Hidden Treasures

Oddly, some of the plants in the garden that do not reseed and do not spread by roots still seem to have figured out how to take over.  How could that happen? Tiny scraps of plants tossed in a planter  and ignored.  Look what happened.
It got crowded

There are more and more of these things all over the garden.  Taking over the veggie beds. 

Growing in the shade of the Dahlia dregs

 Aloe peglarae on the right rescued from under Leucospermum 'Yellow Bird', and the two tiny peglaraes on the left, and the tiny 'Blue Glow' bulbil above, rescued from under the seedling Leucospermum.  Hidden treasures. 
Now you can recover

 These are remnants of what took over a veggie bed, but now the grown-from-seed Leucospermum is taking over.

 Leucospermum seedling, I'm expecting flowers this spring.  You are filling a 4'x4' bed.  You are big enough to bloom.  Look at that Zinnia a few months old, producing flowers even as you engulf it.  For shame!

 Kalanchoes getting ready to fall over and block the path

 Edges of planters being filled

 Edges of pots being filled. 

The fact is, the gardener is letting succulents run rampant everywhere.  Though this would not be possible without the long drought that killed off nearly every snail and slug within a mile of the garden.  None of these succulents could survive a snail attack.

In non-succulent activity,  the 'Amidstad' Salvia had grown huge over the summer.  Cut back hard, several forgotten plants that had been covered up were rediscovered.  The Salvia was quite woody at the base, and really too big for the space, so after cutting most of it off, I pulled it. 

 Not to worry, it lives on in four other places in the garden, feeding hummingbirds and engulfing other plants.

I ended up buying one and only one new plant, (25% off!), to take 'Amistad's place.  The white arrow points to a new 'Love and Wishes' Salvia, which has been very successful in the walled garden near the koi pond.  
Salvia success:

'Love and Wishes' is a smaller grower than 'Amistad'.  I hope it will fit the space better, to hid the sad base of 'Climbing Iceberg' rose (circled in white) without engulfing the formerly hidden rose that has been hidden so long I forgot all about it.  Can't even remember the name--'Apricot' something (pink arrow), encircled last winter so the rabbits would not eat it.  There were hips, so it bloomed somehow in amidst 'Amistad's darkness.   Hidden treasure.  The flattened Iris and 'Rozanne' geranium at the bottom of the photo were engulfed also.  They should recover quickly. 

While making this post, a very strange and unusual thing happened.  Drops of water started falling out of the sky.  The dogs were startled and barked at the unfamiliar pattering sound.   I skedaddled outside to put buckets and tubs under scuppers and downspouts.  A bright flash of light in the darkness and then a rumbling, while more water fell.  Amazing.  There must be a word to describe the phenomenon.  The water falling out of the sky and onto the roof and down on into buckets was black with the dust of April, May, June, July, August, September, and 1/3 of October.   Treasure revealed, falling from clouds.  Flashes of light again and again, then a drum-rumbling in the night.

UPdate 10/13/18 11:00 am:  A ruler and a flat-bottomed, straight sided bucket placed in the open works as a crude rain gauge.  We got more rain here overnight than many places  anywhere else in Southern California--over 1.2" (30mm!).   To put that into perspective, that is about 1/10th of our entire average seasonal rainfall, and about 25% of what we got last season.  It's a lot. 

 Ash from the summer's nearby Holy Fire (we have so many fires here we name them), air pollution, and dust were mostly washed off the plants.  Everything is a fresher color.