Greetings and saluations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, Mani the purebred border collie, here today to tell you about our new guests. You may remember me from such posts as “Practically Nothing”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristic pose.
We haven’t had much rain lately, but things are still very green.
You can see the big paper trash bag in the distance; that’s full of dead rose branches and things like that. It adds a certain something to the garden, don’t you think?
The guy I live with took this picture to illustrate a very good reason why he will never let anyone work in his garden.
Do you see it?
There’s a lot of bulb foliage in this picture, and also some bindweed, but right in the middle of the picture is Gladiolus atroviolaceus, a gladiolus native to the Near East, Iran, and so on, about to flower.
It would almost certainly be pulled up by “garden help” and the guy I live with would be furious.
And probably all that stuff that looks like grass would be pulled up, too. Those are seedlings of Ixiolirion tataricum, the “mountain lily” from Central Asia.
So that’s that business.
The only other thing is that a few days ago the guy I live with said “They’re here!” As usual, I had no idea what he was talking about, until I heard the hummingbird.
They’re back, after wintering in Mexico.
The guy I live with made some sugar syrup, but then a couple of days ago he went to the Indian grocery, and on his way back he stopped at a nursery and bought these:
They’ve been repotted in gallon pots with his special soil mix (in the trash can) to help the plants grow more roots.
These are all red-flowered penstemons except for two Agastache cana.
He said the hummingbirds would enjoy these even if they were sitting on the patio.
It was a broad-tailed hummingbird that we first heard and saw, but we also have black-chinned, and, sometimes, rufous and calliope.
It really depends on what’s flowering in the foothills as to whether or not we get all four species, or just the first two.
And that’s all I have for today.
I’ll leave you with a picture of me doing what I do while the guy I live with paints.
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
How wonderful to be able to enjoy these very special birds.
Yes, they’re pretty fun to watch. The black-chinned will sometimes dive-bomb us.
The rufous are very aggressive; calliopes aren’t much larger than a big bumblebee.
The guy I live with says the farther south you travel, the more red-flowered plants there are, flowering during the monsoon season in southern Arizona, southern New Mexico, west Texas, and northern Mexico.
Would love to entice some hummers to my neighborhood but think there’s probably too much noise and traffic nearby. Heck, what am I saying…there’s too much noise and traffic for us! Still maybe mum will put up a feeder as an optimistic nod to nature. Humans love free handouts, maybe those fiesty little hummers will too. Enjoy your nap, Mani…while it clouds up every afternoon, we have yet to get any rain. Story of our life. Sigh.
Your fur-iend,Wilson, the House Pony 🐾
The guy I live with says a feeder is a good start. 4:1 water to sugar, if you didn’t know.
And the feeder has to be taken down and refilled any time it gets over 85F during the day, otherwise stuff will form that will make the hummingbirds sick.
It’s kind of a lot of work.
They also like the trumpet vine here.
And trumpet vine is prettier. 😉
It is. We have the regular orange-red one. The guy I live with said the late neighbor to the south and one door over was so jealous she bought one, and it’s the very red one, which hummingbirds like even more.
The guy I live with’s wife always wanted the yellow one, but none planted here survived. The rootballs were too congested to absorb water.
There are huge, spectacular yellow ones at the entrance to Wilmore Nursery in Littleton.
There’s a massive one on a power pole near the alley entrance. It’s spectacular!
They are very cool.