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Maypop or Passion Flower is a native vine with unique flowers.

 Maypop (Passiflora incarnata) is one of the flowers of my childhood.       

We often encountered maypop vines along fencerows and on roadsides or in abandoned fields.  We called the plant “maypops” because if you snagged the oval fleshy berry-like fruit and stomped it, the fruit “may pop”.       

The egg-shaped fruit is interesting but the flower is beautiful and fragrant.  The blooms are large (about 3 inches across) with 5  petals which may split and seem to form more.  The petals are fleshy and lavender to white above with green underneath.       

Maypops are one of the few flowers that have a corona.  The corona is an extra whorl or circle of flower parts. 

A maypop corona looks like a ring of fringe that hovers above the petals and below the raised stamens.  The thread-like corona segments are tinted with bands of lavender and white.     

The lovely Gulf Fritillary butterfly is drawn to maypop flowers but she is more interested in the bold lobed leaves.  This time of year, this beautiful orange and black butterfly visits maypop vines and lays her eggs.  The orange and black spiny Gulf Fritillary caterpillars soon emerge from the eggs and proceed to devour maypop leaves.     

When I was a teacher, I learned that the easiest way to teach about the butterfly life cycle is as follows:    

• Step 1 – Find a maypop vine and search beneath the leaves until you locate a caterpillar.  The caterpillar looks spiny but does not sting.
• Step 2 – Place the caterpillar in a large jar – at least quart sized.  Punch holes in the lid for ventilation.  Place a twig in the jar.
• Step 3 - Pick several maypop leaves and put them in the jar to feed the caterpillar.  The caterpillar will also get water from the fresh foliage.
• Step 4 – Add new maypop leaves each day until the larva begins to form a chrysalis.  The caterpillar will hang from the twig, become immobile and secrete a smooth covering.  A crysalis is similar to a cocoon but the covering is smooth rather than embedded with twigs and dead leaves.
• Step 5 – Wait.  In about 2 weeks if all goes well, the chrysalis will split and an adult Gulf Fritillary butterfly will emerge.  As soon as the butterfly’s wings expand, it can be released into the wild.  The Gulf Fritillary butterfly is one of the few butterflies that can complete a life cycle so quickly.  In autumn this butterfly rapidly fosters new generations with the first frost as deadline. 

I was inspired to write this post because of the maypop vines that flourish in the disturbed soils on my land.  It is an amazingly versatile plant with stompable fruit and exotic flowers.  And even if you choose not to observe the metamorphosis inside a jar, maypops deserve kudos for providing habitat for the beautiful Gulf Fritillary butterfly.

I think Winkler's firewheel is kind of cosmic.

I love trees and so my garden is fairly shady.

My soil is mostly heavy clay.

So… I realized a few years ago that my driveway presents unique opportunities to grow plants that ordinarily would not survive in my garden .

I seized the opportunity and began planting herbs and Texas natives in the gravel at the edge of the drive.

One of my favorite plants that abides here is Winkler’s gaillardia or Texas firewheel (Gaillardia aestivalis var. winkleri).

This blanketflower is an endangered species that is native to only a few counties in east Texas.

I procured a plant or two at the Lone Star Regional Native Plant Conference a few years ago.  The plants were nursery propagated by Dawn Stover who is a Research Associate with the Stephen F. Austin Mast Arboretum in Nacogdoches.

This arrangement of Winkler's firewheel, sweetautumn clematis, Chinese abelia, hearts a busting and black eyed Susan was gleaned from my garden yesterday.

A little colony of the firewheel has grown and is in bloom for most of the warm months.  If memory serves, it starts around May and flowers until October.

I think it’s a cosmic plant – maybe because of the firewheel name or the sunburst shape or maybe even because of the purple color.

I know that it blooms for a long time and that during the hottest most brutal months I can find a few flowers to stick in a vase.

The color norm for this species in Texas is yellow centered with white rays.  Dawn selected seedlings that had purple variations.  Her efforts resulted in a variety called ‘Grape Sensation’.  It’s a little purpler than my seedlings, I think.  You can see it at https://www.plantdelights.com/Catalog/Plants/Gaillardia-aestivalis-var-winkleri-Grape-Sensati.html

Check it out if you need a cheerful little purple daisy for your own driveway.

B wanders through a sunshower in our woods.

We rode through an ironwood grove on one of our nature trails today.

I heard the faint pattering of rain next to the golf cart but all was clear ahead.

A few minutes later, it began to rain in earnest.  The drops pattered on the leaves and the scent of rain permeated the air.  The soil released a wonderful earthy smell.

We sat for quite a while.  No words were spoken and time seemed to stand still.

The sun came out and raindrops sparkled on the leaves.

My Mama would say that “The devil was beating his wife with a frying pan.”

The raindrops made the woods seem green as springtime.  The dogs were muddy and happy.

As we cruised home, thunder rumbled in the distance.

This has been a brutal summer.  Last week it was over 100 degrees every day.

I quit watching the weather after I saw a forecast that predicted 111 degrees with heat index.  If it’s going to be that hot I’m better off not knowing!

This time of year, though, I become alert for signs of autumn.

They are subtle, believe me.  Perhaps they aren’t really signs but nuances…

A gentle breeze can bring a smile of anticipation to my face.

I dig that the beautyberries have a purple patina and that my native azalea flower buds are swollen and scaly.

And I’m delighted that a few stalwart fall flowers like the Turk’s cap mallow are beginning their show.

The Turkscap's hot colored blooms are a sign of autumn for me.

Turks cap (Malvaviscus drummondii) is one of those special plants that came with my house – a freebie that I have grown to love.

That first year, when it began to bloom I said “Hello, who are you?’ and reached for my gardening books.

I learned that Turks cap is a hibiscus cousin native to Texas.  It can grow in sun or shade and is remarkably resistant to drought and pests.

Every year it produces a bounty of scarlet pinwheel shaped flowers.  The blooms resemble those of hibiscus in that they boldly present their exerted stamens for all to see.   But, unlike other hibiscus, these flowers never really open.  So the plant is sometimes called sleepy hibiscus.

The flowers appear about the time that school starts and carry on through the hummingbird migration.  Hummers along with sulfur butterflies flock to Turkscap.  Their long tongues allow them to sip nectar from the closed blossoms.

Other birds eat the pulpy fruit that comes later.  It is red and oddly shaped like a turban.

Probably I am grasping at straws to see the promise of autumn in those scarlet flowers.  But there’s also that breeze and the purple tinted berries and those fat azalea buds.  Due to the accumulated evidence,  I choose to believe in the promise of autumn.

Yum!!!

I came home from dance practice the other night to find my husband shelling peas.  He had not planned well and was ensconced in his recliner beneath a mound of purple hull pea hulls.  Eventually he did shell his way out of there.

I do love to eat purple hull peas (or cowpeas as they say up North) but they are labor intensive.

The work begins with the cultivation.  To many in Mississippi, the word “garden” conjures up an image of a never-ending row of peas.  The long straight row recedes into the distance and the unfortunate one at the beginning must either hoe to the end or pick to the end.

Neither is a pleasant prospect.  And at the end of the row… you must repeat the process for an interminable amount of time.

Then there’s the ordeal of pea shelling.  If you run your thumbnail down the seam just right, the peas ripple into the bowl.  My aunt used to shell into a big metal dish pan and spread newspaper in her lap to hold the  hulls.  She had purple thumbs at the end of the day.

Of course after that you must put them up – either freeze them or can them in Mason jars.  Giant vats of boiling water are required.  Canning especially is an arduous task.  The sweat flows freely.  Canners should be required to wear hard hats in case they pass out from the heat.

I have experienced all of these phases of pea processing.  None of them are fun.  But… when I sit down at the table to a righteous serving of peas, I feel particularly blessed.  Especially if there is a slab of cornbread to mop up the juice.  It’s nice if there’s a side of good old slimy okra and some fresh sliced garden tomatoes.   Yum!

Yellow fringed orchid (Platanthera ciliaris) bloomed in trailside bogs.

I’ve been going to a native plant conference in North Carolina on and off since the mid 80′s.

It is held at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, NC.  Last week I made the trek once more.

The Cullowhee Conference has been a wonderful thing for me.

I have made some fine friends there and learned a lot about native plants.

The speakers are great but, for me, the field trips and other nature adventures are the best part of the Cullowhee experience.

Red moss, sundews and grasses collaborate to make a nature collage.

I am posting pictures from my field trip to Panthertown Valley (aka the “Yosemite of the East”).

The trip leaders, Wes Burlingame and Meredith Clebsh, were very low key and extremely knowledgeable.

This granite bald was spectacular.

We hiked through mountain bogs, alpine meadows and climbed to the top of  a granitic bald.

The bald was basically a rock outcropping at the top of Little Green Mountain.  There were conifers, mountain laurel, sandmyrtle and  rhododendrons.

We grazed on wild blueberries.

At the very edge of the bald we found a lovely unknown lily.  It was growing in a crevice just before the rock precipitously dropped off.

This unknown lily was blooming its head off at the edge of the bald.

The lily looked a great deal like the Carolina lily (Lilium michauxii) that is now blooming in my woods.

The balds are reported to be excellent rattlesnake habitat.  We navigated with caution.

This is where we eat lunch in Panthertown.

We paused for lunch beside a waterfall.

It was an incredibly beautiful place.

I tried to store some cool mountain air.

I swam for an extra long time in a frigid mountain stream.  My thinking was that if I could lower my body temperature just a tad…  I could carry some coolness back to Mississippi.

No such luck.  I am home and the temperature is 102.

Formosa lily (Lilium formosanum) reminds us of our nursery roots.

Today is my wedding anniversary.

Richard and I are celebrating 24 years together.

We headed for the nature trails with six dogs and a bottle of champagne.

We sat under the ironwoods for quite some time and then rambled on.

A couple of  Formosa lilies were blooming by the bridge.

They are relics of our old nursery days.

Or maybe they are our anniversary lilies…

We stopped to admire them and then meandered toward home.

I photographed this compass plant or rosin weed (Silphium laciniatum) happily blooming in the oppressive South Mississippi heat a few days ago.

It’s been brutally hot.

It always is this time of year, I think.  We just tend to forget.

Then, due to our short term memory loss, we are blind-sided by the searing heat and virulent humidity in July or August every year.

Right now when I enter a room that is air conditioned, I pause and utter a prayer of thanks.

I am weak and I know it.   So… I really admire those who can hang with the natural conditions.

There’s not too many of my species who can.

After all this is a season of bugs.

Most of the birds have high-tailed it to greener pastures.

The fauna are lying low.

But the yellow flowers rock on.

This is the season of the yellow daisies.  Sunflower (Helianthus spp.) and compass plant (Silphium spp.) are the main players in my part of the world.

The black eyed Susans (Rudbeckia spp.) bloomed earlier.  They are finished with that now and are hunkered down trying to persevere.

Goldenrod will flower when there are hints of autumn.  It will be a little cooler at night.  There will be a glimmer of hope that the madness is over.

The silphiums, on the other hand, are maniacs.

I have never seen one wilted.

They are outfitted and armored to withstand the most intense heat.

They don’t need no stinkin’ signs of autumn.

They gleefully thrust bouquets of lemony-chartreuse daisies high and offer them to the sun.

Richard was happy to find chanterelle mushrooms in our woods.

I am so happy to have some rain.

Last weekend as we tooled around on the nature trails, I spied an orange mushroom.  I checked it out and happily it was a chanterelle.

I knew to expect to see the golden chanerelle (Cantharellus cibarius) after rainy hot weather.  The season starts in July here in Mississippi and is said to extend until September.

We found four of these lovely funnel shaped fungi.  Richard sauteed them in butter.  They were a wonderful appetizer.

Three years ago the weather was just right and our woods were full of chanterelles in late July and early August.  We admired them but were too chicken to eat them.

I’ve since learned how to identify them.  However, it has been so dry for the past few years that none have appeared.

This year with the rain I’m hoping for a bumper crop.

I am also seeing budded Carolina lilies (Lilium michauxii) in the woods for the first time in at least three years.

If all goes as expected, we’ll have food for the table and food for the soul!

Dotsey, Doreen and Woodrow bask beside and in the ephemeral pool.

It’s been raining a lot so we’ve been missing out on our afternoon rides.

This weekend we attempted to make up for lost time by spending several hours out and about in the golf cart.

The rain had motivated the cup plant (Silphium perfoliatum) to make a skyward growth surge.  It towered to an impressive 10 feet and had begun to flower.

We drove around the bend and encountered an ephemeral pool.

I’m not sure why it’s there.  Maybe back in the day, someone parked a tractor in that spot.   Maybe cattle congregated there to feed.  I’ve always thought that its existence was due to some sort of agricultural disturbance.

Junebug and Doreen lounge in the water.

At any rate, the ephemeral pool only holds a few inches of water.  It holds the water long enough for a few frogs to raise a family.   But most importantly, it is a delightful vacation-land for our dogs.

We are in the midst of the dog days of Summer, after all.

In the days of yore, it was believed that July’s intense heat and all the maladies associated with it were a result of the rising and setting of Sirius, the Dog Star.  They called the period from July 3 to August 11 the Dog Days.

My pack used the ephemeral pool as an excuse to revel in their season.

Dotsey was the first to flop down and press her belly into the cool mud.

Junebug and Doreen lounged in the water.

Woody, Boona and B had a delightful time wading.

I took off my sandals and joined them.

A good time was had by all.