[ Lost in the Landscape ]

my new year’s plant

If there’s a plant that says New Year’s Day to me, it’s the com­mon jade plant, Cras­sula ovata. The rea­son why is a lit­tle embar­rass­ing, and I’m trust­ing you not to tell any­one else.

Grow­ing up, my fam­ily would spend the morn­ing of New Year’s Day gath­ered around the tele­vi­sion set­ting, watch­ing the Rose Parade. Over­taken by mis­guided jags of inspi­ra­tion, I’d make my own lit­tle parade floats out of lit­tle card­board boxes and what­ever flow­ers were available.

My fam­ily lived in the same val­ley as Pasadena, though inland a few miles. The two loca­tions essen­tially shared the same cli­mate pro­file, some­thing around Zone 9B. Don’t believe the pro­pa­ganda about the Pasadena area hav­ing gar­gan­tuan fields of roses bloom­ing every­where in Jan­u­ary. Yes, you’ll find roses, but not in the same num­ber as other flowers.

Instead, at my par­ents’, the plant that was depend­ably cov­ered with flow­ers on New Year’s was the jade plant. They had a cou­ple plants in the back yard that were about as tall as I was, and they sup­plied more than enough lit­tle starry white flow­ers to com­pletely cover my artis­tic creations.

Now, all grown up, I have a jade in the front yard. This year, with the bizarrely warm fall we had, the plant was con­fused and started bloom­ing in Novem­ber. Here’s how it looked yes­ter­day. Not totally cov­ered in flow­ers, but with plenty of flow­ers to go around–unless some­one needs to build a major float.

So, with that photo, let me wish you a happy New Year’s! May 2009 bring you piles of flow­ers and inter­est­ing plants and good times with peo­ple who care deeply for you!

January 01 2009 | Categories: gardening • my garden | Tags: Crassula ovata • in bloom • jade plant • New Year's Day • Rose Parade | 7 Comments »

what elephants eat

Polit­i­cally I’m fairly far afield from the Repub­li­can party, but I’m think­ing that one of my plants must be a card-carrying mem­ber. Por­tu­lacaria afra marked the open­ing of the Repub­li­can National Con­ven­tion a cou­ple weeks ago by qui­etly com­ing into bloom.

So what’s the con­nec­tion between the Repub­li­cans and this plant? Ele­phants.

In its native habi­tat this plant can be good for­age for ele­phants. (And I’m sure you know that the ele­phant is the sym­bol of the Repub­li­can Party.) Accord­ing to a treat­ment on this species by Robert J. Baran, 80% of the diet of ele­phants in South Africa’s Addo National Park con­sists of this plant. Hence one of its com­mon names, “ele­phant bush.”

Out­doors in San Diego the plant is ridicu­lously easy to grow. Full sun, occa­sional sum­mer water (ca. every 2–4 weeks) and well-drained soil are all it asks. If you want more of the plant, break off a chunk and set it some dirt. Instant new plant.

Its flow­er­ings are rare here, how­ever, and it’s easy to miss the lit­tle pink puffs of smoke that hover over the plant for a cou­ple weeks.

The plant in the pic­ture is maybe ten years in the ground in this spot, and is about four feet tall. Some reports say it’ll get three times this size, but you can eas­ily break off any chunks that offend you. So far so good in this loca­tion. And in pots it’s much more con­strained. (The ugly fence in the back­ground and its trans­for­ma­tion into some­thing much more fab­u­lous will be the sub­ject of an upcom­ing post…)

The plant report­edly also does well indoors in colder cli­mates. Its easy-growing nature has caused a lot of peo­ple to call it as a vari­ant of the clas­sic beginner’s jade plant (Cras­sula ovata). But aside from the cur­sory sim­i­lar­i­ties the plants are in com­pletely dif­fer­ent fam­i­lies. If you’ve been lucky enough to live where it’s warm enough to see them both bloom you’ll def­i­nitely believe that their rela­tion­ship is pretty far apart.

Mealy­bugs haven’t been an issue with this plant for me out­doors, but they seem to be an occa­sional prob­lem when it’s grown indoors in bright sun. Shade-grown, over-watered suc­cu­lents seem to attract the crit­ters. Try a brighter spot, and cut down on the water­ing if the lit­tle beast­ies are a problem.

Over­all, this is a happy plant that eas­ily crosses party lines. But you might want to keep it out of sight when the ele­phants come to loll about in your koi pond.

September 17 2008 | Categories: gardening • my garden • plant profiles | Tags: elephant bush • in bloom • jade plant • Portulacaria afra • spekboom • succulents | 1 Comment »