L. is interested in planting southern border of her back yard in Leeds. The area, conveniently located below a slightly terraced sloping lawn, has good baseline soil moisture and is relatively flat and stable. In our wooded grove, a small wooded hill of boulders and dense tree cover is constant […]
The kitchen garden needs to be redone – the asparagus patch was never built for easy maintenance, and so I never maintained it. It turns out asparagus doesn’t enjoy neglect, and I am moving it to behind the tomato bed. Also other stuff, like the raspberries, which have turned out […]
I’ve come to love using trees as anchoring points for developing new garden areas; a starting point to build from that a messy brain can latch on to and think, ‘Yes! A starting point.’ Planting under established trees is challenging. It’s far easier to buy a young tree, plant it, […]
When we moved here in 2012 I was drawn to a granite outcropping in the featureless center of the backyard. There is something appealing about massive, half-buried rock lying around like a geological shipwreck, and I wanted to “do something with it”. Inauspicious beginnings: (L-R above): November 2012, three […]
So much beauty so late in the season…
We’ll assume this story is apocryphal because I can’t source it beyond Jeff and I talking about it. If it’s not apocryphal I’m likely mangling details so we’ll just consider it an illustrative ‘maybe’: When architects were designing sidewalks at UC Berkeley, they observed the natural paths made by students […]
I love culinary rue* and use a lot of it around fruit trees (supposedly it repels Japanese beetles but I have a plum tree with some thoughts to share on that point.) The smokey blue color is astounding, the shape of the leaves is weird and elegant and unlike anything […]
I love when you can touch plants with your eyes alone. When changed to black and white, texture is still enchanting. Stripping away the distraction of color lets us fully see the forms and understand why those unrelated shapes work together to make each one stand out more. (I’m not […]
Solomon’s Seal (genus Polygonatum), especially Variegated Solomon’s Seal (Polygonatum odoratum ‘Variegatum’), native Solomon’s Seal and Giant Solomon’s Seal). Rhizomatous, lankily arching, and elegant like the curves in paisley. The variegated version lives in miserable conditions along the garage. Dry, dark, abandoned. Does it distract from the concrete foundation? Maybe not, […]