Posted on by tonytomeo

Unplanned Green Roof

Red willow can be an annoying weed, not because it is prolific, but because it so quickly grows into an aggressive tree that must be cut down.

tonytomeo's avatarTony Tomeo

p90106The last green roof that I wrote about was planned, although not in a typical manner. https://tonytomeo.com/2017/11/25/green-roof/ It is still my favorite green roof. Otherwise, I am none too keen on the fad. Very few buildings benefit from green roofs, and green roofs really do take more work than conventional landscapes in the ground.

The sort of green roof pictured here was most certainly not planned. It could have been the result of a an uncleaned gutter. All sorts of weeds can grow in the damp debris that can wash off of roofs, particularly in damp and foggy coastal climates where moisture so often drips from the edges of roofs. This gutter is just a short distance from the beach in Santa Cruz. The willows in the San Lorenzo River are next door.

Knowing what I know about this particular type of willow, I would guess that the cleanliness of…

View original post 147 more words

Posted on by tonytomeo · 13 Comments

Six on Saturday: Native Range?

Valley oak, Quercus lobata, and Coast live oak, Quercus agrifolia, which I featured here last week, are the two formerly prominent native oaks of the Santa Clara Valley. I do not know if valley oak is native to the Santa Cruz Mountains above the Santa Clara Valley. It should be; and I should know for certain. However, I am not convinced. It is a chaparral species, not a forest species. The several old specimens in the Santa Cruz Mountains are on roadsides and in other situations where they seem to have been planted intentionally. Yet, this region developed mostly after the Great Earthquake of 1906, and not much was here prior to that, but some of the valley oaks seem to be a few centuries old.

1. A different perspective of the same valley oak from last Saturday conceals major storm damage that is otherwise so prominent. This really is a grand tree, in a perfect situation.

2. Although this is not a good picture, and does not seem to show much, it demonstrates how this tree is squarely centered within this view from the old depot baggage platform.

3. From the opposite side, the trunk obscures the baggage platform. Was it planted there intentionally? If so, why was it not centered on the window or doorway of the old depot?

4. It is just coincidence that the tree is situated so ideally on the edge of an area that was formerly used for parking? It was already old when cars still had horses in front of them.

5. Valley oak is such a grand tree. As big and sculptural as this specimen is, it is perhaps a century or so younger than the other tree. It was still quite small and shrubby in 1906.

6. Even the leaves are distinguished. The leaves of the trees in my former neighborhood had rounder lobes and sinuses. I do not know if such traits are environmental or genetic.

This is the link for Six on Saturday, for anyone else who would like to participate:

Six on Saturday – a participant guide
Posted on by tonytomeo

English Walnut

It may take a few years for a walnut tree to grow into a sculptural specimen with striking white limbs.

Like many ‘English’ plants, the English walnut, Juglans regia, is not actually from England. It is Persian, so is quite comfortable here in California. However, the foliar litter and husks contain a natural herbicide that can make nearby seed grown plants and annuals uncomfortable. Planted trees are typically grafted onto native California black walnut understock (roots) that is more resistant to disease, and improves stability.

Mature trees can be as tall as seventy five feet with trunks as wide as five feet, but are almost always significantly smaller, and even proportionate to urban gardens, although notoriously messy with bloom, leaves and nuts. The pinnately compound leaves are generally less than a foot long, with five to nine leaflets that can be between two to six inches long, and about two inches wide. The bark is notably smooth and gray until trees get quite old and furrowed.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 2 Comments

Even bare trees have style.

This big perennial ‘sticks of fire’ produces a thicket of bright yellowish orange stems that changes shades through the seasons.

Everyone knows that flowers provide color in the garden, particularly through spring and summer. As blooms become less abundant in autumn, fall color of deciduous plants and trees becomes more prominent. After most plants are finished blooming, and most of the fall color is gone, the garden may seem relatively bleak for winter. Only evergreen foliage remains. This is when plants that exhibit colorful bark or bare twigs really get noticed.

Various types of birch trees exhibit striking white bark all year. While the trees are bare in winter, the bark becomes even more prominent, particularly against a backdrop of evergreen trees. English walnut trees are not as striking, but are more sculptural. Fig trees (fruiting types) are more gray than white, so are more reliant on a backdrop of rich evergreen foliage or a darkly painted wall for contrast; but they grow fast enough to become interesting sculptural specimens within a few years. 

Bright white or light gray bark are certainly no substitute for the colors of flowers or foliage, but are striking nonetheless. They exploit the starkness of winter, and the sculptural nature of bare trunks and limbs.

Even without the sculptural structure of birch, walnut or fig trees, the more colorful twiggy growth of coral bark Japanese maple and osier dogwood trees can be quite an advantage in a stark winter landscape. As the name implies, coral bark Japanese maple has pinkish orange twigs. Osier dogwood can be ruddy brown, brownish orange or pale yellow. Frost improves color.

Unlike other Japanese maples that get pruned only lightly to enhance their form, coral bark Japanese maple can get pruned rather harshly just prior to spring growth in order to promote an abundance of the twiggy growth that is so colorful in winter. Osier dogwoods can get pruned down almost to the ground at the end of winter to eliminate tired older stems and promote colorful new stems for the following winter. They lack the colorful bloom that flowering dogwoods provide; so it is no bother that such harsh pruning prevents them from blooming.

Like trees with white or gray stems, coral bark Japanese maples and osier dogwoods are more striking against a backdrop of rich green foliage. Because winters are so mild here, they should be located where they will be most exposed to chill.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 2 Comments

Horridculture – Miss Congeniality

Wow! I must have been in a grumpy mood when I wrote this three years ago.

tonytomeo's avatarTony Tomeo

p90109Now, before I commence with my rant and long list of problems with this picture, I should mention that this seemingly abused rose tree does seem to be appreciated. All the roses in this landscape seem to be very healthy, and they bloom constantly between spring and autumn. Their performance suggests that they are regularly fertilized and deadheaded.
The unusually brutal pruning may be an attempt to keep this particular rose tree as compact as possible, within very limited space. It is not how I would do it, but perhaps it helps. The size of the burl suggest that this rose tree has been pruned effectively like this for a few years, although the lack of weathering of the labels indicate that it is not more than several years old. Older canes really do seem to be getting pruned off annually as they should. Even though the remaining canes are…

View original post 390 more words

Posted on by tonytomeo

Pomegranate

Pomegranates are autumn and winter fruit.

As for fig, date, avocado, grape and olive, the esteemed pomegranate, Punica granatum, has been in cultivation for a very long time. Several thousands of years of domestication have generated countless cultivars. They are now popular in many regions and cultures throughout the World. They produce very well here and in other Mediterranean climates.

Most locally popular pomegranate fruits are brownish red, and about three to four inches wide. Each fruit contains hundreds of seed, which are surrounded by juicy and delicately succulent flesh. They separate easily, like many tiny and tender berries. Most are garnet red. Some cultivars produce fruit with darker purplish, lighter pink or even colorless flesh. 

Without dormant pruning, pomegranate trees can get taller than fifteen feet, and develop dense thicket growth. Fruit is easier to collect from well groomed shorter trees. Individual trees may develop a few trunks, and live for two centuries. Orangish red flowers bloom in spring. Leaves turn yellow prior to defoliation in autumn. Fruit ripens in autumn or winter.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 4 Comments

Bare Root Stock For Winter

Bare roots might fail to impress.

Dormant pruning happens during winter, while the plants that benefit from it are dormant. Obviously, it would not be dormant pruning otherwise. Such processes are less stressful to plants while they are inactive and essentially anesthetized like a surgery patient. This is also why fresh bare root stock becomes available and ready for planting during winter. 

Bare root stock grows on farms for a few years. Any grafting is part of the process. When stock is sufficiently mature, growers dig and separate its roots from the soil that it grew in. Much of the stock goes to retail nurseries for heeling into damp sand for sale. Some gets neat packaging with damp sawdust around its roots. Some goes out for mail order sales.

Regardless of the process, it all happens quickly and early during winter dormancy. Bare root stock must then get into soil again, quickly and before the end of winter dormancy. It will not survive if it resumes growth without soil to contain new roots. Planting should be as soon as possible, so that roots can settle in with rain, and be ready to grow by spring.

Bare root stock is less expensive than canned (potted) stock because it is so lightweight and easier to process. Since it occupies less space than canned stock in retail nurseries, more varieties of bare root stock are available. Bare root stock is easier to load into a car, and plant into a garden. Once in a garden, it disperses roots quickly and more efficiently.

Deciduous fruit trees are the most popular bare root stock. Of these, most are stone fruits or pome fruits. The stone fruits, of the genus Prunus, include cherry, plum, prune, apricot, peach, nectarine, their hybrids, and almond. Apple, pear, and quince are pome (pomme) fruits. Pomegranate, persimmon, fig, mulberry and walnut are somewhat popular as well. 

So much more than deciduous fruit and nut trees are available as bare root stock. Grape, kiwi, currant, gooseberry and blueberry are deciduous fruiting vines or shrubs, not trees. Blackberry, raspberry and strawberry are evergreens. Rhubarb, asparagus and artichoke are perennial vegetables. Rose, wisteria, hydrangea and so many more are fruitless ornamental plants.

Posted on by tonytomeo

Addendum

This old article explains why my involvement with the big valley oak that I shared pictures of yesterday is so limited.

tonytomeo's avatarTony Tomeo

p90105kThere is much more to the landscapes at work that I wrote about earlier this morning at https://tonytomeo.com/2019/01/05/six-on-saturday-cabin-fever/ . Otherwise, my job would be quite boring.

I do not climb big trees; so any work that the redwoods need must be done by someone else. The big redwoods, as well as the ponderosa pines, Douglas firs and various oaks, are of course the most prominent and memorable features of the landscapes. There are also a few other exotic trees that were added to the landscapes years ago. My primary work with those that have grown beyond my reach is identifying problems for other arborists to correct or remove.

However, there is plenty at ground level to keep us very busy.

Our landscapes are simple and somewhat unrefined. They take as much work as they do because they are so big and dispersed over a large area. There seems to be…

View original post 149 more words

Posted on by tonytomeo · 2 Comments

Windows Of Heaven

Goodness; this really complicates a simple and potentially artistic picture.

tonytomeo's avatarTony Tomeo

P81229KOr . . . a close encounter of the third kind. Let’s just go with the former rather than the latter.

I am no photographer. The pictures that I post are merely illustrations for articles from my gardening column, and other articles. This picture just happened to make itself available while I was getting the first of the six pictures of the earlier ‘Six on Saturday’ post. The location is nothing special. It is not really out in the forest like it seems to be. A lodge building of six suites is directly to the left. A big ‘housekeeping’ building is to the right. There is a road in the background above, as well as below, from where the picture was taken.

Even the flora in uninteresting. The most prominent straight trunk in the middle is that of a young Douglas fir. The slightly leaning trunk with upward reaching branches…

View original post 147 more words

Posted on by tonytomeo · 13 Comments

Six on Saturday: HAPPY NEW YEAR!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Happy January too! Happy Saturday! Really though, what is all the fuss about? There is nothing new about this. New years have been arriving annually for as long as anyone can remember. New days arrive daily. New hours arrive hourly. In fact, a new one just began within the last sixty minutes or so. Perhaps that justifies trying to be happy whenever we want to. I digress. My Six for this Saturday are irrelevant to this New Year, and actually, are not exactly happy. All six pictures involve just two trees, a valley oak, Quercus lobata and a coast live oak, Quercus agrifolia.

1. Thunderstorms are rare here. A real doozy arrived on Christmas morning though. The wind could have landed Rhody in Oz. This distinguished valley oak lost two major limbs. 

2. The worst of the damage is just above and slightly left of the center of this picture. The large limb that fell from there clobbered another large limb that was closer to the center.

3. Can you identify what this picture shows? The pair of short yellow lines near the lower center of the picture is a clue. That is the dirty tip of my left boot in the lower left corner. 

4. Tilting the camera from vertical reveals why I could not return to work after what was supposed to be a quick errand. This large coast live oak fell and totally blocked the road.

5. But wait, there’s more! This was more than we could move efficiently with the tractor. Two crews, working at both ends, took all day to clear it all. Another trunk fell to the left. 

6. The trunks had been deteriorating for decades. The moisture of the adjacent drainage ditch accelerated rot. All that evergreen foliage finally got too heavy when wet from rain. 

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/