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Gopher Architecture

As much as this particular landscape has evolved during the past three years since this recycled article posted, the gophers remain.

Tony Tomeo

P90922If gopher burrows had windows, this burrow would have hillside views. If gophers had better eyesight, the one who lives here could enjoy the views from such windows. Of course, views are not a concern for any gopher. They just want to burrow through the soil to eat the many roots they encounter. They do not often emerge from their homes for more than the ejection of soil.

If it happens in gardens and landscapes, the consumption of roots by gophers is a serious problem. It can kill substantial plants faster than associated symptoms become apparent. Agaves and yuccas that are safe from grazing animals that might want to eat them from above have no protection from gopher who attack from below. Small perennials and annuals get taken whole.

Excavation such as that in these two pictures is a major problem too. When I see soil accumulating here, I wonder…

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Six on Saturday – II: Six More

Well, I do not make a habit of recycling Six on Saturday posts, but this is what I have for today from three years ago.

Tony Tomeo

‘Six on Saturday‘ is a popular popular gardening meme that many of us garden bloggers participate in on Saturdays. The link explains how it works. Simply, we post six pictures of what is happening in our gardens or landscapes at the time, along with brief explanations. Mine just posted at midnight. I know I should be done, but I happened to find a few more pictures to share.

These six pictures of marigolds that were just installed at work are not as interesting as the topic I wrote about earlier, but are just too pretty to be discarded before I show them off. The second and third pictures, as well as the fourth and the fifth pictures, might be redundant to each other if they show the same varieties of marigolds, but I do not care. They are all so pretty.

Marigold will not likely be featured in…

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Six on Saturday: Craigslist

Craigslist is becoming a bad habit for me. It was the source of the overly abundant canna that I featured earlier, as well as severn Mexican fan palms. Last Wednesday, I procured a big pile of surplus purple bearded iris and African iris, free of charge. The bearded iris are ideal for a new ‘iris bed’ that formerly lacked occupancy. The African iris were heeled in and canned for later installation into another landscape that is not yet developed. The acquisition was very fortuitous, but also necessitated a bit of effort to process all the iris. After I either canned or heeled in all of the African iris, I installed all of the bearded iris, fortunately, by yesterday evening.

1. African iris, Morea iridioides, (which is also fortnight lily, Dietes iridioides and Dietes vegeta), could have potentially been divided into more than a hundred individual pups!

2. A few small clumps of pups were either already separated from the primary colony, or were dug from elsewhere in the same garden, so were divided and processed separately.

3. The few divided and processed pups were then heeled into two #5 cans for installation directly into a landscape, preferably prior to resuming foliar growth at the end of winter.

4. The bulky primary colony was merely groomed and divided into four big clumps, and canned into #5 cans, likely to be divided as pups or smaller clumps for later installation.

5. Bearded iris generated more than a hundred rhizomes, which is enough for more than fifty linear feet if installed half a foot apart, and now occupies nearly half of the ‘iris bed’.

6. They might not look like much yet, but after settling in through winter, should bloom well for spring, grow through summer, and bloom spectacularly for the following spring.

This is the link for Six on Saturday, for anyone else who would like to participate: https://thepropagatorblog.wordpress.com/2017/09/18/six-on-saturday-a-participant-guide/

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Ponytail Palm

In its native ecosystem, ponytail palm grows as a small tree.

Some succulent plants and their friends do not mind being grown as houseplants. Ponytail palm, Beaucarnea recurvata, is one of those rare friends of succulents that actually prefers to be inside, at least during winter when they can be damaged by cool weather and moisture. Plants that are houseplants through winter and get moved out to the garden through summer should be protected from harsh direct exposure since their foliage is adapted to the home environment. Otherwise, ponytail palm likes the sunniest rooms in the house.

The weird distended caudex at the base of the stem is the most distinctive feature of the ponytail palm, which as actually neither a palm, nor outfitted with ponytails. However, almost like a palm, pruning a solitary top down will likely be fatal. (Pruning the terminal bud off the top of a palm will necessarily be fatal to the affected trunk.) Unlike (solitary) palms, ponytail palm can eventually develop multiple trunks, which can be pruned off if absolutely necessary.

In their natural environment, ponytail palms can get to be shade trees with sparse limbs terminating with tufts of narrow strap shaped leaves. Yet, as slowly growing houseplants confined to containers, they rarely get more than six feet tall after many years. They really need good drainage, and prefer to be watered only about twice to four times monthly.

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Succulents Are A Diverse Group

If Agave are succulents, are closely related Yucca also succulents?

There really is no way to neatly classify succulents. Many are spiny cacti with fleshy stems without recognizable foliage. Others are euphorbs (related to poinsettias) that may resemble cacti, or may instead have fragile leaves on fleshy stems. Aloes and agaves have bold rosettes of fleshy leaves that obscure their wide basal stems.

The most familiar succulents are small docile perennials, like the many varieties of jade plants and iceplants. Some are flowering perennials like begonias. A few are even grown as annuals, like busy Lizzie (impatiens).

So what do succulents have in common? Well, that is a good question that is open to interpretation. Most would agree that succulents have some sort of fleshy succulent parts for storing water through dry weather. These succulent parts are most often leaves or stems. Yet, yuccas, dracaenas and ponytail palm that are no more succulent than palms, are considered by many to be succulents like related aloes and agaves.

Many succulents are remarkably easy to propagate vegetatively (without seed). Most aloes, some agaves and many yuccas produce pups, which are basal shoots that can be separated as new plants. Agaves that do not produce pups while young will likely produce many pups after they bloom and begin to deteriorate. (Individual rosettes die after blooming.)

Despite the nasty spines that make them difficult to handle, cactus that produce multiple trunks can likewise be divided. Cactus can alternatively be propagated as large cuttings; but because they are so fleshy, should be left out for their cut ends to dry and ‘cauterize’ somewhat before rooting. Many euphorbs behave much like cacti, but are even more hazardous to handle because of their very caustic sap.

The majority of small succulents, like the many jade plants and iceplants, are notoriously easy to propagate by cuttings.

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Horridculture – On The Fence

Well, at least they are good support for grapevines.

Tony Tomeo

P90522Where I lived in town, the backyard was surrounded on three sides by fences, with the house on the only unfenced fourth side. These were the sort of fences that were common in suburban neighborhoods. They kept children and dogs in or out of adjacent gardens, and probably provided some sense of privacy, although I never understood why we all needed such privacy there.

I mean, if I really wanted significant privacy, I would not have lived in town, where the homes and gardens were all so close together. I enjoyed living there, and I enjoyed my neighbors. We could hear some of each others conversations and televisions, but no one seemed to mind. It was worth living in such an excellent neighborhood so close to everything we could want in town.

Years ago, suburban fences were not too obtrusive. They were only about four feet high. Some of the…

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Radish

All parts of radish are edible.

Everyone seems to be familiar with radish, Raphanus raphanistrum subspecies sativus. It has been so popular with so many cultures for so long that its origin is now impossible to identify. It likely originated in Southeastern Asia at least two thousand years ago. After so many centuries, it has become remarkably variable in regard to flavor, form and color.

Radish are generally cool season root vegetables, although their foliage and flowers are also edible. They can be red, pink, purple, yellow, green, black or white, with white flesh. Their form might be almost spherical, cylindrical or tapered like a carrot. Small types are only about an inch to three inches long. Some daikon radish can get as long as two feet!

Because radish are typically smaller than most other root vegetables, they mature faster. Therefore, their seed can get started in their garden slightly later. If they mature too soon, warmth may cause them to bolt, which ruins their flavor and texture. Subsequent phases extend production, by resuming production as previous phases exhaust their production.

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Cole Vegetables Are Cool Vegetables

Mustard greens are cultivated and naturalized.

September began with the warmest weather of the year. Such weather is not uncommon for late summer here. It can happen as late as early autumn. Still, it can be disconcerting while weather should be cooling. Cool season vegetable plants that are technically now seasonable dislike such warmth. Cole vegetables are particularly responsive to weather.

Cole vegetables are within the Cruciferae family, which is alternatively the Brassicaceae family. They therefore also classify as crucifers or brassicas. They include various forms of broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, collard, kale, kohlrabi, mustard, turnip, radish, arugula, rutabaga and Brussels sprouts. As variable as they are, several are of the same species.

Broccoli and cauliflower are floral vegetables, since their primary edible parts are bloom. Brussels sprouts, cabbage, collard, kale, arugula, mustard greens and turnip greens are foliar. Turnip, radish and rutabaga are roots. Kohlrabi is a distended stem. Mustard seed, which is a seasoning instead of a vegetable, is the only common fruiting cole vegetable.

Therefore, unlike most warm season vegetables, cole vegetables should not fruit or go to seed. Broccoli and cauliflower only begin to bloom, but do not finish prior to harvest. This is why most cole vegetables are cool season vegetables here. Warmth stimulates bolting and bloom, which ruins flavor and palatability. Cool weather prolongs vegetative growth.

Contrary to the implications of recent weather, cool season vegetables, including several cole vegetables, are seasonable. This is the time to sow seed for turnip, radish, rutabaga and other cool season root vegetables directly into the garden. Transplant of seedlings is disfiguring to roots. Weather should be cooler by the time new seedlings start to develop.

Arugula, turnip greens, mustard greens, collard, kale and kohlrabi likewise develop most efficiently from seed. However, transplanted seedlings can be adequately productive too. Because only a few broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and Brussels sprouts plants are likely sufficient, cell pack seedlings are likely more practical than seed. Since they are already growing, they can get planted a bit later.

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Another Johnny Appleseed

. . . Brent is an idiot.

Tony Tomeo

P90330+++++

Just to be clear, I earned the title of Johnny Appleseed before my colleague Brent Green did. While Brent was secretive about our tree planting projects in Los Angeles, I was not so about our similar projects in Los Gatos. While Brent’s neighbors wondered where their new street trees were coming from, mine read about their new park trees in the Los Gatos Weekly Times.

In fact, the exposure from that article is how I started my weekly gardening column in the same newspaper just a few months later, in October of 1998. Los Gatos is a smaller town than Los Angeles is. Secrecy was not an option. Sadly, our projects in Los Gatos, and then in Scott’s Valley, did not continue. We concentrated our urban tree planting efforts in Mid City Los Angeles.

The tree planting projects that I am referring to are our Birthday Trees that I wrote…

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Mr. McNugget

Goodness! This old post reminds me that I have not seen Mr. McNugget in quite a while. I rarely go to the landscapes that he inhabits nowadays.

Tony Tomeo

P90914KWildlife is a topic that is notably lacking from my articles. I mention only that which must be ‘escorted’ out of the landscapes, like Halston Junior. Gophers, racoons, squirrels, rats, skunks, mice, opossums, rabbits, deer, mountain lions, coyotes, rattlesnakes, turkeys, geese, woodpeckers, jays, crows, bees, wasps, mosquitoes, flies and feral boars can potentially be problematic.

There are probably at least a few more. This list does not even include bad neighbors or domestic animals. Nor does it include foxes, just because they eat mice, rats and snails, and do not seem to cause any problems. Butterflies and most birds, except those listed, are quite tolerable. Insects and mites that damage plants deserve their own list. I don’t know where ticks fit in.

Most unwelcome wildlife at least tries to stay out of my way. Others seem to make sport of antagonizing me. Skunks try to be friendly; but I…

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