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Easements Really Should Be Easier

70802thumbLike Michael Jackson said, “You got an easement on down the road.”. . . or something like that. In older neighborhoods, that is where the utility easements are usually located. These are zones for utility poles that suspend electrical, telephone and television cables. When electricity first became available, that was the easiest place to put the cables, and the practice continued for decades.

Utility easements in middle aged neighborhoods are usually at the rear boundaries of back yards. They were put there to get out of the way of shade trees in front yards, particularly street trees. Where there are alleys in back, easements are on one side of the alley or the other. The same applies to narrow streets with easements. More modern neighborhoods have subterranean utilities.

Those of us who must contend with easements know how difficult they can be. Trees that encroach too closely to the high voltage cables on top of the poles must be pruned for clearance, even if such pruning disfigures or kills them. Lower cables for telephone and cable television sometimes get tangled with vines or big shrubbery because clearance from vegetation is not such a priority.

Utility providers have access to easements to maintain their systems. So do the tree services that have the grim task of pruning encroaching vegetation for clearance from high voltage cables. They do what they must to maintain reliable service; which is unfortunately not always compatible with what we want for our trees. Clearance pruning is too often unsightly, but it is very necessary.

The only way to avoid unsightly and disfiguring clearance pruning to to only plant trees that will not encroach into high voltage cables. Of course, in small gardens with big easements, the choices of trees that stay proportionate to available space are very limited. Except for Mediterranean fan palm or palms that stay very short, palms should never be planted below utility cables. They grow only upward, and can not be pruned around cables, so must be removed when they get too close.

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Horridculture – Neapolitan

P80801Baldness was not yet cool while Brent and I were studying horticulture at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo back in the late 1980s. Nor were hairpieces yet tacky. Consequently, some middle aged men work toupees. As these men aged and grayed, their formerly well matched topees did not.

Hedges of Pittosporum tobira ‘Variegata’ are notorious for developing green sports (unvariegated mutant growth). https://tonytomeo.com/2018/07/04/horridculture-mutants/ Because gardeners do not prune these sports out, they become prominent green blotches in otherwise nicely variegated hedges. Pruning large blotches out would only leave big bald spots. That is why such hedges, as well as similarly blotched hedges of other variegated plants, are known as ‘bad toupee’ hedges.

‘Neapolitan’ hedges are a variant of that concept. They are not composed of formerly identical plants that later challenged their respective identities. ‘Neapolitan’ hedges are actually composed of different plant material that has been shorn together. They sometimes develop as feral plants grow up and into formerly uniform hedges. They are often composed of what should have been distinct plants within a well designed landscape, that were merely shorn collectively by ‘gardeners’ who simply did not care.

This hedge in a median of a driveway into a mall in town is a classic example of the latter. The landscape designer likely intended the deep green Burford holly, Ilex cornuta, to develop naturally as dense and low mounds between the more upright variegated holly olive, Osmanthus heterophyllus ‘Variegatus’. Apparently, it is too much to expect a well paid ‘gardener’ to figure that out. Fortunately, this particular ‘Neapolitan’ hedge happens to look good in this particular application, but would look better if the ‘gardener’ would replace the variegated holly olive that has been missing for years from the gap between two Burford hollies to the left.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 8 Comments

Epiphyllum oxypetalum

80808The common names of ‘Dutchman’s pipe’ and ‘queen of the night’ are not much less awkward the the Latin name of Epiphyllum oxypetalum, which might be why the Latin name is more common than the common names are. Some know it as ‘white ephiphyllum’ or even more simply as ‘white epi’. It is one of the more popular of the epiphyllums; and it is the most popular with white flowers.

The nocturnal flowers appeal to nocturnal pollinators. What we see simply as luminescent white is actually outfitted with exquisite patterns that are only visible to those who can see ultraviolet light, like nocturnal moths. Bats are as blind as . . . well, bats, but can follow the richly sweet fragrance if they choose to. Sunlight disables fragrance immediately, and causes flowers to close soon after.

In the wild, sprawling primary stems can cascade almost twenty feet. Of course, they are much shorter in home gardens. The more pendulous secondary stems that bloom get about a foot long, and perhaps three inches wide. Flowers bloom in summer, and can be half a foot wide and a foot long. Epiphyllums naturally hang from trees as epiphytes, so will do the same from hanging pots.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 60 Comments

Cacti Are Notorious For Nonconformity

80808thumbAlmost everyone thinks of cacti as tough plants that live out in the hottest and driest parts of the deserts, where few other plants can survive. They are the sorts of plants that we threaten to plant out in the most inhospitable or neglected parts of the garden. We never actually do so, just because we do not appreciate cacti any more than weeds. They are fine over in the neighbor’s garden.

Whether we like them or not, cacti really deserve more respect than that. Even if they do not fit our style of landscape, they are striking and distinctive features within the landscapes that they are adapted to. Except for a few euphorbs that look sort of like cacti, there are no substitutes for their form and, of course, their texture! The uniquely specialized physiology of cacti is extraordinary.

Cacti really are built for the desert. In a climate where heat and arid air desiccates foliage, cacti do without. Photosynthesis is done in the green skin of the distended stems. Furrows in the stems of some cacti increase surface area for photosynthesis, but still expose far less surface area to the weather than individual leaves would. The succulent flesh of the distended stems stores water.

The foliage is not totally lacking. It is merely modified into sharp spines or irritating glochids with which cacti protect their succulent flesh from animals. Spines of the old man cactus are elongated into coarse hair that diffuses the intensity of the sunlight that might otherwise scorch the green skin below. Bigger thorns that extend beyond the spines within each tuft are actually modified stems.

Cacti certainly put significant effort into surviving desert climates; but surprisingly, most cacti do not even live in deserts, and many live in tropical rainforests of South and Central America! Some have weirdly pendulous stem structure, and some are epiphytic, so they hang from limbs of larger trees. In regions where most insect and animal activity is at night, cacti bloom nocturnally, with big luminescent and fragrant flowers that appeal to moths, bats and their associates.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 3 Comments

Coppice

P80729Coppiced trees and shrubs are just like pollarded trees, but without the trunk and main limbs. Instead of getting cut back to the same distended knuckles at the ends of disproportionately stout limbs, they get cut back to the same stump just above grade over winter. Some get coppiced annually. Others get coppiced only when they get too big. The coppiced California sycamore in this picture may never get coppiced again.
It was not intentionally coppiced. It had merely been cut down. The trunk was in the middle of where this thicket of secondary growth is now, but all of the canopy was over the adjacent parking lot from which the picture was taken. The tree was so severely and asymmetrically disfigured and leaning that it was unsightly and unmanageable. It really looked ridiculous. Removing the tree and replacing it with a new one would have been more practical than attempting to repair the disfigurement with corrective pruning over many years. Besides, such severe pruning to repair the disfigurement would have caused other disfigurement, and in the end, the tree would still be leaning.
Others California sycamores nearby had been cut down years ago because they were crowded. As the remaining trees continued to grow, those that had been cut down regenerated from their stumps with multiple trunks, and are now getting almost as tall as the others that were not cut down. Some of their smaller trunks will get cut down next winter, leaving them with single, double or triple trunks, but they will not be cut down completely as they were before. Instead, they will be allowed to adapt to their crowded conditions naturally. They are all becoming such appealing trees.
The coppiced but technically cut down California sycamore in the picture will be given the same sort of second chance. While bare in winter, the secondary growth will be pruned to leave only one, two or three trunks to hopefully develop into a new tree on the same spot.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 5 Comments

Corndog Orchard

P80728KUrban sprawl replaced the formerly vast orchards of the Santa Clara Valley a long time ago. Nowadays, it is difficult to imagine that they were ever here. Apricots, prunes, cherries, almonds, walnuts and all that the region was once famous for are all now rare commodities.
Only a few minor corndog orchards remain. They survive only because they are not actual orchards that are grown on land that is useful for something else, but instead grow wild on otherwise useless marshland and along the few creeks that flow through the region. Some marshland that could not be converted into usable space was developed into parks, and within many such parks, the remaining marshlands are protected as native habitat.
Vasona Lake County Park and the small Vasona Lake within were once a large marshy area that sustained what was probably the biggest corndog orchard within the Santa Clara Valley. It is at the transition where the Los Gatos Creek flows swiftly from the slopes of the Santa Cruz Mountains, and then slows as it reaches its flat alluvial plain within the Santa Clara Valley. Although not nearly as abundant as they were prior to development, corndogs still inhabit the banks of Los Gatos Creek and Vasona Lake. We know them as cattails.
Because they are a native species that had historically been more common locally than anywhere else nearby, and because of their common name that is coincidentally associated with cats, cattails had been nominated to be the official Town Flower of Los Gatos (which is Spanish for The Cats). There are not many natives that would be as appropriate, and the only comparably culturally significant flowers would be those of the old fruit orchards, such as apricot blossoms. No other flower is both native and so culturally significant.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 42 Comments

Six on Saturday: Bits and Pieces

There were no major projects this week that were interesting enough to get six pictures of. The best that I could do was get six random pictures of random features of the landscapes. I do not actually do much to cultivate flowers, but they happen to be components of the landscapes. Most are perennials that bloom on their own. Of course, I do not mind taking credit for them.

Some blooms started late while the weather was mild, but were then accelerated as the weather suddenly warmed. It seemed that several different types of flowers needed to be deadheaded at the same time. Zonal geraniums and lily-of-the-Nile are two of the most reliable perennials that bloom on schedule no matter what. Zonal geraniums bloom sporadically most of the time, and only bloom more while the weather is warm. Lily-of-the-Nile may start a bit early or a bit late, but is always in full bloom on the fourth of July. The blooms even look like exploding fireworks. More than two weeks later, their flowers are still in full color but will slowly start to fade. Phlox was a surprise for us.

1. Can you guess what this bloom is?P80728

2. You can probably guess that this is phlox. It sure had my colleagues and I perplexed. We had never seen anything like it. Phlox is uncommon here. I would even say it is rare. No one knows why. It just is. I got a picture of it a few years ago only because I was intrigued by it in a neighboring landscape. It took a bit of effort to identify it, although I sort of suspected that it was phlox. It did not look quite like this phlox, and was lower to the ground. No one knows how this one got into the landscape. We suspect it arrived with the ‘fertilizer’ that the horses make for us.P80728+

3. Lily-of-the-Nile is still one of my all time favorite summer blooming perennials. I do not care how cheap and common it is. It is one of the first perennials I divided while I was in junior high school. I grew more than eighty new plants from a single old plant that needed to be removed. It was the old fashioned sort, with big blue flowers and big flabby leaves, perhaps bigger than these. I also like the white ones with the same big flowers and leaves, of course, because they are white. All the fancy modern cultivars are nice too, but not as excellent as the originals. I do like seeing the very pale blue ones in other gardens.P80728++

4. This zonal geranium has these small but cheery cherry red flowers, but it is really grown for the weirdly variegated foliage that is blurry in the background. I think that these flowers would look better against simple green foliage. There is another zonal geranium in another part of the landscape, with small peachy pink flowers and foliage that is variegated only with white. I am none too keen on the flower color, and I am not often too keen on variegation, but the foliage of that particular zonal geranium really looks sharp.P80728+++

5. Himalayan blackberry is one of the worst and most invasive of the exotics weeds here. It develops huge canes that arch over and drop on top of other plants in the landscape. The wickedly sharp prickles (technical term for their thorns) are tortuous when trying to remove the canes. Even picking their berries is nasty business! There are a few berries ripening now, and they happen to be pretty good, but they are sooooooo not worth it.P80728++++

6. Chips needed to be dispersed into the newly landscaped areas that are partially visible in the background of this picture. These chips were free. They are made of recycled wood waste. For our purposes, they are sufficient. However, they include a few large chunks of wood and bits of metal. The chunk of metal in this picture is a short section of rebar. Some of the chips have paint on them. Some seem to be bits of old furniture. It makes one wonder where some of this material came from.P80728+++++

By the way, the bloom in the first picture #1 is merely a fist full of deadheaded white zonal geranium flowers all pressed together. White zonal geraniums do not readily drop their faded blooms like other zonal geraniums do, so they need to be deadheaded.

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/

Posted on by tonytomeo · 2 Comments

Nierembergia

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When first created by Chrysler, the Imperial was considered to be so close to perfection that fancy colors were unnecessary. It was originally only available in black or white, and later red, like the Chrysler Imperial rose that was named for it. It took a while for other colors to become available. Perhaps perfection is the same reason why nierembergia is only blue or white, or maybe purple.

Nierembergia is most popularly grown as a warm season annual for color from the middle of summer to autumn. It can get half a foot high and a foot wide. As a perennial, it has the potential to get twice as high and wide after its first year, but it lasts only a few years, and looks rather shabby through cool winter weather. The small flowers are evenly dispersed over the finely textured foliage, lacking only on the shaded sides of the densely rounded plants.

Because it gets a bit deeper than most other annuals, nierembergia is a nice transitional plant between lower annuals that might cascade over the edge of a planter in front, and higher or more upright perennials or shrubbery that might obscure a foundation behind. It can work alone too, but does not cascade from planters, big pots or hanging baskets.

 

Posted on by tonytomeo · 10 Comments

Enjoy The Fruits Of Summer

70726thumbIs a prune really just a dried plum? No! A plum is really a prune. In fact, all ‘stone fruit’ are of the same prune genus known as Prunus. This means that apricot, cherry, peach, nectarine, prune, plum and even almond are all related. So are all their weird and trendy hybrids, such as aprium, pluots, plumcots and so on. (Almonds are the pits or ‘stones’ of dry leathery fruits that fall away as hulls.)

The main difference between prunes and plums is that prunes contain enough sugar to inhibit mold while they dry, . . . if they dry efficiently enough. Plums are juicier and contain less sugar, so are more likely to mold before they dry. If dried in a dehydrator, plums get squishy, and are likely to develop an odd flavor. Most prunes are European. Most popular plums are of Japanese descent.

The wrinkly and leathery fruit that most of us know as prunes are actually ‘dried’ prunes. Fresh prunes can be eaten just like plums, but are firmer, and have milder flavor. They are better for juicing, canning (whole, while firm) and cooking, although plums make better jam. Plums have richer flavor for eating fresh. Because they are so soft, they do not juice as well, but make nice plum nectar.

Apricots are not quite as easy to dry as prunes are. They must either be dried quickly in a dehydrator of some sort, or sulfured; and sulfuring is probably too much work for most of us. Most of the apriums, pluots, plumcots and other weird apricot hybrids that have become so trendy in the past many years are too soft for drying or canning. Like plums, peaches and nectarines, fresh is best.

Fruit that ripens evenly throughout the tree is best for canning, freezing, drying or any technique that takes large volumes of fruit at once. Uneven ripening is better for fruit eaten fresh. It allows later fruit to continue ripening while the earliest fruit is being consumed. The problem is that the best stone fruits ripen very evenly, all at the same time. If not shared with neighbors, some is sure to rot.

If some of the fruit ripens later than the rest, it will be inside the shadiest part of the canopy. The most exposed fruit on the exterior of the canopy ripens first, and for most types of fruit, has the best flavor. After all fruit is harvested from a tree, any remaining bad fruit should be removed from the tree, and from the ground around the tree. Diseases proliferate, and later overwinter in rotting fruit.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 20 Comments

Horridculture – Reputation

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I earned it. For several years, back when newspapers were composed of a rather ingenious combination of both news and paper, I was a respected garden columnist, as well as a respected horticulturist and arborist. Of course, I was an a horticulturist and arborist first. I later started writing my garden column because I wanted to do better than what the professional columnists who lacked practical experience with horticulture were doing.
For someone who would have preferred to simply grow horticultural commodities back on the farm, the notoriety was an odd fit. I was often asked to be a guest speaker for all sorts of garden clubs, and to write about their events. For a few years, I was a guest of honor and staffed a gardening question booth at Spring In Guadalupe Gardens in San Jose. It was awkward to walk from where I parked to the booth, past a dozen or so posters with my picture and various quotes on them.
People read my gardening column because they wanted accurate and relevant information. Although I was not proficient at writing, I managed to maintain my integrity as a horticulturist and arborist. My expertise was respected.
Then, a ‘colleague’ who wanted to capitalize on my notoriety convinced me to work for him while he established a website for me. I agreed, along with the stipulation that the website conform to my discriminating standards.
That stipulation was ignored. The website was embarrassingly flashy, with pictures of tropical plants that would not survive as more than houseplants in California. The grammar and spelling were deplorable. Articles were modified to be relevant in any season, just in case, for example, someone was worried about frost in the middle of summer. My ‘manager’ was not at all concerned with horticulture, but was instead more interested in installing advertisement for his products into the website.
About that time, I was invited to install a landscape into the 2009 San Francisco Flower and Garden Show. I would have declined, but was encouraged to compose a landscape to promote the new website. The landscape was ‘adequate’, and did happen to feature an excellent reproduction of an old windmill that my ‘manager’ happened to procure. However, the real priority was showcasing the products that my ‘manager’ was marketing, including a rainwater harvesting system. Within our limited space, we had a big black vinyl water tank! Instead of getting a vendor booth at the show, he used the landscape to pimp his products and services! It was mortifying! The fact that my modified design won awards seemed to make it even worse, as if to justify out extreme gaucheness!
It took a few years and the assistance of an attorney to get the ‘manager’ to close down and delete what was supposed to be my website, but was merely a collection of links back to websites and advertisements for what the ‘manager’ wanted to sell. Otherwise, anyone searching for me online would still be directed to products and services that I want nothing to do with, but seemingly endorse. Even now, these two images above and below would be at the top of the list of a search for images of Tony Tomeo on Google. They are from the 2009 San Francisco Flower and Garden Show, and are now associated with a website with which I have absolutely no affiliation. I want nothing to do with such unethical standards.
The picture above was taken within the landscape just before the Show opened to the public. The black vinyl tank is visible in the background. The picture below was taken during the assembly of the landscape, before I had shaven and gotten appropriately dressed.

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