Picked my Thai Rai Kaw Tok Pumpkin. 5 lbs of beauty.

At the end of November, things are still going on.

The gulf fritillary butterflies have been laying eggs and the passion vine has several small caterpillars on the leaves.
A milkweed bug...
A pot of calendula...they will bloom through the winter.
And a bee on pentas...

[mention]SpookyShoe[/mention] I love seeing your photos and especially this time of the year when my garden is bare and fast asleep or covered in snow. Thanks for allowing me to keep watching things live and grow.

Black beauty eggplant failing to note it’s late November. Their Parents are long gone, but the zinnia progeny carry on. Cabbage finding its head. Curly endive looking like a weed and tasting like one to many palates (not this one). The dinosaur forest.

[mention]karstopography[/mention] Everything looks healthy and beautiful. When do you start your eggplants for your fall season?

[mention]MissS[/mention] The Black Beauty eggplant is a carryover from the spring planting. I can’t remember when exactly I planted it, but it was probably around mid-late March from a feed store set. That’s the only one remaining out in the garden. Seems like it got a second wind in September, I might have fertilized it too about then. I wasn’t going to leave any eggplant in this late in the year, but it looked too healthy to kill.

Well that sure is one healthy eggplant. Mine are usually getting pretty raggedy after 4 months. I don't even see any flea beetle nibbles on it anywhere. You are doing something right.

[mention]MissS[/mention] flea beetles were an issue in the Spring and summer for sure, but seem to be MIA now we have had a cool spell or two. I did periodically prune off old yellow droopy beetle bitten leaves and smashed any flea beetles I saw. I thought our little brief dips into the 40’s at night would have made the eggplant unhappy, but so far, so good. Looks like next week could be trouble for the eggplant, though, forecast has days in the high 50s and falling into the high 30s at night.

It hasn't been cold enough for the begonias, lantana, and pentas/lobelia to suffer damage or death. A freeze will kill the lantana back to the soil and if there is a frost I need to bring the croton inside.

All this is on the front porch.

All looking good!
I put my two lantanas away into the garage so they can go dormant for the winter. I love the way they start out yellow then change.
Your pentas are an attractive plant, too. I don't think I've ever noticed any here at the nurseries but will ask next year.

Ligularias. Odd how the blooms attract house and bottle flies, plus the usual honey bees.

My one cymbidium orchid looks like it will bloom. A gift orchid I stuck in the ground two years ago.

Dwarf palmetto fruit, a Texas native. The black fruit is tasty, or at least I think so. I nibble on them once or twice a day. 85% of humanity tastes sweet with these fruit, the other 15% something very unpleasant. Some gene in certain people along with the presense of unique compound in the fruit is responsible for the difference. Have yet to find a 15%er.

The garden as of December 10th. Yesterday, removed underperforming broccoli, siberian kale and cabbage plants. Planted seed in the open places, 3-4 kinds of carrots, danvers, nantes, red and purple, 2 kinds of radishes, bloomsdale long standing spinach, various lettuces, tatsoi, cilantro, white and green bok choi, and finished out my onion sets, 1015 legend and 1015 improved.

The 4 Brussels sprouts that remain are on the watch list. I think the remaining cabbage will be good, except the savoy, I’m less than impressed by that. The curly endive is looking good. Red deer tongue lettuce keeps on giving. Radicchio coming along, arugula check, some little cilantro seedlings coming up. Carrot seedlings good. Who woulda thunk the eggplant would still be setting fruit in December?

Bought 2 flats of random winter flowers for seasonal color pots. Dwarf snapdragon, dianthus, violas, and alyssum.

While at the nursery I saw this winged creature on a bluebonnet plant.

It's one of these?
https://bugguide.net/node/view/314774

Nan6b wrote: ↑Thu Dec 17, 2020 12:48 pm It's one of these?
https://bugguide.net/node/view/314774

Looks like it.

This florist shop gift Cymbidium Orchid bloomed after I stuck it out in the ground out by the Air Conditioner. This would have been about 2 years ago. Pleasant surprise.

Signs of spring are happening very early. Daffodil, nun's orchid, and Chinese ground orchid (bletilla).

Got my good fortune cabbage fresh right from the garden this year. Copehagen Market is the variety.

Garden moving along, things seem to be growing despite the overall cooler and wetter than normal trend here. Tomatoes spontaneously popped up in the garden so I put them in the container just to see if they will grow. One is a potato leaf and I think Hillbilly was my chief potato leaf tomato.

Weird how the eggplant keeps chugging along even in the cool weather. Rabbits are getting on my nerves, will need to get some more netting soon.

Took the opportunity of a warm and breezy day to re-pot/up-pot the tomatoes. I think they are enjoying the fresh air.