Live Oak.

Love. Hate.

It took me a coupla’ years to get into the rhythm of these trees. March, leaves. April-May, catkins. September, acorns.

Their shade is relief from the hot Texas summers, but the rest of the time they’re messy as hell and a ton of work.

We have old-growth Live Oaks out front and in the backyard, one of the relatively few homes in our young neighborhood where they were saved.

This past November we had them all trimmed back substantially, leaving a decent canopy. It’d been 3 years since that last happened.

They look so much better. I doubt they’ll be any less messy, though…

It’s been hot.

Triple-digit hot.

We’ve had triple-digit temperatures for nearly half the month of August, with the last six days being somewhere between 92-98º. It’s back to low one hundreds, reaching 104º yesterday.

Texas in August. Whew.

Here area few shots from shady spots around the garden yesterday afternoon using my newish and incredible Fujifilm X100V.