tuning up; notes on spring cleanup

I worked for 20 years in a profession famous for repetitive stress injuries to the wrists (court reporting) and never suffered from one and could only wonder what it must feel like to those having to wear wrist splints as part of daily attire. Now I wonder no more. Cutting back the garden since arriving in early April, the right wrist really started to feel it. It’s back to normal now, but that marathon spring cutback session needs rethinking. While the pain memory is still fresh, I thought some notes on tuning up this spring garden might be helpful to review next spring, hopefully prompting some workarounds. (For comparison, the cleanup work we put into the Los Angeles garden last October was exhausting, but no one particular muscle group was affected more than the other — everything hurt!)

Dierama needs careful cleanup due to its asymmetric and akimbo growth pattern that juts out stalks awkwardly. I sacrificed some summer blooms to lasso it back into a more vase-like outline and trimmed a lot of its ratty blades. (The Olearia x mollis ‘Zennorensis’ directly behind the dierama surprisingly flourished, but the two shapes fought each other. Which one to move? Not wanting to set back blooms on the dierama, I opted to move the olearia to the front garden, which has a mostly evergreen presence.) The giant restio Rhodocoma capensis was thinned a lot; arguably, it needs a bigger garden than mine, but even reduced and thinned it has a strong presence, so it stays for now. And it definitely has more breathing room now that the tetrapanax is gone — above ground anyway!

Something Ketzel Levine said at Manzanita’s Wonder Garden plant sale last weekend stuck with me. Some of us volunteers were looking at a congested clump of Eryngium paniculatum, and our fearless director said sometimes it’s best to dig up and divide a mature clump rather than waste time trying to clean it. Now, to me, a mature clump of anything is a huge asset, capable of producing more blooms, and some tap-rooted plants don’t take lightly to being divided, but the general point is well taken. The giant eryngo in my garden, E. padanifolium, becomes a congested mass of spiky leaves, very scratchy cleanup work. I opted for a shortcut this week and removed most of the rosettes, leaving the largest. And as for Stipa gigantea, this evergreen grass needs a lot of tidying and cutting back of old bloom spikes, and I’ll most likely divide it next spring and start fresh –.I wouldn’t be without it. The seslerias and deschampsias also need extensive raking and trimming.

Between the two clumps of Silver Spike Grass grew one of the many divisions of Succisella inflexa spread throughout the garden, a fizzy pollinator-attracting perennial that adores growing conditions here and quickly extends to sizeable clumps. With pale lavender, knautia-like flowers, it was a boon to the new garden but becoming an aggressive spreader. Only one clump remains. Symphytum ‘Axminster Gold’ was found at Blooming Junction, a good nursery an hour and a half away. (We made a couple trips to a nearby mechanic to get my Mini Cooper checked out, so there were some unexpected plant shopping opportunities. Garaged all winter, nevertheless, upon startup the Mini had a fit and was throwing multiple computer codes, and the windows, turn signals and windshield wipers wouldn’t work. A hefty repair bill for the Mini at 14 years old, 100,000 miles, but we’ve no interest in car shopping at the moment!)

The comfrey is a much better background for the camassias than the nondescript green leaves of succisella, and as it gains size and spills over the riser it will help conceal the dying camassia leaves.

Overall, since breaking ground in October 2021, more plants have survived than failed, so there’s been lots of digging and relocating this spring. (The only transplant I fear may not survive is Sinopanax formosanus, which flourished in a location that was inappropriate for the size it was attaining, so it had to be moved in any case.) Regrettably I did remove Hebe parviflora var. angustifolia, and will miss its glowing willowy presence when at its peak of summer/fall beauty. As it grew to over 4 feet, however, its scruffy spring presence became harder to ignore.

I expected a similarly scruffy appearance from the stock tank beschorneria, but the buffering effect from the nearby Cassinia x ozothamnus may have saved it from winter’s worst. See, it pays to overplant!

The anthriscus share ground with a young Stachyurus salicifolia, melianthus, Aralia cordata ‘Sun King’ and a nicely maturing Thalictrum ‘Elin’ just in front of the stock tank.

Also here, Thalictrum ‘Black Stockings’ can’t hold a candle to the majesty of ‘Elin’ (imho). Digitalis ferruginea is reseeding almost too prolifically here, and I’m trialing a couple Digitalis lutea too.

More photos and less words soon!