In our region, every drop of rain and every cool day is a blessing. Makes us all feel rejuvenated.
Vitex still has blooms.
Flame Acanthus has gotten a lot of attention from butterflies lately. Here some fast little Sulphurs zip from flower to flower making it a challenge to photograph even a blur of yellow.
This Giant Swallowtail lingered at each tubular blossom.
Beauty in motion.
Swallowtails have a wingspan of 4 to 5 and a half inches, so it’s easy to spot them.
Globe Mallow is covered with bright orange cup shaped flowers. Boy, I never expected this native to get so large.
The orange flowers pop on the grey-green ruffled leaves. The bush is a nice contrast to all the green leafed bushes around it.
The flowers on the Blue Plumbago or Cape Plumbago are dropping daily. The blue flowers are so pale that in bright light they look white. Soon it will be time to carry it into the shed.
Roses are putting on a final extravaganza. I love how rose bushes perform year after year.
Pale peachy color on the flowers from this bush is stunning. I’ve had it so long that I don’t remember the variety.
A tight bud.
Tropical Ixora (Ixora coccinia) is known as jungle flame. It amazes me that the flowers bloom almost indefinitely. The evergreen shrub has a rounded shape with glossy foliage.
Being a plant that naturally grows in Asian heavily wooded areas, it prefers shade. Mine is grown in a pot that is tucked into a corner where it only receives late afternoon sun as it is low on the horizon.
Reblooming Irises are back, although on very short stems.
Variegated Fritillary on a Pink Coneflower (Echinacea). Most of the Coneflowers have dried, but a few have appeared in recent weeks. Coneflower is an easy plant to grow. It reseeds and multiples every year.
Back in August after a heavy rainfall, this trellis that has Sweet Autumn Clematis (Clematis terniflora) was growing so thickly that it toppled over. We cut back the vines to the ground, put in more concrete, and righted the trellis.
Since that time, the vine is growing like crazy. It’s going to be difficult to keep this thing in check. Okay. Maybe it’s becoming invasive.
Copper Canyon Daisy (Tagetes lemmonii) blooms in late fall and is always a nice surprise. It is native to the Sonoran Desert of Arizona and northern Mexico and truly doesn’t need much water.
Up close it also stinks, so deer don’t like it. It’s not a problem outside but reeks in a confined space.
It flowers on the ends of wispy stems that bounce around in the wind.
Nice bright yellow flowers. This might be a Painted Lady butterfly on it.
“Love is like wildflowers; it’s often found in the most unlikely places.” Ralph Waldo Emerson