Cactus Resurrection

So here's the story of The Cactus:

When we moved into this house, which Himself (and his brother) inherited from his mother, the house had been pretty neglected. Mama H. had had a stroke and been in either the hospital, nursing home, or assisted living facility for I think over a year, during which time the house was essentially empty, with the minimum utilities and occasional grass-cutting performed by the brother (we were out of state). When she passed away in summer '03 the house was empty for a while, and then the brother put in a nominal "renter" (really she just paid the utilities), a friend of his and her son while she was getting a divorce--they were there about a year, until just before we moved down to move in and try to fix the place up, with the purpose of selling in a year or two.

When we arrived in Sept. '05 the neglect was pretty apparent in both the house and the yard (I could rant about that for days, but will just focus on the yard/flora here). There had been extended drought in Tejas, it was blisteringly hot for so late in the year, and it looked like nothing had been watered for a very long time. In the midst of moving in I noticed a large white pot on the corner of the porch, with a large, spreading cactus drooping sadly in it. (I seem to be destined to find cacti where-ever I move--at the last rental home up in the cold north, I arrived to find a GIANT upright cactus--as tall as me, sitting in a pot on the porch, fortunately I talked the land-lord into carting it off...) I am assuming this cactus was Mama H's since the renter left it behind, in which case who only knows if it had been watered by anything but the occasional rain for up to 3 years. Good thing it was a desert plant! I don't even know what kind it is--it was not very upright-growing, more prostrate or cascading down the edge of the pot, but I don't know if that is due to its being in a pot or what. It was not terribly attractive, and the thorns were quite wicked. I wasn't too keen on it really. In fact I tried to pawn it off on a few people, who obviously did not take it.

In October we began to dig garden beds in the yard--both to plant garden plants (miniature roses and amaryllis mostly) I had brought with us in the RV, and to put new stuff in. See, I sold it to Himself as a means of increasing the property's value, but it was also a means to indulge the gardening hobby that I had only been able to engage in on rental properties in a rather small way--and we both understood that. I think it was also true that we were (and are) so overwhelmed by the work that needed to be done on the house, that performing hard labor in the yard, which I CAN do, and planting a nice garden bed or six, which I KNOW HOW to do, seemed much more do-able in comparison--not to mention quicker and cheaper. I did put a great deal of effort into learning what would grow here and collecting plants, shrubs, and small trees that would thrive.

And when you are in super hot and sunny zone 8, planting cacti seems like a good thing to do--it had certainly survived in the pot on the porch for years, so I knew it could make it through what little cold-snap winter consisted of here. Thus, when we dug out two large beds in the front yard, I thought, "What the hell!" and plopped the cactus in the ground, surrounding it with a bunch of sage, mostly, and other full sun perennials, decorated with local rock and some bleached wood. Here's a photo of the new bed just after it was put in--you won't be able to see much, but the cactus is in the left corner of it, and one should note the "Dust Bowl" yard--all that surrounding area was not rototilled like the space for the bed--the grass was just D-E-A-D! (I'll do another post about the progress of this bed, now back to the cactus...)

So there that long-suffering cactus sprawled, looking less peaked, though, surely, over the winter. The garden perked up in spring (having gone a bit dormant during the couple of cold spells, but not many things died back completely), a few of the spring bulbs I planted came up, and the sage started to bloom (which really blew my mind--those things to NOT bloom simultaneously in Zone 6!). Then, one day in mid May, I emerged from the house to encounter this:


To which I said: "Wow!"

I mean, lookit those 'cullahs'!
I'm usually not a big fan of fuschia, but the color was so shining and translucent (dig the water droplets in the close-up), almost lit from within--and so unexpected, that, what's not to love?

Next is the view of the cactus "in situ," as Annabelle requested. Travelling left from the cactus and then clockwise, we have: a dwarf yaupon holly, a mum (that was planted in Oct. from a 4 in. pot...), above the mum is 'pink muhly' grass, next are two shades of Autumn Sage (salvia gregii), "Lipstick" and Red, and the short blue-flowered plant between them is Drummond's Skullcap (there's a white- flowered micro-mini rose in there too, but it's difficult to see), the squat round thing on the far right is another dwarf yaupon holly and lastly a "Floral Lace Crimson" dianthus. This show lasted for days, the flowers closing in the evening and opening in the morning.

I thought that was it, but it went through a second flush of bloom a couple weeks later. Here I had tucked in a "Sentimental Blue" balloonflower (campanula) to break up the fuschias and reds of the cactus and dianthus.