In the garden, and RAIN!!!! by SIGNYM

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In the garden, and RAIN!!!!

POSTED BY: SIGNYM
UPDATED: Tuesday, November 1, 2022 17:55
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Friday, December 5, 2014 11:37 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Wow, this has been a hard, hard year for gardening. Last rainy season started out early and promising; October 2013 we got a couple of good rainstorms and then .... nothing. Nothing. More nothing. Which dragged on to the historic drought.

Usually my water usage goes down during winter, but not last winter. I had to water the garden areas every week, and the lawns twice a week (one of the reasons I'm xeriscaping) just to keep them alive. I took special pains with the two avocados and the camellias because they're the grandparents of the backyard, planted by the previous owners sixty years ago. I soaked them deeply at least once a month. But despite my best efforts, the plants still suffered - not from lack of water, but possibly from high salt buildup or basic soil ... the older avocado and camellia leaves took on a pale bronzy color, and needles on my canary island pines were just beginning to turn yellow.

In addition, the tomatoes were crippled and the eggplant killed by a horrible infestation of spider mites. Last year, I gave away almost thirty pounds of homegrown tomatoes and had all of the eggplant I wanted. This year, I was lucky to have enough fresh tomatoes for a weekly salad, and just a few eggplant before they gave up the ghost. The spider mites went on to attack a few more plants (which fortunately I didn't care so much for). My Italian flat beans- which I've never grown before - and my sunflowers (which I HAVE grown before) were spindly and unproductive. Same seed source. I wonder if the seed was good. At least the corn came up OK.

Two of my recently-planted sundrops died, I only have one left. This is a good representation of what the survivor looks like in my garden

and one of my verbena lilacena died, I only have two left ... another good representation

For no reason that I can see except they really, really didn't appreciate such hard wellwater. And then, the summer was hot and humid - tropical, even - and some native plants which are adapted to cool wet winters and hot DRY summers responded with a fantastic case of mildew. I broke down and got some Neem oil so that next year I'll be prepared for the onslaught.

I have NEVER failed with so many plants all in one season! This was a gardening year I was happy to close the book on, and I now have a much MUCH greater appreciation for the commercial farmer, who lives or dies by whether plants produce or not.

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But in order to be a gardener or a farmer, one must be an optimist, I guess. I've been buying my xeriscape plants mostly in onesies and twosies because I really don't know how they'll grow, or what they'll look like ... or what I want ... and the reality is that I'll still have a surprising amount of bare space, even when the plants mature.

So I took out several of my CA native/ xeriscape gardening books, and just looked at the pictures and figured out what I respond to, and what I hate, and the principles behind both. And I just ordered a crap-ton of plants: Spanish lavender (because it looks most like the Great Basin sagebrush that I like, which won't grow here because the winters are too warm),

penstemon BOP which looks like a micro boxwood when not in bloom

white monkeyflower

blue-eyed grass

and Indian rice grass

to go with the germander sage, Dusty Miller, red autumn sage, and the creeping Oregon grape and various native currants and snowberries under the trees.

I hope, when all is done, that you would feel as if you were in some very nice landscape, something that nature had put together in a happy combination of loveliness.

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And then we got RAIN!!!! A storm last Sunday dropped an unexpected 1/2 inch of rain on our location, and the storm which followed added another inch. I once again found myself wishing I had a rain barrel or two or seven. The plants already look happier for the soft water.

So there it is for the garden so far this year. A horrible horrible season, but maybe things will turn around this rainy season year and we'll get at least the usual amount. I still plan to xeriscape more lawn, it just takes a surprising amount of plants to fill in the spaces, I'm finding out!

I hope you enjoyed the pictures. One of these days -when the plants mature - I'll take real photos of my real garden and post them online.

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Friday, December 5, 2014 4:02 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Too hot for snow?

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Friday, December 5, 2014 6:55 PM