[ Lost in the Landscape ]

garden visits

While we were in L.A. we stopped by the houses of John’s cousin and aunt. Here are a few shots of some of their nice plantings.

First, pool­side at Cousin Chris and Susie’s house, was this nice South Seas look­ing com­bi­na­tion of leafy giant bird of par­adise (Stre­litzia nico­lai) with the jewel-tone foliage of Ire­sine herb­stii. The lat­ter plant has a few com­mon names like “beef­steak plant,” “blood­leaf” and–most unfor­tu­nate of all–“chicken giz­zard.” Gross. Who thought up that name?

One of Susie’s sis­ters is a land­scaper who was a final­ist on Home and Gar­den Television’s Landscaper’s Chal­lenge, and it was handy to have her sis­terly advice. But Susie made the plant selec­tions herself.

Then it was off to Aunt Barbara’s. One of her friends had hired a ser­vice that cleared and amended a bed, installed irri­ga­tion and then planted a warm-weather and then a cool-weather assort­ment of plants.

Bar­bara liked the idea of hav­ing lots of flow­ers with­out hav­ing to break her back putting them in, so she had the ser­vice do her own yard. Here are a cou­ple shots of the sum­mer mix, fea­tur­ing zin­nias, salvias, del­phini­ums, celosias, marigolds, por­tu­la­cas, lisianthus, plus some sun-tolerant vari­eties of coleus nearby.

But prepar­ing the beds and plant­ing the plants and installing a water­ing sys­tem isn’t all that’s required to keep these plants look­ing nice. When­ever she has a chance, Bar­bara takes a walk out to her plants and pulls off the spent flow­ers. By her care­ful dead­head­ing, the plant­i­ngs stay look­ing fresh many months after they’re set in the ground.

I’m sure she spends as much time tend­ing the plants as it took to put them in. Still, she’s a gar­dener and enjoys her out­door time. Some peo­ple might call it work, but I don’t think any of us would.

September 10 2008 | Categories: gardening • landscape design | Tags: Aunt Barbara's garden • Chris and Susie's garden • deadheading • plant combinations | 5 Comments »