This week's projects

It's still hot here.  The temperature hasn't gotten above the low 90s but the humidity has been running higher than we're used to.  Garden activities are once again restricted to early morning and late afternoon.  Watering takes the majority of my time during those restricted intervals but I've tackled a couple of projects this week.

The first involved cleaning up an area of the front garden badly damaged by the early July heatwave.  I resisted the urge to cut back the damaged foliage of my Acacia 'Cousin Itt' but I went ahead and pulled out the clover and Santa Barbara daisies (Erigeron karvinskianus) that were incinerated when the temperature hit 110F and stayed there for hours.  I also cut back 2 mint bushes (Prostanthera ovalifolia 'Variegata') that looked spindly and sad well before the heat struck - they have short lives here and I don't really expect them to come back.  I focused on adding topsoil and soil amendments in the hope of creating a good foundation for replanting come fall.

Lots of bare space now for planting when the weather cools.  The Acacia 'Counsin Itt', Arthropodium cirratum, Pennisetum 'Rubrum', Leucadendron 'Safari Sunset', and probably the Artemisia 'Seafoam' will stay.

I'm not sure about the Phormium 'Tom Thumb' or the Pelargoniums.

The area beyond the Acacia and Arthropodium gets sun most of the day.  I'm considering adding another Grevillea 'Superb' (to mirror that on the other side of the path) and either clumps of Lomandra 'Breeze' or Festuca californica.  Beyond that, I'm unsure what to do here but then there's lots of time to deliberate before September.

My second project was seed sowing.  Encouraged by a small success in getting a few Ferraria crispa seeds to germinate, I sowed seeds I'd recently collected from my Pacific Coast Irises (Iris douglasiana).  It remains to be seen whether I'll be successful in getting any of these plants to grow but my fingers are crossed.

I know the Ferraria seedling looks scrawny but I was thrilled just to get the seeds I collected to germinate.  This is a bulbous plant so it'll be a long while before it produces blooms like those on the right but worth the effort as the plants aren't especially easy to find.

I continued to work on rehabbing my succulent containers too.  I made a second trip to the succulent nursery I visited last week.  I hadn't planned to visit again so soon but one does what one must.

A friend joined me on this visit.  These are views of the larger succulents and cacti growing in full sun.

The nursery has a large collection of healthy houseplants too

I checked out the bromeliads this time but decided to hold off on buying anything as there's a bromeliad show scheduled this weekend that's likely to offer better deals

The nursery has a surprisingly large collection of Sansevierias.  I brought home one of those on the far right.

Like my prior trip, I focused on making selections among the smaller succulent under shade cover, although I also brought home 2 houseplants and a large Aloe in addition to the Sansevieria.  My only complaint about this nursery is that most of the plants aren't labeled and the staff isn't always able to provide an ID.

I selected plants for 2 pots that needed rehab.  So far, I've replanted just one, a hover dish planter positioned outside my lath (shade) house.  Once again, I mixed cuttings from my own garden with newly purchased plants.

The Agave lophantha 'Quadicolor', Portulacaria afra, Rhipsalis (maybe R. burchellii), and noID Echeverias came from the nursery.  I filled in mostly with cuttings of Aeonium haworthii 'Kiwi' and 'Kiwi Verde' from my garden.

In retrospect, I think the composition is busy but, as the Agave's likely to pup, I can remove Aeoniums to make room as needed

The biggest garden project this week was my husband's.  He designed and constructed removable shade covers for my lath house.  My hope is that they'll prevent the kind of damage the plants there received when the sun went supernova in July.  My husband installed the covers this afternoon and I spent hours before dinner cleaning up the space.  More on that to come in a future post.  For now, best wishes for a great weekend.


All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Wednesday Vignette: Nighttime Surprises

Last Friday night I glanced out the window and was surprised to see a large orange orb hanging over the harbor.  I'd read there was to be another "blood moon" in late July but had utterly forgotten about it until I saw it.

That's the Los Angeles Harbor below the moon

Two nights later I was caught off-guard by a less welcome sight when the cat made a mad dash to the window with a loud hiss.  I saw a furry rump round the corner from the side patio along the path to the back garden.  What was a bigger surprise is that another furry creature was right behind him (or her).  Here are a few outtakes from our security cameras.

Raccoon #1 can be seen to the left of the support post in the middle of the shot.  See his glowing eyes?

He's just outside Pipig's patio enclosure now

As raccoon #1 moves toward the back garden, you can just make out another furry shape above the Mexican feather grass to the right of the post

Here's raccoon #2.  He (or she) seemed slightly more inclined to inspect things along the route but he didn't lag too far behind his sibling.  Raccoons are usually solitary foragers, which is why I suspect these 2 must be siblings.

The lead raccoon is shown here atop the fountain in the back garden, their favorite destination.  A second set of glowing eyes can be seen mid-way along the path on the right.

I turned on the dining room light at this point.  Raccoon #1 held his position but raccoon #2 beat a hasty retreat, or so I thought.

In this screenshot you can see that raccoon #2 looped around to flank his sibling on the left side.  See that second set of glowing eyes under the Echium?

That's my blond head coming out the door, flashlight in hand, as both raccoons retreated

They came back after I chased them off of course.  The seashells that fill the upper tier of the fountain were scattered about the next morning.  I didn't bother to search the camera feed for further evidence of their reappearance. 

That's my Wednesday Vignette.  To see what others have to share, visit Anna at Flutter & Hum.

All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

In a Vase on Monday: Summer Stars

Finally, the flowers that define summer in my garden have arrived!  My lisianthus (Eustoma grandiflorum) experienced a set-back following the nuclear heatwave in early July, searing foliage and withering some buds in place, but in general the plants have recovered in the weeks since that event.  My dahlias and zinnias were late to arrive because I planted the tubers and seeds late.  I subsequently filled in with a few nursery grown plants and I'm pleased to see that the former are now catching up to the latter.

The green-flowered lisianthus that bloomed this past weekend provided the starting point for my first vase.   I think they look their prettiest as the buds first begin to open but that stage doesn't last long when temperatures are as warm as they've been of late.  We benefited from unexpected morning fog for a few days last week but the afternoons were still toasty.

I snapped this photo late Saturday afternoon when the flowers looked like rose buds

By Sunday morning the green Lisianthus no longer looked like roses but their color provides a nice foil for the more fully petaled Eustoma grandiflorum 'Black Pearl'.  I planted the dark-flowered lisianthus last year and the flowers were disappointing but they look much better their second year in the ground.

Hebe 'Purple Shamrock' (aka Veronica 'Purple Shamrock') forms the base of the arrangement

The top view shows off the native California aster, Symphyotrichum chilense.  It spreads by rhizomes.  The seller claimed it wasn't aggressive.  I'd beg to differ.

Clockwise from the left, the vase contains: noID green-flowered Eustoma grandiflorum, E. 'Black Pearl', Hebe/Veronica 'Purple Shamrock', and Symphyotrichum chilense 'Purple Haze'

Vase #2 includes lisianthus, dahlias and zinnias.

Dahlia 'Otto's Thrill' continues to pump out big beautiful new blooms

Zinnia 'Queen Red Lime' decorates the back of this arrangement with a little help from pink lisianthus

Top view

Clockwise from the upper left, this vase contains: Dahlia 'Otto's Thrill', Abelia grandiflora 'Hopley's Variegated', pink Eustoma grandiflorum (most of these from last year's plants), Zinnia elegans 'Queen Red Lime', Prunus laurocerasus (aka English laurel), and Tanacetum parthenium (aka feverfew)

While most of my dahlias now have buds, nursery grown 'Otto's Thrill' is still the most prolific; however, 'Terracotta' produced its first bloom this week and, with the promise of more blooms to come, I cut it for a small vase.  My recollection is that last year's blooms were large.  I thought it was a dinnerplate variety but it's actually classified as a semi-cactus variety.  Still, the blooms have a projected size of 4-5 inches and this first bloom is a relatively small 3 inches in diameter.

Front and back views of the small arrangement

This vase contains: Dahlia 'Terracotta', Leucadendron 'Safari Sunset', Prunus laurocerasus and, hidden behind the dahlia, a noID Zinnia elegans

Visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden to see what she and other IAVOM contributors have put together this week.

All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

More succulent container rehabs

I've been planning to rehab the succulent container near our back door for months.  A trip to a new-to-me succulent nursery in nearby Torrance provided both the incentive to do so and a supply of fresh material.  The nursery is an offshoot of California Greenhouses/OC Succulents and it specializes in succulents and other drought tolerant plants.  I've visited the Irvine location many times and when I learned they'd opened a store much nearer to me I made plans to check it out, although it took me almost a year to finally get there.

Unfortunately, I left my trip until mid-afternoon and, as they close at 4pm, I didn't have much time to explore.  Focused on succulents in 4-inch pots, I found plenty of those in a very large shade-covered tent structure.  I took a few photos.

The area was neat and well-organized

and all the plants were in pristine condition

I didn't have time to check out the bromeliads, much less the larger succulents in the outside area or the indoor plants

I came home with 14 plants, all succulents.  Some of them went into replanting the pot by the back door.  I cleaned up and reused the 'Sunburst' Aeoniums and the variegated Portulacarias that were included in the pot when I first planted it, filling in with another of my favorite succulents, Echeveria 'Blue Atoll'.

This was the planter as it looked back in January with Aeonium 'Sunburst' hogging all the attention

This is the newly replanted container.  Unfortunately, the Aeoniums are sun-scorched, something I didn't notice until I cut their tall stalks in preparation for replanting the container.  I'm guessing this was yet another impact of the nuclear heatwave we experienced in early July.  While some of my other 'Sunbursts' are bleached out, no others are scorched like this and I'm wondering if reflective glare from the the patio surface could've been a factor in the damage.

There was a very large, healthy specimen of 'Blue Atoll' at the nursery.  It was impressive but the 4 I included in my pot cost about half as much altogether.

It filled a 10-inch pot.  I didn't know it could grow this large.

I noticed that the color of the 'Blue Atoll' Echeverias I've planted out in the garden has faded.  Although some growers said full sun exposure is acceptable, I think they'll probably retain their blue color better with less sun so I plan to keep my refurbished pot out of the hot afternoon sun.

I used another Echeveria and Portulacaria in replanting a pot by the front door.

This pot was formerly occupied by a Senecio candicans but that plant seems to prefer life in the ground to life in a pot so I moved it

I expect I'll be paying another visit to OC Succulents in Torrance soon.  Their selection and prices are much better than my local garden center.

Best wishes for a cool, comfortable weekend.  For my local friends, may the fog be with you!

We've enjoyed morning fog for 3 days now.  This photo was taken at noon yesterday when the fog held on until 2pm.  It's kept our afternoon temperatures much lower than those we started out with at the beginning of the week.

 

All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

Wednesday Vignette: Hazard Zone

We've lived in our current house for more than 7 years.  We've talked on and off about renovating our kitchen.  My issues mainly have to do with the work surfaces, cabinetry, and aging appliances.  My husband is more concerned with the layout and the annoying upper cabinet he still bumps his head on.  Our discussions never led anywhere until the cabinets literally began falling apart.  We met with a contractor and designer who'd done work for a neighbor and, as these things go, we fell down a rabbit hole.  My husband, who I thought was committed to keeping the project small, proposed raising the roof height over the kitchen and pushing one wall into the existing patio area by 5 feet.  I thought the roof height change might be an issue.  It wasn't.  But pushing out the wall is.  The city we live in has designated an open spaces hazard zone, intended to address landslide risks.  We knew that but we'd received notice in 2012 that the city was planning to move the hazard zone east.  For whatever reason, that hasn't happened.  And it seems that the current hazard zone runs right through the middle of our house.  So we filed the appropriate paperwork and paid a fee to request a review.  The city geologist didn't see any obvious problems but we were told we had to obtain and submit a formal evaluation of the site.  That meant hiring a geologist and digging some very big holes.  The geologist's team arrived bright and early yesterday morning.

The change we've proposed would involve extending the kitchen wall (the one with the garden window on the left) to align with the back portion of the house that's already bumped out.  We cleared the space for the geology crew and my husband erected a shade cover before they arrived so they wouldn't be working in direct sun.

As it turned out, instead of 2 holes in the patio area next to the kitchen, they dug one there, one at the patio's edge near the mimosa tree, and another at the bottom of the back slope.  So the shade cover was of minimal use.  I kept the crew supplied with water and coffee cake, though.

This was hard work, involving jackhammers as well as shovels.  The temperature outside reached 95F by mid-day.

The biggest hole, dug until they reached bedrock, was 5.5 feet in depth (shown here with the geologist in an orange shirt standing in it)

They took soil samples from each hole.  In general terms, our soil is classified as volcanic basalt.

Digging the holes, data collection, and restoring the area took 5 hours.  The diggers worked incredibly hard.  It was all the more impressive as we're in the middle of yet another heatwave.  The off-the-cuff comments were positive.  As the crew reached bedrock between 3.5 and 5. 5 feet in all 3 cases, the foundation for our kitchen extension doesn't present any obvious issues, although it'll be weeks yet before we get the formal report.  Then we have to submit it to the city with a good-sized check for review.  If approved, we then have to fit our project into the contractor's and designer's schedules.  Fun.  This adventure represents my Wednesday Vignette.  For more, visit Anna at Flutter & Hum.

In addition to the holes dug into our patio and garden, I faced another hazard this week: the heat.  After the damage done by the early July heatwave, I'm gun-shy and I've gone to great lengths to protect my garden from further heat damage.  I spent a good part of last weekend deep watering selected areas and spreading more mulch.  My husband and I also erected shade covers of various sorts.

Covering a big area of my succulent bed on the south side may seem odd but, in the middle there is my Metrosideros 'Springfire'.  After July 6th's 110F temperature, it's barely hanging on so I'm doing everything I can to baby it.

I've been waiting for the green blooms of the Lisianthus (Eustoma grandiflorum) in this bed for months now.  The plants were scorched in the last heatwave so I purchased a beach umbrella to protect it this time.

The lath house may look the same at first glance but emergency measures have been taken there too as the structure didn't protect all the plants inside during the last heat blast

Until we can construct more attractive shade covers for use during the summer season, we tacked up an old sheet in the roof rafters.  I moved most of the plants on the upper shelves to the floor too.

I also brought out a broken umbrella to provide additional shade for the Fatsia japonica and other plants

The heatwave is expected to peak today with the temperature here approaching the century mark but, oddly, we awoke to fog blowing in.

It feels a little like an episode of the Twilight Zone.   The world around us has suddenly disappeared.  Even the harbor seems strangely quiet this morning.  Not that I'm complaining!  The weather forecasters are continuing to tell us it's going to be hot, Hot, HOT!

All hazards pose challenges.  Some are easier to tackle on one's own than others.  My fingers are crossed that we'll successfully work our way through both of the challenges addressed in this post.


All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

In a Vase on Monday: Cool Blues for a Hot Day

We expect to be beset by another heatwave beginning today and continuing through the workweek.  The forecasters say it won't be as nasty as the heatwave of July 6th that sent our temperature here up to 110F (43C) but then they didn't anticipate an event like that in early July either.  I've been giving the most vulnerable areas of the garden extra water in advance of this new heatwave in the hope of stemming further damage.  Whether it'll be enough remains to be seen.

I was tempted to cut just about every bloom I had but I restrained myself - I'd like to have some left to cut in future weeks, especially as my dahlias and zinnias have been slow to get a move on.  I found a few new Agapanthus blooms in the shadier areas of my garden on Sunday morning and cut those on the assumption that I'll get more enjoyment out of the pristine blooms in my dining room than I'd get from seeing withered stalks in the garden.

While Agapanthus was the starting point for this vase, the real stars may be the white and purplish blue Lisianthus (Eustoma grandiflorum), which starting blooming in earnest this month despite the earlier heatwave

I used some of the Lisianthus left over from last week's vase to dress up the back of the vase

Top view: The bi-color Lisianthus (center) surprised me.  I planted it last year but I don't remember it blooming last summer.

The vase contains, top row: Abelia 'Hopley's Variegated', noID Agapanthus, and Crassula pubescens ssp radicans
Middle row: 3 varieties of Eustoma grandiflorum
Last row: Duranta erecta 'Sapphire Showers', noID lavender, and Prunus laurocerasus

As my Gaillardia are blooming profusely, I cut some of them to create a simple arrangement for the front entry.

The stems of the Gaillardia blooms are frustratingly short

Back view featuring 2 varieties of Leucadendron, some taken from another of last week's arrangements

Top view

The vase contains, top row: Gaillardia 'Fanfare Citronella' and variegated Lantana 'Samantha'
Bottom row: Leucadendron 'Safari Sunset' and what I think is L. salignum 'Devil's Blush'

For more Monday vases, visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.  I'm off to do more hand-watering before the heat soars.

All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party