Glasshouse Dreams

Posted on November 27, 2010 by Denise

With the cold snap on in the western U.S., and the heat temporarily off in our home pending repairs, the Saturday after Thanksgiving found us heading for the warmth of conservatories. Last night’s temp inside the house was 57 (Fahrenheit), so it’s not that cold, but it’s not that comfortable either.

When I stepped through the doors of the Huntington’s conservatory, where their most exquisitely sensitive specimens are housed, it felt as though we were on the heels of Rousseau.

Photobucket

Henri Rousseau never set foot in a jungle, but he did spend many afternoons in Paris’ botanical gardens and conservatories. He described his frequent visits to the Jardin des Plantes: “When I go into the glass houses and I see the strange plants of exotic lands, it seems to me that I enter into a dream.”

Photobucket

Photobucket

I usually rush by the cactus tables, but not this time. It was warm inside, so I lingered, circling the tables again and again.

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Posted in agaves, woody lilies, garden visit, succulents | Tagged , | 8 Comments

One Smooth Agave

Posted on November 23, 2010 by Denise

Not just one but a regiment of smooth agaves, A. desmettiana in bloom, a dynamic but also hauntingly melancholy sight.

Photobucket

As we agavephiles know all too well, flowering heralds their death, the definition of monocarpic.
I wonder if the Museum of Latin American Art knows that the jig is up on a large percentage of their fairly new landscaping.

Photobucket

“Smooth” refers to this agave’s lack of barbed leaves, having just the one terminal central spike.

I’ve been watching these blooming agaves at this nearby museum since before summer, scanning for signs of their inevitable descent into decrepitude, which can take up to a year once flowering begins. Knowing their days are numbered, I asked MB Maher to swing by MOLAA earlier in the week to grab some photos while they still radiated vigor, piercing the sky with bloom spikes over 6 feet in height. This landscaping was installed approximately 2007, and the smooth agave blooms after approximately ten years of age, so it seems pretty clear that large, mature agaves were chosen for maximal visual impact. There’s also cactus and aloes, Aloe striata just visible in this photo.

Photobucket

Due to a pressing pre-holiday workload, I wasn’t able to physically leave the office to gadabout taking photos of agaves in their death spiral, but that doesn’t preclude extended bouts of procrastination at my desk, hitting on nearly every A. desmettiana link in cyberspace. I tumbled into cyber rabbit hole after spider hole after rat hole, found some truly odd home videos people made about their agaves, discovered some astounding Dutch agave porn, but little useful content and much of it contradictory.

But I am now in possession of the following facts (and sharing them makes me less a procrastinator and more a researcher, doesn’t it?):

1) Agaves striata and bracteosa are some of the few agaves that don’t die after flowering. A relief to learn my little A. bracteosa may have a long life still ahead of him. I say may because it’s also reputed to be monocarpic by many sites. (Typical of Internet research, gathering information is like building on quicksand.)

2) Agave desmettiana, one “t,” is the preferred but less widely used spelling, in that the agave is named for Louis De Smet (1813-1887), a Belgian horticulturist and nurseryman.

3) Agave desmettiana cannot be reproduced from seed, only offsets. (On this blog’s All My Agaves post, I erroneously referred to mine as seed-grown, which is how they were labeled at the nursery.)

4) A study on nectar-feeding bats in Colombia found that this agave produced more pollen and 10 times more nectar than other plants visited, so its flowering is a feast for wildlife.

5) A. desmettiana may be an ancient cultivar, possibly derived from A. sisalana or A. kewensis Jacobi (the Flora of North America). Possibly originated in tropical and subtropical Mexico. There are no sightings of this agave in the wild but it has been in cultivation for centuries. The canard persists about all specimens coming from only Pre-Columbian sites. Personally, I’d love to believe Chichen Itza was once studded with this agave.

As moving as this spectacle of dying agaves is, I’m already wondering what they’ll plant in their place. For a replacement, high-impact agave, maybe the salmiana hybrid ‘Mr. Ripple,’ which doesn’t offset too obnoxiously and grows large enough to be effective in this huge space. But it does lack variegation. The variegated americanas, though large, produce way too many offsets. Maybe a variegated attenuata? More procrastinating research is in order to find the perfect landscape agave.

Photobucket

Photobucket

Photobucket

Posted in agaves, woody lilies, MB Maher | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

Veltheimia bracteata

Posted on November 23, 2010 by Denise

Yes, Joseph, this one will be a slow grower, so settle in.

My system for summer-dormant bulbs is fairly lackadaisical, as in if I’m lucky I just might trip over the pot tucked in an out-of-the-way spot and notice the new green growth. Which is pretty much what happened in early September with this South African bulb, veltheimia, lying above ground all summer in a clump of dry potting soil in the shade. I was jolted into action at the sight of the healthy green tip and promptly repotted the bulb for its winter growth cycle, keeping it above soil level and watering it in thoroughly.

Photobucket

This is what we’re hoping for, V. bracteata in flower from the Pacific Bulb Society page. Its hyacinth family lineage is easy to see in the shape of its flowers.

Photobucket

Progress as of today:

Photobucket

In my zone 10 veltheimia may be semi-dormant and not need complete drying off in summer. If I can bring this one to flower sometime late this winter, I’m going to reward myself with a serious perusal of the Telos Rare Bulb catalogue.

Posted in Bulbs, Plant Portraits | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Flea Market Sunday

Posted on November 22, 2010 by Denise

Yesterday was the third Sunday of November. When we first moved into this 1919 California bungalow, the third Sunday was kept holy each month for a huge local flea market. But once we found all the necessary vintage hinges and drawer pulls and school house lights and had filled this tiny bungalow to the rafters with all the other great stuff one invariably finds at flea markets then has to later give away for lack of space, we began to actively avoid the flea market and strove to forget the significance of the third Sunday and erase it from consciousness. The house was too small, the garage had long been turned into an office, and the temptation was too great.

If you follow the blog at Rancho Reubidoux, you’ll know they are flea market fiends. Reading the blog, the long-suppressed third-Sunday timetable was bubbling up again from the depths. I was ready for it this November.

And I had a specific goal, always a good idea with flea markets, which was to find a receptacle of some sort to set potted tropicals in for next summer, so runoff from frequent watering would pool at the bottom to be reabsorbed. Not a water garden per se, but a means to water more efficiently, and the tropicals would flourish in a couple inches of standing water.

The third Sunday dawned amidst a rainstorm that threw the entire plan into doubt. The early departure we had planned was scrapped, but when the rain abated late in the morning we decided to drive by, since it’s close. The flea market was open but with very light attendance, which made us giddy with excitement. On a busy day, it’s sometimes impossible to gain access to the vendors’ goods, ringed in by rows and rows of buyers.

I was open to any and all possibilities the flea market had to offer, saw a couple things of interest, but settled on this for its color and corrugation:

Photobucket

Serendipity and kismet is a big part of the allure of flea marketing, as in: If it hadn’t rained and the crowds of buyers had come, or if we had stayed home due to the rain…but it did rain and we didn’t stay home, and now this gorgeous hunk of verdigrised scrap metal is all mine!

I am a timid flea marketer, so indulge my boasting over the negotiating technique I used:

Me: I would like to make you an offer on this (pointing).
Vendor: Okay.
Me: You won’t like this offer, because it’s half of what you’re asking.
Vendor: Okay. And I’ll loan you a hand cart to haul it away.

More serendipity in a vendor who was a pushover. And so the deal was done.

There was also a vendor selling plants, a wonderful assortment of succulents, many of which I didn’t know. I bought an unnamed cotyledon from him I’d never seen before, a chalk fingery looking plant with a chartreuse cast to the leaves, whose identity he said had eluded the experts at the Huntington Cactus Garden. “You stumped the Huntington?” I gushed incredulously. What a savvy purveyor of plants, who may have played me like a fiddle, but it’s all part of the fun.

The next third Sunday is December 19th, rain or shine.

Posted in garden ornament | Tagged , , | 6 Comments

Pennisetum spathiolatum

Posted on November 21, 2010 by Denise

This pennisetum, the Slender Veldt Grass from South Africa, has been on my mind for some time. The form of it has, at least. I didn’t know its name until last week.

Photobucket

I was hoping to find this form in Stipa gigantea, low grassy growth, tall, waving inflorescences, which has been planted in the front gravel garden but has yet to flower.
It wasn’t until I saw this pennisetum at a nursery last week that I realized it was the one.
This grass, no more than 18 inches tall, grows as a low clump but is topped by tall, reedy inflorescences of over 3 feet beginning in early summer.
Digging Dog’s description conveys this unique habit, but other descriptions I’ve read fall short and leave it unclear as to whether you’ll be living with a 3-4 foot unmanageable beast, as stout in the middle as it is tall. The clump in the photo below is about a foot across, and Digging Dog lists mature size at 3’–4-1/2′ high x 2′ wide. (Bottom of the frame is a hesperaloe, not a grass, and one of the pennisetums is just adjacent to the hesperaloe.)

Photobucket

I brought home three in gallon cans, in full bloom, and planted them last week. My fall-planting extravaganza. As can be seen from the photos, the Slender Veldt Grass doesn’t have an exceptionally notable leaf or bloom, but this habit of growth sets it apart and gives it a place near walkways, to stir into motion with an absent-minded wave of the hand when the wind is still. Its diaphanous habit will not obscure the plantings beyond, and its aerial grace releases the eye from the tyranny ground level sometimes exerts in a small garden. I often find myself stooped over, hands behind my back, examining the low grasses and succulents and other small treasures used for the edges at the front of the garden. This little grass seems perfect for adding another dimension, mixing it up at mid-level but without adding excessive bulk.

Photobucket

(And, yes, that silly cat doesn’t seem to mind a bit of rain.)

Zoned to 7, maybe 6, evergreen in my zone 10, full sun, drought tolerant.

Edited 12/18/10 to add notes taken by My Back 40/Chuck B. from a John Greenlee lecture: “His favorite three grasses for the basic California meadow garden: Carex divulsa, Pennisetum spathiolatum, Festuca mairei. He identified three qualities important for a garden meadow grass. It should: 1) have a noticeable flower, 2) not drop seed, 3) be evergreen.”

Posted in Plant Portraits | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Got Cranberries?

Posted on November 20, 2010 by Denise

We stumbled into this sight, an impromptu cranberry bog, at Rockefeller Center this past October.

Photobucket

Who on earth could be behind such a spectacle? Exquisitely appropriate seating for the occasion in the form of picnic tables and benches running down the center of the bog, and sturdy, sensible place settings. An army of attendants. Oh, of course…

Just today I found this press release describing the ultimate meaning of this event, and perhaps the show has already aired. At the time, through signage and excited whispers, we learned that Martha Stewart was behind it all somehow but didn’t stay for her arrival. I think we were heading for onion soup at the Waldorf-Astoria and could not be deterred. Watching those cranberries slosh and swirl in the wake of assistants shod in wellies was mesmerizing, though.

If cranberries and horseradish sounds like a good idea, give Mama Stamberg’s Cranberry Relish Recipe a try. And give thanks your dinner table isn’t sitting in a cranberry bog.

Posted in Ephemera | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Award-Winning Los Gatos Project

Posted on November 19, 2010 by Denise

Jarrod R. Baumann of Zeterre Landscape Architecture designed this Los Gatos residential landscape with Jim Everett of Evland LLC as his lead contractor. Earlier this week it was announced that for his work as lead contractor on this project, Mr. Everett has won the Stuart J. Sperber Sweepstakes Award for 2010. That means that the project was judged best landscape installation for all projects, commercial and residential, for the entire state.

Congratulations to Jim Everett for the well-deserved award. And a quick peek of the project, which will no doubt be the centerfold of magazines in the coming months.

Posted in garden visit, MB Maher | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

Hail To The Thief

Posted on November 17, 2010 by Denise

Sub rosa footage taken through the kitchen door window late in the evening two nights ago.
We thought a possum might be responsible for what was becoming the nightly theft of cat food, and that was exciting enough to contemplate.

Photobucket

I’ll have to explain that living solidly in urban Los Angeles as we do, our own neighborhood running a huge deficit of parks, with the surrounding fauna mostly dogs, cats, and birds, this thrills us no end.

Obviously, we’re just not staying up late enough to absorb the entirety of wildlife that visits the garden.

Awed whispers described his girth and beautiful coat. Someone murmured in appreciation, “How dexterous he is!”

Photobucket

Dexter did manage to knock the container off the porch, open the lid, and eat the contents, which wasn’t much.
But still, we don’t want to turn Dexter into a dependent softie, so we’re bringing the cat food container in at night.
I’d prefer his appetite stay keen, omnivore that he is, for my garden snails.

Posted in creatures, garden visit | Tagged , | 7 Comments

Foliage Follow-Up November 2010

Posted on November 16, 2010 by Denise

Hosted by Pam at Digging, where we’re regularly treated to the best in Austin, Texas gardens.

I have to confess that it’s not just fall that brings leaves into prominence in my garden. Though I give it my best shot, flowers are increasingly incidental, verging on
rarities.

Euphorbia rigida and Sedum nussbaumerianum.

Photobucket

I’ve photographed this sedum quite a bit, but couldn’t resist including it again today. This pair is the first thing I see entering my back gate. Arriving this morning from a before-dawn, 3-hour freeway commute, they were balm for road-tired eyes. The euphorbia was planted over the summer. The sedum is a large, established clump that acts like a traffic cone on a corner of the path from the back door to the office, guiding corgi paws along the prescribed route around the plantings and eliminating the temptation to cut corners across the garden. I have to say that this euphorbia right off the bat is a much better performer than E. myrsinites for me, which is slightly similar but has a more sprawling habit of growth. This E. rigida is now my go-to spurge, and I plan to grow lots more of it.

A couple feet away from the euphorbia and sedum, deeper into the garden bed, is this purple mizuna, a kale with heavily dissected leaves and red stems, planted just over the weekend. I asked for a volunteer taste-tester to sample it before sprinkling a few well-washed leaves into some chicken soup. “Tastes like caterpillars.” No, I didn’t ask a child’s opinion but a grown, seemingly adult man’s. (Doesn’t taste like caterpillars at all, unless they happen to be mildly peppery.)

Photobucket

Agave desmettiana under siege from Senecio vitalis. I like my plants grown tight, but this is getting scary. I do think the fact that this is one of my least scarred agaves is due to the physical protection it gets from the Blue Chalk Fingers, which will be trimmed away more and more as the agave gains size.

Photobucket

Arundo donax ‘Golden Chain,’ planted this fall.

Photobucket

Linnaeus help me, I’ve misplaced the name of this succulent. I’ll find it and edit it in later. A fabulous one. Must be a grapto-something.

Photobucket

A very elegant, lemony coprosma, a golden form of C. areolata.

Photobucket

Echeverias and aloes.

Photobucket

Graptoveria, Senecio mandraliscae, Oscularia deltoides with the little blue leaves and pink stems.

Photobucket

A species leptospermum from Strybing Arboretum, unlabeled, showing fresh growth.

Photobucket

The New Zealand leptospermums used to be such fashionable plants in Southern California, now slightly out of favor. Wonderfully sharp, peppery smell to their myrtle-like leaves. They have a romantic, windswept habit of growth that now is often meatball-pruned into submission. It is fascinating how plants dip in and out of fashion, and how when they’re out of fashion, invariably the secateurs get sharpened.

No time to explore that today, but for some wry observations on the foibles of fashion, it doesn’t get any more cutting than the Kinks’ A Dedicated Follower of Fashion.

(No idea why Harrison Ford is included in the video. “Carnabetian” refers to Carnaby Street, a London shopping district.)

Posted in agaves, woody lilies, garden visit, succulents | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

POTUS Gives State Tour of White House Vegetable Garden

Posted on November 15, 2010 by Denise

President Barack Obama leads Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, center, and Vice President Joe Biden on a tour of the White House Kitchen Garden following their meeting in the Oval Office, July 1, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza).

Photobucket

You can sign up for the White House Daily Snapshot here.

Posted in garden visit | Tagged | 1 Comment