I took these photos about 1-1/2 weeks ago. In the past, the blooming period is spread out over a month. This year blooming was condensed down to about a week. It was spectacular. Distance is deceptive in the photo. The distance from the left side of the photo along the fence to the trees on the right side is about 1500' — about 1/3 mile.
This patch is located in the pasture close to the house and must have covered between 5 - 8 acres.
Many of the large drifts were as dense as the cluster in the middle of this photo.
This shows a different perspective of the same drift of Herbertia as in the first photo. The drift thins out somewhat as it reaches the road leading to our corral near the tree line.
This is what it looked like on the other side of the road for about another 1/4 mile.
Looks good to me! Bloom period has been spread out more here at my house, but we haven't had any rain in the longest--they are still blooming now.
=)
About 50 acres in the east pasture were covered with huge drifts. If you look carefully, the bluish stripe in the distance is actually a very large drift of Herbertia.
A closer view of some of the drifts a round the trees.
The canopy of the live oak pictured has a diameter of about 100'. Gives you a reference point.
Finally a photo of my companion on this photo shoot — Blue.
I can't decide which I like best — the prolonged blooming period or this massive display. In the past, the Herbertia were mixed in with Texas dandelions and false dandelions. That mixture of blue and yellow was unbelievably gorgeous. The display lasts until about 2 or 3 in the afternoon when the blooms fold up and disappear. We didn't get much in the way of dandelions this year as we have been spraying the pastures to get rid of weeds. Under drought conditions, we need to get rid of the competition. Fortunately, the Herbertia have not been affected by the herbicide.
You need to add a couple of the shots to the PF, all there are close ups. http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/101489/
Oh my Goodness, those are spectacular!!!
It looks like you have the Herbertia lahue capital of the world.
You are so lucky, because what you have this year is almost a miracle, I wish I could have been there to see it and admire it along with you. Those flowers are so pretty up close, like miniature iris, or even orchids. Congratulations!!!
Josephine.
Those are so pretty in mass or individually . When I was a kid we used to pick wildflowers for our mothers and unfortunately these drooped before we could get them home.
Ann
Beautifully Grand.. bettydee... Isn't country life spectacular??
Sheila, thanks for the idea. I'll add some of the photos.
Josephine, how did the seed that I sent you do?
Ann, they close up so soon. Luckily a few of the days the week I took the photos were cloudy. If the day is very cloudy, the blooms remain open well into the late afternoon.
beck, I certainly would have had this scene in the city. The down side is that we have had mesquite on a grand scale too. LOL
Betty, what a breathtaking scene. Thank you for posting your pictures. Frostweed is right, you need to add some of your pictures to plant files.
Well, the seeds you sent me are still tiny plants and are not doing much, I guess they don't like where i have them.
They appear to need full sun. I've noticed that only a few are found near shade. The big dense drifts are out in the open. They don't seem to mind competition. They are growing in either native grasses or in Bermuda.
Betty... think about it... at least you can sell mesquite for the BBQ... now I have yaupons.. they aren't good for anything... hehe
LOL Around here everybody has some on their property. No market for it. We do use it in our BBQ. :-)
Bettydee, if the mesquite is big enough wood workers would love to have it. If you don't know any, do a Google search on the Texas Mesquite Association.
And thanks for posting the pictures because somebody gave me some of that at the RU. Now I know what it looks like en-masse. I hope it spreads in my yard like that. When does it go to seed? Does is die back after it seeds or does it stay green?
silver... what about the yaupon.... huh???? LOL
Silver, few of the trees are large enough to provide any heartwood. They are just big enough to be a nuisance. The seed ripen in late june into July. Then it goes dormant for the rest of the year. The leaves are slim so they aren't very noticeable when they turn brown.
Beck, sorry I don't know what to tell you about the yaupon.lol It would be nice if we could find a use for that.
The problem with mesquite is that it takes so long for it to get big enough to make anything out of and it takes a lot of water. And if you cut it down, you just get more mesquite. I've seen fields of short mesquite "shrubs" in west Texas around El Paso, but I thought that being closer to the coast there would be more big mesquite. Most of the mesquite we use comes from near the coast.
Someone may have been playing w/my head but he/she told me that mesquite trees are mostly underground - the big part underground. For that reason if you have a field covered w/mesquite it will be "unfarmable" because you can't just go and cut down the trees and then plant. If they want some good wood they dig w/power to get the wood from below the top of the soil. Hope what I have written makes sense. Anyway, the land that has mesquite on it may be good for grazing land but not farming. Right or wrong?
Ann
Ann, you can farm it, but a root plow has to be used to pull up the node that is buried underground at a depth of 12"-18". This is only possible if the mesquite is relatively young. A mesquite has a massive root system. I don't know of anything that will remove an entire root system or even a part of one.
The tap root in some species can go down a record 100' in search of water. You are right, the lateral roots of the mesquite are huge. I can't find it now, but I remember downloading a PDF file that included a photo of an exposed root system. It was massive, much much bigger than it's top.
Luckily, our pastures used to be cotton and peanut fields so those trees are not that old. The problem there is that before we purchased the land, the leasee of the ranch overgrazed, but he also plowed. That cut the tops, but the roots kept on growing. For us, spraying was the most cost effective way to try to get rid of as much mesquite as possible but, there wasn't enough top growth to translocate the herbicide down to the roots so many resprouted. Now seven years of spraying later, we either spot spray or my DH uses a 3' root plow. We have a 75 horsepower John Deere tractor because the size of the ranch doesn't call for anything bigger. So the largest root plow we can use is a 3 footer. We are still battling resprouts and of course new ones.
The biggest challenge is to get rid of the mesquite in the woods. Some of those mesquites have trunk diameters of 12 - 18". The problem there is to get rid of the mesquite without harming the 100 to 250 year old live oaks. Spraying is not an option there. Most harvesters will only remove the top. We need to have the node removed as well or the mesquite will regrow. As long as the node is removed, the rest of the roots will eventually rot.
I really don't mind having a few of the larger ones. They provide shade and because they are legumes, grass will grow under the canopy. The cattle love to graze under them. They get to eat under the shade. :o)
bettydee, that was very interesting about the mesquite trees. I'm a city girl and when we moved out to "the country" - Palacios, etc., - people tried to tell us a lot of baloney mixed in w/some real facts. These people had homesteads "out there" that had been in the families for ages and they were farmers and ranchers - you know the type: look like they couldn't find two dimes to rub together but could buy and sell the rest of us w/their pocket change. After you had been there for awhile you more or less learned who to trust as far as their tales were concerned. They are really a wonderful bunch of people but they do like to mess w/city folk. It provides a good campfire story telling time.
Thanks so much for educating me.
Ann
Bettydee's absolutely right about the roots being big. But boy are they beautiful when they are sanded and finished. The root wood is the prettiest because the grain is not straight. It's just as crooked as the roots are. It's exciting when somebody brings a root to us.
I'm sorry I just remembered we hijacked a thread.:(
FYI--Herbertia lahue will form, mature, and pop those seeds within 3 weeks. I have some about to pop now and some also blooming today. So definitely do not wait until June or July to gather those seeds if you want any.
Another interesting bit of trivia about the TEXAS form of this bulb--it is a repeat bloomer.
A little background here to illustrate this point. There are exactly 4 bulbs in this pot--no more, no less--I know this because I'm researching to publish a paper about the 2 forms of this bulb in a Botany.org publication this fall. Most of it would not be very interesting, but this point might.
Look carefully into this pot and you can easily find the 4 bulbs.
This shot was taken this morning of the same pot--notice all the seed capsules? And the repeat bloom on one of them? Each seed capsule represents a prior bloom. This is kind of typical of the many small Iris related species (Herbertia pulchella does this too)--but not one usually noticed. This is why they are covering your fields with such beauty!
Sorry, don't know much about mesquite except I think the mesquite flavored almonds are my favorites!
Debbie
Debbie, does the flower stalk produce an offset stalk?
yes--but 2 blooms on a single scape. You can sort of see that in the last pic, let me see if I've got one that shows it better.
OK, this could get more technical than is necessary--so I will try to make the discussion work without words no one but me cares about--lol
2 blooms are on each scape--here is a picture showing this--with my very poor "Paint" function skills showing this
My point was not to use a commercial picture (I really do try to avoid that on the forums--PlantFiles is another matter)--but without having to spend a great deal of time looking thru about a zillion untagged photo's under "today" (which includes about 6 months worth of pics--lol) this was the quickest that makes the point. See how this scape starts to jag over to the right? This gives the subsequent scapes (and each will also hold 2 blooms) a space to emerge. Does this make any sense? Sometimes its very hard for me to write without very unspecialized vocab.
I just think this ability of a single bulb to throw up 6-8 blooms and seed capsules is a rather fascinating Iris family (and others sometimes do this too) adaptation for survival. Also throwing these seeds off at different intervals might help against predation by a flock of birds or some such thing that might happen if they were all flung off at once.
edited to add--those are small Crinums in that picture, the Herbertia lahue were close by last year, ignore the other plants
This message was edited Apr 24, 2008 3:23 PM
I hadn't paid attention to the blooming habits before, but I was out today to take a look. They are still blooming today although not in the quantities of two weeks ago.
You can scatter seeds into other areas where they are less dense, to give you a more even "blanket" for next year!
=)
Some of those drifts were massive — several hundred feet or more. Those are big blankets. I'll consider myself lucky if I can postpone buying the herbicide until the seeds ripen. I'm the one with the applicator's license. So he can't buy it without me. LOL
They should be popped and dropped in 30 days (that sounds a little odd--lol)--the bulbs also go down immediately (within 2 weeks for me) after they drop those seeds. I think you would be safe in using the herbicide by about June 1st.
I'm sending you a dmail about something else you might have out there in your pasture.
Debbie
Any chance of getting seed of the Herbertia? Looks wonderful.
