Tropical Gardens and Plants #106

I don't have a pretty tropical plant photo at the moment ... so I hope since the subject has been about birds it's okay to share this one. This is a juvenile Cooper's Hawk that was in the backyard early this morning. I heard the Blue Jays, Cardinals and other birds raising a ruckus and knew there was a hawk nearby so I grabbed my camera and went out. We have a few different types of hawks and I've gotten some good pic's the past few years. I guess my backyard is good pickin's because there are so many bird feeders that attract backyard birds they prey on. The hawk was perched in the Senna tree, and I can't believe I could get so close ... only way I know it was a juvenile is because it kept hopping about the branches trying it's best to catch a little bird for breakfast. It was so funny because all the other birds were ganging up on the hawk and eventually chased him off! I love when I can get a picture like this!

One more ... gotta finish fixing dinner. This is where he was ducking and looking up at all the little birds who were yelling at him. I wish I could have gotten some of the Jays and others in a pic! It wasn't long before he took off with the Blue Jays in chase!

Awesome photos Lin! Big hawk freak myself!

If you enlarge the middle picture two times, you will see that the bird's eyes are reddish-pink.

Lin,
this is a great photo...http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/fp.php?pid=8698176

I'm thinking that little white bird is an albino too.

Yeah !!!!!!!! Milk N Honey blooming......I finally got one to bloom when I could enjoy it...instead of right before the freezes ........

Wow, mj that is gorgeous. Aren't those flowers graceful. I'll bet the perfume is heavenly!

a lovely display of beauty, there. congrats!

dzzy, Debra,
Thanks, I'm pretty happy that it's happy ! I was about to kick the brugs to the crub.

MJS, So beauttiful! Keep the pictures coming.

I guess it was inevitable for a branch to fall and hit one of my leaves(it had to be the newest... :^() not bad damage though) on the Philodendron Giganteum!

We get those Cooper's Hawks here in the summer and the Sharp Shinned hawks in the winter. I find the birds stay away from our feeders for almost a week after one is in the area. Once the hawk finds the pickins slim it moves on and the birds come back. One time during the winter when I had one of those long finch feeders that has about 36 perches, a hawk chased the birds and in a panic they flew into my windows. It sounded like machine gun fire. Fortunately most of them flew off safely that time, that is not always the case.

When hawk does catch something they fly into a nearby tree and devour it. Usually this happens when we have company for supper and my dining room looks out over the yard. It is not very appetising.

I have tried to eliminate all the Crinum americanums, they are terribly invasive here, but this one slipped by. When I saw the buds I had to leave it until it bloomed.

This message was edited Jul 18, 2011 7:37 AM

Dwarf Singapore Pink has finally decided to bloom, it, and everything else, has been so slow this year.

love that bloom on the crinum. is it inside a palm? beautiful plummie, mine is barely hanging in there..

Yes, they pop up everywhere and this one came up beside a Butia capitata or what we call a jelly palm because it makes yummy fruits that can be made into jelly.

ardisia: Love, Love, Love that gorgeous Plumeria!! I can almost smell the wonderful fragrance from here. I gave all but one of my Plumie's to a neighbor last spring. The one I have left I don't remember the name of but oh how I love the fragrant blooms. I didn't realize there was a dwarf variety, I might have to have to check into getting one of those!

We have a couple of different types of hawks year round and unfortunately since I feed the backyard birds, they are easy prey for hungry hawks. I lost a lot of my photo's when my laptop crashed last year but luckily had uploaded some on Flickr and Facebook. This is a photo of a Sharp-shinned hawk two years ago ... it got a Mourning Dove in the backyard. Someone on the bird identification forum identified it as a juvenile which I guess is why it let me walk right up to within 5' to get some pic's. Either that or it was so hungry it was gonna eat breakfast regardless, LOL. It stayed there for what seemed like a long time ... ate the entire dove, turned and looked at me and then took off for the trees. This picture is kinda gross ... but shows nature at work: http://www.flickr.com/photos/plantladylin/4467611967/in/photostream

Glad I'm not the only one with no flowers right now! Lin your hawk shots are wonderful. We have a family of Cooper's Hawks (never knew what they were until you posted your picture, thanks!) that nests every spring in the neighbor's trees.

My two brugs from Debra are showing color, might open tonight! And my little fig tree has a fig! I thought I'd lost it when it first came home as it got all rusty and dropped most of its leaves, but it has come back gangbusters and here we are with fruit!

A big THANK YOU to mjsponies for this great idea! She posted a photo on a recent thread showing how she stuffed an old cage type bird feeder with sphagnum moss and dischidia plants. I immediately recognized her bird feeder and thought I had thrown mine away because the interior plastic had cracked and broken. I was out searching for something in the shed today and came across the old feeder! I didn't have enough sphagnum to stuff it with, so I grabbed someTillandsia usneoides ("Spanish Moss") from a tree and stuffed it with that. I was going to take cuttings from my big Dischidia ruscifolia but decided to use Cryptanthus bivitattus ("Earth Stars") and ... voila:

Gotta fix dinner but thought I'd share another picture I took a little while ago ... the corner of the backyard where my bench used to sit under the trees. There are cement pavers on the ground where the bench sat and the area is being taken over by Virginia Creeper vine and Cherry Laurel tree seedlings among other weeds! It seems like this has become a dumping ground for plants that need repotting (and somehow get lost in the shuffle) ... there are a couple of things that have started shooting roots from the bottom of the pots into the soil. One of these days soon I will get out there and do a bit of clean up. I thought my tree fern had died from the freezing winter but it re-sprouted and is looking pretty good!

Great job Lin!

Doesn't it make you crazy, when you ignore plants some of them do better than they ever did when you coddled and cared for them?

This is my Passiflora quadrangularis - Giant Granadilla - still in a 3 gal. pot but climbing away up into the bamboo thicket!

Alice, the leaf looks a bit like Castor Bean ricinus communis. There's a pic of an all-green variety here http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/165686/

Could that be it? If so, watch out! They grow FAST.

ardisia: If not Ricinus maybe Manihot Casava (commonly called "Tapioca Plant")

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/1827/#b

dyzzy: I've never heard of that Passiflora but I'm not real familiar with any of them. My 'Lady Margaret' bit the dust this past winter. I just posted two pics on the plant identification forum for a vine growing along the fence out back because for the life of me I couldn't remember what it was. Someone suggested a Passiflora and I think it may well be ... my backyard neighbor and the neighbor to the side both have them.

I have grown both of those plants and this one is different. It is a vine coming up from the ground, it took root in that basket and now it is all the way up in a tree.

great shots of plants and the hawk pictures are supper. I love hawks.

Jan

why don't we start a hawk and owl thread...i love owls also!

This message was edited Jul 18, 2011 9:05 PM

Love your hawk photos, lin. I love birds. Gee Dyzzy, I love that vine, it looks like a type of passi, or a merremia umbrellcia morning glory. hmm. if you get a bloom, please post. I have grown the green castor bean plant and it grows up right. put ONE palm out on the fence line, came home to its' base exposed from the durn squirrells. so put rocks on top of it like everything else.

Can't wait to see brug blooms, I really hate to see all my buds continually dropping from this horrible heat wave we have.
This is for KayJones, the little orange crocrosmia is blooming..

there are little EE's popping up everywhere..

my lantanas are loving this heat ( tropicals for me )

a view of the snow queen hibiscus under the old pear tree, it is so happy here..

voodoo lillys are all waking up.. kinda late..

Awwwwwww, Debra - that is so pretty!

I want to say "WELCOME" and hello to a new tropicals forum member - islandgirl37, from Marathon, FL - if you get a chance, say 'hi' and take a look at her list on the 'sticky' - WOW is all I can say!!!

i saw her have list.. I sure would like to see some pictures. oh wow..welcome islandgirl!
*hugs* KayJones.

I was checking out Island girls list myself and I would love to see some of the pictures of her "Haven"

Debra, you guys ok with all this heat? Nice flowers...Please send pictures of the
Voodoo Lily blooming

Debra, do those cute little EE's stay in the ground in Kansas?

Picasso's Paintbrush

Sorry this is coming up katty wampus. I thought I had already fixed that but obviously my computer had other ideas.

This message was edited Jul 19, 2011 10:31 AM

you know, I can't imagine them over wintering, the only thing I can think of is when I dump my old pots, I dump them in this area down the south side to amend the soil. It is very hard red clay, and I pile about three ft of leaves on it every fall. In Fact, the leaves go all around the flower beds all over., front and back, and stay there until I see green things poking up thru them. Kinda wish I had them on right now , maybe it would insulate them from the heat?
love those crotons, I still can't seem to grwo one to live, altho I have seen them in pretty planters all over town, in full sun, with other flowers around them..
this is the south fence this day last year...too ugly to show it this year.. DH tells me to give up.. the temps have everything out of whack, and I am leaving this friday to go to arkansas.. when I get back, I am going to start the long task of bringing in the plants.

this time last year I had four brugs in full flush.. tis year I am good to have leaves.. LOL
Drew, we missed the blooms..

this one has babies in it's pot.

this one I posted on another forum I think

I have lost three out of 8 lantanas so far this year..

someone asked for dahlias..out of 13 different ones, I have three blooming..