Archive for the ‘Los Angeles Nurseries’ Category

A 5 foot baby!

I took this on my recent tour of the Low Coun­try with my sis­ter, Mary Lynn. Not a great photo, but I didn’t want to get any closer. As per Wikipedia, since 1948 there have been more than 275 unpro­voked attacks on humans in Florida, of which at least 17 resulted in death. There were only nine fatal attacks in the U.S. through­out the 70s, 80s, and 90s, but alli­ga­tors killed 12 peo­ple from 2001 to 2007. In May 2006, alli­ga­tors killed three Florid­i­ans in less than a week. This photo was taken at Mid­dle­ton Plan­ta­tion out­side Charleston, South Car­olina. I was thrilled to see this guy out of the water as I had seen 3 in the water pos­ing as float­ing logs — not very excit­ing. I think he (or she) might be more of teenager than a baby. There were all sorts of fam­i­lies stand­ing around which didn’t phase him, but some­one closed the top on their stroller and bam, he was out of there!

An inter­est­ing fact: the range of alli­ga­tors is increas­ing north­ward along the Atlantic Coast towards Vir­ginia. Look out, Wash­ing­ton, DC! Our politi­cians may not be at the top of the food chain much longer!

And finally, I leave you with these words of wis­dom from nat­u­ral­ist and TV per­son­al­ity Jack Hanna: “The best thing to do is just leave them alone. Alli­ga­tors want to be away from you just as much as you want to be away from them.”

On the web:

Sales:

• The Theodore Payne Foun­da­tion for Wild­flow­ers and Native Plants Annual Native Plant Sale, Octo­ber 14 — 15 in Sun Val­ley (San Fer­nando Val­ley) (www​.theodor​e​payne​.org)
• San Diego Botan­i­cal Gar­den, Encini­tas: 29th Annual Plant Sale, Octo­ber 15 — 16 (www​.sdb​gar​den​.org)
• Jun­gle Music/​Encini­tas: owner Phil Bergman has posted a “new arrivals” sec­tion on his web­site show­cas­ing new palm trees, cycads and trop­i­cal plants (www​.jun​gle​mu​sic​.net)

Classes, etc:

• Hunt­ing­ton Gar­dens, San Marino: every­thing you wanted to know about Gingko, Oct. 11/ Iris: the Rain­bow Flower Talk and plant sale, Octo­ber 13/​Flower Arrang­ing: the Crafts­man Esthetic, Oct. 15/​Orchid Sale and Show, Octo­ber 14 — 15 (www​.hunt​ing​ton​.org)
• Des­canso Gar­dens, Flintridge: In Praise of Grasses event and Paint your Gar­den with Wild­flow­ers lec­ture, Octo­ber 15 (www​.des​canso​.org)
• Potted/​Atwa­ter Vil­lage is spon­sor­ing a weekly con­test for best ter­rar­ium with a grand prize of $500.00 (www​.pot​ted​store​.com)
• Los Ange­les Arbore­tum, Arca­dia: lec­ture on Nat­ural landscapes/​Garden Spaces with Amy Net­tle­ton, Octo­ber 12 (www​.arbore​tum​.org)
• Fuller­ton Arbore­tum, Fuller­ton: Eat the yard: Organic Edi­ble Gar­den­ing Part I, Octo­ber 15

The O’Keeffe com­pound, Abiquiu, New Mexico

I had a deli­cious expe­ri­ence vis­it­ing the Geor­gia O’Keeffe stu­dio in Abiquiu, New Mex­ico this past week­end. Located about an hours’ drive north­west of Santa Fe, the Span­ish colonial-​era com­pound was the painter’s per­sonal home and stu­dio; Ms. O’Keeffe also painted nearby at Ghost Ranch. As the brochure states: “ Tour­ing her per­sonal home and stu­dio in Abiquiu gives you a remark­able, first­hand glimpse into the way she lived and views of the land­scape she loved. She cre­ated some of her most famous and iconic works here.”

Geor­gia O’Keeffe’s studio

Geor­gia O’Keeffe, who died in Santa Fe in 1986 at the age of 99, was one of the most impor­tant artists in the 20th cen­tury, and a pio­neer of Amer­i­can Mod­ernism. I espe­cially love her flo­ral paint­ings and land­scapes. She was coura­geous in her con­vic­tion that women could paint as well as men, a belief not widely held when she started painting.

The court­yard she painted so many times

A favorite quote of Ms. O’Keeffe’s:

When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment. I want to give that world to some­one else.

On the web:

• Sept. 1 — 11: The Pot­ted Store/​Los Ange­les: Storewide Sale (www​.pot​ted​store​.com)
• Sept. 2 — 4: City Farm­ers Nursery/​San Diego: Mas­ter Chain Saw Carver George Kenny carv­ing demo and auc­tion (www​.city​farm​er​snurs​ery​.com)
• Sept. 3: Hunt­ing­ton Library and Gardens/​San Marino: 28th Annual Suc­cu­lent Plants Sym­po­sium (www​.hunt​ing​ton​.org)
• Sept. 5: Des­canso Gardens/​la Canada: Redis­cover the Cal­i­for­nia Gar­den talk and tour (www​.des​canso​.com)

Laguna Beach — design or happenstance?

Ahhhh, the coast. Most of us live within an hour or less of the ocean, but how often do we go? I grew up in St. Louis, and my favorite song in the 60’s was the Beach Boys Cal­i­for­nia Girls. I have vowed never to take the ocean for granted!

The Sun­set Mag­a­zine West­ern Gar­den Book has 24 cli­mate zones; num­ber 24 is des­ig­nated “Marine influ­ence along the South­ern Cal­i­for­nia Coast”. This is the most benev­o­lent of cli­mates. Never too hot or too cold, it is dom­i­nated by the mild Pacific Ocean in South­ern Cal­i­for­nia. The nurs­eries along the Coast tend to mir­ror the cli­mate, car­ry­ing ten­der plants as well as suc­cu­lents, Aus­tralians and trop­i­cals. I have been told that toma­toes don’t care for the coast, although there are always excep­tions. And who hasn’t cursed the mildew on their roses dur­ing “June gloom”? After all, it’s only fair that there be some dis­ad­van­tages to liv­ing on the coast! Below is a list of truly coastal nurs­eries (all are listed to the left):

Ven­tura County:

• Island View Nurs­ery (www​.island​viewnurs​ery​.com)
• Rin­con Gar­dens (805−658−1518)
• Sea­side gar­dens (www​.sea​side​-gar​dens​.com)

Mal­ibu:

• Cosentino’s Nurs­ery (310−457−3981)
• Mal­ibu Gar­dens Nurs­ery (310−457−3981)
• Pacific View Nurs­ery (310−457−8356)

Los Ange­les

• Marina del Rey Gar­den Cen­ter (www​.Mari​na​gar​den​cen​ter​.com)
• Mer­ri­hews Sun­set Gar­dens (310−452−1051)

South Bay/​Long Beach

• Deep Roots Gar­den Cen­ter (www​.deep​-roots​.net)
• Per­for­mance Gar­den Nurs­ery (www​.per​for​man​cenurs​ery​.com)
• Peters Gar­den Cen­ter (310−372−2288)

Orange County

• Brita’s Old Town Gar­dens (www​.britas​gar​dens​.com)
• Dana Point Nurs­ery (949−496−5137)
• Laguna Nurs­ery (www​.lagu​na​nurs​ery​.net)
• Laguna Gar­dens Nurs­ery (949−497−4950)
• Rogers Gar­dens (www​.rogers​gar​dens​.com)
• Sea­side Grow­ers (www​.seaside​grow​ers​.com)
• Shore Gar­dens (949−942−3526)

San Diego County

• Cedros Gar­dens (www​.cedros​gar​dens​.com)
• Jun­gle Music (www​.jun​gle​mu​sic​.net)
• Solana Suc­cu­lents (www​.solana​suc​cu​lents​.com)

Bloom­ing in Laguna Beach

Esmer­alda and new­born baby Gnat

What can one say about moth­er­ing and nur­tur­ing? Moth­ers aren’t always nur­tur­ers and nur­tur­ers aren’t always moth­ers. How­ever I find that gar­den­ers are always nur­tur­ing their plants and often the envi­ron­ment. Moth­er­ing a plant? Why not? My suc­cu­lents are like my kids. They seem almost human to me because the dif­fer­ent kinds have so much personality..brash, prick­ley, shy, cun­ning, gre­gar­i­ous, intro­verted and totally frustrating!

But get­ting back to Esmer­alda and Gnat, they are moth­ered by Susan of www​.far​m​girl​fare​.com. This wise and witty blog fol­lows Susan’s unique per­spec­tive of going from city to farm. Go on and if you like what you see, subscribe…you will not be disappointed!

I lost my mom in June of 2005 but I’m blessed with my won­der­ful mother-​in-​law Ruth. I never thought I would be a mom but I lucked out with my won­der­ful daugh­ter Holly.

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you who nurture!!

My suc­cu­lent babies

On the Web:

Ander­sons La Costa Nurs­ery, Encini­tas: 20% off on all fruit trees thru May 12 /​ander​son​sla​costa​nurs​ery​.com

May 7:

Theodore Payne Foun­da­tion, Sun Val­ley: 8 am: A birds eye view of native plants /​10 am: 3 part Native plant design /​theodor​e​payne​.org

Venice Gar­den and Home Tour, Los Ange­les /​Venice​gar​den​tour​.org

City Farm­ers, San Diego: Rais­ing Tilapia as sim­ply as pos­si­ble, 1:30 — city​farm​er​snurs​ery​.com

Des­canso Gar­dens, La Canada: Iris Walk and Talk 11 am.…..Flower Mart Tour 7am — 2pm.…..May 8 Var­i­ous Mother’s Day events includ­ing brunch/descansogardens.org

May 7 & 8: Gera­nium Show at the Los Ange­les Arbore­tum –arbore​tum​.org

May 9: San Diego Hor­ti­cul­tural Soci­ety meet­ing: The Alchemy of Plants and Gar­dens: Source of Life and Inspi­ra­tion — sdhort​soc​.org