Raymone's Plants du Jour

Not all the plants habitating at the CB are native to these parts. In fact, anticipating hotter and drier conditions, we have been introducing plants to the CB from points south and southwest to see how they'd do. But some other plants have been introduced in weak moments, as the Crumby Ovate has previously admitted. Then too, some plants are irresistibly cute, like Cupheas, for example. No doubt, Cupheas have it made for the nonce because humans find them irresistibly cute. Cultivars also occasionally get admitted to the CB premisis too. Sometimes cultivars are planted in areas lately reclaimed from the St. Augustine weed. Finally, some of the goofiest plants habitating at the CB were growing at the CB long before it was the CB and pre-date our arrival on the site. If they don't spread, we don't generally try to kill them, but instead, let them pass of their own volition, like the nasty old rose bushes.

Here's a couple of examples of plants that are totally inappropriate to the CB.

Hamelia patens. This one is widely disseminated in the nursery trade. It is vended as firecracker bush, fire bush, scarlet bush, etc. From observing its behavior for lo many moons, we can tell that it prefers a tropical rainforest habitat. To do any good, it must have all the water it can get. Like it wants gallons every day. Otherwise, its leaves hang vertically, like a sad dog's ears. Also, it is nowise frost hardy and very slow to come back in the spring. Apparently, the leaves brewed up as a tea, confer immortality to the tea's imbiber. This water hog was introduced due to a weak moment and also because we got a real good deal on the four plants. All four were like six dollars.

Then there's Crinum sp. ?. Nobody has any idea what any of these Crinums are, taxonomically speaking. We tried to kill these off by digging up their extensive system of rhizomes, tubers or what not. But Beelzebub, maybe, had hold from the other end and wouldn't turn loose. The foilage is an unattractive pale green. They flower in the hottest part of the year. The flowering culms always flop over onto the ground. To take this picture, Raymone had to prop the culm up. Even though these are planted under the eaves, they are always thirsty because it hardly ever rains in these parts. Honestly, we feel guilty about not watering them more, but Jeez Louise!

We used to have some spider lilies, Hymenocallis sp., also taxonomically impossible,
in with the Crinums, but those finally expired, maybe. These Crinums pre-dated us and will post-date the demise of the Judeo-Christian tradition, oh my!