Thursday, March 24, 2016

It Will Grow Back

This morning was beautiful. 

The sky was blue and the sun shined brightly through the trees.

The sun was able to shine through the trees because most of the leaves were on the ground after last night's hail storm.  Yes, that is a decomposed granite pathway.

Hail was still piled up against the fence some nine hours after it came crashing down from the sky.

When I set up my bottle bush last year, I wondered how it would fare in a hail storm. Evidently, pretty well. I could not see any damage to the bottles. 

Around in the front yard, the tender leaves of the cactus did not hold up as well. 

That is going to leave a mark.

Just a few injuries on the agave.

Over the weekend, I was spraying a stream of water on the stems and leaves of this Hill Country Penstemon to remove aphids. I think the hail got any that were still hanging on. It removed most of the stems too.

I was excited to see a flower stalk on this Hesperaloe. I added this plant to the garden in 2013 and I have been waiting since then for it to bloom. The stem was damaged by the hail, but I think it should survive, although it may be deformed. I hope I am able to positively identify the Hesperaloe variety once it blooms.

Just for "fun", here are some before and after pictures. 

Before: This past Sunday, the parkway was full of bluebonnets.

After: Now the parkway is full of smashed and broken bluebonnets. Notice the ladder leaning against the house in the background? The neighbor had to cover their skylight last night. The hail shattered skylights in every house around me.

Before: Here is that Hesperaloe again. Flowers in the background and perky bluebonnets in the foreground. 

After: Flattened bluebonnets and not much color in the background.

Before: Pretty.

After: Pretty sad. (If you see the weed in this picture, I pulled it after taking this picture.)

Before: Pathway facing west.

After: Facing the direction the hail came from. 

Before: Golden Groundsel.

After: Ground up Groundsel.

Before: Facing the morning sun.

After: Facing a weekend of cleaning up all of the broken plants the garden. The good news is that it will all grow back. The plants may carry some scars for a while, but it could have been much worse. One bright point is that the hail knocked all of the leaves from the neighbor's live oak into their yard instead of mine. 

8 comments:

  1. Oh nooo! That's a lot of cleanup and some sad looking plants. I hope there's enough left on the Bluebonnets to set seeds for next year.

    Always a bright spot with the leaves, they all fell straight down at once. Maybe it even knocked out a few of those oak tassels. We are coated with the pollen down here.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Surprisingly, several of the bluebonnets perked up. Bees were buzzing around the flowers yesterday. I may not have as many seeds, but it should be enough for next year. I probably have some dormant seeds in the soil anyway. I think the hail ended our oak pollen season a little early. Maybe there won't be as many acorns in the fall either.

      Delete
  2. I have faith your garden will come out of this well. The storm was so bizarre. I live less than a mile west of you and we had no hail to speak of. I used to live less than a mile east of you, and the condominiums are a disaster!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Glad you did not have much damage, Collagemama.It was bad here, but it could have been much worse. I cleaned up the garden yesterday and it looks much better now. My biggest long term concern is how the large cactus will look. They were hit pretty hard on the south and west sides.

      Delete
  3. Oooof. That hail storm did do you a solid stripping the oak leaves and leaving them next door to you. Fingers crossed everything manages to bounce back promptly to set seed, etc. Deer chew on the hesperaloe stems here routinely but even the bloom stalks they munch often persist and manage to flower eventually. I'm betting that particular mystery will be solved for you, and soon! Looking forward to "discovering" what type it is along with you.

    Happy Easter Bounce-Back!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Wow! I do say, only a gardener would know to look for the weeds in a photo. ;)

    I'm sorry about the hail damage, but dang if those bluebonnets weren't beautiful a week ago! Ours did not do well this year and I'm now wondering about the seed viability from the source we bought from. Last year was so much better for us.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Oh No! I share your pain as we had a similar occurrence last April. The most hurtful is the damage on agaves and cactus. It will never go away. New leaves will replace the ones shredded. So sad fro your bluebonnets.I have fewer this year because I lost all the seed last year. But having said that I think this years bluebonnets were happier for being less crowded.

    ReplyDelete
  6. So sad. Hang in there!

    ReplyDelete

Comments are closed due to excessive spam. Message me on Instagram.

All content © Michael McDowell for Plano Prairie Garden 2009-2023. Unauthorized reproduction is prohibited.

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.