Author Archives: Denise
on the tour; chasing variegated chimeras
A garden I visited on Saturday decidedly belonged to a devotee of the variegated leaf. (It takes one to know one.) The infatuation wasn’t apparent at first glance. This was a mature garden, well-treed, bambooed and shrubbed. But after every … Continue reading
Agave parryi ‘Cream Spike’
This is such a sweet agave for containers. Under a foot across in ultimate size, it is nevertheless a busy little mother. Just before its photo, I had cleaned out the offsets it produces so freely, which I’ll grow on … Continue reading
Schefflera actinophylla ‘Soleil’
I’ve recently added the houseplant section to my itinerary when visiting plant nurseries, a group of plants I’ve mostly been ignoring, so there’s basically no category of plants now that goes uninvestigated. Let me just say that this is an … Continue reading
shop chair plant stands
Marty grabbed these two tall, slim shop chairs from a salvage yard in Gardena for cheap today, as a future sand-and-paint project. In the meantime, I think I’ve found two new plant stands.
Posted in pots and containers
Tagged Eucalyptus 'Moon Lagoon', plant stands, salvage, Yucca rostrata
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on the tour; Passiflora vitifolia
The self-guided Mary Lou Heard Memorial Garden Tour stretches from my hometown in Long Beach to about 50 miles south, as far as San Clemete and Mission Viejo. For much too short a span of time, but long enough for … Continue reading
Cinema Botanica; 2014’s best garden in a supporting role
The Great Beauty, awarded the Oscar for best foreign film in 2014, is mysterious and ravishing, like the formal garden Jep’s balcony overlooks, where a nun and children play hide and seek, with the battered hulk of Rome’s Coliseum looming … Continue reading
Posted in Cinema Botanica, design
Tagged formal gardens, Italian gardens, The Great Beauty
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aftermath of a spring heat wave
Unseasonal, sudden onset heat, like cold, is similarly not in a plant’s best interests. The pristine good looks of Agave ‘Blue Flame’ took a hit last week. Poor thing didn’t have time to develop a base coat and suffered a … Continue reading
Posted in agaves, woody lilies, Occasional Daily Weather Report, Plant Portraits
Tagged Agave 'Blue Flame', Agave celsii var. albicans 'UCB', Anigozanthos, Coprosma 'Plum Hussy', Eryngium pandanifolium, Gaillardia 'Oranges & Lemons', Harpochloa falx 'Compact Black, Lavandula multifida, Melanoselinum decipiens, Orlaya grandiflora, Pelargonium 'Golden Lemon Crispum', Plectranthus neochilus, Russelia equisetiformis, Salvia sclarea 'Piemont', Senecio leucostachys (vira-vira)
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a succulent table (filed under fun but useless things)
If I wake up to a day that has a few extra hours rattling around like loose change in the pockets of Marty’s jeans that I always borrow, clinking against paper clips and last night’s Peroni bottle cap, it’s pretty … Continue reading
isoplexis and digiplexis side by side
There’s no telling which of these, if either, will be around for photos next year, so now’s the time for a side-by-side color comparison.According to this article, it was Isoplexis canariensis that was crossed with Digitalis purpurea to give us … Continue reading
this is my brain on spring
Spring is such a massive distraction, and that’s coming from just my own little garden, which apart from work* I rarely want to leave. For the first time in my adult life, I drove by a multiplex theater on Sunday … Continue reading
Posted in garden travel, plant nurseries, succulents
Tagged alcantarea, Andy's Orchids, bromeliads, Cerbera odollam, Cosmos 'Yellow Garden', eiphyllums, Entada sp., epidendrums, Graptopetalum pentandrum ssp. superbum, Graptopetalum superbum 'Cotton Candy', rhipsalis sp., Southern California Spring Garden Show 2014, tillandsias
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