Category Archives: Plant Portraits
Bloom Day September 2012
A stupefyingly hot Bloom Day here in Los Angeles. June and July were lovely, August and September the devil’s smithy. This heat wave is having the same effect on the streets as martial law, rendering them eerily quiet and empty. … Continue reading
August water bill
20 percent less water usage this past August compared to August 2011. That wasn’t too terribly painful. The back garden is fairly torn up right now, but that’s all me, Edwina Shovelhands, not a result of any water rationing. The … Continue reading
my, how they grow
Looking at the front fence, in back of which, planted along the sidewalk, is a row of box hedging, now over 7 feet tall. Height restrictions of course limit privacy options for fences along the sidewalk, but as far as … Continue reading
something different in an alstroemeria
The Alstromeria isabellana that I brought home from Far Reaches Farm in Port Townsend, Washington, opened its first bloom in my garden in Southern California a couple days ago. Sean Hogan had pointed it out to me in a display … Continue reading
snapshot of August 2012
August is always a truth-telling time in the life of a garden and a good month to take a snapshot of it. The hoses have been deployed this week to deep water the trees and soak the now bone-dry soil. … Continue reading
bringing it home
Visiting first-rate plant nurseries necessarily involves purchasing plants, or so I’ve always believed — even if the purchaser is thousands of miles from home and has to shove the pots into an already bursting suitcase and then into the cramped … Continue reading
Joy Creek Nursery
Continuing the posts on my recent visit to Oregon and Washington with some unabashed flower porn courtesy of the display gardens at Joy Creek Nursery, a retail and mail-order nursery in Scappoose, Oregon. (The buddleia might be ‘Evil Ways’) I … Continue reading
Cistus Nursery
The second installment of my recent visit to Oregon and Washington (or How I Mispronounced Botanical Latin for Six Days While Touring Gardens and Nurseries of the Pacific Northwest). My own peculiar zonal filter can’t help but color these posts; … Continue reading
summer 2012 road trip: Pacific Northwest
I find vacations in the Pacific Northwest have a lot in common with Chinese food; after being home for a few days, you’re hungry for another serving of Puget Sound, please. I’m sitting at a table in my garden in … Continue reading