Garden Rant

Bad plants have names too, and this one is called Datura stramonium

Color me mildly annoyed that a syndicated story about kids eating jimson weed that ran in our local rag this week totally failed to mention the botanical name of the plant. Paragraph after paragraph went by in which I learned such tidbits as the following:

The jimson plant is located throughout the United States — including Western New York — and parts of Canada.

The potentially deadly symptoms include abnormal heart rhythm, respiratory arrest, high fever, hallucination, seizures and coma.

The uncomfortable symptoms include hot, dry skin. That could explain why some patients come in nude to emergency rooms, said Lisa Oller, senior poison specialist with the University of Kansas Hospital Poison Control Center in Kansas City, Kan.

The weed goes by many names, including gypsum weed, stinkweed, loco weed and thorn apple. Some people call it moonflower. But Queen, the Derby police lieutenant, said moonflower is a different plant — a cousin of jimson weed — that gets used for the same hallucinogenic effect.

But nowhere in all this did the actual name of the plant appear. Of course, knowing the botanical name would not have stopped the kids from eating it, but this is an article that is supposed to be giving parents important facts. One of those facts would certainly be the correct name of the plant. Sigh.

Those crazy kids. Some of my less-desirable friends used to toy with that stuff too, back in the day. They knew it was dangerous, and they said enough about it to make me think twice.

And that’s why I’m here today.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Calling all porn junkies

We know who you are, because we are you. Who doesn’t love beautiful pictures of fabulously exotic gardens? Well, not all the time—but once in a while, it’s fun to check out famous gardens. You may have been to them in person or you may hope to go. Or maybe, like me, you plan to visit as many world-renowned gardens as you can, and you’re checking them off. Fellow WNYer and Garden Walk prez Jim Charlier has created a site devoted to his garden traveling. So far he’s got Giverney and Edinburgh up; soon to be added are gardens or garden events at Amboise, Moiret-Sue-Loing, Nevis, Dominica, and Chauteau de Chaumont. Check out Art of Gardening.

Lloyd’s last

We are always on the borderline of what it’s most sensible to attempt. Such gardening may be silly, but, on the other hand, it can be the most exciting.
—Christopher Lloyd

Look at any photograph of the elderly Christopher Lloyd, standing in the middle of a tall thicket of colorful, extravagant plants like canna, dahlia, banana, brugmansia, or any of the other bright blooms and foliage giants he ripped out a traditional rose garden to install. He looks so happy with what he has created, so friendly and welcoming. I often regret I never had the opportunity to meet the man in person, and listen to him talk about his accomplishments at Great Dixter.

I loved Christopher Lloyd after the first chapter of the first book of his I ever read—it was The Well-Tempered Garden—and I have since taken great care to buy anything he wrote, whether it might help me as a gardener or not. In fact, his advice is often of minimal practical value, at least to me. Lloyd gardened on a large property and had the benefit of the comparatively mild English climate, as well as a greenhouse where he could keep plants in reserve. He would often blithely advise moving bulbs and seedlings to various show beds and holding beds in order to maintain a lushly blooming look at all times, recommendations clearly impossible to anyone working under the limitations of a small urban space. No matter. Lloyd got me excited about plants and their possibilities in a way no other garden writer has.

Timber Press has just released the book Lloyd was working on when he died: Exotic Planting for Adventurous Gardeners. Each chapter by Lloyd has been augmented with a brief follow-up essay by a star-studded list of co-contributors, including Anna Pavord, Dan Hinkley, Ray Waite, and Helen Dillon (who writes the plant directory). Hence the authorship is Christopher Lloyd & friends (with the & friends in really small print). Though I have been disappointed by posthumous books before, where clearly incomplete works have been puffed up with lesser ballast, Exotic Planting works well; who wouldn’t be happy to have their Lloyd seasoned with a dash of Pavord or Hinkley? Not to mention luscious photography of Great Dixter by Jonathan Buckley.

Sustainable Gardening News Issue 2 on Newstands Now

Just kidding, but it has been distributed and also resides right here in the Archives.  I'd love some help with:

• Additions, corrections to my article about Composting.  I've noticed on local listservs that people can't stop asking questions about compost, no matter how often they're answered.  So we're trying to get it right and park it on some websites for reference.
• In the On The Blogs section I've included some newsy or on-topic posts from the Rant and my own blog but please - if you have one, send it along so it can be added it to the discussion.  And you'd better believe I added Michele's wonderful post about rules for beginners - with its 38 excellent comments - to my Getting Started page. 

And I welcome any other suggestions you might have.  I've decided to publish the newsletter at the leisurely pace of once a month, with no particular date of publication.  Just trying to stay loose. 

What Landscape Architects Carry

One of my new blogging mates over on the Gardening Coach Blog, Santa Barbara landscape architect Billy Goodnick, gives us a hint of how his work is different from that of simple garden coaches.  His post is entitled "What I'm Carrying These Days" and it stands in stark contrast to my own "Tools of the Coaching Trade."

An exotic, eco- and child-friendly gardenAnd the designer who made it

by Susan
Well, it's winter, a fine time to enjoy the lushness of a fabulous new garden in my neighborhood.  It was recently visited by a group of DC-area landscape designers, and their tour guide was the garden's designer, my friend and fellow gardening columnist, Pat Howell.  Pat's assignment was to transform the all-turfgrass front yard.  Into what, she wasn't told.  Oh, and how about some soft surfaces for the kids to play on?  And here's the result.

A GARDEN FOR YOUNG CHILDREN
Now if you're going to all the trouble to yank the lawn, why not make it a space where the homeowners' young kids could have some fun?  That notion led Pat to research gardening with children, and she soon discovered that having kids simply work alongside adults in vegetable gardens is going out of style, in favor of a focus on play.  So this garden has boulders to climb on and hide behind, sand boxes, and even a Faerie Garden.  Pat learned to use that Celtic spelling, and had fun shopping for figurines and other essential fairy items at local shops and the National Cathedral greenhouse.

A MODIFIED RAIN GARDEN
To direct water from three downsprouts, Pat consulted with Lauren Wheeler of Natural Resources Design, and a rain garden with drainage for excess water was the solution.  Packed with colorful but water-loving plants, they definitely needed the occasional flooding Pat gave them to survive the Great Drought of 2007.

A FOUR-MULCH GARDEN
And not a one too many. Shredded hardwood was used in the rain garden because it filters pollutants. Pine fines, Pat's favorite mulch, were used in the flat "meadow". Pea gravel and pine fines were used in the boulder garden.  And for a soft landing in play areas, Pat spread a layer of Tread Spread, a recycled tire product used on playgrounds.  It turned out to be soft enough but too hot under the summer sun for barefoot play.  Too bad!

A HAVEN FOR WILDLIFE
Because plant choices were left up to Pat and she's a real plantsperson, this small front garden is now home to 53 different perennials (250 in all), nine shrubs or small trees, two vines and seven annuals, including enough red and orange flowers to attract butterflies and hummingbirds.  Talk about your biodiversity!  For sheer tropical lushness Pat included large purple elephant ears and the only banana plant that's hardy here (Musa basjoo, which gets cut to the ground in fall and covered with four inches of mulch for the winter).  And nothing too tall was planted because the homeowners like to sit on the front porch and see their neighbors passing by.

COMBINING GARDENING AND POLICE WORK
Pat and I met for lunch recently to talk about the garden and she filled me in on her other life -- patrolling the streets of D.C. in a police cruiser on the midnight shift for 40 or 50 hours every month.  She's a member of the Police Reserve, having completed nine months of training many years ago when she first got involved with the force.  This grandmother of two also contributes her vast plant and growing knowledge to the 200+ members of our local gardening Yahoo group, free of charge.  And her clients tell me she leaves them little notes suggesting the care their plants need, so she doesn't just design and install, but also teach.  I'm hereby designating her a gardening coach.

[The sign in the bottom photo says "Peace, love, marriage - rights we should all enjoy," as best I can make out.  I should know the words by heart, though - they're all over town.]

No Free Lunch

(Photo cribbed from food-info.net.)

The Wall Street Journal has an excellent story today about the tortuous journey of chemical-contaminated ginger from China to the plates of Californians, where it is making people sick.

More evidence that cheap supermarket food only seems cheap.  The hidden costs are really ugly.

More reason to trust your local farmer, or even better, to go grocery shopping in your own backyard.  At least then, you have a good idea of what you're getting.  Plus, trust me, the shopping experience is way more pleasant. 

That Seventies Plant

Are terrariums back?  I miss those groovy, flying saucer-shaped Eames plastic terrariums of my youth. Maidenhair ferns spilled out of them, Spanish moss concealed the potting soil and gave a vaguely Southern Gothic air to the arrangement, and wisps of patchouli drifted from an incense cone tucked between the fronds. Then somehow terrariums just faded away, along with macrame and Starsky and Hutch. 

But if a seventies TV show can be revived as a mediocre summer blockbuster, terrariums might have a second act, too.   Consider the following--and yes, I am seriously contemplating an all-terrarium Christmas this year.  Who needs an iPhone when you can have a Venus fly trap in a plastic globe?

For cubicle dwellers, I like the Desktop Carnivorous Plant Set from ThinkGeek. "Perfect for the casual office worker who delights in watching insects slowly meet their makers as they are painfully digested by an engaging variety of meat-sucking flora. Nothing quite like it."  The only drawback to this little toy is that it comes with seeds, not plants.  I can see middle managers everywhere working themselves into a frenzy over their inability to get their pitcher plants to germinate.  Do them a favor and buy a few live plants to get them started.  $22.99

The Plantarium Garden Lab from Fat Brain Toys is marketed as a kid's toy, and perhaps the brightly-colored gel will get kids interested in the otherwise mundane (ahem) process of watching plants grow, but I think these would also be totally cool in that hip urban loft you just redecorated. Just don't let your guests mistake them for jello shots.  Comes with basil, cucumber, and tomato seeds, but I'd try rooting a psychedelic coleus cutting or a giant purple and black-spotted scarlet runner been seed.  For ages 5 and up, $23.95.

Finally, if you've got the budget, you're definitely going to want to check out the custom-made creations at the Terrarium Museum. You can get miniature Victorian conservatories, sleek contemporary sculptures, and even these totally groovy terrarium lamps.  (here's your attractive grow light solution, Elizabeth)

Ah, the return of the terrarium.  Those were simpler times.  Even Nixon and Ford don't seem so bad, looking back on it. Perhaps the terrarium deserves a second chance after all.

Grand finale

A few weeks back, Ellis Hollow posted—and I agreed— about the disappointing fall color we’ve had in New York, at least the central and western parts. I may have jumped the gun a bit; just days before Thanksgiving, I’m seeing bursts of orange, red, and yellow everywhere. Some burgundy, too. It seems late to me. Normally, all the color happens in October and November ends up being a pretty drab month. I could be wrong of course, but this year we had the longest summer ever, with 80 degree days through October. Also, who knows what’s going on with these trees; many of them suffered mild to severe damage during last October’s freak storm. I just can’t remember seeing this much color, this late.

More cool stuff in AG

Sure, we’re all thrilled about the article in American Gardener on blogging; it’s one of the most substantial pieces of recognition in the traditional media that we garden bloggers have received so far. But I have other reasons to want to continue getting the publication now that I have a copy.

This is a pretty good magazine! It seems to speak to the average gardener, the articles are generally well-written, and the topics are interesting. I glanced through the reports on Christmas tree politics, colony collapse disorder, and echinacea as a cold remedy (now they’re saying it DOES work) and skimmed the piece on winter shrubs (I do long for a witch hazel). But the article on fragrant houseplants sealed the deal. Keep in mind, I am the only ranter who—far from shunning houseplants—loves them, collects new ones every year (and kills many others, but I do that outside too), and is in the process of adapting an upstairs room for their improved comfort. So, thank you, Tovah Martin, for sharing my enthusiasm and turning me on to some plants I might not have considered otherwise.

Martin addresses the whole houseplants-are too-hard attitude thusly:

I generally avoid houseplants that make holy nuisances of themselves. As a matter of fact, my scented-leaved geraniums stand accused of “asking so little, but giving so much.” You need to be attuned to watering needs … You should fertilize during the plant's growing season. And be prepared to provide the light preferences your fragrant plant prefers.

I agree that these are the basic requirements to keep a houseplant going and I honestly don’t see why they’re sooooo difficult, especially since most of us are jumping through a lot more hoops than that outside. I would add that I give all my plants a preventative spraying with a soap or something safe before I bring them in. Strike early and infestations are not such a problem. And don’t bring palms into the house (I love them outside as annuals) as they attract everything that crawls or flies.

Martin recommends osmanthus fragrans, several jasmines, hoyas, melianthus, and heliotrope, among many others. Several of the plants have lower light requirements. I have a few of these, but I had never considered heliotrope as a houseplant …. interesting. Martin, like me, maintains that the old-fashioned heliotrope cultivars are the best.

If a publication gets me excited about buying plants (my favorite occupation) then it passes an important test. Logees, here I come: clearly, I need to buy more fragrant houseplants.

Book Review: Covering Ground

by Susan
It's timely, it's gorgeous and it's just released - Covering Ground by Barbara Ellis, whose work we've reviewed previously here.

PHOTOGRAPHY
Homeowners who are unhappy with their lawns need all the help they can get in finding plants to grow instead, and this book has ideas and inspiration to spare.  Call me overly visual, but photos by the likes of Jerry Pavia and Saxon Holt inspire the hell out of me.  After drinking in images like this one, I'm not just getting rid of something; I'm drawn toward totally new visions of what beautiful "yards" can look like, and exactly which plants I can use to make it all happen.  My question for Jerry, Saxon and the many photographers in this stunning book is how did you find all those amazing gardens?  Really, I'm curious, because you sure can't just Google "gorgeous thyme garden" and find them. 

Photography like this reminds us why books still have a place, despite the plethora of free information on the Internet.  Gorgeous, high-resolution images printed on high-quality paper - it's still a Good Thing.

A NEW DEFINITION
I love that Ellis thinks outside the box, showing us that there's no need to replace turfgrass with plants of similar stature.  Referring to mid-size shrubs, she says "for a large yard, consider a central planting of one or more of these wide-spreading species, perhaps surrounded by smaller shrubs."  So don't be surprised that her book covers 20-foot shrubs and has a whole section about azaleas and rhododendrons, which I' was happy to see the author describe as  "far happier in partial shade south of Zone 5."  Hallelujah.

CONTENT?  LOTS OF IT
I approached Covering Ground as a highly motivated reader desperately seeking ways to cover my own ground, and found countless examples of information that readers like myself really, really need.  Some examples are:

• How ground covers spread.
• Sections about ground covers for every possible situation, and truly helpful tips about them (sedums are shallow-rooted, so not the best choice for holding soil on steep inclines).
• Good site prep basics about removing weeds, sod, soil prep, even recommending a 2-week delay before planting to let soil settle and allow weed seeds and root remnants to sprout.  That's some great advice I never see, and it comes from an author who's clearly done her share of site prep.  And she tells us that smothering and solarizing of existing sod or weeds require a whole year before planting.
  
• The truth about landscape fabric, that it should be installed when your site is being prepared, not later, and that it "has disadvantages and a great many gardeners avoid using it completely".  She then tells us why. (Starting with the problem that weeds are difficult to remove because the roots become entangled in the fabric.)
• Lots of good advice about how to avoid transplant stress, which "can be a killer".  Yes indeedy!  One suggestion I'll pursue is to shade newly moved plants with a spun-bonded row cover such as Reemay.  It rests directly on the plants and I want some!
• As gorgeous as all these plants are en masse - huge drifts, swaths - they're waaay more expensive than grass seed, and cost is an important factor limiting our ability to substitute creeping perennials for lawn.  So Ellis offers a slew of helpful suggestions about how to make it happen without a huge budget, like buying one of each and observing for a year before making a larger investment.  She devotes a lot of space to methods of propagation and urges us not to make the easy mistake that tightwad gardeners like myself have learned to regret - using the cheapest (often free) fastest-spreading plant. You know, the ones that end up devouring everything in their path.

PICKING NITS
Now I get to whine about what I would have done differently - as if I'd ever take on such a huge project as writing this book or do nearly as good a job as Ellis has.  But reviewers don't have to be doers, now do they?

• There's much discussion of the negatives of turfgrass - all the water, fossil fuels, pesticides, herbicides and fertilizer required to keep it going - but no mention of going organic as an alternative.  Further, alternative ground covers are described as "labor-saving", which isn't always the case.  I was happy to see, however, a mention of new, better lawn cultivars that are more disease-resistant and need less frequent mowing.  After all, lawn is here to stay, so let's all look for healthier ways to grow that damn stuff.

• The now-ubiquitous generalization that "Locally native plants are best able to tolerate the heat, humidity, soil and exposure in your garden."  Well, that depends on whether your garden has remotely similar conditions to where those plants grow in nature, right?  So why not say "many" and "depending on where you plant them"?

• And like any gardener, when I've grown plants myself I have stories to contribute.  So I would warn readers that when Liriope spicata receives direct sunshine, it spreads so aggressively as to make  English ivy look positively mind-mannered.

Okay, I got that off my chest.  Now DO buy and enjoy this excellent book. 

Photo credits: top, second from top, and lowest photos (c) Jerry Pavia, from Covering Ground by Barbara W. Ellis, used with permission from Storey Publishing.  Photo third from top (c) Saxon Holt/PhotoBotanic, from Covering Ground by Barbara W. Ellis, used with permission from Storey Publishing.

Another gardening mag notices bloggers, story at 11

Here is the article by Doug Green from American Gardener. These jpegs ought to be readable when you enlarge them; best I could do, as we can't seem to get the pdf up. If you print the enlarged image, it should also be readable. Or use this link to take you to the current issue; scroll down to the article about blogging. And here's the link to the magazine's site, which also has the article: American Gardener

Learning Disability

In its last issue, the soon-to-be-missed House and Garden has a fun piece about the ineffably weird gardens on Lake Como.  The picture at the right is the one that really impressed me.  I have no idea how tall those Italian cypresses really are, but certainly too tall for me to climb that ladder with pruning shears for any sum of money.  Yet, apparently somebody is willing to do it, because according to HG, those cypresses are trimmed every single day.

That photo reminded me of how much I don't do with my own Felcos.  Which in turn, reminded me of another photo, from Penelope Hobhouse's luscious Flower Gardens.

I've long admired that Dutch garden on the right.  In fact, I planted boxwoods in my front perennial beds, hoping to achieve the same sophisticated contrast between the loose shapes of the perennials and the strict geometry of the evergreens.  Only in my garden, there is no geometry--because I can't bring myself to prune the shrubs.  Because I know that if I start attempting to shape them into balls, they will wind up whittled into nothing.

I'm confident about a lot of other things, but I am not a confident pruner.  Part of the problem is that pruning directions in books always make my head spin.  Don't talk to me about second-year canes and fruiting buds and old growth and new growth and laterals and leaders--and especially, do not talk to me about clematis groups with Roman numerals after them.  This is the kind of mechanical learning that no matter how hard I try, falls out of my head the instant I learn it.

Some of the fault possibly lies with the quality of the directions.  Possibly they were written by the same people who wrote the assembly instructions for my daughter's tricycle.  The always witty Eleanor Perenyi complains in Green Thoughts about how infuriating pruning instructions are. 

But I think most of the fault lies with me.  It's a learning disability.  I can't make sense of anything that involves diagrams and step one and two.  When I was in college and had to assemble incredibly complicated equipment quickly for an organic chemistry lab, I would spend two out of three hours just trying to get the glass tubes lined up... and never managed to synthesize the chemicals I was supposed to synthesize.  So I did the only sensible thing.  I got a boyfriend in the class.

But now there is no boyfriend willing to do my bidding on the pruning front.  And my husband is very nice, but confines himself to chain-saw issues.   So I really just need to get intrepid and start mangling some plants. 

My New Dawn rose is only two years old, but it's already getting out of control.  My grape vines, I don't know what to do with.  My clematis always languish, except for sweet autumn, which the books assure me can be lopped to nothing or left completely alone, and I like that about it.  Still, it's time for boldness.  Next spring, I'm going to take the pruning guides out into the yard with me and get them dirty.

 

Bloom Day in Ranterville, November edition

Ironically, the only one of us who might have more actual flowers (Amy) is traveling, but what the heck, here goes:

Michele has some saffron crocus, grown purely for the thrill of harvesting her own saffron. You can see the little threads. Cool!

I don’t have too much going on outside and what is out there is mostly covered in roof grit, but I took some pictures anyway. Fall color is what it’s all about: hosta, red maple, hydrangea, and Boston ivy. I have more at my blog.

Susan has beautiful color going as well as berries. Check out her winterthur viburnum. I also love her Japanese maple (those can’t be beat for fall color), serviceberry, and hydrangea, which looks like a similar macrophylla to mine. See more at her blog.

I also, at the top, show an image of my cyclamen and African violet, currently in bloom, just to demonstrate that there are other ways to have cold weather color!

Blast from the Past: Secret Life of Plants

Did you watch it when it came out?  Did it trip you out?

This is just the Stevie Wonder video, but the entire film is  available online here as well.

Do plants have feelings? Discuss among yourselves.

Cool reads for the cold months

Garden books are rolling off the presses as the holidays approach and I have quite a few in hand, mainly from Timber Press. I’ll be posting longer reviews in the coming weeks—and we will be hosting some authors as Timber rolls out a digital book tour. Stay tuned especially for an interview and discussion of a future release that’s bound to be controversial! (That’s all I’ll reveal.)

In the meantime, here are a few titles I think would be great ways to fill in the time for those of you who won’t be doing much gardening.

This is a fun one. I’m always interested in plants that have literary and historic connections. No advice here, just the lowdown on plants mentioned in the Bible and the Quran. Was it an apple or an apricot? What the heck is frankincense, anyway? I learned what Cedar of Lebanon is (besides a local restaurant) and that bulrushes are becoming endangered, as Middle Eastern wetlands are filled in. (I have bulrush/papyrus plant in my pond.) I did notice that most of the plants are tracd back to the Bible, fewer from the Quran.

Over the years, I’ve come to really love viburnums; I wish I had room for more—in fact maybe I should take that huge step of uprooting the rhododendrons and plant viburnums instead. I have a plicatum tomestotum and it thrives in a ton of shade. This book lists them all, alphabetically by species and cultivar, describes their habits, lists variations and where they grow, and tells you what they need. Kind of a must-have for the viburnum geek and I know there are plenty out there.

Finally, I want to mention how excited I am about reading Bringing Nature Home. I’ve just glanced through it and I like the writing—enthusiastic and down-to-earth, as it should be. This isn’t just a list of plants; almost half the book is devoted to the politics of native plants, the many ways in which disappearing habitats affect us, and the practicalities of maintaining a healthy ecosystem that doesn’t require a unrealistic change in how you garden. All this stuff may be old hat to many of you, but I am undereducated in the subject. I hope to write more on this book when I’ve finished it.

So there you have it—three books I consider well-worth your attention. All from Timber.

Look, up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane!

The view this morning

No, it’s filthy debris by the bucketload raining down on all you hold dear. No one seemed too offended by my bulb advice, so here’s my advice for when you need a completely new roof (what’s known in the trade as a tear off) or any other major exterior work that will obviously damage your domestic landscape.

I think timing is key. We chose late fall because gardening is completely at an end here. No one is spending any time in the space except to walk in and out of the house. I have seen too many friends and neighbors commit to exterior work in the spring and summer and heard too many of their laments. These guys can work in the winter if they have to, and I don’t feel too sorry for them—not for what we’re paying!

Make sure they use protection (always good advice). Our roofers have clothed the sides of the house where they are working in plywood, which is slanted over the planted areas, so nothing falls into those beds. It’s impossible to protect everything though. I suppose we could have mini-teepees over every shrub.

Finally, I think the main thing is: don’t look! Keep your eyes forward when you walk in and out. It will all be over soon.

The politics of highway mowing in Virginia

"This is simply unacceptable," proclaimed the head of the County Council in Fairfax, VA (a suburb of DC) about unmowed grass along public roads.  "It gives people the impression that their government isn't doing its job and doesn't care."   

According to a recent article in the Washington Post that's not available on line, "Hundreds of complaints were pouring in," and it's an election year for the county!  Another office-holder said:  "It is so awful.  It is unsafe.  It is unsightly."  And it's not just aesthetics that are at stake; others are complaining that sight lines are obstructed. 

Actually, mowing along highways isn't even the county's job - it's the responsibility of the Virginia Department of Transportation, which is having a funding crisis and decreased the mowings to 3 per season. But residents THINK the unmown grass is the fault of their elected county officials, so those officials are anxious about it.

Now how does all this square with a recent article in Landscape Architecture Magazine about highway vegetation, which cited a survey finding that people "prefer the view" when highways are mowed less frequently and have "natural vegetation"?  Maybe just not in Virginia?

Checking in with Horticulture Magazine

by Susan
All this talk lately of gardening magazines, especially the sudden demise of House and Garden, caused me to take a cold, hard look at the next one that fell through my mail slot - Horticulture - and ask myself the all-important question: Would I recommend it?  Based on the contents of the December/January issue I most definitely would, and here's why:

• A meaty, 8-page "For the Mid-Atlantic Gardener" section and presumably for other regions.

• Photos of the drop-dead gorgeous English garden of a professional garden photographer.  It's not the usual gorgeosity we expect to see, though.  It's all gravel and meadow-style plantings of Mediterranean plants and grasses.  Very distinctive.

• A profile of 'Gold Cone' juniper, which grows to 4-6' tall and 1-2' wide after 10 years, just the size plant someone in my town SHOULD have put on either side of their front door instead of the Canadian hemlocks they used.  (Ultimate width: 25-35 feet.)  Junipers, as common as they might be, are an underexplored genus.

• Most of all, for the feature "A Gardening Life."  This one profiled a most interesting man, one J-P Malocsay, who didn't "get serious about money" until he turned 50. "I'm a working gardener, too dirty and tired at the end of the day to claim anything beyond a comfortable way with the basics."  He laments that his clients rarely buy his notion that "a garden worth living with is nature-friendly to the max.  Not just the sweet-tweet stuff, the birds and butterflies, but the full range of creepy-crawlies that sustain and animate real organic habitat."

And here's my favorite part:  Every client receives their own copy of a journal he writes to document the garden and make his arguments for environmentally sensitive gardening. "I've never been fired but have often wondered why."  His current project, transforming the grounds of the hospital near his Pennsylvania home, reflects his mission in horticulture:  "To replace the routine horrors of the landscaping goons with public-space gardens that offer genuine down-home appeal."  Well said!

• A good feature about rock gardens, including mouth-watering photos, beginning with this quote: "All gardeners become rock gardeners if they garden long enough.  Gardening is an art and rock gardening is the purest, most personal of all forms of horticulture."  Now THAT turns me on.

• A good profile of agaves, with wonderful photos.

• C. Colston Burrell on "The Invasive Problem," in which he writes, "Exotic-plant bashing has become the pastime of zealots who would like to ban all nonnative plants.  This is neither necessary nor desirable."  And "Not every invasive species acts the same in all regions of the country, or in all ecosystems within a region."  He says it's hard to predict which nonnative plants will become invasive but that plants bearing fleshy fruits "head the suspect list" and recommends we commit to excluding them from our gardens.  Now this seems reasonable, but wouldn't it mean giving up Nandina, one of the most drought-tolerant evergreen shrubs of all time, even though birds don't actually eat its berries?  Here's where I wish Burrell had said all this in a blog so we could have a conversation about this hot topic. 

To pick a nit (and who can resist?) I wish they'd ditch the childish, unappealing illustrations and give us photographs in their place.  For example, when the author of "Conspiracy Theory" describes "marveling" at his garden, with its "wonderfully satisfying slope of happy plant associations," I want to SEE it.

THE WEBSITE and BLOGS
I was hoping to link to these stories on their website but oops - it isn't current.  But I did find something there I can praise - three blogs.  They each have About pages that give us all sorts of information I love knowing about a blogger - where they garden, what kinds of garden they have, favorite gardening reference, and on and on.

WANT A LAUGH?
When I Googled for an image of a Horticulture cover, I found this link to the website of a landscape service.  The owner either didn't have a photo for his bio or just thought what the heck - use Brad Pitt instead!

Nurseries going organic in the SF Chronicle

Funny thing. Open Register mentioned this story in the SF Chronicle about growers going organic.  So I filed it away and when today I finally got around to reading it I found, at the very end, the bio of our very own Amy.  No wonder it's so good.

But Amy, how come we had to hear about it on the street?  We're family here; tell us first!