Almost Fall in Americus Georgia

It is hard to believe that September is almost over and Fall should be upon us. The temperatures here in Americus have been setting heat records in the 90s. I just took a stroll around the garden to see if there were any signs of autumn. (Remember to click on the photos for the larger image.)

As you can see, the water lilies are in bloom. Against the incredibly blue sky, the snowball bushes are displaying their "snowballs".
The sedum is flowering.
The salvia looks gorgeous.

The Mexican petunias have really filled out.

Amongst the oleander, I found lots of seed pods.

I found seeds in the Little Gem magnolias, too. Aren't they beautiful?

Kim just finished building this planter around the lantana. It looks great.

The brown turkey fig tree has a very peculiar aroma. Having never been around fig trees, I have no idea if that is normal. However, there are a lot of immature figs on the tree. We have yet to taste a fig from our trees...

I finally found a true sign of autumn. The dogwood trees are full of berries.

A closer look at the berries.

The Chinese Flame Tree is showing some color.

With the end of September upon us, this weekend is the Plains Peanut Festival which is a celebration of Plains, Peanuts and a President. It is an early birthday party for Jimmy Carter whose birthday is October 1, 1924. It's hard to believe that he is going to be 86 years old. We will be very busy as we already have every room reserved.

Next weekend, the first weekend of October, will be another local festival - The Andersonville Historic Fair. We still have rooms available if you want to join the festivities.

Thank you for visiting the Americus Garden Inn today. Wish you were here.

Berries, Bees, and Buds

It rained last night and when I wandered the garden this morning I realized the nandina are covered with berries. (Remember to click on the photos to enlarge.)

There was this beautiful cauliflower mushroom growing on the stump by the school house. Last year we had one that became enormous. From what I have read, it may be edible. Don't worry. I won't be serving it for breakfast. The Mexican petunias responded to the rain by blooming profusely.

The hollies by the pond are loaded with berries, too.

We have 2 fig trees in our garden. The Celeste fig is the one that had the figeater beetles all over the fruit. There are only a few immature figs left on the tree. The other tree is a brown turkey fig, which I photographed today.

If you look closely you can see that it is full of figs and, so far, there are no beetles.

The vitex tree is like a bee magnet. We have watched the bees fall asleep on the branches, but, never have I seen them fighting over one particular bloom. One of the bees was ready to challenge me - see the bee in the center of the photo hovering!

Now, see it on the left. There were 4 bees fighting over these flowers.

In this photo, they are jockeying for position.

And then, all was quiet. It was really interesting to watch.

Thumbelina (one of the neighbor's cats) brought us a lubber grasshopper as a present. I regifted the lubber to the spider in the sago palm. You can see that she has wrapped the "present" - she is in the center and the lubber is below her.

I looked more closely and saw something familiar in the web (remember to click to enlarge).

In an earlier blog post I had mentioned the egg cases on one of the sago palms. Well, now I know who they belong to.

I went over to the pond to check on the tadpoles and was greeted by this dragonfly doing a headstand.

Then, I saw there were 2 others behaving in a similar fashion. Must have been gymnastics time.

We have had many guests ask what the identity of the plant below is. It is "purple queen", with purple foliage and light pink flowers.

The oleander is blooming through the canna lilies and is offset by the white crepe myrtle.

Through all the heat we have had, the Mickey Mouse plants continue to thrive and add a splash of color to the garden.

A lot of the flower beds could use some dead-heading, but, when it is so hot outside, I just can't go out there. This bed of black-eyed Susans is in full bloom.

To finish, a beautiful water lily from the pond.

I hope you enjoyed the garden tour for today. We would love to share it with you in person. Wishing you a beautiful day.

Hot and Sticky in Americus

It has been ridiculously hot here and I have not been outside much. However, the cats brought us this beautiful dragonfly.The red rocket crepe myrtles are absolutely beautiful right now. Obviously, they like this weather.

There are several banana spiders that have taken residence around the pond. The next few photos are of the spiders and their webs. Can you find the spiders? Hint: they are yellow and black and they tend to be in the part of the web with the zigzag design...

Can you see the intricacy of this web and the spider within?

How about this one? Remember to click on the photos to enlarge!

A side view of one of the spider webs really shows how intricately they are designed and how large they are.

Several years ago, there was a banana spider in one of our trees with a web so large and strong that a bird got caught in the web. We will relocate these spiders when their webs get too large...

To finish for today, a few flower photos:

black-eyed susans near the parking area

and a couple of water lilies in bloom in the pond.

Since I started this post, it has begun to thunder outside. Hopefully, the rain will cool things off a little. Thanks for visiting.

The First of July Hummingbird Tour of Americus Garden Inn

While waiting for our guests to arrive, I saw a hummingbird and grabbed the camera.I followed the hummingbird around the garden.
The hummingbird went from one bed of flowers to the next.

I followed and tried to get a good angle.

The hummingbird seemed to sample every type of flower in the garden.

But, every time I tried to take a picture, he had already moved on.

However, I didn't realize we had new buds on the saucer magnolia.

Or that the lythrum has really filled in beautifully.

The bed of stargazer lilies has exploded with blooms so fragrant you can enjoy them throughout the garden.

And, the crinum lilies continue to flourish in several beds scattered through the garden

Last, but not least, a single water lily is closing its petals for the evening.

Thanks for checking out the hummingbird tour. Hopefully, next time I'll actually get a picture of the hummingbird!