Well, I don't have picture, but I found 9 ticks crawling up my clothes on Sunday after walking through some brush.

There were June bugs under the security light Sunday night.

Saw this Tiger Swallowtail yesterday.

{{gwi:462968}}

randy

This birdhouse was empty last month. Every day a couple of sparrows are seen poking even more debris into it. I wonder if there will be room for them and their eggs? Yesterday I took down a birdhouse I thought wasn't being used and out of the hole fell an egg and two naked little hatchlings! OH NO! Well I didn't want to touch because I've heard the mother won't feed a baby if she detects human, so I found a piece of paper and carefully scooped them up and put them back into the hole. I felt so bad. The egg was a total loss.

Here is what my back porch looks like on the north end:

and here's a view of the south end:

I have hummers.. I seen on hummerbird.net that they should have been in the area weeks ago.. but I think people are jumping in and posting before they really see them.. as I have been waiting and watching for a few weeks now..

At least I can now say I have my Hummers back!

I would be happy to take some shots from my south central OK home but I still have not learned to get the actual photo into the post. I only know how to send a link to the photos I have posted in the photo galleries.

Can anyone tell me how to do this?
G.M.

merryheart - Do you have them in photobucket or flickr? I use flickr and maybe I can tell you how from there.

I have a grass finch with eggs in my old mail box and my first Iris bloomed today. The lilacks are blooming and the purple smoke is about 6 inches high. I guess it is finaly spring here.

My new personal best nine blooms open at once. 8)

Plantermunn,

Congratulations on the arrival of spring at your place! Everything looks lovely!

Happy, happy spring!

Dawn

Carol I created a Flicker account and uploaded photos in there. I would really like to learn how to do this more than I want to share the photos of my early spring yard.
If you or anyone can help me figure this out I would be so grateful.
G.M.

Merryheart - This is the easy way to load one photo.

(1) Open the pic in Flickr that you want to post by clicking on it.
(2) Just over the picture in small letters you will see a small magnifying glass that says ALL SIZES. Click that.
(3) It will probably open in large. Change it to the size you want to use. I suggest MEDIUM.
(4) Scroll to the bottom of that page and you will see two blocks of text. BLOCK 2 is the one you want to copy.
(5) I am sure you know this but highlight it and right click and choose to COPY (or Control-C), etc.
(6) Now move to your GardenWeb message.

This is a sample so don't do this. If you paste that URL in the body of msg it will look like this and viewers would have to copy it and paste it into their browser to see it, so don't do this.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3265/2368853417_f9bb5c31e9_b.jpg

(7) Instead of the above. Paste the URL in the block at the bottom that is marked OPTIONAL LINK URL:
(8) Give it a name in NAME OF LINK:
Sample: Gayle's favorite plant.
(9) Click on PREVIEW MESSAGE
(10) If everything works like you want it you can submit. If not, you can BACK and fix it. Good luck.

Here is a link that might be useful:

Peach tree with little peaches

Frog in the flower bed

Bargain bush is doing well

Iris about to bloom

Candytuft and malva

Our kitty and another frog in side yard (which is another bare spot)

This callibrouchoa over wintered on my patio I wonder if it will thicken up if I prune it?

Peony...it was going to bloom for the first time ever last spring but the frost got it.

Variety of vine seedlings

Tulip Magnolia is almost done blooming

So there are my shots of what was happening yesterday in my backyard.
G.M.

P.S. I FINALLY learned how to get the photos into the post! yippee!

Hey, you win the gold medal for learning to post pics. My instructions didn't include posting multiple pics so you must have gotten some help from someone else. Right?

Nice pics, BTW. Carol

Carol I do so appreciate your help and directions! You gave me the idea to get a Flicker account. After that I still didn't know how but finally found some instructions on GardenWeb under FAQs and that helped me figure out how to do it. After reading those instructions I knew what to look on Flicker and it was easy after that.
I had been wanting to learn how to post one or more photos into a post for a long time and some of the guys tried to help me last year. But I never took time to actually try it and then lost the instructions. I forgot I needed a photo storing and sharing account so your answer was a real help.
Thank you so much!
I sure hope everyone is safe tonight! It is rugged out there but so far we have had nothing but some rain and that not even very heavy.
Thanks again!
G.M.

I am glad you mastered it. We have lost our TV satelite several times tonight but all it has on it out of Tulsa is weather coverage. SE Oklahoma appears to be having a tough time and we are hearing that north Texas (Denton) and some of western Arkansas (Ft Smith) have had serious problems. Maybe the late news will show more.

I am glad Ardmore is safe. I have a lot of friends and family in that area. Carol

Merryheart, your Bargain Bush I believe is Diascia. I have one, too. They are so pretty, aren't they? Mine is the same color as yours.

Beautiful photos everyone! I have so many things up. The violets are blooming (both the blue and the deep purple). My hyacinths have bloomed and gone, as well as the daffs. Getting ready to bloom is my zizia aptera (Golden Alexanders) and my Amsonia. I have Bidens blooming, Scabiosa, and the Diascia.

I wanna go work in the yard, but it so cold and windy yet today!

Susan

Hi Susan!!!!
Where have you been? I missed you!
Thanks for the name of the bargain bush. I just couldn't recall what it was...of course I would have only the common name and would have thought a sage or salvia but as you know I can't even remember my own name sometimes....lol.
I am sure your yard is looking very nice already. Mine is at least a month behind, perhaps more.

Welcome back!
I look forward to hearing about what is flying around your place.

G.M.

G.M., the common name for Diascia is twinflower. It is in the snapdragon family. I think they are gorgeous.

I watched Oklahoma Gardening today and they did their show at TLC to show their new annuals and perennials. It was very interesting and some hot new things on the market among heucheras, coleus, lavendars and other herbs, and lots of gorgeous plants. One heuchera I may just have to get is one that gets very large with great big leaves on it, and is kind of a chocolate/butterscotch color. I have lots of shade and my garden can always use something new!

Susan

I had a heuchera for several years. It was (if I am not confused again on latin names) Coral Bells. It did well until last summer when it disappeared like my hostas did one time.
I have no idea what happens when plants just suddenly disappear. Do little gnomes come and steal them when we are away at the lake in the late summer/early fall? lol

I have seen the chocolate one...it is very pretty and unusual.

I am on here procrastinating on going out to start bringing in pots of plants and seedlings. But it has to be done sooner or later.

G.M.

Susan
The plant tag from the "Bargain Plant" had Salvia greggii, commonly known as Autumn Sage, it is Lamiaceae or Labiatae, also known as the Mint family. Mine is called "Flame".

I kept thinking Sage or Salvia but that is all I could remember. I will never be like so many of you on here who see a plant and remember all those names. As I said it is good day when I remember my own....lol.

I found that tag when I was out in my garden shed getting out pots and buckets to be ready for covering up plants.
Thought I would go ahead and tell you that I found the tag while I was still thinking of it.
G.M.

Just in time for the cold nights, the first water lily bloomed today.

Also newly blooming this week in the pasture: Texas bluebonnets and pink evening primrose.

That's about all that's new the last few days.

Moni, I love those first pictures; plants can be so sculptural. Down in Bowlegs, where the dandylions and purple henbit have been blooming since the last of Feburary, the hyacinths, species tulips, early daffodils, forsythia, and quince have come and gone. The heather is about to finish blooming, while the Dianthus, Darwin tulips and deep purple "Cemetary" Iris are blooming in full force, with muscari sprinkled about. Both the old fashioned purple and the Confederate violets are flush with blooms. The purple looks especially nice with the new growth on the blue spruce sedum where the two have set up shop together. The "Burning Heart" tulips planted late last year (December!) have been stealing the show in the front beds with absolutely *huge* flowers that just laughed at all the rough weather. Strawberries are beginning to color up, and the rabbiteye blueberries are covered in blooms and if the number of blooms is anything,it looks like the red mulberry tree is going to have a bumper crop. (My Grandson adores mulberries) The lilac and clove currants are lending their perfume to the air and so many plants with fragrant leaves are up that I probably spend half my garden time just wandering around touching and smelling. :^)

The race was on between the Old Blush, the Green Rose and yellow Lady Banks as to which would bloom first, but the Lady won by a whisker. The leaf buds on the crepe myrtles are beginning to unfurl, and there are hopeful buds on the peonies. Merryheart, like you, my peonies have yet to bloom, but the foliage sure looks nice. Dawn, I wish I had some kind of water feature in the yard to grow water lillies in; what a lovely flower. Still, the majority of the Iris haven't even sent up buds yet, and neither have the long rows of Twin Sisters daffodils, so it looks like there's still plenty of spring left to enjoy. :^)

Merryheart,
Yup your 'Bargain Bush' is a Salvia greggii. I've grown them for years. I only have one left. It is from a cutting I made off my original old plant. It is growing in the middle of one of my strawberry beds.
They are natives of Mexico.
The 'Flame' may have been the original colour (what we used to call Fuschia), but now you can get Salvia greggii in all sorts of others colours, too, like white, oranges-corals-peaches, purples, yellows, pinks-soft pinks, pinkish-red, red-orange & reds, to name a few.
The OKC Zoo has (or did have) a wonderful planting of them in the Xeriscape area near the elephants. It is breathtaking in April-May. I love going there to see the flora even more than the fauna!
~sweetannie4u