All posts by Jan Nelson

I am a landscape designer and consultant in the Santa Cruz mountains in California. I write a weekly gardening column for the Press Banner newspaper. I am also a Calif. Advanced Certified Nursery Professional and managed The Plantworks Nursery in Ben Lomond, Ca. for 20 years.
Flowering trees, garden design, trees

How to have a Sense of Place in your garden

Leave a comment

Recently I got to enjoy this beautiful October weather walking among the redwoods, mixed oak woodland and open fields watching hawks soar overhead and listening to migrating warblers in the trees.  I was not here in Santa Cruz county, however, but Pt. Reyes National Seashore-a similar but different environment. What struck me was how the gardens of the local residents reflect where they live.  There was a sense of place to the landscaping. 

Our gardens reflect where we live, too.  What can we learn from our surroundings that will help us in our own gardens?

Look to the horizon.  Check views from every possible angel. Borrow scenery if it’s attractive or screen eyesores and distract the eye from them.

Highlight existing features. Develop designs that retain and enhance elements on site like interesting rock formations, meadows, existing trees and native woodland plants.

Consider all aspects of your outdoor space. What are your favorite flower and plant foliage colors?  What patio materials do you like -flagstone, wood, gravel, pavers? What is your favorite season- spring flowering trees and bulbs or fall foliage and berries?  How many hours do you spend enjoying the garden-  sitting, reading, working, relaxing or entertaining?

Whatever landscape design elements you use in your garden, remember they can be broken into smaller parts to make them more manageable- paving this year, planting trees next year, then shrubs, perennials, garden art. Installing a garden is about the journey.  There is never a finishing point.

Important in any design is your choice of trees. More than any other living feature in your landscape, trees contribute to your sense of place. Imaging how different this area would look without the redwoods, spreading oak trees or tall ponderosa pines.

A tree that looks good and thrives in many types of gardens while requiring little summer water once established is the Strawberry tree or arbutus. A relative of the madrone, this evergreen tree is interesting year round. In the fall and winter, clusters of small white or pink, urn-shaped flowers hang from rich, reddish-brown branches with shedding bark. Fruit resembling strawberries ripen in the fall and attract birds. The handsome glossy green leaves emerge from red stems and contrast nicely with the bark, flowers and berriies. Growing to about 25 ft tall they accept full sun or part shade. What’s not to love about a tree with ornamental bark, dainty flowers, decorative edible fruit and handsome foliage?

Another tree to dress your garden for fall is Prairifire flowering crabapple. Birds love the berries and the 1/2 inch fruit remains on the tree for a long time after leaves drop providing food well into winter.  Many of the popular crabapple varieties of the past were highly prone to fungal diseases but this one is among the new disease- resistant varieties now available. Prairifire bloom later than most crabapples with long lasting bright red flowers. Even the red leaves lend color to the garden when they emerge in the spring. If your looking for a small 20 foot ornamental tree with spring flowers and fall berries, this is a good choice for your garden.

Let your landscape express a sense of place to your garden.

bulbs

Shade Gardening ideas

Leave a comment

Many of us garden in the shade year round. Other have sun in the summer but shade from fall through spring as the sun’s arc becomes lower. Here are some encouraging tips for you if this describes your garden.

If you’re new to growing vegetables you may be discouraged that your tomatoes are still green. Fear not ! Tomatoes don’t need direct sunshine to ripen , they only need warmth. That’s why green tomatoes will ripen on a kitchen window sill. Don’t be tempted to prune leaves out of the way so whatever sunshine you do get can hit your tomatoes. This can sunburn the fruit if we get a hot day and the result will be a white spot that eventually turns black, hard and inedible.

What about bulbs in the shade? If you dream about drifts of colorful flowers under you trees in the spring but didn’t think they would bloom in the shade, think again . Some bulbs manage to grow just fine beneath trees-even evergreen trees. Many from the daffodil clan, including jonquils and narcissus will grow, bloom and naturalize year after year under tree canopies or other lightly shaded areas. Common ones to try are Golden Harvest, the classic, large yellow King Alfred daffodil and Dutch Master with pure gold flowers. Barret Browning has a soft. butter-yellow corolla and a pumpkin orange frilly tube.

To make sure your bulbs stand out in the landscape, figure at least 20-40 bulbs per drift. Be sure to pick up a sturdy, foot-operated bulb planter to better dig through surface roots and hard ground. In a time when money is short, naturalizing daffodils is an affordable way to grow more flowers and they’ll come back every year without losses from deer and gophers.

Squirrels, mice and moles, however, are observant and crafty. Once they discover newly planted bulbs, they’ll assume it’s food. Just disturbing the earth is a tip off for them. Daffodils and narcissus bulbs are unappetizing but if they dig them up and leave them exposed with just a nibble taken from them, so much for any spring flower display. Protect your bulbs with wire baskets or spray them with foul tasting repellent, letting the spray dry before planting. You can also bury the bulbs with ground up shells.

Planting bulbs along side a path makes for a beautiful look come spring. If you installed a flagstone or stepping stone path or sitting area this fall, now is the best between. Low, sturdy types that can withstand some foot traffic include blue star creeper for regularly irrigated area and creeping, woolly or elfin thyme for drier spaces. Make sure you have enough planting mix between the pavers for the plugs to grow. Fill the largest spaces first and allow them to spread into the little cracks. Mixing groundcover types looks great as long as they have the same water requirements. Low growing pennyroyal and corsican mint smell wonderful when you walk on them as does chamomile, although you need to mow this one occasionally to keep it neat and tidy.

Whatever you choose for your project this fall, you will love the look come spring.
 

wildflowers

How to Sow Wildflower Seeds

Leave a comment

Gardeners who sow wildflower seeds in the fall may envision a springtime scene of brightly colored blossoms billowing in the breeze with butterflies and bees dancing from bloom to bloom. but sometimes when spring arrives, weeds-not wildflowers steal the show.

The most common mistake when planting wildflower seeds is not getting rid of the existing weed and grass seed that is in the soil and germinate along with the wildflowers. These fast-growing weeds smother the slower growing wildflowers. For a more successful planting, take time to eliminate the competition.

First, choose a site in full sun, To get rid of existing weeds, cultivate the soil 3-4" deep and remove all the weeds. This the the method with the least environmental impact.

The next step is crucial. Soak the soil thoroughly, then wait for the weed seeds to germinate. When they do, lightly cultivate the soil to a depth of not more than 1 inch. Deeper cultivation exposes more weed seeds that will germinate along with the wildflower seeds.

Before sowing the seeds, rake the soil to form shallow grooves. Ensure even distribution of seed by mixing with 4 times its volume of sand and broadcast by hand. Rake the seed lightly into the soil and tamp it for good soil contact. Wait for fall rains to germinate the seeds. You can water to keep the soil moist if rains don’t come.

Next year, when the plants have dried and dropped their seed, .  Be sure to take pictures of your meadow in the spring with the butterflies, bees and birds enjoying it.

color in the garden, fall foliage

Fall Planting ideas

Leave a comment

It’s always exciting for me to see the first fall colors of the season. we may not have a show like they do in the the hardwood forests of the east coast but we’re still barbequeing and they’re not. If your garden cries out for a something that you can put a table and chairs under and still have room to play, consider a red maple. Autumn Blaze maples spread to 40 ft. wide and you’ll be enjoying their brilliant orange-red fall color long into the fall season. They need an occasional deep watering like a fruit tree but little pruning.

Take advantage or fall weather to plant cool season flowers.  October is a great month to plant as the plants will have time to become established and start flowering before winter sets in. You’ll be amazed at how much color your plants will produce when you start early. Good choices for this area include iceland poppy, snapdragon, chrysanthemum paludosum, calendula, stock, pansy, viola, primrose and cyclamen.

citrus trees, fruit trees, landscape design

Citrus & Avocado for the Santa Cruz mts

Leave a comment

Late September and you can feel autumn in the air. While our days are still beautiful and warm, nights are getting cooler with less daylight hours. Perfect weather for transplanting or adding new plants to your garden.

Why is this a good time? Cooler air is kinder to plant foliage and soil temperatures are still warm, which creates an excellent environment for new root growth. In the fall many plants and trees ( even broadleaf evergreens ) are entering a period of dormancy. With no need to allocate resources into foliage, plants are transferring all their energy into roots and storing nutrients for the cool months ahead. By spring, the roots system should be well established.

So take advantage of fall planting weather. Decide what changes or additions you want to make in your garden.
Perhaps it’s time to remove lawn from banks or slopes where water runs off instead of soaking in. Replant with more drought tolerant ornamental grasses or perennials.  Picture hummingbirds feeding on beautiful variegated autumn sage, their creamy white and green leaves topped with brilliant red flowers from summer until frost.

If you have a small lawn on flat land and want to improve water absorption and reduce water waste, rake out the thatch that accumulates at the base. Then aerated your lawn in a hollow-tine aerator or power aerator from a rental yard.  This brings plugs of soil to the surface, then rake compost over the hoes and water well.

Now is a good time to plant citrus and avocado. They will fair better during the cold winter months if roots are established.  Remember to give older citrus a good soak every week or so or the fruit will be dry.

If you’ve always wanted an avocado tree there are several varieties that do well here.  The Bacon avocado is hardy to 24 degrees. You can harvest medium sized fruit from November-March. They even produce at a young age and grow to 30 feet tall. Fuerte avocado have excellent flavor. This tree is large and spreading, hardy to 28 degrees and the fruit ripens from November-June. Zutano is another good variety for this area. Mexicola varieties are also very good.
 
These avocados are self fertile for the home gardener. You can expect your tree to live for about which is a lot of guacamole.

If you receive frost of consecutive night during the winter you can easily protect a young avocado or citrus by erecting a simple frame of 1×1" stakes that extends above the height of your tree.  Then drape with a frost blanket or beach blanket on cold night. Don’t use plastic- the cold will go right through it.

Take advantage of this great fall planting weather. Bon appetit !

landscaping history

Landscaping in the Early 1900’s in San Lorenzo Valley

Leave a comment

Our gardens reflect who we are. Some of us plant edibles while others fill their gardens with fragrance. Some concentrate on native plants, attracting hummingbirds and wildlife while others have a bit of everything.

Our area is rich in history. I love to look at old photos and try to identify what the early settlers planted around their homes in the Santa Cruz mountains.

Most of this area was heavily forested until the late 1800’s.  Boulder Creek, in 1899, was the 5th largest shipper of timber in the entire country.  Quarry operations also used forest trees and shrubs to fuel the lime kilns. Early logging techniques were very hard on the environment. Clear cutting was common and included the understory madrone and tan oak. After the removal of the broadleaf trees, the conifers were cut, to be followed by burning. To clear the bark from the logs and thin the shrub growth to facilitate with log removal, a fire was set. This first fire in itself was no problem since the trees could and would re-sprout from the base. But after removal of the logs by ox team, another fire was set and since these fires were uncontrolled, they would burn surrounding areas as well. The result was a sequence of fires that would kill the growing sprouts and saplings and allow invasion of shrubs, thus delaying the natural reforestation. Burning plus severe soil erosion at times so damaged the land that it could no longer support trees. In other areas the forest did not return until a long successional sequence of brushland to woodland to forest had occurred.

So what could a woman do to make a house a home back in those days? Many settlers arrived from the east coast, the midwest and Europe and brought with them seeds and starts of plants. As early as 1871 nurseries in San Francisco were importing plants such as pittosporum tenuifolium and the 1915 Panama Pacific Exposition in San Francisco allowed many more plants to become available to homeowners. Hebes from New Zealand were all the rage.  The brochure for this world fair describes a Palace of Horticulture and Tower of Jewels as …" a great garden, itself, a marvel of landscape engineering skill… one side of a magic carpet on which these beautiful palaces are set with its floricultural splendors for a wondrous beauty, has never been equaled."

My interest in early local horticulture started after looking at a friends family photographs from the turn of the century. His family had a resort with a natural spring and rock-lined forest paths close to Hwy 9 in south Felton. This was very near the Big Tree Grove resort ( now Toll House ) that opened in 1867.     I remember looking at the photos and marveling at all the flowers surrounding the dwelling. The redwood trees have now grown back but at that time there was lots of sunshine, a by product of clear cutting.   I could see roses, lilacs and shasta daisies in the photo surrounding the wrap around porch.

Landscaping in the Santa Cruz mountains in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s could be lush or sparse depending on the location and logging activities. A picture from the 1880s of the Harmon cabin off Hwy 9 shows many palms that look like Canary Island date palms. Perhaps they were imported from a nursery in San Francisco and brought down here by railroad. The landscaping is lush and full of plants.

Pictures of the Locatelli barn in 1892 near the grammar school in Boulder Creek, however, show the hills nearly clear cut. Railroad tracks at that time ran right through downtown.  Simple houses with picket fences were located very near the tracks and these yards had no trees, shrubs or flowers at all. It must have been quite hot for them in the summertime.

By 1905, residents of the area had settled in and planted fruit trees, vegetables and ornamentals. A photograph of a chicken ranch on Huckleberry Island shows lots of landscaping around the house. Certainly the available chicken fertilizer helped the roses and wisteria that appear in the pictures to bloom.

Up on Alba Rd. in Ben Lomond, the J.N. Walters family grew strawberries and peaches. Photos taken in 1915 show palms, and hollyhocks in their yard. Out on Bear Creek Rd., the Ercoli villa featured yucca which I saw in many other photographs.  Most likely they originated from the deserts in the southern California and Mexico and were brought north by the missionaries.

California fan palms and canna lilies appear in many landscapes. The Middleton house in Boulder Creek was heavily planted with native western sword ferns.  Black locust trees planted for their fragrance and flowers are still seen here today where they have naturalized.  Originally planted for erosion control, particularly on strip mined areas, their durable timber was used for homes.

The 1915 Panama Pacific Expo introduced more plants to the public. In 1916, construction of a home in Brookdale featured timber, flooring and doors shipped from the expo to this area by Southern Pacific railroad. When the house was finished in 1926, photographs show a beautiful home surrounded by hollyhocks, roses and wisteria.

Also in the museum archives are the scrapbooks of the Valley Floral Club, later called the Valley Garden Club. Dating back to 1947 they contain old newspaper clippings as well as the minutes of monthly meetings, details of various speakers and pictures of plants and members. One old clipping from 1928 shows as ad for "Calif. Redwood Burl Ferns " for 75 cents that were a ..".guaranteed curiosity in any home for several years".

That’s my trip down the memory lane of horticulture. Many thanks to Linda Phillips and Maya Caldwell from the SLV Museum for their help in researching this information.

If you have any of these plants in your garden, remember the early settlers enjoyed them also. You might even plants a for the fun of it.