August 2026
One of our neighbors asked me why we had decorated early for Halloween. I had no idea what he was referring to until he pointed to our pecan trees. The large silken, amorphous webs enclose leaves and tender twigs that are used as food by hatching larva. Each adult female moth (Hyphantria cunea) lays hundreds of eggs on the backs of the leaves within the web. The hatching caterpillars harm young trees by defoliating them, but they will not kill our well-established pecan trees. We do have some natural webworm controls including parasitic wasps, predatory insects, and insectivorous birds.
August 2, 2026
There are hundreds of thousands of tiny black pellets or webworm droppings, called frass, covering anything and everything under this pecan tree. Wind causes frass to fall out of the webs and onto the ground and our heads if we are sitting in the shade of the tree. You can see how frass collects in the indentions of the fossilized ripple stones we use for pavers. There are two good things about webworm frass – it is a form of organic fertilizer since it is digested plant leaves, and it is usually not sticky like the frass from aphids that consume plant sap and secrete honeydew!
Berlandiera Texans, green-eyed daisy, is a perennial wildflower native to the southwestern states. The central disc of the flower is green, so it is easy to see why it is called “green eyes” or “lyreleaf green
eyes”. It is a good plant for hot sunny garden spots, but it will also tolerate some shade. It has a pleasant smell that some people think is similar to chocolate and others say it is lemony. It smells like
chocolate to me, and I understand why our bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds are attracted to it. We plan to collect seeds and propagate this excellent low-maintenance nectar plant.
August 14, 2026
This is an example of horseweed (Erigeron canadensis/Conyza canadensis). Several plants appeared unexpectedly in our garden this year, and I left this one plant specimen for us to observe. It is noted for being very beneficial for pollinators by providing nectar and pollen when pollinators need it most – late summer and fall. Its flowers are easily accessed by large and small (solitary) bees. It is also hated by agricultural businesses because it spreads rapidly through crop fields, and interestingly, it is the first weed to become resistant to the herbicide glyphosate! Nurture with care. I plan to remove the seed heads.
This naturalized southeast African plant is related to North American milkweeds. Like milkweeds, Gomphocarpus physocarpus has a milky latex sap that is slightly toxic, specialized flowers that must be pollinated by insects, and air-dispersed silky seeds. It has been a curiosity in our garden this year. Kids and adults are attracted to the ball-shaped capsules that form and monarchs lay eggs on the leaves. This plant is easy to propagate from seeds. It can provide lots of food for caterpillars, BUT … we cut ALL of our non-native milkweeds back before Halloween so monarchs do not lay eggs on them when they should be migrating.
August 15, 2026
Salvia penstemonoides is one of my new favorite plants. In their third year, these wildflowers have doubled in size at their crowns, and flower spikes have reached 3’- 4’ in length. I mentioned in a previous entry that they were discovered in the 1840s and were thought to be extinct until they were rediscovered in the 1980s. There are less than ten wild populations known today. These plants are easily propagated by seed and we currently have 15 seedlings that we will nurture through the winter
and plant in spring. That will bring our total population to nearly forty plants. If you know of a wild population of Big Red Sage, report it to Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower farm or Texas Parks and Wildlife.
August 17, 2026
Solitary common mullein (Verbascum Thapsus) plants can be found growing along the sides of roads or in the middle of fields. We have one that came up as a welcome volunteer in one of our black pots. Last year it was a rosette of large fuzzy leaves that reminded me of lamb’s ear. We now know without a doubt that it is mullein. In its second year, a four-foot spike has emerged from the center of the crown. Its
sulphur-colored flowers bloom from the bottom to the top of the spike over a period of several weeks providing pollinators with a feast. It is a naturalized biennial ‘weed’ that is beneficial because it is drought
tolerant, it doesn’t spread aggressively, and it provides food for our pollinators. I would welcome this plant yearly.
Last month, our new beds were submerged in water and one month later the soil is cracking. The cracks aren’t deep, yet, but they provide a good teaching moment because they indicate that soil moisture is being lost rapidly. This soil is probably composed of some clay because clay soils expand when wet and shrink when dry. Extremely hot August temperatures are greatly accelerating evaporation rates, too. Another consideration, this bed is near a mature tree which is removing large amounts of water from the soil. Cracking ground tells us the bed needs more organic matter integrated into the soil, the soil should be covered by a couple of inches of mulch, and we need more rain!
Earlier this month I wrote about our infestation of webworms, so I had to share this photo. Today I saw something I have never seen before – a yellowjacket killing a webworm moth! As predatory carnivores, yellowjackets help with pest control by capturing live prey like flies, aphids, other wasps, crickets, and
caterpillars. They take protein-rich prey to their nests to feed their larvae. This is another natural webworm control that should be added to my list since yellow jackets are different from parasitic wasps.
I end this month by sharing several entries related to something that has caused us a lot of garden-related worry and stress. Remember last month how excited I was to share photos of our new gigantic pipevine plants? We spent $600 to buy 30 plants that were well established and rapidly producing new vining growth. We began making plans to build a row of large arbors, for our Pipevine Swallowtail Host Plant Haven. The tag on the new plants stated that they were Aristolochia- Dutchman’s Pipevine. The species was not listed after the genus on the tag; however, I thought they looked like Aristolochia tomentosa which are native to parts of Texas. The lack of a species name should have been my
first clue that something was wrong. Please read the next entry.
We noticed that our Pipevine Swallowtail butterflies were laying a few eggs on the plants, but the eggs did not hatch, or if they did the caterpillars died immediately. We originally thought the plants had been
treated with a systemic pest control to protect the plants from hungry caterpillars until the plants could be sold. The nursery that raised them even told us if this was the case the spray would be gone in two
months. We waited. We began to look at the leaves of the plant and after hours of research and comparing photos of different species of Aristolochia, we now know we bought Aristolochia maxima. It is tropical pipevine and has a much higher toxicity than Aristolochia tomentosa. We will never be able to use these plants, and I am grappling with the realization that we will have to destroy them.
In the photo: As one of our observations, we placed healthy caterpillars on some of the new growth and observed them for a couple of hours -- they would not eat the plants.
August 28, 2026
Aristoloochia maxima is a good host plant for Pipevine Swallowtails in tropical populations, but not for the pipevine butterfly species native to Texas. It should NOT be sold in Texas or any state in the US. We currently have the plants covered with mosquito netting so butterflies cannot lay eggs on them. We cannot give the plants to anyone because their smell will attract local butterflies to lay eggs that will never develop into healthy caterpillars. In hindsight, after lots of research and observations, we can easily differentiate the leaf shapes of the native tomentosa species vs. the tropical maxima species. We also recognize the stronger smell of the high aristolochic acids in the maxima.
LESSON LEARNED: Do not buy pipevine plants without knowing the species and look for anatomical clues to verify the species information given on the tag.
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