Out with the old

My maidenhair fern couldn't hack it in my urns, so I switched them out today. Also put up these tiny bud vases for some summer color.

As you can see above, my failing rose is completely revived. I came back from a trip out of town to these colorful blooms. Unfortunately, my other roses aren't doing well at all. One has lifeless flowers and the other can't seem to make new growth. Suggestions?

Last Week's Harvest

Joi Choi, Cabbage, and the first zucchini.

More from Filoli

Filoli- The Gardens

Although the house is amazing, the real reason to go to Filoli is to wander the grounds.

An Experiment

I tired of the aging poppies and asylum in the front bed, so I ripped them up when the rain took a break today. I left the daffodil greens so they can keep storing up energy for next year, but planted some of my extra vegetable garden seedlings and seeds as an experiment: Cosmos Versailles Mix, Marigold Gem Mix, Horned Voila, Matina Tomatoes, Mammoth Basil, Red Belle Peppers, and Speedy Bush Beans. I may add some peppers and other herbs later. The front bed gets great light but the soil seems poor and is constantly attacked by burrowing animals. Too lazy to do real digging and amending, I added some fertilizer and planted in pockets of planting mix. We'll see what happens. Below are photos of the construction site.

Home Sweet Home

We left on vacation for a few days and I'm amazed at how our puppy and the gardens have grown in the small amount of time we were gone. Life is like that I suppose, always moving on. I picked the first, albeit small, carrot and a few ripe strawberries. Found a little volunteer tea rose hiding under the front citrus tree and a rogue pansy in with the poppies. All promises of good things to come.

Scenes from the Backyard

Officially an old Southern lady

I have my very own hat to prove it.

Advice for Novice Gardeners

Can be found here. And I'm guilty of many numbers on his list...

Green Envy

From Brix in Napa:

Crime Scene

Dislike

I absolutely hate the black fabric people use to create flower beds. I know it is supposed to keep weeds out of a bed, but is it really necessary? Doesn't it inhibit the natural progression of things- decomposition and so on? Seems counterintuitive to the whole "grow your soil" movement. Other reasons I hate it:

- Made planting bulbs difficult as I had to cut through the fabric and pull it apart

- Made enlarging the bed difficult as there was hidden structuring (staking and boards) to keep it down

- Makes planting anything new difficult as it is quite shallow

I'd dig it all up but this is a rental and I've decided it isn't worth the effort. But I'm going to keep on hating it.

** After writing the above, I checked my favorite garden blog. She agrees! Go here to see what else she doesn't like.

Around the Yard

The sweet peas:

Below is the back bed with petunias, foxglove, and hellebores finding their way through the old daffodils. Trying to restrict the color palette to whites and muted tones- a lesson I've learned from working on the front yard. The wildflowers I sowed are a bit too varied, making the front look cluttered and undirected.
First bloom on my JFK rose:

And now my sweet sad rose. It was lousy with leaves and buds before I hacked away at the black spot. Just a twig of a thing now:

And despite my best intentions, the black spot has returned:

I'm letting the leaves be from now on. Gave her some fertilizer and hope she bounces back.

April's Project: Backyard

Now that the front yard is under control, I've begun focusing my energy on the backyard. When we moved in it was a wasteland except for some singed grass and a few lavender plants here and there. The other week, I spent some time researching part sun/shade plants that are appropriate to Palo Alto's climate and came home with an assortment of:

Delphinium 'belladonna Casablanca', 'Galahad'

Pacific Giant Delphinium 'Blue Jay'

White Storm Petunias

Confection White Nemesia

Helleborus Orientalis 'White Lady Spotted'

Abutilon 'Tiger Eye'

Digitalis Purpurea (Foxglove): 'Apricot Beauty', 'Camelot Lavender', and 'Foxy'

Planted them between my spent daffodils around the patio. Hoping they will establish themselves and stay green at least throughout the summer. My new irrigation line should help.

In other news, I received three trees for my birthday: Black Jack Fig, Bears's Lime, and Santa Rosa Plum. All recommended in Sunset Western Garden for my area. I aged their terracotta pots with yogurt and expect fruit in the future.

The vegetable garden continues to grow although the slugs are doing their best to take over the place. I'm combatting them with Sluggo, beer traps, and old fashioned picking-them-off. I refuse to let my beans, kale, and joi choi go without a fight.

I planted red, yellow, and white onions today. A bit late for this zone, but the starters were a gift from an unidentified source and I have nothing to lose.

Snow peas producing like crazy, sweet peas in full bloom, and strawberries teasing me with baby berries.

It is about time for some more photos on here. I'll get to it soon, I promise.

My problems with Roses

Besides disliking the cliche red bouquet, I'd never thought much about roses until I moved into a Los Angeles apartment with a couple of rose bushes out front. They'd flower every once in a while and didn't seem to require any attention from me - ever. That apartment had a gardener who'd come by once a month or so to tidy things up. At first I was upset that he kept cutting back the branches, but soon realized that this pruning helped keep the bush in production. So I continued to ignore the bushes.

Then I moved to another rental up North and inherited two rose bushes. The front bush was covered in spent flowers and many of the leaves were yellowing or had black spots. I'd learned enough in Los Angeles to know that dead heading could help. And it did. The bush continued to bloom well into the fall. While pruning, I found that the rose seemed to be two bushes growing closely together. Why anyone would have planted them this way was beyond me, but I thought the tiny buds growing at the side were a cute bonus. This shows you how little I knew about roses.

When I started work on the front yard in February, I thought adding more roses could help with the continuity. But I didn't do much research and just picked two from the nursery that looked pretty and came recommended (Double Delight and John F. Kennedy). I soaked the roots, made holes in the ground, fertilized, and planted. And only after this did I really start my rose education.

The neighbor across the street (who seems to know all things plant related) called the tiny tea rose shooting off my original bush "pedestrian." Then he explained the whole grafting phenomenon which this beginning gardener should have already known. As per his instructions, I pruned the "Perfect Moment" heavily and brought out the big shovel to try to rid myself of the offending shoots from the rootstock. Crisis averted. Or so I thought.

I started to read more about roses- the types, grafting and pruning techniques, care instructions, and so on. But the more I read, the more behind I realized I was.

An example: My Perfect Moment started to get black spot again. Every book I read told me that it was irreversible. My only hope was to pick off all infected leaves and spray with fungicide. So I went to the crunchy, organic nursery and bought the spray then picked off so many leaves, the bush looked like a bunch of thorny twigs and sprayed it down. After two weeks, it is still an eyesore. And the neighbor has since advised me to scrap the spray and just plant garlic around the base. Oy. I really had tried to do my research and failed yet again.

Another example: This one deals with my new roses. In Second Nature, Michael Pollan describes the downside to modern hybrid roses. In fact, he says very little that is positive about them. Instead, he lauds Old English Roses that seem to be hardier and produce flowers only once a season. My Double Delight and J.F.K are certainly hybrids and certainly not up to snuff according to Mr. Pollan. So here I seem to have failed again.

The good to come out of all my follies: I'll know better next time.

Flora Grubb

Went here today. Heaven.

The Garden Plan

Because I'm testing out crop rotation and companion planting, it seemed only necessary to draft a plan of the garden. As you can see, we're trying to fit in a wide array of edibles in the 10' by 12' bed. As things grow, produce, and die, I'll keep notes for the future. In addition to what is in the bed, I've filled just about every discarded pot, bucket, and old trash can around with potting soil and planted root veggies like beets, radishes, and carrots. Few seeds germinate under our oak tree, so I'm hoping to get a harvest out of my containers.

In the mail today from The Cook's Garden:

-hot pepper spray to go to task on the aphids

-seeds: herbs, yellow currant tomato, summer lettuce mix, hot pepper mix, empress of india nasturtiums, versaille cosmos mix, rainbow bell pepper mix, hot dance pepper mix, tri color pole beans, and cannelino beans

-Suzanne Ashworth's Seed to Seed - in hopes that I can learn to seed save this year and reduce my need to purchase them

Three in one day

This looks pitiful in comparison to the Gamble property, but the vegetables should still taste great regardless of what the garden looks like.

Trying out companion planting and starting to use the "biointensive" method of spacing instead of rows. It's all a mish-mosh at the moment.

Above: Blueberry bushes and daffodils on their last legs. When the daffodils are completely spent, I'll remove the bulbs and repurpose the pots for veggies.

Elizabeth Gamble Garden - 2

Some additional pictures of the grounds:

What my Euphorbia would have looked like (if they hadn't died):
Master gardener flower plots:
Peaceful fountain:
Something about this area reminded me of Greek mythology. Maybe it was because I wanted to "spend all my life on the bench at the very end" but reconsidered just in case I could be cursed like Midas... too much of a good thing you know:
The gardens are just heavenly. If you find yourself in Palo Alto, you must visit.