[ Lost in the Landscape ]

bad day for ferns

After three weeks of days in the 60s the last two have pushed into the 80s. It’s the kind of intensely sunny spring weather that makes peo­ple pro­duc­tive or deliri­ous. Next door they’re play­ing bas­ket­ball and down­ing beers, and here at home John and I have been get­ting a final coat of paint on some steel stairs to the roof deck that had started to fade and show some rust spots. For us, the beers and mar­gar­i­tas will flow later this after­noon, when we go over to Mason’s and Carlos’s for dinner.

What is a great day for humans hasn’t been so kind on the Aus­tralian tree fern, Cyathea cooperi that we put in the ground last fall. Gen­eral plant­ing guide­lines for them say to give them semi-shade, except near the coast, where they can tol­er­ate full sun. Three weeks ago we had a week­end like this one, sud­denly sunny and hot after a long period of cool weather. The plant wasn’t used to the heat, and the last set of fronds sud­denly browned.

For­tu­nately the fern was pro­duc­ing a more fronds at the time, and they since unfurled into a gor­geous new set. Hope­fully that hot weather pre­pared the plant for more sun and heat, and that the new set of fronds doesn’t dry up like the last ones did. We should find out in a few days.

Still, in the end, I won’t worry too much. This is about as hot as it ever gets at the coastal edge of town. The plant is get­ting estab­lished, and it’s fully capa­ble to pro­duce more fronds just in time for the cool, over­cast months ahead, months with con­di­tions that the locals have dubbed “May gray” and “June gloom.” Now that the sun’s out, though, it’s time to work on my tan…

April 12 2008 | Categories: my garden • plant profiles • rambles | Tags: Australian tree ferns • ferns • hot weather | No Comments »

free at last

Some­one John knew had a big Aus­tralian tree fern in a pot in his front entry. The plant got too big and we adopted it. At some point we repot­ted it into a fairly huge pot, some­thing like two feet across. The fern seemed happy enough and kept grow­ing. That was three or four years ago, and by Octo­ber the fern was about to grow into the eight foot tall patio cover.

When we com­pleted the new raised bed hav­ing a giant tree fern in the mid­dle of it wasn’t in the plan. But look­ing at the fern, set­ting it free into the ground seemed like the right thing to do.

Mov­ing the 200 pounder through the soft new dirt wasn’t easy. Nei­ther was dig­ging a hole deep enough to accom­mo­date it. (Thanks, John!) But the beast is in the ground, and from all appear­ances, pretty happy with its new spot in the gar­den. In fact, it cel­e­brated by unfurl­ing new frond after new frond, more than dou­bling the num­ber it had while in a pot. See­ing that, it seemed like the fern had been in sus­pended ani­ma­tion all the while it was in the pot, and now it was finally tast­ing life. Nature in a pot may be con­ve­nient for the humans, but nature might not be so thrilled…

The new home for the fern…

Some new fronds…

December 02 2007 | Categories: gardening • my garden | Tags: Australian tree ferns • potted plants | No Comments »