![\"Rusty](\"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/02\/viburnum-bud-open183.jpg\" "\\"viburnum-bud-open183\\"")
Rusty Blackhaw Viburnum bud<\/p><\/div>\n
Rusty blackhaw viburnum is one of the most beautiful of the native shrubs, but it’s routinely scraped off by developers as “brush”.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Here, the buds are just opening to show the bud-cluster that will be a puffball of pure white within a week.\u00a0 Easy to see why it acquired the name “rusty.”\u00a0\u00a0 It’s a valuable plant for wildlife, producing tasty blue berries for birds–and nectar for the early butterflies and moths.<\/p>\n
Another native early bloomer is the Mexican plum.\u00a0\u00a0 This is the tree-sized wild plum, and it comes out before the thicketing plums.\u00a0\u00a0 It’s another valuable wildlife food source.\u00a0 Right now, nectaring butterflies and moths are flitting around the branches, waiting for the flowers to open.<\/p>\n
![\"Mexican](\"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/02\/mex-plum-buds-open188.jpg\" "\\"mex-plum-buds-open188\\"")
Mexican plum buds opening<\/p><\/div>\n
We’ve been working on this year’s garden space.\u00a0 Last year, we didn’t plant a garden so digging the aggressive Bermuda grass out of it this year was a lot of work.\u00a0\u00a0 Muck-buckets of aged horse manure have been dug in this year as well.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It’s so dry, however, that it’s gong to be hard to get a good crop.\u00a0\u00a0 In an ordinary year, the space between the beds would be bright green with winter annual grasses and forbs.<\/p>\n
![\"Garden](\"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/02\/garden187.jpg\" "\\"garden187\\"")
Garden prep<\/p><\/div>\n
This was taken before the drip irrigation was completely re-installed.\u00a0 The old timbers are finally rotting out (they’ve been there about 20 years.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Even in a dry year, spring comes early to central Texas.\u00a0 I’m recovering from pneumonia so can’t get out to the full 80 acres, but here are some pictures from around the house.\u00a0\u00a0 (I need to plant some elbowbush up by the house, as it’s one of the very earliest.) Rusty blackhaw viburnum is one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,21,7],"tags":[71,9,70],"class_list":["post-135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activities","category-photography","category-plantlife","tag-activities","tag-drought","tag-photography"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=135"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135\/revisions\/139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}