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Snapdragon

80523They are short term annuals in spring or autumn. Where winters are cold, they may last from spring through autumn. Where summers are hot, they may last from autumn through spring. So what are snapdragon, Antirrhinum majus, here? They can be either or both, depending on where and when they get planted. For most of us, they are a cool season annuals that finish before summer.

Although they prefer to be in full sun, the warmth of such exposure is what limits their practicality through summer. They bloom a bit less in partial shade, but are more likely to last through summer if kept cool, particularly in an innately cool microclimate. Like many annuals, they want rich soil, and regular watering. Because they are susceptible to rust and mildew, foliage should be kept dry.

Snapdragon blooms in white and many cheery hues of yellow, orange, red and pink. Some of the older varieties, particularly those developed for the cut flower industry, can get very tall, and might almost reach low eaves! Modern garden varieties are shorter and fluffier. The biggest are less than four feet tall, and less than a foot and a half wide. Deteriorating flowers should be pruned away.

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Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day May 15 – My Second (Yes, Another Sequel)

 

Just like in April, there is too much blooming here in the Santa Cruz Mountains above Los Gatos to easily select only a few pictures. Again, these pictures are from work instead of my home garden. We are in USDA Zone 9, on the coastal side of the Santa Cruz Mountains, which is significantly less arid than the chaparral climate of the Santa Clara Valley below the inland side.

In the process of selecting pictures, I omitted most of any flowers that I have used or will use for other articles, as well as the new warm season annuals that will be more prolific later in the season. However, I might feature chamomile soon, and will post several pictures of rhododendrons on Saturday morning.

Mock orange, Philadelphus lewisii, is finished blooming. I wanted to get this picture of it before it was completely gone. These flowers were in a shaded spot, so lasted a bit later than the others. They are extremely fragrant, and extremely white. They contrast nicely with their rich green foliage and the surrounding evergreens. This mock orange is the state flower of Idaho.5bd1Mock orange of a different flavor blooms sporadically and later. This one is Pittosporum tobira, or something like it. It happens to be a very old shrub, so might predate the modern garden variety, or might be a slightly different species. It does not look quite right, but I can not explain it in any manner that would interest anyone. It is fragrant too, but with heavier fragrance.5bd2Roses are finishing their first phase, but are already starting their next phase. Most of these are floribundas, which are not my favorite, but work very well here were they are so visible. Quantity is more important than quality here in this prominent spot. We want them to bloom more regularly than to make flowers for cutting, although some do happen to make nice stems.5bd3Clematis is still in the can because it was only recently purchased from a nursery to be added where others are not filling in on their trellis adequately. Vines are such a bother. Most are too aggressive and crush their trellises. Those that are not so aggressive do not fill in well enough. Clematis blooms nicely this time of year, but rarely does much more once summer gets warm.5bd4Peruvian lily or alstoemeria do quite well here, and are certainly happier than in the Santa Clara Valley a few miles away. There are three here. A pink one can be seen in the background. There is also a salmon pink one. All three are the sort that used to be grown for cut flowers, but are difficult to obtain now. Most garden varieties are lower and mounding with shorter stems.5bd5Chamomile can naturalize here, but this garden variety does not seem to seed so profusely. Actually, it does not seem to seed at all. I have not yet seen any feral chamomile. The foliage of this variety was bright yellowish chartreuse when it was new, and is now fading to light green. It blooms most of the time. By the time it gets too green, it can get cut back and start all over.5bd6Rhododendron is blooming all over. I took pictures of only this one flower because, as I mentioned earlier, I will post six more pictures of other rhododendrons on Saturday morning. I chose this particular flower because I also wanted to show how big the plant that produced it is. Other colors can be seen nearby. They are really happy here, even with minimal maintenance.5bd7This picture does not show off flowers as well as the rest of the pictures do, but shows how big the rhododendron tree is. Although it is not as broad as some of the others are, it is likely the tallest here. It is situated at least twelve feet below the bridge, and stands about twelve feet above it, so is at least twenty five feet tall! Even by my standards, it is a big rhododendron!5bd8Garden Bloggers all over America and in other countries can share what is blooming in their gardens on the fifteenth of each month on “Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day”, hosted by Carol Micheal’s May Dreams Garden at http://www.maydreamsgardens.com

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Tropism Gives Plants Some Direction

80523thumbWhen a seed germinates, the roots know that they want to go down, and the new stem knows that it wants to go up. Going up sounds simple enough. Stems just go towards the light. How do they know where the light is while they are still under the soil? Well, new stems go upward for the same but opposite reason that roots go downward; gravity. Roots go toward it. Stems go away from it.

Tropism is how plant parts respond to a variety of stimuli, particularly gravity and light, but also water, chemicals, mechanical stimulation, trauma and electricity. Response to gravity is geotropism. Roots exhibit positive geotropism by growing towards gravity. Stems exhibit negative geotropism by growing away from gravity. Stems exhibit positive phototropism by growing towards sunlight.

Roots are always figuring out where to go next by prioritizing their innate positive geotropism, their tropism for or against certain chemicals, and their tropism for moisture but against saturation. Until we see them migrating into lawns, displacing concrete or getting into a septic systems, their work underground is unseen. Tropisms above ground are quite visible and perhaps informative.

When a tall herbaceous plant falls over, it tries to get up. If unable to, it can at least curve new grow upward. Even cut flowers and vegetables in the kitchen can do that much. Snapdragons that are initially arranged leaning outwardly from the center of a floral arrangement can go vertical within a day or two. The fluffiest houseplants regularly get turned so than they do not favor one sunny side.

Trees are too big to move, but on rare occasion, it happens. The crossed pairs of Mexican fan palms commonly planted outside of In-N-Out Burger restaurants get planted at a lean while mature, but then grow vertically after installation, leaving an angular kink where the direction changed. Such a kink in an otherwise straight trunk of a tree that was not planted at an angle might indicate a sudden destabilization. A curved trunk indicates either a slow destabilization, or tropism to escape shade.

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Fleabane

P80513Erigeron karvinskianus

Is it really supposed to be the bane of fleas? If so, why? I learned it as Santa Barbara daisy. Is it native there, or was a particular variety of it named for Santa Barbara? Is it a weed? Is it native? Is it a native of somewhere else in California that merely naturalized here? There are so many questions about this simple little flower that is growing wild under a cyclone fence at the backside of a motorcourt at work.

Whether it really is native or not, or whether it is a straight species or a selected variety of one, fleabane happens to do well in drought tolerant landscapes composed of native plants. It naturally spreads out to form shallow but wide mounds. If it gets cut back in its off season, it comes right back. Although it dies after only a few years, lower stems typically form roots and grow into new plants before the original one dies, essentially replacing itself before anyone notices.

If it is a weed, it is polite about it. Stray plants that appear where they are not wanted are easy to get rid of, and do not regenerate too aggressively to be managed. Those that happen to appear in out of the way situation can be left to bloom without much concern of profuse seed dispersion. Weed or not, it is preferred to other nastier weeds that it might prevent from growing simply by occupying the space.

It happens to grow in my planter box downtown. ( https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2017/11/04/my-tiny-downtown-garden/ https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2018/01/06/six-on-saturday-my-downtown-planter-box-again-and-up-close-this-time/ ) I certainly did not plant it. It was there long before my time, and remain, even if merely in a minor degree, just in case the person who planted it years ago ever stops by to check in on it.

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San Francisco Iris II – the Expected Sequel

P80512KIt is not as if the previous article about it was inadequate. https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2018/05/05/san-francisco-iris/ I really did not want to get into the habit of writing so many sequels. However, something happened to necessitate this update.

I found what seems to be a REAL San Francisco Iris, right here in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Except for being somewhat etiolated from the shade of the surrounding redwoods, it looks very similar to the San Francisco iris I picked on the Montara Peaks when I was in high school! This one happens to be a bit lighter blue than most, but is certainly well within the color range of the flowers that I remember. Most were probably a bit darker blue, but many were lighter, and some were very pale blue.

It is impossible to know if it was planted in this spot that had been landscaped in the distant past, or merely grew wild. It is right down the road from the more colorful cultivars that I got pictures of earlier. It only recently bloomed on rather grassy foliage that was easy to miss.

I know it does not look like much, but I prefer it to the fancier garden cultivars of the same specie, Iris douglasiana. (It is not the ‘San Francisco’ cultivar of bearded iris.) It is what I am familiar with, and exemplifies the species. Besides Montara, I remember it from San Bruno Mountain, Angel Island and Alcatraz. I might have seen it in the Oakland Hills and on Point Reyes too, but I am not certain if they really were the same.

The bearded iris from my great grandmother’s garden will always be my favorite. https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2017/09/10/roots/ However, these San Francisco iris and I have too much history together to ignore.P80512K+

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Six on Saturday: Tree Ring Circus

 

When a tree falls in a forest and there is no one around to hear, it makes a big noise, as well as a mess, and it leaves some if its root in the ground. If a redwood tree falls in a forest, and there is no one around to hear, it is probably better that way. It wold be dangerous to be too close to a redwood when it comes down! They are so big and tall, and are typically so crowded amongst other trees, that they bring down tons of debris with them.

Falling redwoods are rare. They live for centuries or thousands of years. Yet, sooner or later it happens. In more modern history, after the ecology of the redwood groves was disrupted by extensive harvesting, redwoods sometimes get killed by forest fires. (Redwoods are some of the few trees in California that survive forest fires by being fire retardant, but can be killed if enough of the more combustible trees around them burn hotly enough. Extensive harvesting allowed more of the other combustible trees to mix into redwood forests than would normally be there.)

The one thing that redwoods do even less frequently than fall is die. Even after they fall, burn to ‘death’ or get cut down, they regenerate from their stump or roots. Sometimes, several or many genetically identical new trees that are all attached to the same root system develop around a dying parent before it falls. They sometimes do so after a parent burns or gets cut down. Eventually, the original tree decays, leaving a circle of new trees around where it once was. Outsiders often refer to them as ‘fairy rings’. To us, they are just tree circles or rings. Larger and more impressive circles might be known as ‘chapels’ or better yet, ‘cathedrals’.

They are impressive features in the forests. When the area nearby gets landscaped, they are typically ignored because they are so excellent that they can not be improved. There are not many plants that live in the debris of redwoods anyway.

1. This is a nice small but crowded chapel where I work.P80512
2. How does such a chapel get landscaped? It doesn’t. Ours happens to have a nice patch of azaleas nearby. This picture was taken earlier. Bloom finished a while ago.P80512+
3. These azaleas are just so excellent that I had to get a better picture to show them off.P80512++
4. Forget-me-not happens to be one of those few plants that does not mind light redwood litter, so we often let it grow and bloom if it shows up in a good spot.P80512+++
5. Columbine just seems to look good with redwoods for some reason, but it dislikes the litter. This columbine is in a nearby planter that does not get much litter.P80512++++
6. I can not explain the red freesias that bloom earlier in spring. There are yellow and purple ones too. No one knows where they came from, but they do not seem to be bothered by a bit of redwood litter.P80512+++++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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Mirror Plant

70510As the old fashioned larger mirror plant, Coprosma repens, fell out of favor through the 1990s, several more colorful varieties of a more compact species of mirror plant, Coprosma X kirkii, became popular. (The ‘X’ in the name indicates that it is actually a hybrid of two specie.) Without getting much more than two feet deep, it spreads out laterally like dense evergreen groundcover.

The color is not from bloom, but from the very glossy foliage. It can be variegated with white, gold, red, pink or bronze, or completely brownish bronze. Some varieties stay very shallow. Others can be shorn into low hedges like Japanese boxwood, only shorter. Although mirror plant does not mind partial shade, foliar density and color is best with full sun exposure and occasional watering.

Most modern varieties are known by their cultivar names, without their specie names. For example, Coprosma ‘Tequila Sunrise’ lacks the species name of ‘X kirkii‘. Such omissions might be the result of confusing hybridization with Coprosma repens, for rounder leaves. In other words, some cultivars may be of ‘questionable parentage’. Some are just dwarf cultivars of coprosma repens.

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Deciduous Rhododendrons

P80509They are not a myth. They are quite real. So are the related and similar deciduous azaleas. There are certainly not as popular or as diverse as the familiar evergreen cultivars, but they have their place.

Like the popular evergreen cultivars, deciduous rhododendrons and azaleas have been extensively bred so that they are more spectacular than their ancestors in the wild. They lack the purples and blues of the evergreens, but they compensate with bright oranges and yellows that are uncommon among the evergreen cultivars, as well as reds, pinks and whites. Some of their colors are bright and fiery, while some are more relaxed. Compared to evergreen rhododendrons, the flowers of the deciduous rhododendrons are smaller, thinner, and suspended in smaller trusses. However, these smaller trusses are often significantly more abundant, and are flashier as they bloom before new foliage develops in spring.

Deciduous rhododendrons and azaleas are not grown for the foliar color in autumn, but where autumn weather is cold enough, their foliage can color somewhat well. It is mostly clear yellow, but can sometimes turn orange before falling away cleanly, leaving neatly bare stems through winter.

What deciduous rhododendrons and azaleas excel at that their evergreen counterparts can not compete with is their fragrance. Many are moderately fragrant. Some are VERY fragrant. It is rare that such showy flowers are also so fragrant. (Most flowers rely on one technique or another to attract pollinators.)

Now that the evergreen rhododendrons are blooming, our few deciduous rhododendrons are just about finishing. Visitors often ask about the fragrance, since they do not expect fragrance from rhododendron or azalea flowers, even though they can see little else blooming in same area. These flowers are so popular that we would like to plant more near windows of meeting rooms.P80509+(The article from my weekly gardening column that is typically posted on Thursday was posted yesterday, which is why this article, which is more appropriate for Wednesday is posted today.)

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Foliage Shows Its True Colors

70510thumbFlowers were originally colorful only to attract pollinators. Breeding has improved the color and quality of many garden varieties of flowers, to make them more appealing to the people who grow them. Some have been bred so extensively that they are sterile, which defeats the original function of flowers. Now their function is merely to look good in the garden. Improvements are relative.

Foliage is green because it is photosynthetic. Chlorophyll, which is necessary for photosynthesis, happens to be green. Yellow, red, blue, purple, bronze, gray and variegated foliage might not be as efficient at photosynthesis as green foliage, but can be appealing in home gardens. Many plants with colored foliage are inferior to their greener counterparts, but are somehow more popular.

Gray and blue foliage absorbs less sunlight, which can be an advantage in harsh environments. Blue hesper palm and the various blue agaves are from arid deserts. Colorado blue spruce is from high elevations of the Rocky Mountains. Arizona cypress, silver mountain gum, artemesia, lambs’ ears, lavenders, dusty millers and blue junipers all provide distinctively gray or blue foliage.

Golden arborvitaes and junipers can be strikingly gold as new foliage develops in spring, even if the color does not last long. Most plants with gold foliage fade to yellowish green through summer. Golden honeylocusts do not fade as much, so are still mostly yellow by the time they defoliate in winter. Purplish or reddish foliage of purple leaf plum and red Japanese maple holds color better.

Euonymous, English holly, osmanthus, silverberry, hosta and various pittosporums can be variegated with white or yellow. Ivy, and hydrangea can be variegated with white. New Zealand flax and mirror plant can be variegated with gold or bronze, . . . or red or pink. Any unvariegated mutant growth (known as ‘sports’) that appears on variegated plants should be pruned away. Because it has more chlorophyl, it grows more vigorously, so can overwhelm and replace the more desirable variegated foliage.70510thumb+

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‘Emerald Green’ Arborvitae

80516The many cultivars of arborvitaes of home gardening have been so extensively bred and selected that only the foliar texture resembles that of their ancestors. ‘Emerald Green’ which is also known by its Danish name ‘Smaragd’, is a cultivar of arborvitae that was developed from the white cedar, Thuja occidentalis,which grows wild from Minnesota to New Brunswick, as a forty foot tall tree!

‘Emerald Green’ grows quite fast while young, but should get no taller than about fifteen feet, and no wider than about four feet. It is one of the best columnar arborvitaes for tall hedging. Although they can be shorn, they are so dense and uniform that they are at their best if only occasionally trimmed of stray stems, or to keep taller specimens from getting too much taller than shorter ones.

The tiny evergreen scale leaves are tightly arranged on vertically arranged flat foliar sprays. Foliage is quite dense, and softer than that of most other conifers. A bit of shade is tolerable, but too much compromises foliar density. Bloom is barely noticeable, and seeded cones are not much to look at. The shaggy ruddy brown bark is handsome but seldom seen on well foliated specimens.