two.  They're constantly raining down from the tree as they fall off.  But there are many buds, and they don't all bloom at once, so that stretches the blooming period out a bit.  The pollinating insects are all over it, creating a nice background buzz.

Something else has started to bloom, too:





Looks like I was right about that mystery weed.   

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackberry

Looking forward to picking some fruit at some point.

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

Didn't know holly had a scent  .

Used to gather blackberries as a child. My Gran made blackberry and apple dumpling. Yummy.

[Vijaya]

Didn't know holly had a scent  .

Used to gather blackberries as a child. My Gran made blackberry and apple dumpling. Yummy.

I too have lovely memories picking blackberries with my kiddos. And blackberry wine is so delicious! In WA we picked wild berries June through Sept. Then the rains came and it'd be time for mushrooms. We just got new bees this evening for our hive! We'd all starve without bees.

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

I too have lovely memories picking blackberries with my kiddos. And blackberry wine is so delicious! In WA we picked wild berries June through Sept. Then the rains came and it'd be time for mushrooms. We just got new bees this evening for our hive! We'd all starve without bees.
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Lovely to have bees and your own honey and knowing it is pure.

[Vijaya]

I posted some pictures of our new bees on my blog: https://vijayabodach.blogspot.com/2024/04/keeper-of-bees.html

[Jan Hurst-Nicholson]

I posted some pictures of our new bees on my blog: https://vijayabodach.blogspot.com/2024/04/keeper-of-bees.html

You have quite a menagerie. Lovely  . They must keep you busy.

[djmills]

Vijaya, I tried to leave a comment on your blog post, but needed a google login and then more google stuff so I backed out.
I love the bee hive. And the farm animals where you got the bees from. Enjoy the honey produced.