Category Archives: agaves, woody lilies

Venice Garden & Home Tour 2011

Buy tickets and a map at the Las Doradas Children’s Center, apply the lime-green wrist band, and we’re off on the VGHT 2011 (Last year’s post here.) Under overcast skies, thirty houses, covering several miles. Bikes would be the preferred … Continue reading

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Sudden Mediterranean Plant Collapse Disorder

I made that name up. But it’s true, collapse and then a swift death does come suddenly to mediterranean plants in lusty health mid-summer. Which is why I’m ecstatic that this one cutting of Coronilla valentina subsp. glauca ‘Variegata’ has … Continue reading

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The Kashmir Cypress

A pre-dinner garden tour at Dustin’s. “What is it?” I asked. “You asked me that last time,” he answered patiently. “It’s psoralea.” “Oh, the Kool-Aid something or other?” (Strange, how memory works.) “Right,” he explained, “from Annie’s.” His psoralea is … Continue reading

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Landscape Crit

A new shopping center was planted with sharp plants four years ago. Agaves, yuccas. I was thrilled but also slightly alarmed.

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Agave ‘Cornelius’

When I got home last night, Luc Besson’s The Fifth Element was streaming from Netflix. (Sidebar: TV is amazingly complicated these days.) First thing this morning, I was of course snapping photos of the Agave ‘Cornelius.’ Or “Corneeleyoos,” as Mila … Continue reading

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Yuccas Do

And how. Then keep on doing some more. Agaves get all the love, while yuccas just quietly get the job done. Yucca filamentosa, probably ‘Golden Sword,’ name tag lost long ago. Hardy to zone 5.

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Vacuuming the Sotols

Elsewhere February seems determined to be one for the record books. Added to worries for family and friends all over the country, there’s now anxiety for the gardens and their owners all over the world I’ve come to know through … Continue reading

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Friday, January 21, 2011

Today was a day of mathematical simplicity, nothing too complex. Like an abacus, disparate elements slid in and out of place, adding in then subtracting out throughout the day. Work lined up for the day cancelled. Subtraction. But being home, … Continue reading

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Deja Vu Plants

In my garden, succulents are the deja vu plants extraordinaire. New acquisitions can look suspiciously familiar because, in fact, they have been brought home before. Maybe they became submerged under rampant growers, like the soft-leaved yucca I just unearthed when … Continue reading

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Rediscovering Agave guadalajarana

My memory of the name of this agave planted years ago in the front garden went as far as guada-something. Easy enough to plug in a partial search string, right? Yet searches always narrowed down to the most likely suspect, … Continue reading

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