Karoo wildflowers

Gathering up July’s wildflowers. Lime green flowers on Euphorbia mauretanica are lit up in Worcester, back home in our garden there is promise in the burgeoning leaf tips, but not even buds yet. After our walk, the nursery was closed for lunch. And the restaurant has closed altogether. Twice disappointed. They are busy reworking the garden in front of the nursery. We’ll try again in August.

Our Karoo Koppie is swathed in reddish flowers with an undercarpet of Oxalis pes-capreae on a mission to take over the world. This succulent garden is also surrounded by works in progress as he redesigns the Mediterranean Sun Circle so we’ll skip the wide view till he’s done.  This morning the leaves were sheened and dripping dew.

Cotyledon orbiculata, Aeonium
Quiver tree, succulent pelargonium

Gardening for wildlife in a Cape winter

We garden for wildlife. If a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound? Between RL and gardening, rediscover your sense of wonder. Take time out, see what wildlife makes its home, or pauses, in your garden.

In Paradise and Roses both of our strelitzias have a flower open. I know our strelitzias are grown in California, I wonder if the hummingbirds use them as a nectar source? Strong stem and a bowl overflowing with nectar brings an impatient queue of  masked weavers and  Cape weavers.

Strelitzia reginae occurs naturally only in South Africa: eastern coast, from Humansdorp to northern KwaZulu-Natal in coastal bush and thicket. It grows along river banks in full sun, however sometimes it occurs and flowers on margins of forest in shade – from PlantZAfrica.

Weaver on Strelitzia

July garden catch up

I was. I was going to prune the figs this afternoon. He was. He was planning to work on his current Ungardening project, which is stuck at the nasty muddy chaos stage. But the next cold front rolled in from Antarctica direction, and it’s bucketing down. He is tucked up with TV and cat.

from Dasklip Pass to Witkranskop
with Leucadendron