butterfly garden |

Happy Belated New Year ! I hope your holidays were joyous and relaxing. While not exactly relaxing, our holidays were most definitely joyful! Sally and I spent a whole week on Orcas Island in Washington State. We were there to meet the newest member of our family. Our youngest daughter gave birth to our second grandson. What a joy to visit with her and welcome Bernard to our ever expanding family.

Did you make any gardening resolutions? Personally, I gave up on resolutions several years ago. However, I still set goals. I guess this is kind of like making resolutions. However, thanks to some weird part of my brain, I seem to have less guilt when I fail to complete a goal than when I fail to accomplish my resolutions.

I have set lots of goals for 2016. First, I want to figure out how to spend more time in my garden. I will need to do this since I am doubling the size of my vegetable garden and adding a large butterfly/cut flower garden. I also planted two 35’ foot rows of blackberries back in the summer and those will need tending.

If your daughter is going to live far, far away, pray that she lives in a beautiful place. This view of My. Baker is just steps from daughter's house.

If your daughter is going to live far, far away, pray that she lives in a beautiful place. This view of Mt. Baker is just steps from daughter’s house.

My next goal is to finish several unfinished landscaping projects. I have decided that 2016 will be the year that I finally finish the granite walk paths that pass through the three rose arbors and connect all of my gardens together. The walk paths were on hold so I could run water and electricity out to my vegetable garden. I am proud to say this project was completed back in November. While I am looking forward to finishing the walk paths, I am more excited about the six water spigots that I have added that will allow me to install and use drip irrigation in my ever expanding vegetable garden.

My final goal is to do a better job documenting all of these changes on the blog. In addition, Patty and I are going to introduce a new feature. Each month we are going to visit with gardeners around the state and see what works, and what doesn’t, in their gardens. Each time I visit with a gardener I pick up something that I can apply in my own garden. I hope you will enjoy our visits and I hope you get some tips that will make you a better gardener too.

I was impressed with the number of vegetable gardens we saw on the island. Seems like everyone had one. This one was truly beautiful

Last year was a great year for the blog (click here if you would like to see the “Year in Review” presentation from WordPress). The “Weekly Tips” were incredibly well received. While I am not going to continue this, I will continue to post a weekly tip on my Facebook page. If you don’t already follow us on Facebook please check it out and give us a like.

Thank you all so much for continuing to follow us. We are so humbled that you choose to get some of your gardening tips from our little website. We work hard to provide information that is relevant, useful and (hopefully) entertaining. If there is anything that you would like to have featured or discussed on the blog do not hesitate to send us an e-mail or leave us a comment. Happy New Year!

Hummingbird migration season is upon us. Because of this, we have so many ruby throated and black chinned hummers in our yard that my wife is filling our two feeders everyday. While the hummers seem to appreciate the sugar syrup that she makes for them, they always head first to the only thing that is still really blooming in my garden; cypress vine.

Cypress vine flowers on my potager fence. Photo by Ramez Antoun

Cypress vine (Ipomoea quamoclit) is a member of the morning glory family and as such grows very well in our hot Texas summers. It is a tropical plant that is native to Mexico and Central America. It is a lovely vining plant that can grow 20 feet or more in a single season. Cypress Vine has loose, feathery foliage that is covered with hundreds of tiny, tubular flowers. The star shaped flowers can range in color from deep red to almost white and they are irresistible to butterflies and hummingbirds. Other common names for this plant include Hummingbird Flower, Star Glory, and Cardinal Plant.

Cypress vine is very easy to grow. Start seeds when the soil has warmed up to around 70 degrees. It prefers full sun but can tolerate light shade. Cypress Vine likes to be kept in moist, rich, well drained soils but it will grow in just about any type of soil and will tolerate some dry periods. Cypress Vine is a quick grower and can produce blooms in as little as 45 days. You can fertilize with a high phosphorus fertilizer right before the first bloom to enhance its flowering. Cypress vine readily reseeds itself so once established you will be able to enjoy this plant year after year.

Cypress Vine on the arbor

Because of its vining habit, Cypress Vine needs support. I planted mine against the western fence of my potager. This fence has an arbor over the gate and I wanted it to spread over both of these structures. All of the growth you see in these pictures came from two vines.

Unmanaged, Cypress vine will grow in and over anything that is in its way. Since mine is on a fence, I trained it to grow up and out toward the arbor. This kept most of the runners in check. Some runners did grow down into my daylilies but I simply pulled them off. The plant did not seem to mind one bit. Cypress vine is also an aggressive self seeding annual. All of those lovely flowers produce tons of little black seeds. So, if you plant Cypress Vine, be prepared to have lots of it in years two and three.

All of this from two vines in the first season!

Cypress Vine is a very lovely and very hearty plant that thrives in our climate. It is easy to grow and looks great on a fence, trellis or arbor. This self seeding annual is relatively disease and pest free and will provide you with a flush of blooms from May through late fall. If you can tolerate its aggressive growth habit it will reward you with a beautiful late summer garden full of butterflies and hummingbirds.

*This article was published in the September issue of “Hort Update” (http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/newsletters/hortupdate/2010/sep/)