Big Freeze Clean Up: Before and After

So I left off with the big freeze having happened. This means that plants got goobered.  Plants that hadn't been cut back in eons died back to the ground, some plants, like my Arizona Ash still haven't recovered since it was already budding out right as the freeze hit. 

The Asiatic Jasmine corner. Before. On the plus side, the freeze really did kill off most of this invasive plant making it much easier to get rid of.

After.  I realize it's hard to see the difference since it was all brown before and is still brown. But hopefully the tree appreciates it.

Can you find all the toads?  There was a whole family of them living under an old grill cover which was in the Asiatic Jasmine.  The cover had been full incorporated into the jasmine. 

The Toadrys.  I had to text my "snake guy" coworker because he's into all the cool animals - like seriously, I've brought him skulls, jaw bones, snake skins, and pictures of snakes in the past to find out what they are. So naturally I texted him a photo of the toads and was like "uh...I'm doing yardwork, how do I save these guys? Do I need to use gloves or anything?" So this was the first time in my life where I went about catching toads and putting them in a bucket.

"Hey! Where do you think you're going, mister?!". The amount of talking I was doing to those toads and the spiders I found probably had my neighbors questioning my sanity.

Adult Rough Earth Snake. We have these occasionally in the yard and I love them. This was my first time actually catching and holding one. And then I had to catch him AGAIN because he was intent on needing to be in the part of the yard where the asiatic jasmine was and didn't WANT to be in the garden area.  Bonus points to me that I didn't need to contact "the snake guy" since I joined a snake identification group on Facebook and now spend a lot of time looking at snake pictures and have gotten much better at identifying them - Shawn says hopefully this means I'll actually SEE the snakes before I step on them (I've almost stepped on a racer, a bull snake, a rattlesnake, and a rat snake).

As for planting things in this area, I'm trying to generally keep it unplanted through this summer (because I predict it's going to be a summer from hell a la 2011 again). BUT, this is also an area that like years ago I had planned to plant some beauty bushes in this area - bushes that I promptly had purchased with the misguided idea that if I had the bushes on hand, I'd remove the asiatic jasmine sooner rather than later. 

Hahahahahahahaha

Yeah - the beautyberry, Mexican buckeye, and agarita sat in tiny pots for YEARS. I needed to cut the containers away from the roots and still dig them out of the ground.  BUT! I did get them dug up and then replanted in this area. But since those plants were also damaged by the freeze, they all got a severe cut back and now I'm waiting for them to leaf out more so you can actually see them in the photo. But with the warmer weather, I am getting some of the Asiatic jasmine coming back from root pieces I missed, so I need to keep the area clear for a growing season or so, just to make sure I got it all.

Now... where'd we leave off?

Okay, so essentially 4 years after leaving you guys, I decided I should take up blogging about the garden again.  We'll see how long it lasts.  It may be only 2 weeks.  The suspense is terrible, I hope it lasts.

So I left off in March 2017. This basically coincided with me really getting into kitten fostering and volunteering at the animal shelter. So let's get you caught up - there was racist rally in Virginia in which the president refused to condemn the white supremacists and insisted that there were "very nice people on both sides."  Actually, the president never did condemn white supremacy the entire time he was in office.  Not surprising since they did (and still do) make up a significant portion of his base.  The US left the Iran Nuclear deal and the Paris Accords, killed NAFTA, and started courting Russia and North Korea as allies while telling Europe they could suck it.  the #metoo movement happened and generally abated with not a whole lot having changed (other than Harvey Weinstein going to jail and a lot of men being upset thinking that women were out to get them).  There was also something about a Hurricane that the president tried to alter it's path with a sharpie and questions about the president's mental aptitude (I mean, the man DID look directly at solar eclipse).  

And then the 2020 pandemic happened. 

That's right. A pandemic. A mother-effing flu-like pandemic that resulted in working from home, wearing masks everywhere, and avoiding elderly family member like you had, well, the plague.  Mixed in with all that, race relations came to a head because for some dumb reason cops refuse to stop killing Black people for doing normal things like "sleeping in their own home," or "going for a run," or for minor law breaking like "used a $20 counterfeit bill" or "had expired license plates."  

Other shitty things that happened in 2020: Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, as did Elijah Cummings, and John Lewis.  But here we are, on "the other side" with vaccines being stabbed in arms and things returning to "normal." Why, we've already had 2 school shootings and schools aren't even really in session. So yeah, the world is healing.

While everyone was like "oh man, at least 2021 can't be any worse," 2021 was like "here, hold my beer" and kicked off with an armed insurrection at the national capitol on January 6, followed by a polar vortex in February which caused the Texas power grid to shit itself like a newborn babe. And I mean one of those shits that shoots up out the back of the diaper and somehow covers EVERYTHING.  

And so, I feel like this is a good point to pick back up with the gardening. Because there's nothing that likes shit more than a gardener (hey oh!)

The polar vortex messed shit up, yo. It knocked enough plants back on their ass and required such a massive amount of clean up (which I'm still doing), that it really resulted in me getting everything almost back to "clean slate status."

First the ice covered everything and weighed it down

Then the snow came and covered everything.  

And then the power outages started.  Ted Cruz ran across the border into Mexico in order give his family a better life with electricity, heat, and running water (seriously, for reals, though sadly he came back). Meanwhile, the Texas grid was like minutes away from crashing to the point that it would have taken MONTHS to fix it.  The outages were meant to be "rolling" but the amount of power that needed to be off the system was so much that they had to kill every "non-essential" circuit - this is why downtowns were all lit up like Christmas while neighborhoods were blacked out - because downtown areas tend to have hospitals and police stations.  So some people went without power for almost a week.  The temperatures didn't get above like 20 degrees for that entire time.  Houses down here are not insulated like they are up north.  Houses down here don't have shut offs to their exterior facing hose bibs to keep the pipes from bursting.  Even if people wanted to leave, they couldn't because the roads were impossible to drive on since we don't have any means of removing snow/ice from the roadways.

At least the snow made for some nice, and not normal for Austin, photos

As the snow was starting to melt, and things were looking up, the water ran out.  One of the Austin water treatment plants went offline for a while because of falling trees and then no one could figure out how to get the power back on because the Water Treatment Plant hasn't been modernized since like 1950.  Because everyone was dripping or running their faucets to keep pipes from freezing, the water reserves got used up REAL QUICK LIKE.  This meant that we were frantically saving snow in buckets and coolers and even tupperware containers just so we had some type of water. Toilets were only getting flushed after pooping, everyone was drinking their beer stash instead of having to boil water, etc etc.  Thankfully, those that had been without electricity for a week, generally didn't lose their water service.

Water outage map for Austin

Thank God for rain barrels which are full of water...though they were frozen solid...dangnabbit.

So. Like I said, the polar vortex was epic and the plants did not like it. At all. Plants which hadn't died back in years were knocked to the ground (e.g. almond verbena, Philippine violet, Turk's cap), plants that had already budded are still recovering (arizona ash), plants which should have made it through with no problems are having problems recovering (yaupon holly), and some of our more tender plants are being watched on baited breath for recovery or have already been ripped out because of the time it would take to recover (lorapetalum, pitsporum, crepe myrtle).  

I'm going to try to do a post per area as it got cleaned up because in addition to cutting back things that haven't been touched in YEARS, I also added compost and mulch so everything is looking tip top - if a little bare while I wait for things to fill back in.

Wildlife Wednesday - Toad

Lookee what I found under the compost bin when I moved it the other week. 

She (at least I assume it is a she based on size) is most likely a Gulf Coast Toad (Bufo nebulifer) which is technically now called a Coastal Plains Toad but I think most people still just call it the Gulf Coast Toad even though the Gulf Coast Toad and the Coastal Plains Toad split a while ago, though they are VERY closely related.  In any case, these toads are pretty common in this area, and we usually see them in the spring, summer, and early fall.

After emptying the compost juices (i.e. the liquid so I could make compost tea), we carefully replaced the composter base and the compost bin.  I hope to see her again in the spring. 

Hmmm...I think this also means that I need to get a few toad houses and put them about the yard.  ;)

Why Hellew, Toadry!

Not sure what type of toad this is, he was living under one of my flower pots, though.  I think it may be a juvenile gulf coast toad?

Successes

The sole gulf fritillary butterfly I've had born in my yard this year. The rest have been killed in their formative stages by the paper wasps that live in the eave of the house.

The saucer I put out for the toads and lizards is finally being used by one of the toads.

The bird feeder, which is mostly used by the Jays and the Doves is also being used by Cordelia the Cardinal (also, my husband believes I am crazy naming all the resident animals, though he had no problem with me naming some of the ducks in college.) Also, this photo was taken through a window and a screen.

It's also being used by the squirrels...meh. They need food, too. Besides, I only put a cup of seed out each day so it's not like I lose a lot by letting the squirrels take the left overs after the birds are done.

Hackberry Emperor butterflies mating on my window screen. You go, little butterflies, a variety of which I've never seen in my yard before, but likely were attracted to the sap from my pistache tree because the bird feeder rubbed one of the branches every time I took it off of the tree.

And finally, the best success of them all, a picture of Bettye - the resident female humming bird (yes, she looks like a male in this picture, but it's just the angle). I have at least three that visit throughout the day. This photo was taken from about 20 yards away. The next day I was able to move my chair to 15 yards. Soon I'll be able to be close.

Toads too!