The flowers that bloom in the Spring, tra la!

We've established the annual appearance of Bluebonnets leaves me weak in the knees.   However, human nature being what it is, after the first few weeks of anticipatory breath holding, once the blue blooms kick into high gear, I find myself beginning to cast around, looking for signs that anything else is similarly responding to longer days and warmer temperatures.

And anything else most certainly is.  Specifically, Oenothera speciosa.  The pink evening primrose.

Some say wanting pink primrose in your garden represents a case of needing to be careful of what you wish for.  Massed pink primrose plants can be cantankerous, seemingly wanting to seed in and send runners wherever you don't want them. Left to their own devices they are content to jump out of beds into lawns, paths and planters.  They are much easier to get started than they are to contain or get rid of. They are sometimes considered invasive by those with more orderly tendencies.

Aloe bloom stalk rising above massed Primrose blooms-to-be.

Also under cover, at the base of this stake, a Bulbine struggles to reemerge while this tiny anole observes.

Orderly?  Not me.  What strikes others as invasions appears to me as natives simply doing what they do best.  Given their tolerance for heat and drought I welcome these persistent ladies wherever they may roam.

After all, despite their boisterous tendencies to elbow competitors aside, the pink primrose is a boon to native bees and other pollinators.  Past that, I am and always have been deeply smitten with their blooms.

Because oh!  Those flowers....I've sought them out and loved them since I was a child.  Each one only lasts 24 hours. If it weren't for the oak poison pollen so abundantly in the air I'd be out as many of those hours as I had the light, watching their pink skirts swaying delicately in the breeze.