But have you ever looked around and noticed that some vines make themselves at home on your fences, sometimes without you even lifting a finger to plant anything? There are quite a few vines that give you a sense of privacy, or just something pretty to look at, while also offering great benefits to wildlife.

Coral honeysuckle, also called trumpet vine, is native to Texas and stuns with coral-colored flowers that attract hummingbirds and other pollinators. In contrast to the invasive Japanese honeysuckle, you’ll find that coral honeysuckle behaves quite well and isn’t an aggressive grower.

Pearl Milkweed Vine. If you’re fortunate enough to have pearl milkweed vine, rejoice! You’re in the presence of a stunning native vine that’s difficult to find in the typical nursery trade. This vine serves as larval host for monarch and queen butterflies, but you’ll also find many other pollinator friends enjoy the glamorous charm of this bejeweled native.

Star Jasmine. Though not native to Texas, star jasmine is well-mannered and drought hardy. You’ll find great joy in walking by and smelling the peppery, bright fragrance of the stunning pinwheel-shaped flowers. It’s versatile in that you can use it as a groundcover (like Asiatic jasmine, but much better in my opinion) or as a climbing vine. Just be mindful that you’ll need to trim it every now and then to make sure it doesn’t climb too high.

Snapdragon Vine is another native favorite of mine that you may have seen poking out from a shrub. With gorgeous flowers that resemble snapdragons, it looks delicate but is quite resistant to drought. This vine may not provide the sprawling fence cover you’re looking for, but it’s lovely for small trellises and hanging baskets or billowing out of a pot if you need something to adorn your patio. Otherwise, you can use it as a flowering ground cover. And if you want to be extra creative, you might have it grow alongside other well-mannered vines — it’ll provide pretty pops of purple and white along your fence.

As the weather gradually begins to cool down, it’s a good time to survey what’s growing on your fences or around your neighborhood. Whatever looks successful may just be what should earn a spot in your garden next.

Malachi Leo is a public health graduate and native San Antonian, the importance of water as our most vital natural resource is not lost on Malachi. Working as a field investigator under the irrigation plan review umbrella, he helps to ensure that irrigation systems going into the ground meet state and city standards. When he’s not doing that, you’ll find him exploring restaurants in town—pointing out native plants he recognizes to his friends along the way.

Bluebonnets, winecups, prairie verbena and Indian blanket dress up meadows and medians in Texas in springtime. But there’s a large bouquet of species that are specific to fall.

These late bloomers signal a change of season as we finally end our hot dry summers. They also welcome the migration of butterflies and birds, including hummingbirds, that pass through our area in September and October.

One example of a specific fall blooming wildflower is the array of mistflower species. They range from one to six feet tall, in white, lavender and blue. Monarch and queen butterflies making their 2,500-mile migration trek southward feast on the nectar-laden flowers to fuel up.

Another stunning roadside show-off is gay-feather or blazing star, now fully ablaze on area roadsides. A one- to two-foot tall woody stock of purple frilly petals, it can start blooming in August and will last into October.

A native plant that’s sometimes overlooked, frostweed is an incredible nectar plant for pollinators and found in almost all our natural areas and woodland spots. Exclusively a fall bloomer, it grows four to six feet tall with a large bouquet of tiny white flowers at the top. Frostweed gets its name from what happens at the base of the plant in our first hard freeze. The roots and stem at the base of the plant are holding water. When we get that hard freeze, the frostweed base explodes into a unique ice sculpture.

You need to be up early in the morning strolling our natural areas or creekway trails to catch this little wonder of nature. By the time the sun is midday warming the earth, those delicate ice sculptures will have thawed and melted away.

You can’t talk about showy fall wildflowers without bringing up the Maximilian sunflower. This showy specimen thrives in ditches along our highways, growing up to six feet tall with large gold-centered sunflowers from base to tip. But just because it grows along highways doesn’t mean you can’t also grow it in your sunny landscape bed. It will perform well in your fall pollinator garden.

There are many other native wildflowers that are not specifically fall bloomers but have an extraordinarily long blooming season. Take zexmenia, for example. This hardy little orange flower can begin blooming in April and continue all the way into November. During our long hot summers, you may not see it blooming as survival is the focus. But once the weather cools and we get some fall rain, it will show off again with its mounding, bushy, orange-yellow flowers.

Turk’s cap is a great long-blooming native. With its bright red, spinning petals and tall stamen, it attracts hummingbirds buzzing through our area in fall.

Cowpen daisy can be a real fall showoff. It loves the understory and cooler fall days. And golden-eye grows strong through our hot summers but waits for September to burst forth with numerous yellow flower heads.

This is but a short list of wildflowers that bloom in Central Texas come fall. But don’t take my word for it — explore our natural areas, creek way trails and take a country drive to see for yourself.

Perhaps you’ll be inspired to try a few of these in your yard and welcome fall’s late bloomers into your garden oasis.

Though much longer lived than turfgrass, trees are not permanent. It’s estimated at least 20% of our local tree canopy has been lost in the past 20 years. Whether due to rapid development, disease, ongoing drought, or extreme wind and weather, losses have accelerated among both young and mature trees, amplifying the effects of our urban heat island.

But you and your WaterSaver landscape beds can help change that! If your yard has a stump or recently lost a tree, let that be an invitation to replace the shade. Bonus: the timing could not be better as cool weather months are ideal for adding trees to your landscape.

A WaterSaver landscape bed is a perfect place to put in new tree plantings, as they’re safe from whirling blades of lawnmowers and weed eaters.

For 1-gallon sizes, trees can be inserted among existing WaterSaver plants, and for 3-gallon and larger sizes, the bed can be bumped out to expand the available area.

In the first few seasons of a WaterSaver landscape bed, many trees will typically volunteer on their own. Any trees germinating from the existing seed bank will first appear as weeds (especially in established neighborhoods where existing trees have contributed their offspring). These can include all kinds of oaks, cedar elms, redbuds and mountain laurels.

Many of the first volunteers in any tiny forest are hackberries, which quickly become instant shade and nurse plants for slower-growing trees. Don’t be so quick to dismiss hackberries. They serve an important role in restarting the microcosm of soil organisms needed in an urban forest and quickly solve our shade deficit. Just look to the San Antonio Botanical Garden, which retained hackberries to provide a pleasant forest edge to different areas in its native Texas sections.

Though still uncommon in intentional landscape plantings, hackberries make up a natural percentage of the local shade canopy. One local species is among those recommended for the San Antonio region (pdf) and native nurseries have even begun selling hackberry trees.

Evaluate your shade needs. Wherever your landscape touches asphalt — whether that be the driveway or street — temperatures are elevated. Consider adding shade overhead instead of grass underfoot.

Brad Wier is a SAWS conservation planner. Years in South Texas landscaping and public horticulture gave him a lasting enthusiasm for native plants that don’t die when sprinklers — and gardeners — break down. He’d rather save time and water for kayaking and tubing. He is a former kilt model, and hears hummingbirds.

When planning a butterfly garden it’s important to know a few things:

• A caterpillar hatches from an egg and eats very specific vegetation before it builds a chrysalis and emerges as a butterfly. This mature butterfly can now consume nectar from many different kinds of flowers. For example, the female monarch butterfly lays her eggs only on plant species of the genus, Asclepias, more commonly known as milkweed. Once the eggs hatch, the ravenous caterpillars eat the leaves and flowers of the milkweed. After the monarch caterpillar emerges from its chrysalis, it seeks out nectar from less specific flower sources.

• In the instance of the monarch butterfly species, the Asclepias plant is considered its larval host plant. Every species of butterfly has one or more plant species they utilize for egg laying, knowing that these plants will provide the right food for the caterpillars. As a butterfly gardener you must be comfortable with caterpillars consuming not only the nectar of the flowers, but the vegetation as well. Don’t worry, the foliage will grow back!

• Any and all pesticides should be avoided if you want a successful butterfly garden. Pesticides are designed to kill insects and are non-selective when doing so.

• Provide flat stones in sunny locations for butterflies to warm their wings on as they’re cold-blooded and have no other mechanism for creating heat.

• Provide shallow water sources, such as pie pans filled with gravel, that are easily accessible for butterflies. Deep ponds are not ideal.

To attract butterflies from spring to fall, be sure to include spring, summer and fall-blooming species

Butterflies native to our region have long coexisted with the native vegetation of the central Texas landscape. Focus on planting native vegetation in your butterfly garden.

Plant some of these native and drought tolerant species to attract butterflies all season long! This is only a partial list and there are many others to choose from. Many of these are larval host plants as well as nectar sources.

Perennials

Marigold leaves will give you a dark green and finely divided structure, showcasing their feathery appearance but it’s the flowers are the highlight of these plants, boasting vibrant and warm colors that range from shades of gold and orange to yellow and red.

Marigolds are known for their pest-repelling properties due in part to their strong-smelling foliage and because they naturally produce pyrethrum, which is an insecticide. This makes them popular for companion planting. Yet in spite of their insect repelling propertied Marigolds are great for attracting butterflies.

With our scorching heat dome predicted to linger, summer temperatures can be just as hard on gardeners as they are on plants. We’ll exercise brevity in our seasonal recommendations and stick to the basics:

Work in the morning. The humidity has dropped so much that mornings are surprisingly (and momentarily) pleasant enough to check over new plantings and finish up select tasks like light pruning, mulching and watering.

Water in the morning. Even if you have WaterSaver landscape plants, this is the season when the sun is scorching them. Leaves may be curling, folding and wilting just to get through the afternoon. The plants in need of help are those still visibly struggling the next morning, particularly if they were newly planted this spring. By hand-watering before 10 a.m., you can easily see where it’s most needed — and allow the roots to absorb it before the soil heats up.

If the top two inches of clay soil have dried out, it can be a bit hydrophobic at first, meaning water tends to run off before soaking in. (Don’t be afraid to test it with a finger). To provide a deep watering by hand watering, you may need to borrow a trick from the irrigator’s handbook and “cycle and soak” it or watering over the area several times.

Keep in mind you’re not trying to encourage tender new leaves in August. Growth slows down for grass and other plants during summer dormancy.

Got mulch? If any of your wilting plants are standing in bare soil by this time of the summer, this is when mulch can do the most good, dropping soil temperature by up to 40 degrees. Apply it after watering to help to lock in moisture.

Prune gently. Many plants were so well watered by rains in June and July that they’re unusually overgrown this August (for me, these include crownbeard, Turk’s cap, flame acanthus and plateau goldeneye.) It’s okay to clean them up a bit, but avoid going overboard with shaping, shearing, hedging and heavy cutting, especially on already-stressed plants — this isn’t the time to encourage tender new growth.

Take care of your trees. Trees are a long-term investment that, like mulch, can decrease the surface temperatures of everything underneath by 40 degrees or more on a summer day. A good rule of thumb is to hand water trees once a month in summer if it hasn’t rained (and it’s been over a month since our last significant rainfall).

Although their fine feeder roots can extend out to twice the height of the tree, you’ll get the most bang for your hand-watering buck if you apply water around and inside the circular dripline under the tree’s outer branches. Avoid wetting the trunk itself.

If mature established trees are still growing in the middle of a turfgrass lawn, converting that turfgrass to mulch will help protect them and the soil underneath over the long term.

Brad Wier is a SAWS conservation planner. Years in South Texas landscaping and public horticulture gave him a lasting enthusiasm for native plants that don’t die when sprinklers — and gardeners — break down. He’d rather save time and water for kayaking and tubing. He is a former kilt model, and hears hummingbirds.

Adequate Light the Key to Success with Houseplants. The typical indoor environment has very low light intensity. House plants differ significantly in their light needs. A plant in less than sufficient light will gradually go downhill.

Learning to water your house plants is one of the most important skills in plant care. Applying too much water can suffocate plant roots and too little water causes growth to become erratic and stunted.

Most tropical plants need consistent moisture and can tolerate slightly lower light than other interior plants.

Most succulents need to dry out between waterings and need a brighter light.

Sansevieria, also called the Snake Plant is a tough houseplant that thrives in lower filtered light with minimal waterings.

If you are looking for easy blooms go with African Violets; and be sure to keep them consistently moist and in a bright window and they will reward you with plenty of color.

Pothos Ivy is a lush trailing vine has gorgeous heart-shaped leaves is renowned for its hardiness and low maintenance. It easily adapts to low light areas and is full of fuss-free foliage.

Other Factors:

Temperatures inside your house can vary widely. Flowering potted plants do best in temperatures of 65°F to 75°F during the day and 55°F to 60°F at night. To extend the bloom of flowering potted plants in the home, move them to a cool spot at night. Foliage plants are more tolerant of high temperatures—they thrive at temperatures between 65°F, and 70°F

Frequency and amount of fertilizer application will vary depending on the age and rate of growth for each plant. As a general rule, use a recommended fertilizer every two weeks from March to September. During the winter months no fertilizer need be added at all because reduced light and temperature result in reduced growth. A healthy houseplant starts with great soil. Potting mix retains moisture and nutrients for the roots and allows for enough air as well. Fast-growing plants will need to be repotted annually because they soak up the nutrients faster. Other plants may only need to be repotted every two years or so. To help you stay on schedule, remember that spring is a good time to replace the soil

On a visit to Milberger’s beautiful greenhouses you will find a wide choice of bromeliads, orchids, ferns, and much more. We have three 40ʼ X 80ʼ climate-controlled greenhouses stocked with plants that will provide a healthy and pleasant ambiance to the interior of your home or office.

Have you ever handpicked a plant from a nursery only to completely disregard the included care tag? The placement of the plant in your landscape and corresponding sunlight can be just as important as the amount of water you provide for healthy growth.

In grade school we learned that plants make their own food through a process called photosynthesis. Plants use their leaves to capture sunlight and use it, along with water and carbon dioxide, to produce the sugars they need to grow, flower and establish good root systems.

Plants have developed qualities that can help them thrive in different environments. Care guides often categorize them into the following:

Asiatic jasmine makes a useful groundcover in landscapes too dark to grow grass. These plants generally have leaves with a greater surface area for maximizing the capture of sunlight and have a higher concentration of chlorophyll. Examples of plants that do well in shade include asiatic jasmine and split-leaf philodendron.

These plants can be placed under or on the edges of a tree’s canopy. Their leaves are thinner and more susceptible to sunlight. The leaves are also long-lived because replacing them can be costly in a low-energy environment. Plants that do well in partial shade include inland sea oats and Turk’s cap.

Sun-loving plants have smaller leaves that are thicker to prevent overheating. They can also have protective pigments and reflective surfaces. Examples of plants that do well in this environment include the blackfoot daisy and cenizo.

Planting shade-loving plants in direct sunlight can cause stress, while placing sun-loving plants in the shade can stunt their growth. So, remember to be kind to them and always follow directions.

After working in banking for over a decade, Juan Renteria transitioned to water conservation with the desire to protect a resource that is emblematic of San Antonio. As a conservation planner at SAWS, he enjoys helping residents troubleshoot for leaks and informing them about the various WaterSaver Coupons & Rebates available for creating water-efficient landscapes. In his spare time, you can find Juan biking the Salado Creek Greenway or trying new restaurants with family and friends.

Spotted across town gobbling up all the sunflowers, the non-venomous caterpillars typically have orange bodies and black bristles. Spreading like zombie slime mold as a group, they devour their host, but don’t consume whole leaves. Instead, they ‘skeletonize’ the leaf, making your plant look like it’s turning into gross, dusty spiderwebs.

In butterfly form, it’s pretty — mostly black with orange and white spots in a variable pattern — and unassuming, with a smallish wingspan of about an inch and a half. Momma butterflies lay hundreds of eggs on a host plant, where they hatch simultaneously (not creepy at all) and begin eating. When you mess with them, they start flicking their bodies in unison which I assume is a defensive measure.

Before you panic and start spraying pesticides or cutting everything back, take a minute to consider the purpose of your garden. Is it merely an accessory of your property? Or a plentiful paradise for pollinators?

Also, keep this in mind: These caterpillars grow up quickly and their host plants, particularly perennials, usually bounce back with no issues.

In my yard, they seem to prefer the abundant annual sunflowers and plateau goldeneye. I’ve also seen them go for smaller plants like straggler daisy and zexmenia, but after they eat most of those leaves, they move on to bigger sunflower plants, allowing the little ones to recover.

Annual sunflower is one of the few native plants that my landscape often has too much of. But every spring, I let a handful of them sprout as sacrificial buffets for the birds, bees and my bordered patch bros. Other abundant plants they consume are ones people usually don’t mind removing from their gardens, like ragweed, cockleburs and Santa Maria feverfew.

So, why not let these little guys chow down — then enjoy the flutter when they turn.

And when you get a chance stop by and visit Milberger’s Butterfly Garden.

Kevin Pride is a SAWS Conservation Field Investigator and a self-proclaimed nature boy. He has a background in restoration ecology and is zealous about native plant landscapes that use zero irrigation. Kevin spends his free time deep underground surveying caves or hiking barefoot with his daughter, Daisy, and their dog.

A lot has been said about the difficulty of cultivating native Texas milkweed. I’m not going to dispel the myth outright, but I do argue that it’s not hard to propagate — though it can fool unsuspecting gardeners.

This slow-growing group of plants goes dormant and retreats underground every winter. It pulls the same disappearing act during particularly hot and dry summers. And just to keep things interesting, milkweed also seems to go dormant when conditions are perfect.

In nursery conditions, with rich potting mix and precise irrigation, milkweed sometimes appears sickly or like a pot of bare soil. However, the seeds tend to sprout very easily. And if you’ve ever wonder why they’re called milkweed, that’s because of the milky latex sap and that they pop up where they aren’t wanted.

Producing thousands of fertile seeds, plants in this group are a common resident in ranges, roadsides and anywhere their airborne seeds land. Unpalatable to most four-legged grazers, ranchers have long considered it a pest.

As a casual native plant propagation hobbyist, I can tell you that milkweed seeds typically sprout very easily. But don’t worry if wild seed collection and propagation is not a side quest you want to take on. Luckily, many of our native milkweed species are becoming easier to find (with a targeted search) in nurseries.

Native nurseries are a great place to start. A few milkweed species that come to mind are butterfly weed, antelope horns, Texas milkweed and zizotes. They’re tough and require very little water (except butterfly weed (A. tuberosa), which needs a moderate amount).

What exactly is a milkweed?

Milkweed is in the Dogbane plant group aka Apocynaceae. Though there are about 350 genera in this family, Asclepias is the genus commonly known as milkweed. Funastrum, Cynanchum and Matelea are other notable genera in this group and can be found in central Texas. They’re typically not good forage for deer or cattle, which is probably why it earned the name milkweed.

Sitting staunchly at the hub of our unique Central Texas food web, milkweed persists through the worst Texas has to offer. It’s a long-lived perennial with the ability to multiply prolifically in harsh conditions.

The trait that makes it unpalatable forage for livestock and wildlife is what makes it attractive to a certain few. It’s well known that monarchs lay eggs on milkweed and the caterpillars that follow will feed exclusively on the plant.

Milkweed is so named because it contains a toxic milky sap. The monarch retains the toxins throughout the metamorphosis process and the adult butterfly emerges with quite the defense mechanism. If an unwitting young bird attempts to eat the monarch butterfly (or caterpillar) it will quickly learn to avoid anything that looks like that again. The soldier and queen butterflies also utilize this strategy. They’re less known because they don’t have the unusual migratory life cycle as the monarch. Additionally, there are butterflies that simply mimic the general vibe of the monarch, queen and soldier and benefit from being avoided by predators.

Most are familiar with the milkweed-monarch relationship, but its many benefits are not limited to the ones using it as a host plant. This broad plant group is attractive to a wide variety of pollinators and their predators.

Native bees, butterflies and beetles also feast on the flower’s nectar and pollen. Aphids feast on the milky sap, ants often feed on the aphids’ “honeydew.” In fact, aphids are so common that if I’m trying to identify milkweed in the wild I will look for aphids as a clue that it’s a milkweed.

Kevin Pride is a SAWS Conservation Field Investigator and a self-proclaimed nature boy. He has a background in restoration ecology and is zealous about native plant landscapes that use zero irrigation. Kevin spends his free time deep underground surveying caves or hiking barefoot with his daughter, Daisy, and their dog.