It's the ultimate cottage garden - I love it!
Thanks so much for posting the pictures, CalSherry!
MissSherry

You are most welcome! I told him I'd teach him how to do it (he asked me to post first then he'd learn after...). I agree with your assessment that it is more 'cottage' than jungle.

Wow,
this is an awesome Butterfly-Haven right there..Loving it...
Bet there are daily tons of FLUTTERBY'S..
If someone considers that a Jungle,then they have no clue about Butterfly-Gardening..lol

Butterfly-Greetings
Susanne(SUE)

I've been there and it is the most interesting garden on the street! Butterflies love it. Penny

I was thinking BF jungle. But that's only because I like the connotation of a place with so much flora and fauna that the animals are totally uninhibited!

Sandy

I would say that is more than a cottage, more like a butterfly VILLAGE!
Love the way you have let your plantings envelope your parking strip. Great to use every inch for the butterflies! Your Verbena bonariensis looks great!

Jill

Absolutely amazing Murray.

Love it Murray! Those are happy butterfly bushes (they are butterfly bushes, right? I've never seen any that large!).

Murray,

You get the most plant growth out of every squre inch that I've seen. Tell us the relationship of the window to your butterfly bush/etc. I can imagine you spending lots of delightful moments watching your butterflies through that window.

Be careful, tdog may start charging you AND ME for posting our pictures.:):):):):):):):):):)

mike

Mike & Murray,

I'd NEVER charge you guys for posting pictures. :) I love you two too much and you are family. Who charges family members? (Well, my biological dad did but that's another story...)

I'm just going to teach you both how to do it, slowly, just as I did with DH. When you're ready to learn, I'll teach you. He's able to do it now so I know you will be able to do it too. :)

tdog

OMGosh!!!! That's my dream cottage garden. It's beautiful!!!! Perfect habitat. I bet the neighbors drool.

Thanks Murray for making the world a more beautiful place :-)

Edna

I really want that garden!!!!

I love it when people think outside the constrained "normal landscaping" box and wind up with such a beautiful work of art.

Keep up the good work!

Maryann

Wow. If it didn't look somewhat planned, I'd have to say WONDERFUL JUNGLE!!

How on Earth are you managing to maintain that, or are you just really, really REALLY skinny to squish in there to deadhead and check everything?

Never seen such tremendous, gorgeous, wonderful growing of butterfly EVERYTHING!

Wow!...nope, needs more than that...WOW!!!!!!

Guess I have a lot of work to do...!!

Is this place an actual cottage? I was just wondering if others on the street have lots of flowers too or is this sight to see. Do people come to check it out everyday...and look for butterflies. Quite stunning. Mine is shameful!!! I wish everyone's yard would look like this instead of the boring grass. But yeah, not a whole lot of time for deadheading and weeding, I guess. But wouldn't it be nice if our world looked like that and not so boring???

Heh. Now all we need is a PLANTING DIAGRAM, hint hint....Murray, where are you....Murrrraaaayyyy......?

Guess we need to send out the beaters and native guides.... :)

Seriously, Murray, I'd love to see a rough diagram of what is stuffed in the ground where. I'm trying to get my yard to look somewhat planned and tidier than it is (HA! that won't take much) and I'm failing miserably at getting anything spaced even close to 'right'.

Help!

Here's Murray
{{gwi:480975}}
and his sidekick
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Hi Everyone, and thanks so much Sherry for posting the pictures of us and our wild habitat. I actually feel very awkward going outside to weed or deadhead as I did yesterday and today. I keep waiting for someone to tell me what I already know which is that I am OUT OF CONTROL. But I can't stop. And my older daughter has joined me and is doing the same thing down in southern CA where she and her family live. Everynight we email each other pictures of our new plants and butterfly sightings. And my granddaughter comes up to collect cats to raise in her school class periodically which is also fun.

You're right, Mike, I do spend entirely too much time at that window looking for visiting butterflies and then I run through the house to see if anyone is visiting out back. It is truly crazy because I even go out several times at night to see if there are any moths around.

The funny thing is that my neighbors next door just have dead weeds and my neighbor in back has literally cemented her entire yard back, side and front. Caleb and I stand out like sore thumbs. My youngest daughter says her husband would take a sickle to it all. Oh well, what can I say? I really didn't plan it at all. It just developed over time after I returned from a trip my sister took me on to see the monarch migration in Sants Cruz about 12 or so years ago.

The other day a neighbor said his friend who was visiting and said it was the most concentrated example of biomass or biodiversity she ever saw. And it is like that all around my house except for one roadside strip along side the house and I am itching to descend on it but I fear the neighbors may begin to stone me. At least I know they respect Caleb who occasionally hurries people along if they tarry too long. Murray

Tdog, would you add Murray's picture( and Caleb-if possible) to our putting faces with names thread?

Murray,

Thanks for the info. on how your "Camelot" got started. I love the fact that your "mania" has infected your older daughter and your granddaughter. What a great story about frequent calls to your oldest daughter to share your garden/butterfly stories for the day!!!!!!!!

And thanks to tdog for making all this possible.

Btw, I can picture you, Murray, enjoying the sights through your senic window.

mike

Yesterday or the day before I cut down two huge Buddleias to get another great blooming for the fall. It is easier than trying to deadhead when the bushes are so tall. It occured to me that if my yard were any larger one could get lost in it but what one probably couldn't do is fall down in it because it is too dense. Sometimes I get claustophobic and have to cut some branches or tie back some pipe vine. The hardest thing for me is being terrified of spiders and the vines grabbing at me sometimes leaves me dashing for an open area. But I have to put up with it because I have no other option now. Murray