Don't panic, stay calm, and garden!

Working at the nursery the other day I had a chance encounter with a group of young people who work for a state run organization. They are learning about the garden and how to grow food. They have started seeds, and came by to learn about the compost tea we make. Afterward I was told that just the other day the powers to be told them they cannot have a garden this year, due to the drought. I guess they will just have to buy their food from the local grocery store. What kinds of lessons are these young people learning when they are told they can’t grow healthy, organic food to eat? I guess the thinking is, “conserve water buy relinquishing your ability to monitor it and use it wisely.” Instead we are supposed to go to the grocery store during a drought, and buy food that was grown by “professional” farmers who know how to use the very same water better?

 A friend and fellow nursery person Annie Hayes, of Annie’s Annuals in Richmond, penned a wonderful post titled, “Home Gardeners are NOT the problem.. Read it to learn why the garden is getting an unfair reputation for water waste during the drought. The garden, be it ornamental or edible, adds immensely to our lives. Our gardens can still produce and thrive during a drought. We just need to be more mindful this year about how the water is used. Gardens and gardeners are easy marks for scorn during our annual low water cycles. It’s so easy to point one's finger and say, “that garden should be allowed to die, or not even be planted this year”.

 Annie summed it up well with this, “If you don’t have a large lawn in a hot Summer area, YOU ARE NOT THE PROBLEM. If you’re growing a sensible mix of low and average water use plants YOU ARE NOT THE PROBLEM. Home gardeners who are growing healthful fruits and vegetables or flowers for joy, beauty, and to support and enjoy our birds, butterflies and bees ARE NOT THE PROBLEM. You don’t have to stop watering your beautiful plantings – just be smart about it.”

I offered to help the young people and the organization they work for learn how to still have that garden, while learning how to be good stewards of the water we are allotted.  Don’t let all those wonderful seedling plants die just because the bureaucracy in charge can’t see beyond “NO GARDEN”. Don’t send the message to these young people and others that we can’t be responsible enough to know how to handle our own health, and the ability to grow what we need to live.  Let's "teach our children well" during this drought. Panic and giving up are not an option.  At this time in our history, and at this place, we need to "get ourselves back to the garden"  more than ever. 

“I have come here to lose the smog

And I feel to be a cog in something turning

Well maybe it is just the time of year

Or maybe it's the time of man

I don't know who l am

But you know life is for learning

We are stardust

We are golden

And we've got to get ourselves

Back to the garden."

Woodstock

by Joni Mitchell, Woodstock

A California Original

Lloyd Kahn is a writer from my neck of the woods who built this home in 1961. It has a sod roof, and was built without power tools for the most part. Lloyd says, "We sold the property in 1967 and many years later I went back and discovered that a young couple and their child were happily living in the building. I took a photo of them, which appeared in our book Home Work. Some time around 2000, the property was sold again, and the new owners bulldozed all the buildings and built two large homes :-(

Unfortunately tearing down cool homes and putting up mansions is a trend in northern California. For myself, the following is what makes this place appeal to me even more. Lloyd say's, "After building this, I never looked back. From that point on, I’ve lived in owner-built homes (over 50 years now), and have never paid rent or had a bank mortgage." 

Did you know the word “mortgage” comes from the French “mort-gage”, literally death-pledge. Why do we do this to ourselves? My wife and I are headed towards a debt and mortgage free life. While we are not there yet, the journey is invigorating and the goal worthy. Does this sound like something you would dream of? Don't know where to start? Lloyd has some great advice.  "...when you don’t know how to start, simply begin. As you go along, you’ll figure things out.…"

The natives are restless

In this case the natives are insects native to Africa, who have decided that California is the place they ought to be. The Bagrada Bug arrived in Southern California just 6 years ago and already had decides to move north. The experts were hoping the colder winters might kill them off, but they decided to hide in the top layers of soil during winter. Come spring they emerge to eat stuff like "cabbage, kale, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts and broccoli, but they don't appear to be picky eaters. They have been known to feed on a wide variety of garden vegetables in California, including green beans, cantaloupe, corn, peppers, potatoes, tomatoes and sunflower. Even landscape plants are not immune. Bagrada bugs have been found feeding on ornamental plants in the mustard family, like sweet alyssum, stock and candytuft."

From the comment section at The Yolo county extension service, "I am a Master Gardener in LA County, managing a vegetable garden in The City of Bell. Bagrada bug has massively taken over arugula and to a lesser degree, Kale. I tried soapy water spray and pinching but could not keep up with them. Now I vacuum these crops on an almost daily basis with a hand held dust buster. WOW! I get hundreds every day and it is pretty quick to do. I have ordered some stink bug traps and will bait them with alyssum. I think that between the two controls, I MAY be able to grow greens this fall without a huge infestation."  

LA creates first "public orchard"

Los Angeles has created a public park complete with public orchard. According to a LA Times article county officials, " hope the 'edible art' will encourage more locals to spend time there." Apparently it's the states first public orchard with residents planting "27 fruit trees and eight grapevines in Del Aire Park and 60 additional fruit trees in the surrounding neighborhood."

Three artists calling themselves, "Fallen Fruit" designed the orchard. David Burns, one of the artists said, " This is about creating something that is abundant that has no ownership." The Times say's, "for now, a wooden sign overlooking the trees describes their purpose: 'The fruit trees in this park belong to the public,' it says. 'They're for everyone, including you. Please take care of the fruit trees and when the fruit is ripe, taste it and share it with others.'" They planted "plums, pomegranates, limes, avocados and apricots." One of the residents across the street said, "he loves having fruit trees across from his home."

I am not sure how this is going to work. Will the county or residents maintain these trees? Who will be allowed to harvest the fruit? How much fruit can one community member take? The statement that, "this is about creating something that is abundant that has no ownership," concerns me. When no one "owns" the plot, who will feel the need to maintain it? If one neighbor ends up doing most of the maintenance how will they feel when others swoop in to take limes for their mojito's?" How much fruit is enough for one person to take?

Considering the number of fruit trees in the LA area that already bear fruit on property, and then is left to rot on the ground, I don't hold out much hope for this. Community gardens and farmers markets make it because people feel ownership, whether it's a small allotment or selling the fruit at market. This project has the county to fall back on, so their is no sense of ownership or pride in keeping it up. I hope it works, but I am afraid this has the makings of a "temporary art project".

Fallen Fruit has some interesting ideas however, one of which is "Public Fruit Maps".  According to their website, one of their "core projects is to map neighborhoods to which we are invited, mapping all the fruit trees that grow in or over public space.  The maps are hand-drawn and distributed free from copyright as jpgs and PDFs." This is a great idea, and one which may have more potential than the "public fruit park". They have also created a project titled, "Fruit Tree Adoptions". According to Fallen Fruit they "distribute free bare-root fruit trees in a variety of urban settings.  We encourage the planting of these trees in either public space or on the periphery of private property, in order to create new kinds of communal life based on generosity and sharing.  Each recipient signs an adoption form promising to care for the tree — initiating a relationship with it." I like the adoption form which provides that sense of "ownership", which may encourage the person signing up to adopt the trees to maintain them.

The chapparral comes to life

Where I live the passing of the  solstice and the arrival of winter rains brings the chaparral to life. Walking through the chapparral one can hear the sound of bees, busy at work on the manzanita flowers.

Chaparral occurs in a very small area of the world. Only about 5% of the state of California has chaparral. Chaparral is a Spanish word derived from chaparro, meaning a "small" or "dwarf" oak. The area is known for it's lack of rain during the summer and early fall. Often 6 to eight months will pass without a drop of rain. When winter arrives it can rain 45 inches in just a few months. With the rains, plants that have been dormant during the long dry summer come to life.

Manzanita can be roughly translated from Spanish as to mean "little apple" for the berries that develop in summer from the small bell shaped flowers. The flowers  appear early winter, like the one pictured above at the UC Botanical Gardens at Berkeley.

Today the sun is shinning and the ground freshly rained on. A perfect day for a walk.

Merry Christmas,  from deep within the chaparral.

Evelyn Ackerman, famed California artist dies

Evelyn Ackerman and her husband Jeromes art encapsulated a time and feeling in California that I am lucky to remember. My mother use to create these mosaic art pieces on the top of tables. I think we had one in our patio, and I hadn't thought about it until reading of Evelyns death last Friday. Mom must have gotten the idea from one of her many art classes she took when we lived in Southern California, perhaps even from The Ackermans. You can read more about Evelyn here at California Home and Design.  According to the post , "Evelyn and Jerome specialized in making affordable home accessories, and worked with a number of mediums from woodcarving and textiles to mosaics and ceramics. The couple’s work was inspired by the German Bauhaus art movement, which placed equal importance on fine arts and craftsmanship. They are known to have inspired California midcentury modern style, which remains popular and stylish today."

Most of all I love their outlook towards art. At Ackermanmodern.com she is quoted, “We strove to make things we could be proud of in terms of our design and art backgrounds, but that were viable commercially, that people could afford and get pleasure from putting on their walls or their tables.”

To see more of The Ackermans work, go here.  I might suggest listening to Dave Brubeck while viewing their work. Dave just passed away the other day, and also hails from that "certain time and place" that was mid-20th century California. The smell of jasmine wafting through the patio doors would complete the scene.

"This is the most significant plant disease invasion into California in modern history"

California's citrus industry accounts for $2 billion in revenue. You would think a disease that threatens the industry would get more attention, yet this is the first I have heard about it. According to Yahoo news, "state bug detectives fanned across...suburban Los Angeles neighborhood Monday, vacuuming backyard trees with bug catchers, setting traps and taking tissue samples from citrus in a frantic effort to stop the spread of a deadly disease detected there last week."

According to the article, "the USDA confirmed on Friday what state agriculture officials had feared: Both a psyllid and the 8-foot, 8-year-old grafted lemon-pummelo tree where it was found March 22 in the Hacienda Heights suburb of Los Angeles County were infected with huanglongbing. The disease is 'citrus greening' which is transmitted by 'an infected psyllid.'  A psyllid is an insect that when feeding on a citrus leaf can transmit the disease from one tree to another. 'This is the most significant plant disease invasion into California in modern history,' said Ted Batkin of the Citrus Research Board."

Are you an organic gardener? State inspectors are fanning out across LA searching for the bug, and potentially infected tree's. If you have a infected tree the state will, "spray the tree with the pesticide TEMPO, a pyrethroid-type insecticide that lasts up to 30 days." Then they will remove the tree for destruction. "The state is asking the Office of Administrative Law for emergency authority ordering mandatory treatment all of the trees in the half-mile zone in an attempt to kill the psyllids and prevent the spread of the disease. County agriculture officials are working to educate homeowners by mailing out information prior to a community-wide meeting April 9".

I remember the early 80's living in The Bay Area, helicopters would fly over at night spraying Malathion in an attempt to eradicate The Mediterranean Fruit Fly. Ironically, the man who ordered the spraying then was Governor Jerry Brown, our current governor. Of course aerial spraying would be much more difficult to pull off in today's environment. So for now state inspectors are walking door to door hanging traps and inspecting trees. "In one 15-minute span on Monday CDFA trappers using vacuum-like devices collected 25 Asian citrus psyllids from a single backyard tree in the target area."

I think this would be a great opportunity for garden centers, nurseries, and garden bloggers.  Use the power of social media to inform, and help people understand the nature of this threat. With so much happening in the world stuff like this can "end up under the fold" so to speak.  As the Yahoo article say's, "the people of Los Angeles County need to realize how important this is. It's so common to have citrus in residential backyards, and nobody wants to see widespread losses there."

Here is a post I did awhile back on the original Washington Navel Orange Tree, which still lives in the middle of a busy thoroughfare in Riverside. That tree has sure seen a lot of changes in the 130 plus years of it's existence.

California Horse Chestnut

This is one of our most miss-understood native trees, the Horse chestnut (Aesculus californica). This picture highlights why the tree is so miss-understood. It goes dormant during summer and doesn't come out of dormancy until the rains return in fall. Right now the chestnuts are forming and will fall to the ground. There they will sprout and start a new tree. These trees are all over the place in the foothills. It is a common component of the chaparral. This is a very easy tree to grow.

Of course the problem is it looks like its dying during the summer, yet it is perfectly adapted to our summer droughts. Think about it, when there is no moisture to be had it goes dormant only to come out of dormancy when the rains return in fall. This is one reason we call fall the "second spring" around here.

Trees and plants like this that are so adapted to our climate will never become popular until we re look at what constitutes a "desirable" landscape here. California is a place where just about anything will grow with water. Why would someone moving here from different climates want a "dead" looking plants in their yard. Of course styles change when confronted with drought and a lack of water.

What we need here is a garden aesthetic that celebrates our climate. It's happening on a small scale with xeriscape and like climate gardens, but they are few and far between.While the Horse chestnut may not fit into the "look" most people are striving for, plants that are adapted to the dry summers will become more popular as we look for gardens that take less time to maintain.

Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Colony

The Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Farm Historical site is right next to the school my kids went to. I pass by this spot on my way to work. The Colony was the first group of Japanese to arrive and settle in the United States. The colony had come to grow mulberry trees for silk production, tea plants, and bamboo plants. The colony struggled along and eventually gave up and returned to Japan. The story of Okei, a young girl who stayed here when the rest of the colony left to go back to Japan is touching. She is buried on top of the hill she sat on when she would look forlornly east, towards Japan waiting for the colony to return. Her grave still stands on the top of the hill just a little way up this dirt path. When I worked at Gold Hill Nursery for Al Veerkamp some 20 years ago we would have visitors from Japan come in with post cards picturing the site, asking how to get to the grave and memorial. I believe there is even a replica in Japan. For years the grave has been fenced off but now there is a movement to purchase the property. The Florin and Placer chapters of the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), the Fukushima Kenjin Kai, the California State Department of Parks and Recreation, and the American River Conservancy have formed a working partnership which seeks to acquire the historic 303 acre Veerkamp property at Gold Hill, a rural area between Placerville and Coloma in western El Dorado County according to the web page.

This is quite exciting as I would think this would be a huge destination for people, especially from Japan or with Japanese ancestry.The historical significance is huge and it would be great to see the old house and the rest of the property preserved.

The photos are from the shrine and historical marker that was placed here in the sixties. I am not sure but I believe this was when then Governor Regan and Japanese dignitaries came here to honor the colony. The shrine was designed by my friend nurseryman Don Yamasaki's Father.