Summer Coreopsis and Cacti in Texas Gardening

Yucca, coreopsis, lantana, mealy blue sage, purple sage shrub.

Coreopsis makes the most wonderful seeds. They flake off into your hands (or your seed envelope). From a small bed of coreopsis I have a plastic eight quart mixing bowl filled with seeds at the end of the summer. Then each spring I sew them every where.

Once the heat of summer descends upon Texas you must always wear boots and carry a hoe and a pistol. This is a beautiful beautiful flower bed but it always has rattlers. You can never, never just reach down into the ground with your hand or walk where you cannot see the earth. This is just life in Texas.

Last night as the moon lit the garden I watched a snake slither onto the patio ledge, ever so slowly, ever so steadily. If you know snakes you know that particular quiet relentless pattern. In the moonlight it was not possible to tell whether he was a rat snake or a young rattler. I took a chance and hoped he was a rat snake. The broom handle worked to pushed him off the ledge, you could hear the rustle of the bark and the rock as he landed five feet below — and then I heard his sound, his threat, his anger at having been so indignantly pushed off his ledge, the faint rattle of an immature rattler. He will be back and next time I will know.

He came for the water. He came to survive.