Summer visitors

This gopher tortoise was hanging out in the drive, and made no effort to move until after I got out of the truck to photograph him.
The state reptile of Georgia, these guys lend cool factor to the garden.

Indigo bunting, is this guy blue enough for you?

The cow killers are colorful too.
I walk around bare-footed, but I don't think I'd want to step on one of these guys for more reasons than concerns for the critter...

The hummingbirds are adorable.

Manduca rustica caterpillar shows his close kinship to the tomato hornworm.
Feeding on vitex (chaste tree), which I'm willing to share... He crawled off and did whatever shortly after posing for this photo shoot.

Tiny Red-banded Hairstreak butterfly visiting the verbesina

GBBD August

The Garden Bloggers Bloom Day is such a neat concept, and I always want to post something... getting the pics on the right day is spotty...

The Front Yard

Butterfly pea (Centrosema virginianum), makes a nice display...

These little dayflowers (Commelina erecta var. angustifolia), are cute, they're a very different critter than the usual dayflower... which plagues a flower-bed, covers the ground... rooting at every joint.

St. Andrew's cross

Garden Spider

wild sweet potato

Prarie Broomweed (Amphiachyris dracunculoides)

This yard is completely unvisited by the lawn mower... I hate those things!

There's a lot of trouble in the suburban front yard, Neighbors who want to dictate the acceptable appearance of the yard, and I feel bad for them, I think mine is ever so much nicer!

The Garden

Hyacinth bean in bloom

The clasping heliotrope continues to attract butterflies... I have a patch of low-growing lantana next to the heliotrope, and this plant out-competes the lantana!

Swamp hibiscus... Not the best choice in a sand hill garden...
While I can keep these things alive, they seldom look like anything here.

An interesting combination, silphium astericus and apple mint in bloom, with bumble bee.

Sulphur yellow butterfly visits salvia coccinea, Let's not tell the humming birds, k?

Zinnia and gulf fritillaries.

Tiger swallowtail and zinnia.

The butterflies found the tithonia!

Happy full moon

I didn't think to shoot the moon last evening... but I did take lots of garden pics yesterday afternoon...

After a bit of rain, the lantana has put on a flush of new bloom.


To go with all the new blooms, there seems to be a fresh hatch of butterflies...

Painted ladies...

The clear-wing sphinx moth (Hemaris thysbe) is always exciting!

The spicebush swallowtail is abundant...

Gulf Fritillary

Tiger swallowtail

The butterflies haven't found it yet... the tithonia has begun to bloom...



Red chenille (Acalypha hispida), is a new flower to this garden... brought it in last Autumn, most people grow it as a house plant... will see how winter hardy, and how drought tolerant this plant is... seems like red chenille would make a good turf replacement...



This is interesting... the white dwarf crepe myrtle threw a red sport on one limb...



I ate a pear recently, I'm still waiting for them to ripen up a bit more...



The crook-neck summer squash are through, so... here's some new squash seedlings.



I plant all the butterfly weed seed that my plants produce, but these guys don't make it easy...



Milkweed bugs ruin the seeds...

July blooms

When I first started gardening here, It seemed like the humming birds would look for humming bird feeders next to the structures, while ignoring the flowers that I was planting for them... They eventually figured it out...






The goldfinches had no problem finding the sunflowers...






I hate these 7 minute itch plants (Cnidoscolus stimulosus)
With all the butterflies pollinating them, I don't think I'll be rid of them any time soon.






These black grasshoppers are bigger than the plants they eat...






Wonder what the cat is hunting...







The verbesina is blooming.
I found this cool wildflower growing along the side of the road, being mowed. I pulled a coupla pieces, it came up like mint, and was as easy to transplant. The yellow variety hasn't started to bloom yet.




This is an interesting plant... The flowers resemble lavender. This guy is a natural sand-hill resident. I need to post it for identification at a plant forum.
I posted the flower, and got an immediate response... Field snakecotton
You really can't call something a weed when it only grows in sand where little else can grow.




Florida tasselflower (Emilia fosbergii) This plant showed up this year, I only have this one... Ima let it grow, in spite of it's close resemblance to a couple of rogue customers...






River oats are very pretty, but difficult to photograph.








Mint attracts some cool pollinators...
Meet the Double-banded Scoliid (Scolia bicinta).
When not pollinating mint, the double-banded scoliid catches beetle grubs for the next generation.

Tropical milkweed seeds.

As always, the pictures click for larger views.