Garden Rant

Me and My Landscape Architect

You wouldn't believe how crappy my little 900 square foot front yard looked through my first 9 years here and at least that many utterly forgettable design attempts.  Small spaces are hard!  Then I hired landscape architect Holt Jordan and for only $250 (in 1994) I got this lovely plan, which I dutifully implemented.  What you see is the view from the street, with the sidewalk along the bottom.  Highlights:

• Removing the hideous cement walkway up to and along the front of the house and replacing it with red brick pavers to match the front porch, and a new planting area.
• What had been a busy, distracting lawn shape is now this simple oval that regularly gets compliments.  That's right; a geometric form is the highlight of the garden.
• Replacing the black-and-white metal awning over the porch (what I call the house's '50s-style  tackification) with a wooden one that complements the Sears bungalow (1925, the Conway.)
• A custom-built teak arch over the entrance to this now-enchanting space.
• The plants?  The reason this very talented guy charged so little for the plan is that the plants you see here are mere filler, colorful blobs, and all plant choices were left to me.  I did follow his suggestion to plant the large purple tree on the right - a flowering plum - and the three cherry trees along the street.  The big stuff.

GET SOME HELP
That's my mantra.  Because so many properties have some really awful hardscape elements like concrete, metal awnings and chain-link fencing that need to be dealt with, dammit, or the garden is NEVER going to look good, no matter what we do with the plants.  And we don't admit it because fixing these problems costs more than buying plants, and we don't know what we're doing.  AND because sometimes it takes a professional to give the lawn and borders the simple but perfect shape that allows the plants to look their best.  And lots more reasons where they came from.

So sure, this make-over made a dent in my checking account - about $4,000 in labor and materials* - but it doesn't take a realtor to know it enhanced the property value by more than that.  And more importantly, it gave me the beautiful front garden that I'd failed miserably to create on my own.  Then there was an unexpected result - it was this very make-over that transformed me from a maintenance gardener to a passionate gardener.  You know what I'm talking about here - the conversion event after which there's no turning back.

Below, a "before" and two "afters".

Oh, and to catch you up on Holt and me, the next year I hired him for a one-hour consultation for the whole property.  And then 3 years ago my new next-door neighbors hired him and he created this.

*Information gleaned from my good-enough gardening records.  $4000 covered plan, construction and plants, but not the new porch roof.  Since then, the dirty-white asbestos siding has been replaced with no-care vinyl siding in Colonial blue.

Take the Flower Survey

Hey, if y'all have a minute, will you stop by Dirt and weigh in on my flower poll?  Spread the word, too, if you feel like it--it would be great to get lots of responses.

These lovely flowers were an arrangement I made for a friend's wedding last year.  I cannot tell you how happy I was that the bride chose such a rich color scheme!

Speaking of Feeling Guilty...

Now that it's fall, it's time for the perennial Fall Garden Checklist, a staple of garden writers everywhere.  Go ahead--pick up a newspaper's home & garden section, a gardening magazine, or visit one of those other kind of gardening websites--you know, the kind that provide actual advice or information--and tell me if they don't just smack you over the head with the Fall Garden Checklist.  It includes such gems as:

• Rake leaves.
• Mulch.
• Prune shrubs.
• Clean and repair tools.
• And so on.

It's the tool thing that always gets me.  I have never, ever, not even once, cleaned or repaired a tool, and truthfully, I feel just awful about it.  My tools get tossed into their little hovel without so much as a splash of water or a swipe against my jeans to thank them for their hard work.  But you know what?  I've had some of these tools for a decade or more.  And they still work.

I think Martha started this "fall tool tune-up" craze.  Just look at the list at the bottom of this page, which cites Martha as the source.  It includes:

• A stiff bristle brush will clean shovels, spades, forks, and hoes.
• A stiff putty knife will help to clean off caked-on soil.
• Be sure to oil all cutting blades after use and cleaning.
• You can sharpen the blades yourself by running a Carborundum stone or file along the beveled side of the blade

And then there's that tip about filling a bucket with sand, pouring in some motor oil, and sticking your tools in it to store them. Do you know what would happen to a bucket of sand and oil in the little laundry room closet where I store my garden stuff? It would get knocked over, and the sand and oil would get rubbed into the floor, and become a part of the floor, and the tools would go right back to sitting in a happy little dirty heap.

Is this wrong?  Does it help if I feel guilty about it?

Rant on the Radio

A few months ago, I had a chance to do a live radio broadcast from the Santa Fe Farmers Market with Bob Ross, landscape architect, garden design consultant, and host of KSFR's "Gardens, Food, and Santa Fe."  (Well, actually, I was live, and he was live, but the show just aired last week.)

After we spent some time talking about earthworms and the cut flower industry (hey, I gotta sell books), we got down to business:  Garden blogging!  It was a fun discussion, and if you'd like to hear it yourself, it's available online now.  Check it out--it's the October 21 broadcast.

A Tree-Lover's Lament: "I Can't Take it Anymore"

A Response by Julie Walton Shaver of Tree Growers Diary
So, um, here's my thing. See, if my neighbor who hates trees would go ahead and cut down the stupid Norway maple in his front yard that keeps shedding huge branches every time the wind blows, I could plant something new and fun to watch; a Donald Wyman crabapple has been on my wish list for about eight years now.

So, yes, I'm in agreement. Cut down your trees! Let's start with the dreaded Bradford pear (of which I have two, I'm ashamed to say). Next: all Norway maples have to go. Can we leave up the sugar maples though? What would a fall palette be without some orange leaves? Oh, right, we can buy those plastic ones at the store and wrap them around the light posts for a splash here and there.

I wrote in my blog recently about piggy-backing on the Shade Tree Commission's booth at the Country Fair. Here's what I learned: PEOPLE HATE TREES. Three-quarters of the people who visited the booth complained to the poor commissioner that the stinkin' Shade Tree Commission doesn't ever actually DO anything about all the darn shade in town.

And then I read this Henry Mitchell thing on your blog and people are writing in telling their neighbors to cut down the trees?! What's gotten into the world? I LIKE shade. Didn't anybody ever hear of skin cancer? I like to sit outside and not be hot. I like to watch birds and squirrels and hawks and I don't much like doing this while my neighbors can see me from their kitchen window. I want a tree between me and him, a vertical fence defining the air space between us and darkening the ground so I don't have to squint from sun glare. You can buy tomatoes at the store. Where can I buy shade? 

But you know what? That's it. I can't take it anymore. The tree haters have gotten to me and won. A 10-year-old even wrote in recently to tell me my site had a stupid name. WHAT ELSE should I call it? (Kid probably can't even tell an acorn from a sugar maple seed.) Oh, dozens of people picked up acorns from a basket at the fair and, I swear, wanted to know "what are these"?

I'm closing down shop, cutting down my trees, joining the mainstream, and starting up a new site: a web cam focused on the concrete sidewalk in front of my house. How will it grow and change? What can I learn from it?  Who cares anyway? By next week, some developer will plop another house in my front yard.  After all, there's a population explosion and the trees are taking up too much space. We have to make room for gigantic houses with itty bitty yards and great big 3-zone air conditioners.

As for the grand 100-foot-tall beech that lived when Abraham Lincoln was president, cut her down too. All new houses have to make room for a driveway.

[Photo by Julie Walton Shaver.]

Fall Color, No Driving

When I saw something on the news about places you could DRIVE TO and see fall color I had to laugh.  But seriously, could I stay sane if I couldn't see scenes like this just outside my door?  I sure hope I never have to find out.

The Myth of Planning

"Think ahead.  Don't let day-to-day operations drive out planning."  U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld

I don't like most gardening advice, or for that matter, most of what Donald Rumsfeld recommends, either.  But let's leave Iraq out of it and concentrate instead on the bloodshed in our own flowerbeds. 

What's the problem with gardening advice?  It usually violates the most basic principle of gardening: one place is not just like another.  Eureka, CA, where Amy Stewart gardens, has a maritime climate entirely different from that of Saratoga Springs, where I garden, though both places are nice Victorian towns.  Takoma, MD, where Susan Harris gardens, has a climate more similar to mine, albeit a few zones warmer, but her neighborhood--a commuter suburb of Washington, DC--has an entirely different gestalt, and they do a super-sophisticated woodsy thing there that I would not even attempt in my little fenced plot.   

Yet, there are entire industries--books, magazines, nurseries, individual writers--that make their money by telling Amy, Susan, and me that we all ought to be doing the same thing.  Of course, we're experienced gardeners, and we can laugh off such absurdities.  What bothers me is how much these experts do to discourage would-be gardeners, those just starting out who buy these books in good faith and then feel that because they either find the advice incomprehensible or the results of following it less than optimal, they are somehow not cut out to be gardeners.

Among the many poisonous myths promulgated by the advice industry, my least favorite is the myth of planning.  That if you don't plan your garden, you will inevitably wind up with a disorganized mess.  Half-hearted, full of pathetic bits of things that you purchased, God forbid, on a whim.  Whims!  Perfectly reasonable if you're deciding whom to marry, but really reprehensible when you're deciding whether to take home an eight-dollar plant.

I feel so strongly about this particular myth because I was a victim of it earlier in my gardening life and avoided perennials for years because of it.

Green House Exhibit Gets it Wrong on Landscaping

Lord knows I hate to rain on the parade of this important exhibit at D.C.'s National Building Museum:  "Green House: New Directions in Sustainable Architecture and Design."  And you know I'm all aboard the sustainable train myself.  And to echo all the good press the exhibit's been getting, I applaud it for its very existence and prominence (including a Laura Bush drop-by), if not for getting it right in the details.

See, while one of the 5 excellent principles it espouses is responsible land use, the devil is in the details:  "Exposed earth absorbs rain and runoff." HUH?  Seems that "green" is no longer green but the color of bare earth.  Couldn't any gardener have told these folks how ass-backwards that is?  Not only does bare earth NOT absorb rain well but it doesn't stay bare for long.  I was going to cite some soil erosion sources on the importance of plants but is that really necessary??  (See it for yourself here.  Scroll down to #3 and let your mouse reveal the advice.) 

And there's more.  Under the heading "large environmental footprint" - bad homeowner - the exhibit tells us that lawns are expensive to maintain and pesticide-dependent.  Well, if museum curators would only read gardening blogs they'd know the lawn picture is waaay more complicated than that.  My own good-enough lawn needs one organic feeding in the fall and about 6 mowings each season.  Plus, it does a terrific job of absorbing rain.  So there.

Then there's this misleading but politically correct declaration: "Native plants require minimal water and pesticides."  Why can't they just say "Use plants that require minimal water and pesticides"? 

But back to the exhibit.  It's running until June of 2007 so check it out next time you're in D.C. and give me a reality check - Am I being overly crabby?

The National Building Museum, built in the 1880s to house the old Pension Bureau, is worth a look-see all by itself and it's easily accessible by subway.  Take a virtual tour of its main hall - the site of almost constant fetes, including inaugural balls.  Unbelievably today, this hall was originally filled with rows of government clerk-typists.

I Was Gonna Build a House, But a Wildflower Meadow Sounds Nice, Too

So there you are, an ordinary West Coast real estate developer, working on your latest 3800 square-foot home in the East Bay, when what do you stumble across but ten percent of the planet's population of the endangered wildflower Clarkia franciscana, also known as the Presidio Clarkia.

Ooops.

It's not enough that you're planning to set aside an acre for a conservation easement that would also preserve the Tiburon buckwheat and the not-at-all-stuck-on-itself Most Beautiful Jewelflower (Streptanthus albidus peramoenus).  Nope--sorry, Dennis the Developer.  This is a wildflower, and it's an annual, which means that it could spring up just about anywhere, including right under those happy homeowners' whirlpool bath or those Mexican tiles in the atrium.  In other words, an acre somewhere or other just won't cut it.

Now, I'm on the side of the wildflower here, I really am.  But I gotta sympathize with the developer, who noticed that these endangered wildflowers are--uh--pretty easy to grow from seed.  In fact, he brought the City Council a photo of a Presidio Clarkia he'd grown himself from seed collected on his land, thus increasing the plant's worldwide population by--what? 13 percent?

Oh, and excavating 1400 cubic yards of soil for this project would unearth not just a handful of wildflowers, but also quite a lot of asbestos, and the neighbors aren't so happy about that stuff floating around.  Dennis, buddy, you may need to find yourself another project.  Either that, or go into the nursery business--looks like you've got a knack for growing rare plants.

Via:  Alameda Times-Star  Photos via National Park Service.

Why Suburbs Will Never Have Tall Trees

Continuing our focus on trees here at the Rant, check out this article about suburban trees in July's Landscape Architecture Magazine.  That link won't show you the whole story, so here's what it says about the ways that tree growth is stymied (and tree death promoted) in new developments:

• Heavy earth-moving machines create oxygen-deprived hardpan around new homes.
• All but a few inches of topsoil are removed and sold off, leaving just enough for sod.
• What topsoil there is often contains debris-filled "builder's loam."
• Holes are bored into the hardpan to plant saplings, causing roots to circle the planting hole and the trees to eventually decline.

And as I've noticed in my own neighborhood, the hardpan hasn't improved a whit in the 80 years since the earth-movers did their damage - at least in spots where no organic matter has been added.

This reminds me of the time the sidewalks were replaced on my own street.  We learned from talking to the city that the contract for the work required 4 inches of topsoil in the hell strip between the street and the sidewalk, but what we actually got was about a quarter inch - just enough to fool the eye.  Underneath was pure builder's loam - concrete rubble, rock, and little else.  That is, unless the homeowners stood guard during the work to force compliance with the contract specs.

Which makes me wonder what, if any, topsoil requirements exist for new housing developments and if there's any enforcement if they do exist.  Because hey, what developer can resist the big money to be made in stealing topsoil from their buyers?

Photo:  You've seen it before but doesn't it nicely illustrate what you can grow - even in a hellstrip - with actual topsoil? 

Gardeners to Nurseries: Fall's the New Spring

You hear this advice everywhere:  plant in the fall.  Trees, shrubs, flowering perennials, grasses, bareroot, bulbs, cool season veggies and annuals, wildflower seeds--there is nothing, it seems, that wouldn't benefit from being planted in the fall so that it can put down roots all winter and go crazy in the spring.  Here on the west coast, our mild, rainy winters and dry summers make it necessary to do major planting in the fall.  Otherwise, new plants won't make it through the summer without a massive irrigation project.

So--uh--where are the plants?  Sure, nurseries start carrying bulbs, bins of bareroot asparagus, and fruit trees around this time of year.  But the nurseries are almost bare--and the few scraggly perennials that are left are marked down and shoved off in a corner to make way for holiday greens.

I was at a nursery last week and when an employee asked if he could help me, I said, "Well, I'm just looking for stuff to plant.  It's the season to plant, you know."  He just laughed and said, "Yeah, it's ironic--but we can't get anything in this time of year and we wouldn't have time to get it all sold anyway."

So there you go.  Fall planting may be best for the garden, but I guess it's just not convenient for the nursery industry.  Wait for spring, when overfed flowering annuals will crowd the parking lot at your local garden center.

Let's tell 'em what we think. 

Save the Pollinators - Plant Flowers

Here's a disturbing report, and we thank Robert and Michael for alerting us.  Populations of birds, bees and bats have demonstrably declined in North America and Europe.  The cause?  Loss of habitat and the use of herbicides and pesticides, the usual culprits.  And a new one - global warming causing plants to flower earlier in the season, throwing off the process of pollination. 

What can we do to help?  Plant flowers, of course.  But can we do something about the loss of habitat?  We're losing 3,000-4,000 acres a day in this country, ya know, and we're not getting it back.  Maybe there's hope in the 240 anti-sprawl initiatives now under way across the U.S.

Meanwhile, check out Monarch Watch and join the backyard and community habitat movement over at the National Wildlife Federation.

Pink Flamingo Faces Extinction

Enough about native trees. We have real problems to deal with.  The Sun-Sentinel in Florida is reporting that the only company that manufactures the garden icon, Union Products, is closing its doors. The company's former president says:

"They think the pink flamingos could be extinct, and they think I will be extinct soon, too," he said. "It is sad that it is happening, but it may not be dead yet."

Featherstone and Plante are hoping for a resurrection. Plante has been seeking another company to buy the molds. So far, two companies in the U.S. and one in Canada have expressed interest.

"I am hoping that someone will come forward and save the plastic pink flamingo from extinction," Plante said.

I guess I just took it for granted that those plastic pink birds would always be with us. In fact, they were just about to celebrate their 50th birthday.  But without habitat restoration and serious conservation efforts on the part of gardeners and bird lovers everywhere, these lovely creatures may vanish from the American landscape all together.  Don't let it happen, people.

A note about identifying these creatures when you spot them in the wild:  BoingBoing points out that, according to Wikipedia, the authentic Union Product flamingo bears the imprint of founder Don Featherstone's signature under their tails, sport a yellow beak with black tip, and are sold in pairs.

American Hort Society on Perennials - a Keeper

So out of nowhere this stunning 500-page fact-and photo-packed reference arrives at my door, sent to me by the good folks at the American Horticultural Society.  THANKS!  See, I attended a press event for new plants at their headquarters in Virginia and gave them my address, and now I'm fully prepared to step up to the plate and recommend that everyone buy their book.  See how easily I can be bought?

Kidding!  If I hated it I'd just give it away and never say a word.  But au contraire - it's the reference book I've been looking for all these years.

First, how can it fail when it's edited by the top-notch garden writer Graham Rice (a Gardenrant reader!) and Kurt Bluemel, the Maryland plantsman of ornamental grass and perennial fame?  (If you're anywhere near Baltimore, visit his nursery, like this week.)

But more than a fine-print collection of hort arcana, this encyclopedia inspires - with its gee-orgeous photos, of single plants and of whole beds and everything in between.  Nothing like those abominable extreme close-ups we see in catalogs that show us nothing about what the plant actually looks like.  And there are terrific sidebars - listing sun-proof  hostas, even slug-resistant hostas, or suggesting ways to design with various perennials, like turning us on to the to-die-for combo of blue hostas and ferns - in drifts.  Even the dark side of perennials is revealed - think powdery mildew on Monarda - so this is not the usual advertising copy put out by growers.

Finally, I appreciate the editors' insistence that information about a plant's origin mean something. Thus we learn that Penstemon is native to open plains and alpine areas in North and Central America and Begonia grandis to shaded banks or woodlands at high altitudes in East Asia.  Nothing like the useless "Native to the U.S." we're seeing more of these days.  (Like the silly nationalism of no less an authority than the USDA in their on-line plant profiles.   Separating out the immigrants in our post-9/11 world?)

And to respond to the nice offer in the press package enclosed with the book - yes, I'd love an interview with either Rice or Bluemel - anytime, anywhere. 

BUY IT here.

Gardening with Locally Native Trees and Plants

by Guest Blogger J.L. Blackwater at Arboreality

Native plant species are those trees and plants which have been growing in your particular area since before the arrival of European settlers (and their cache of plantlings from the motherland).

To help us better understand gardening with native trees and plants, I visited the Bowman's Hill Wildflower Preserve just south of New Hope, Pennsylvania to speak with Executive Director Miles Arnott.

Our conversation began with the basic question, "How does a gardener select the right native plants for their garden?"

The answer: go take a hike.

Seriously - Miles' advice for gardeners interested in native species gardening is to get out, take walks in the local woods, and see what's going on.

"Try to find a site in nature that looks like your garden site." Miles advises. If your garden is low and wet, try to find low wetlands and see what grows there. If your garden space is dry and hilly, go find a rocky hill and take a peek."

Gardening Hurts

The Seattle P-I reminds us that gardening is not for the faint of heart.  A typical weekend in the garden yields unexplained bruises in unusual places, scratches and rashes from hostile plants, torn muscles, and--in my case--the odd bump on the head from that classic garden blunder, stepping on a rake and bringing the handle straight up to the forehead.  I've even been known to grab a handful of dead stems in one hand, pick up the Felcos in the other hand, and nearly slice off my finger along with those stems.  (Fortunately, I was wearing gloves, or I'd be typing one-handed right now.)  Oh, and don't forget grabbing a weed and pulling it so hard that it flies out of the ground and straight into my eye.

The P-I recommends one of those garden kneelers, but my gardening is too haphazard for that level of equipment.  Long-handled tools and raised beds (like, raised high enough so you don't have to kneel) are other options.

For me, the best protection against the hazards of the garden has always been the gym.  If I can lift weights, I can lift a bag of dirt. If I can do yoga, I can get on my knees and dig.

What about you?  Worst garden injury?  Best injury-prevention tool?

Link: seattlepi.nwsource.com.

Does Henry Mitchell Stand the Test of Time?

Our friend Carol at MayDreamsGardens started a Most Excellent Thing - the Gardenblogger Book Club.  And first up is The Essential Earthman, a book we've talked about here, too - because who doesn't love reading Henry Mitchell?  But since Carol opened the can of worms that might be called Mitchell's mistakes, get ready for some more.  My personal favorites:

• Calling Japanese honeysuckle "a true aristocrat of gardens."

• Saying of English ivy, "The ivy is the most beautiful and practical of all evergreens grown in Washington," and "we might pause for a minute to salute its merits and suggest a wider use for it."  He particularly loved ivy when it matured and fruited.  And while warning that it could harm a dogwood, "on old trees it does no harm and is beautiful." [Note: ivy's invasiveness becomes truly neighborhood-wide after it scales trees, matures and bears fruit.]
  

• And his rant about what he calls "the current balderdash that Trees Are Good Things.  It's only a step - and this nation has taken it - to saying that trees are sacrosanct things.  The result is that the entire eastern part of the continent is becoming overrun with trees.  And "The proper place for trees may be summarized easily.  They belong in parks, which we need more of; along streets, where they relieve the monotony of bad architecture; in the country, where cows may doze beneath them; and in the gardens in extremely limited numbers."  Mitchell thought we should all "we do ourselves and society a favor and cut down a few trees around the house."  Well.

Michele Owens Totally Rocks

So there I am at the grocery store, flipping through O, the Oprah magazine, when I see the face of a friend:  our own Michele Owen's story on flowers appears in the November issue, right after a story on the fashion secrets of famous designers. 

So if you're not a regular reader of O, give in to the guilty pleasure and pick it up this month for Michele's story.  She's writing about a subject very close to my heart--the emotional power of flowers.  I'll give you a taste:

So what is it we're smelling when we smell the rose?  Maybe we are smelling ourselves at our best, our own potential for goodness and joy.  No wonder we find the scent intoxicating.  Maybe we even need the rose--always associated with romance--to remind us to be romantic, the Oriental lily to remind us to think sex, the red geranium to remind us to be optimistic, the daisy to remind us to be sociable.  Otherwise we might be too purposeful and pleasure-free.

Y'all check it out.  Good on you, Michele.

A Message to Ecobloggers Everywhere

Over on Eco-Chick I've written a guest-blog I titled Why Gardening MATTERS because I'm trying to nudge them to have more gardening coverage on their otherwise fabulous team blog.  So wander on over there and weigh in on the topic, or just give 'em a long look - they're worth it.  Thanks to the Chicks for inviting me to guest!

Sustainable Plants Revealed

My recent column on Sustainable Gardening promised a part 2 in which I'd list all the sustainable plants I could conjure up for this part of the world, and here it is.  The impetus for compiling such a list was reading the National Wildlife Federation's recommendations for sustainable gardening practices, which includes the directive to use native plants, period.  Well.  Readers won't be surprised to know I'm critical of generic gardening advice directed to all 300 million of us (or even worse - all of N. America). And how anyone can expect the almost exclusively woodland plants native to the East Coast to be drought-tolerant, even in full sun, is beyond me.  Can this be ideology trumping reality?  (By the way, notice what Ed Snodgrass has to say about whether native plant are suitable for green roofs - or not.  Check his website's FAQs.)  Me, I can't imagine gardening my whole property using just the plants on this list of natives.

My sources for the list started with every website I could find but included many respected hort experts and native plant advocates in the D.C. area and I thank them all.  Now gardenbloggers and readers, what can you add?