Monthly Archives: April 2017

color in the garden, colorful foliage, flowering shrubs, Flowering trees, moon garden, white garden

Creating a ‘Moon Garden’

As the days grow longer I anxiously await those warm summer nights when I can sit outside and enjoy the evening air. As daylight fades it?s the white or silver plants and flowers that come to life. Whether your view is from a window or from your favorite place on the patio be sure you have a ?white garden? to light up the garden late into the evening. Sometimes the best color for your garden is white.

Cornus ‘Mountain Moon’

Even on a grey day a white garden looks fresh and inviting. With so many white flowering plants, those with white variegated foliage and silver leaved plants to choose from yours can beckon you throughout the seasons. White feels relaxed and clean and will slow you down after a long day.

The plants that take a starring role springtime in a white garden include some of my favorites. I just need to get them all in the same area of my garden in order for them to do their magic.

Iris pallida lends color to the white garden through it?s spectacular

Iris pallida in Butchart Gardens, Victoria, British Columbia

striped variegated foliage. Easy to grow and deer resistant they won?t break your water budget either. The bearded flowers are a spectacular shade of lavender blue and this variety of iris is more shade tolerant than most.

If I add a few more white flowering plants to another area I can have two moon gardens. I wish I had room for a sturdy trellis as I?d surely plant an evergreen clematis. Their scent alone would justify the space. Another candidate for a strong support would be a white blooming wisteria like Longissima Alba. Guess I could get a wisteria that?s been trained as a standard or tree. As it stands I?m keeping a star jasmine pruned to a shrub so I?ll have that sweet fragrance starting in late spring.

Leopard Plant

For my shady garden one of the flowering plants that glows in the fading light of the day or the light of a full moon is pieris japonica or Lily of the Valley shrub. The huge clusters of tiny bell-like flowers are spectacular. Along with the huge variegated foliage of ligularia ?Argentina? or Leopard Plant both are sure to draw my eye at the end of a long day.

Choisya or Mexican Orange is one of those work horse shrubs that grows fast, has few pests, is deer resistant and the fragrant lowers will scent your garden in the spring and sporadically throughout the whole year. The handsome foliage looks clean and vibrant even in the winter time.

Rhododendron occidentale

In addition to my white flowering dogwood I have long planned to add California native, Western Azalea to my garden. A true native of California it?s found only in our state except for a tiny spot where it extends into southern Oregon. In addition to the Sierra Nevada it grows naturally in our area and then up the coast north of San Francisco. The large floral trusses are breathtaking- sparkling white marked with a bright yellow spot. The fragrance of the flowers is sweet and spicy clove reminiscent of cottage pinks and carnations. Their beauty and fragrance will enhance any garden.

Other native plants with white flowers are Philadelphus lewisii or Wild Mock Orange. Also Carpenteria californica or Bush Anemone is a beautiful plant to include in a white garden as is silver lupine and douglas iris ?Canyon Snow? -often described as being one of the most reliable native iris.

Oakleaf hydrangea

Later in the season look to white hydrangeas– mophead, lace cap or oakleaf- to add to your moon garden. Sally Holmes roses, hardy geranium ?Biokovo?, Even the common Santa Barbara daisy when planted en masse makes quite a statement in the white garden.

Forest bathing, Shinrin-yoku

Forest Bathing in the Redwoods

You know the feeling that you get when you are out walking slowly in the forest, stopping to admire a wildflower or mushroom that catches your fancy? You know it?s good for the mind and body, but why? It turns out that there are more benefits to being out in nature than the calmness it brings.

Sherman out on the trail ‘Forest Bathing’

Having a dog gives me a reason to be out on the trail. Being out in my garden simply enjoying the birds and flowers also promotes health and studies have shown that spending time in natural environments lowers our stress levels and improves our memory.

Apparently what we take for granted living where we do is all the rage for city dwellers with high stress lives. The idea is simple. Spending time in a natural area and walking in a relaxed way is calming, rejuvenating and restorative.

In the past several decades there have been many scientific studies that demonstrate the mechanisms behind the healing effects of simply being in natural areas. Many of the benefits from the forest actually come from the air. Trees give off phytoncides, such as alpha-pinene and d-limonene, which are volatile organic compounds or aerosols. These compounds protect the trees and plants from insects and disease, but they also benefit us.

Forest bathing is what the Japanese call it. Shinrin-yoku is their term that means ?taking in the forest atmosphere.? Forest therapy has roots in many cultures throughout history. John Muir wrote that ?Wilderness is a necessity.? Scientists is Japan are measuring what?s actually happening to our cells and neurons.

Trees give off organic compounds that support our immune systems and help our system fight cancer. Other scientifically proven benefits of forest bathing include reducing blood pressure, accelerating recovery from surgery or illness, improving sleep and our mood and reducing stress. Forest bathing lowers our heart rate and lowers levels of the stress hormone cortisol. Soaking in the forest air increases our NK or natural killer cells by about 50 percent.

All I know is that when Sherman and I are out in the garden or strolling in the forest we feel good. We stop to watch the progress of a banana slug. We listen for new bird calls. And as a garden designer I strive to create a space for clients that brings that feeling to them whenever they are outside.

Part of of that good feeling we get being outside has to do with the color green. Green is the color of spring, of growth, renewal and rebirth. It renews and restores depleted energy. It?s a positive color and increases our feelings of relaxation and calmness. Often I get a request for including the color green in a client?s plant palette. We tend to overlook it?s value.

If you don?t have a forest of your own bring that forest feeling to your own garden. Stroll in a relaxed way without thinking about weeds or pruning or other items on your to-do list.

bulbs, Easter Lily, fragrant bulbs

Easter Lilies in the Garden

Whether you observe Passover, Western or Eastern Christianity Easter when this time of year arrives I wait patiently for my Easter lilies to come up in the garden. The shoots are now about 6″ tall but they are a long way from blooming and I look forward to those huge, fragrant, white trumpet-shaped flowers. I pick up a few new blooming plants each year to enjoy now and celebrate Easter. It’s a tradition that marks spring along with decorating eggs, chocolate bunnies and Easter baskets.

Easter Lily aka Lilium longiforum

Easter lilies that are blooming at his time of year have been forced under controlled conditions to flower in time for Easter. This is a very tricky process since Easter falls on a different day each year dependent upon celestial bodies. Falling on the first Sunday that follows the first full moon after the vernal equinox, Easter can be any day between March 22 and April 25. Crop scheduling and timing is critical. The flowers must bloom exactly when they’re suppose to with no margin for error.

Did you know that over 95% of all the bulbs grown for the Easter lily market are produced by just 10 farms in a narrow coastal region straddling the California-Oregon border? Known as the Easter Lily Capitol of the World, the area offers a climate of year-round mild temperatures, deep, rich alluvial soils and abundant rainfall which produces a consistent high quality bulb crop.

The Easter lily or Lilium longiforum, is native to the southern islands of Japan where it was grown and exported to the US until WW ll. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941 the Japanese source of bulbs was abruptly cut off. As a result, the value of lily bulbs sky-rocketed and many who were growing lilies as a hobby here decided to go into business. The Easter lily bulbs at the time were called ‘White Gold’ and growers everywhere attempted to cash in on the crop. By 1945, there were about 1,200 growers producing bulbs up and down the Pacific coast from Vancouver to Long Beach. But producing quality, consistent lily bulbs proved to be quite demanding with specific climatic requirements. Over the years, the number of bulb producers dwindled to just the 10 current farms near the Oregon border. Even after the Japanese started to ship bulbs again after the war, they have never been able to come close to the quality of our US grown bulbs.

Easter Lily

Here’s how to make your Easter lily continue to thrive in your garden. For the longest possible period of enjoyment, remove the yellow anthers from the flowers before the pollen starts to shed. This gives longer flower life and prevents the pollen from staining the white flowers. Place the plants in bright indirect daylight, not direct sunlight, and water when the soil surface feels dry to the touch. Do not let the plant sit in water.

After blooming, plant your lily outside in sun or part shade after letting it acclimate to brighter conditions for a week or so before transplanting. Plant in a well-drained garden bed that has been amended with lots of organic matter like compost and mulch the surface with more compost. As the original plant begins to die back, cut the stems back to the soil surface. New growth will soon emerge but go dormant again during the winter. Next year they will bloom naturally in the early summer.

Easter lilies are a great addition to the flower border. Easy to grow, fragrant and hardy.