Monthly Archives: October 2010

butterfly plants, Design trends, flowering shrubs, flowers, grasses

New Plants for 2011

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I know this gardening season isn’t over yet, but I’m already . Some are already being grown on a limited basis by the wholesale growers while others won’t become available until 2011. Recently I had the opportunity to view up-close and personal some of these new unique perennials, shrubs and grasses. It’s exciting to envision these in our own gardens.

It’s no secret our weather is just about perfect here. That’s why so many of the wholesale nurseries have operations in this county. They know the growing conditions are excellent here for annuals, perennials, grasses and woody ornamentals.

Many of the plants we buy start life as small plugs and liners. Some of these are produced in tissue culture labs located in places such as India, China, Guatemala and Holland. These are then grown on to sellable size by other wholesale growers before they eventually arrive at your local nursery. If you have a Black Mondo or carex grass or a cordyline, hellebore or heuchera it may have been started from a tissue culture somewhere on another continent and has more frequent flyer miles than you do.

Plant tissue culture consists of taking a piece of a plant, such as a stem tip, and placing it in a sterile ( usually gel-based ) nutrient medium where it multiplies, It’s similar to taking a cutting of your favorite houseplant and growing it to share with a friend. The production of plants in sterile containers allows the propagator to reduce the chance of transmitting diseases, pests and pathogens.

One of the new plants that I saw that really caught my eye is the grass,  Pennisetum Fireworks. The variegated pink striped blades of this grass are just as spectacular as the pink flower heads. Some gardens with clay soil and heavy frost in winter may need to grow this plant in a container but it’s worth babying this one, it’s so beautiful.

You may have bought a bright orange Begonia Bonfire this year and were impressed with the hundreds of flowers that it easily produced over the season. Well, next year you’ll be seeing the Sparkle series begonia which is similar. This tuberous begonia is nothing like the classic you are familiar with.  One plant will grow to about 24" in the ground or a container and depending on which color you choose, will be covered with scarlet, white blush, rose or apricot flowers.

And don’t even get me started on all the new mimulus colors that are going to be available next year. The Jellybean series comes in classic orange and gold but also red, purple, pink, light pink, lemon and terra cotta. Remember these are deer resistant, too.

Also there are new hummingbird favorite agastache flavors out now.  Picture in your garden, flower spikes in colors that look like fruit- grapefruit, apricot, grape and orange nectar.

I haven’t even touched on new introductions like Green Jewel echinacea or dwarf butterfly bushes in magenta, violet or pink. How about a bush form of the vine, Hardenbergia?  Meena will grow 36" tall and have purple flowers in winter.

Look for one of these new perennials next year. It’s going to be a colorful year in the garden.
 

color in the garden, fall foliage, houseplants, wildlife

Fall Tips for Gardeners

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Halloween is just around the corner and besides deciding what your or the kids are going to be this year, it’s time to bring in any plants that you plan to overwinter in the house. Whether they’re the houseplants that you put out on the patio for the summer or frost tender plants that you want to save, this is the .

 Although our nights are still well above freezing,  plants need to acclimate to the indoor environment before you start turning on the heater regularly. Be sure to wash them thoroughly and inspect them for any insects that may have taken up residence while they were vacationing outside. Usually you can dislodge any hitchhikers with a strong spray of water but if that doesn’t do the trick, spray them with a mild insecticidal soap or one of the other mild organic herbal sprays like oil of thyme.

If you want to decorate for Halloween there is a lot of plant material you can harvest from your own garden or nearby woods. Manzanita branches can often be found on the ground and make great arrangements combined with nandina or other berries. Some of the trees have started to turn color and their leaves can also be used for wreaths.  The leaves of New Zealand flax last a long time and add fall color in bouquets.

Mums are the classic fall flower.  They come in nearly every color except blue and the flowers have many shapes from daisy to spider mums.  They are perennials and make good additions to the garden. Best of all they make excellent cut flowers.

This October has had the perfect weather  allowing fall color to develop in our trees, shrubs and perennials.  Warm days, cool nights, not a lot of wind or heavy rain all help plants to attain and keep those bright reds, oranges and yellow colors we love. Here’s a short list of small plants that you can easily find space for even in the smaller garden.

Japanese barberry turn yellow, orange or red. They get red berries and are deer resistant.
Blueberries not only are good for you and their foliage turns beautiful yellow-orange in the fall.
Oakleaf hydrangea leaves take on burgundy hues.
Crape myrtle shrubs explode with brilliant red and orange color.
Pomegranate bushes turn bright yellow
Spirea foliage varies from red, orange to yellow.

Squirrel wars
If you are at odds like me with squirrels that dig up everything while burying acorns for the winter, delay planting your bulbs until Thanksgiving when they’ve finished stocking the pantry.  Store you bulbs in the frig or a cool place until then.  If you just have to plant some on a beautiful autumn day, cover the area with flat stones or chicken wire.

Don’t prune now
One last thing and you’ll be happy to hear this.   Fall is not a good time to prune.  Wounds heal slowly, leaving them more susceptible to disease.  As a general rule, don’t prune when leaves are falling or forming.  Wait to prune most trees until late in the dormant season or  late spring after leaves and needles form.  To avoid sap flow on birches and maples, prune after leaves mature. 

berries, birds, butterfly plants, California Native Plants, soil

What to Plant in Clay Soil in the Santa Cruz Mountains

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              "The soil is made of butterfly wings, dinosaur teeth, pumpkin seeds, lizard skins, and fallen leaves.
                  Put your hands in the soil and touch yesterday, and all that will be left of tomorrow shall return
                                         so that new life can celebrate this day."  -Betty Peck

Soil is a wonderful thing. It grows our food, anchors our trees and provides a foundation under our feet. But it sure can be hard to work with if it’s not the soft, crumbly loam that many plants prefer. It’s amazing that anything grows in some of the soils here in the Santa Cruz mountains. Some folks garden in an ancient sea bed of sand and there are others who have such heavy clay in their gardens that you wonder how anything survives.  Recently I helped plant in the dense clay of Garrahan Park in Boulder Creek and I dedicate this column to those of you with similar inhospitable soils.

The soil in Boulder Creek required a pick ax to break up enough to plant. Sound familiar?  Although rich in nutrients it needed compost in many areas to provide the environment  necessary so beneficial microbes, worms and other critters could do their work and aerate the soil. A thick layer of mulch will be spread over the soil by The Boy Scouts to preserve the structure and prevent it from packing down again.

There are many plants that are tolerant of clay soils and plant selection is half the equation. The park chose mostly California natives that won’t need fertilization or pruning, can be eventually weaned from irrigation and will provide food for the birds and visiting children. Juncus, a type of grass, red-flowering currant, redtwig dogwood, California rose and western redbud will be the stars of the park in the wet, clay soil. The drier side of the park was planted with deer grass, toyon, California rose, huckleberry, coffeeberry , ceanothus, native honeysuckle, vine maple, native iris and California fescue grass.

I’m sure the park will be the crown jewel of the area and hopefully you will come to visit and see the progress of the plants. Kinda like a local demonstration garden in the San Lorenzo Valley.

There are plants from similar environments in other parts of the world that would also do well if you garden in heavy soil. One of my favorite trees for these conditions is the strawberry tree. Also hackberry, ash, gingko and paperbark trees work well also. Shrubs to try include flowering quince, bottlebrush, Australian fuchsia, smoke tree, escallonia, pineapple guava, mahonia, osmanthus, Italian buckthorn, elderberry and vitex. Easy perennials for clay soils are yarrow, bergenia, carex grasses, fortnight lily, coreopsis, echinacea, nepeta, salvia, teucrium and verbena to name just a few.

If you’re not familiar with some of these plants it’s easy to see what they look like by Googling images. It’s what I do to see a plant full grown and not just a line drawing or a close-up of the flower.

So you see, there are plants that will be successful even in heavy, clay soil, you just have to pick the right ones.

berries, birds, California Native Plants, wildlife gardening

Attracting Birds to your Garden

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Fall brings with it not only foliage color but also colorful fruits and berries that invite birds into your garden. If you’re a backyard birder you probably already have lots of plants to lure our feathered friends,

If you have room for a new tree, consider Paul’s scarlet hawthorn.  With clusters of double rose flowers and small vivid red fruits resembling tiny apples in late summer and fall that hang from the branches well into winter, this tree offers interest in more than one season.  Robins are attracted to hawthorn berries.
 
Flowering crabapples sport showy edible fruit relished by many birds in the winter, including black-headed grosbeaks.  Fruit color ranges from reddish purple, brilliant red to golden orange.  Crabapples are good lawn trees and their spring blossoms are stunning.  To avoid disfiguring diseases, choose varieties that are resistant to cedar-apple rust, scab and powdery mildew.   Among these is ‘Prairiefire‘, with pink flowers and dark red fruit.  This tree grows 20 feet tall.
 
A native that puts on a fall show is  A background plant most of the year, the white berries on this 4-foot shrub stand out when the leaves drop.  Snowberry is a good choice for erosion control on banks.

Looking like clusters of pale purple pearls, the gorgeous fruits of beautyberry ( Callicarpa ) are born well into winter.  This deciduous shrub reaches to 6 feet and takes sun or light shade.
 
For both bird-attracting berries and brilliant winter stems, plant redtwig dogwood.  Native along creeks and other moist spots from northern California through the Northwest, it performs well with little additional summer water once established in gardens
 
Other shrubs with beautiful colored berries include barberry, cotoneaster, currant, elderberry, mahonia, nandina and pyracantha.  As an added bonus many of these berries make good holiday decorations, too. 

 

weather

La Nina 2010 in the Santa Cruz Mountains

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Mother Nature sure knows how to throw a curve ball. She can dish out balmy 75 degree weather one day, then switch it up to 107 in a heart beat.  Cold and windy comes to the mound next followed by "what’s next?"  from the pinch hitter.  I hear rumblings about a strong La Nina coming to town this winter.  What will this mean to us here in the Santa Cruz mountains? Will it be a dry winter?

To understand major climate trends, scientists collect temperature readings every week from dozens of buoys in the Pacific Ocean. They combine them with satellite images and temperature readings from ships, then plug the data into computer models from scientific agencies around the world.

According to Klaus Wolter of NOAA’s Earth System’s Research Laboratory, water along the equator in the Pacific is currently between  2 – 3.8 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than normal. In extreme La Nina events, it can get up to 7 degrees F cooler.

While a La Nina often allows the Pacific jet stream to trend further northward, bringing increases precipitation to the Pacific Northwest and below normal for So California, across the northern 2/3 of California, there really isn’t a strong precipitation signal in either direction for this event.  Northern California is the dividing line between the two extremes and it’s hard to say where exactly that line will fall in any given year. Klaus Wolter contends that we may be subject to notably strong and cold storm systems later this fall but La Nina’s effect on our rainfall is not clear enough for him to draw any definite conclusions.

Jan Null, a former lead forecaster with the National Weather Service who now runs Golden Gate Weather Services in Saratoga, thinks . That’s because in some La Nina years, rainfall has been more plentiful than normal. In one such year, 1999, San Francisco rainfall hit 115 percent of normal.

How’s that for hedging your bets? Just thought you’d want to know the latest predictions for this winter so you can so a little planning!

 

bulbs, color in the garden, paths

Autumn crocus for Fall Flowers

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There’s nothing like a couple of to remind you that all things are possible with a bit of imagination. Recently I visited several inspiring gardens on the tour hosted by the Monterey Bay Master Gardeners here in our area and also saw some spectacular landscapes on the peninsula with APLD ( Association of Professional Landscape Designers ).  So many ideas-so little time. Here is just a sampling to get you started.

At one of the awesome gardens I visited, I was tickled to see a clump of autumn crocus blooming beneath some trees. This look alike of the true crocus provides a burst of brilliance in the fall just when you need it. Spring crocus are actually members of the iris family while autumn crocus or colchicum autumnale are members of the lily family. Native to the Mediterranean area and parts of Asia, they make dazzling patches of amethyst, mauve or white flowers in partial shade or full sun. The blooms last for a couple of weeks in late summer and early fall and the bulbs naturalize easily. These bulbs are also called meadow saffron but it is from one of their close relatives that expensive saffron spice is harvested.

Several months from now strap-like leaves will appear, growing to about a foot high, then die back- similar to naked lady bulbs.

Autumn crocus can be enjoyed outdoors or brought inside to grow in pots while they are flowering. You can even set bare corms in a saucer of pebbles like narcissus bulbs to enjoy the splendid flowers that quickly emerge.
Corms of these beauties are only available now during their brief dormant period. They make a fine addition to any garden.

At another garden, I saw a design trick that turned a mulched hillside into a path with just a couple of steps added. Paths not only get you from point A to point B, they can be part of the journey itself. In the upper part of this particular garden, the soil was mulched around the raised veggie boxes and the hillside below. A formal path with edging wasn’t needed here so a few flat stones installed as steps in just a couple of places directed you to a lower patio. The stone steps weren’t really needed but they gave the illusion of a path. Cost: maybe nothing if you can find some flat stones around the yard.

Everybody’s growing vegetables and herbs these days but not everyone wants to water and take care of a large vegetable garden. Enter the container gardening solution. In most of the gardens I visited, there were either raised beds or containers happily growing every herb and vegetable imaginable. Even the McMansion had a raised bed for growing edibles and flowers to attract bees, butterflies and hummingbirds, Think small, pick only your favorites to grow and enjoy the fruits of your labor with out all that much work.

There were so many wonderful ideas that I got from each of the gardens.  Where I met the owners, they were happy to share their ideas, techniques and even some cuttings.