A Tale of Canna Lilies and Irises

By |2018-05-01T10:37:57-05:00May 7th, 2018|A Writer's Life|0 Comments

The urge to dig in the dirt attacks me every spring no matter where I live.

I miss certain elements of all my gardens. Things like the columbine and poppies of Colorado, Tennessee irises, rhododendron in Connecticut, and the lilacs of Kentucky to name a few.

Often I was able to transplant favorites from place to place. Sometimes the climate differences between states meant plants couldn’t thrive in the new locale.

Our return to Texas last year meant a return to familiar gardening with an added benefit I was able to reunite a favorite garden flower (canna lilies) and my antique birdbath.

When we lived in Texas before our move to Colorado, I transplanted Rose of Sharon, cannas, and monkey grass from my family home in Austin to our home in Houston.

Because canna lilies love the Texas heat and are prolific, I shared plants with friends and family. One of those friends let me come dig some of the cannas I’d given her for my new garden here.

I inherited the birdbath, which has been around since 1930, from my family home in Austin, where it sat in the backyard with cannas around it. After the birdbath moved to Colorado with us, it’s returned to our backyard once again surrounded by its cannas. I added the butterfly plants to attract Monarch butterflies to our wildlife habitat.

Hurricane Harvey’s floodwaters were too much for a very large, tall pine tree that stood where the flowerbed is now.

The same friend offered clumps of her Aunt Reece’s irises for the birdbath bed in the side yard. I’m sure they’ll thrive beside the lemon tree.

The previous homeowner left that birdbath and the one on the ground. The swan is a holdover from our antique shop days. Altogether, the little flowerbed invites the robins and cardinals to stop.

The yard is a work in progress. Soon the hot days of a Texas summer will limit my gardening, but in the meantime I’m enjoying myself.

Digging in the dirt is a great stress reliever for me and the fruits of my labor bring immeasurable reward. Who doesn’t feel a sense of joy and peace walking in a garden with the aroma of flowers and the sound of birds chirping?