Flowers for Suki

I planted a scrawny nearly dead twig of a brugmansia in the disturbed soil next to my dog's grave last autumn and this is what is has become.

This was my mom's plant that was sidelined in a pot in my yard for awhile until she found a new place to live (my mom that is).  Mom's new patio really wasn't spacious enough for an Angel Trumpet, so the potted plant stayed with me.  It wasn't until I wanted to use the pot for something else that I decided to plop the brug into the ground . . . I really wasn't that into the plant and figured it would die anyway.

It has repaid that backhanded kindness with a cascade of flowers.  We fondly call them Suki flowers after the dog . . . she was also white and odorous.

This tiny katydid is stepping out to take on a giant flower.  These guys love to eat holes in flowers.

There is also a mantis lurking around the flowers waiting to catch the unaware bee or maybe that katydid when it has gotten a bit larger.  At one point she was standing guard over a hole in the sepals, hoping something tasty would emerge no doubt.

Sometimes she retreats back into the shrubbery or takes up a position at the crossroads of brugmansia stems.

The brugmansia has been in bloom for two weeks now.  It's almost done with its heroic display; many shriveled blooms hang limp from the stems and bulbous pods begin to form and I thank it for its tribute to both my dog and its own tenacity and for creating a place for life in what was a empty spot in the garden.

RIP Suki