My 45 Minutes of Fame – From a Humble Blog

If Andy Warhol was correct - that "In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes" – I’m multiplying by three this week. Though this posting won’t be about my typical subjects, I know that a lot of my readers are fellow garden bloggers. It’s looking like writing is starting to expand my landscape architectural business considerably, so perhaps this bit of recent history will encourage some of you to expand your blogging talents in the pursuit of a higher profile writing endeavor.

I just got my third writing gig, this time for an eclectic on-line publication that caters to our little paradise of Santa Barbara. Edhat.com is a collection of local news stories, goofy contests, pet of the week stories, photo galleries, and special events coverage for my home town. Just who Ed is remains a mystery, but the misty legend continues to be a source of mystery for well-funded researchers.

I started this Garden Wise Guy blog just over a year ago, in May, 2007. Part of my motivation was to increase my consulting work and thanks to blogger Susan Harris at GardenRant, I realized that I was actually a garden coach. I was pretty much done with full-service landscape architectural services and needed to cultivate a more light-footed approach. Blogging seemed like a great was to do some guerilla marketing with zero dollar outlay.

About the same time, my Garden Wise Guys TV-show partner, Owen Dell, and I became the subject of Coastal Woman magazine, a regional publication geared toward entrepreneurial women. Owen and I were featured as “The Men We Love” (strictly platonic). We had an absolute blast during the interview with writer Nancy Shobe. After getting a few blog posts under my belt, I asked Nancy for a critique of my blog.

Lo and behold, she told me that the publisher of Coastal Woman had been considering a garden column and suggested I get in touch with her. Two e-mails later, I was writing “The Garden Coach” in exchange for advertising. 800 words of clever landscaping advice in exchange for thousands of eyeballs viewing my ad seemed like a no-brainer. The phone started ringing and jobs were coming my way.

Meanwhile, Owen, who’s even busier than I am, referred another local magazine publisher to me. Santa Barbara Homeowner is a mostly-advertising mag that’s direct-mailed to select zip codes in our area, offering materials and services for (you’ll never guess) homeowners. “Could you give me 1000 words every two months? Something that help people tackle their own landscape projects? And have fun with it.” said James Kappen, publisher. So far, I’ve tackled the topic of the role of color in the landscape, how to figure out the best landscape style for your home, and a few other subjects. I get a half-page ad and, again, the phone’s been ringing. Great, adventurous clients, too!

Yesterday, Edhat launched my first article. It’s just a quick “hello, this is who I am, here’s what I’ll be writing about.” But Ed has quite a tolerance for tall tales, bizarre facts and tongue-in-cheek satire. I think I’m up to it. My reward? A banner ad and links to my blog and business web site.

The challenge is finding three “voices” for three very different audiences. Needless to day, I’ve been spending some time at the local independent bookstore browsing and buying books about writing. We’ll see if it rubs off on my blogging.

So pop by a few of the sites and think about how blogging can not only link you to a world of amazing people, but put a few bucks in your bank account without having to sell vitamin supplement ads at your site.

Is It Okay To Eat This?

It only looks like a scruptuous sorbet, but it's Tecoma smithii (Orange Bells). I conducted my end-of-class tour on Saturday and this amazing shrub was in full glory. I call it a shrub, because it's a shrub, but I'm working hard at turning it into a small multi-trunk tree in the focal point corner of my favorite client's yard. I visit their house twice a year to prune out a lot of volunteer sucker growth, am rewarded with a turkey sandwich (rye, lettuce, tomato, mustard, and Swiss - no mayo, PLEASE!).

We're gradually making headway on the structure after 5 years from a 5-gallon starter. It's now about 12 feet tall with a spread of about 10'.




But it's the marmalade-colored flowers that steal the show, surrounded in late summer by Salvia madrensis (Forsythia Sage) with it's lemon-yellow blossoms. Nummmmmmers!

Just wanted to share. Lots going on, but no time to write much right now. Hope this holds you.

Not So Mysterious Afterall...

I'm always so grateful for having a wide circle of friends who are also experts in related fields. Virginia Hayes is the Curator of the Living Collection at Ganna Walska's Lotusland. If you're not familiar with this astounding horticultural collection in Montecito, CA. click on this link for more. It is perhaps one of the greatest gardens in the world, the vision of a most wonderful and unusual lady.

Anyway, as soon as I had the photo of Sunday's strange cactus uploaded to my Flickr site I wrote to Virginia and Randy Baldwin - my "know every plant in the world" experts. Randy is the general manager of San Marcos Growers, one of the top nurseries on the west coast specializing in Mediterranean-climate plants.

Randy was unfamiliar with the strange manifestion that I interpreted as either a French braid or the neck and head of a buzzard, awaiting a tasty meal of carrion. Turns out the explanation from Virginia was a bit more simple and makes perfect sense...

Hi Billy,

This is just how those large cactus flowers curl up after being open. If you want physiological reasons, I'd guess loss of turgor pressure in both the petals (pale color) and the sepals (greenish, narrow structures) and probably lost unevenly so that the infolding and twisting happens.

Have a great day,
Virginia

So, no need to call out Sherlock and Watson. Just nature doing it's usual thing.

Just Plain Bizarre!

I was walking my pooch, Biff, a couple of days ago, carrying my trusty camera in case something cool popped into view. I'm carrying it more and more these days, as I've just been asked to write a bi-weekly garden column for an amazingly fun local website. Edhat.com is hard to describe, but it perfectly suits Santa Barbara's Left Coast mindset. It features everything from contests to guess the average price of a turkey sandwich, to local news and links to photo galleries. 

Anyway, Biff and I happened by this one garden we've walked past a number of times. Nothing outstanding; in fact, it might be one of the "this is what not to do" examples I show my classes. But popping out the side of a vertical "organ pipe" type cactus was this bizarre flower. Right off the bat, the most primitive core of my brain saw a buzzard's head, waiting patiently for its next meal. It was right out of a Gary Larsen Far Side cartoon. 

On closer inspection, I noticed these odd structures that appeared to be a French Braid, like a bride might have done for that special event. 

I can write no more. If someone can tell me what's going on here, I'd love to be filled in. 

Bizarrest of Sundays to you. 

Nice Of You To Notice

I received one of those "gotta throw your chest out and brag" comments at my blog today. I've been a fan and reader of "Ewa In the Garden" (English pronounciation is Eva), a garden blogger in Poland (one of my grandfathers was from there). She sent me this "I Love Your Blog" icon. That's a cause for celebration, if there ever was one.

Ewa and I have been communicating for a while now and have formed a mutual admiration society. What's so cool about blogging is that there are no physical or geographic boundaries and if I ever have the opportunity to travel anywhere I'd like, I've got the seeds of a frienship already planted.

Thanks Ewa!

It's the Genetics, Stupid!

I’m not a geneticist. I don’t even play one on TV. I did pass my high school biology class (C-minus counts) and retained a pretty impressive archive of knowledge on the subject. As I recall, years before the dinosaurs arrived, ferocious Nucleotides stalked the primeval forests, warred with and eventually wiped out the friendly, but passive Peptides and became the dominant life form on the planet. One thing led to another and pretty soon, humans started buying plants at nurseries, paying no attention to the label in the container. That’s when the inexorable slip into stupid gardens started.

Sorry, didn’t mean to flaunt my expertise, but there’s a lesson lurking somewhere in this muck. Let me don my hip waders and see if I can pull out something worthwhile. Back to genetics…

Giving credit where credit is due, my TV partner, Owen Dell, reminds us that every plant has its “genetic destiny” (hereinafter abbreviated at GD) . Think about it…contained in the seed of a spreading chestnut tree are instructions to grow a certain way – height, width, branch structure, leaf shape, (ask the kids to leave the room – ready?) reproductive structures, you get the idea. So if we ignore the GD of the loverly Castanea dentata, plant it in a window box and try to talk it into behaving like a Petunia… Well, you get the point.

Thesis statement – “Ignore a plant’s genetic destiny and you will be a sorely disappointed, hard working gardener.”

I’m a label reader. I was an avid reader of cereal box labels when I was a kid. Mayhap it was because the sight of my dad eating soft-boiled eggs made me want to wretch, so I’d build a wall adorned with the Trix rabbit, or Cocoa-Puffs toucan. Anyway, when I go to a nursery and pick up a plant I’m not familiar with, I read the label. Of course the skeptic in me cross-checks with other references, but hey, it’s a start. I want to know how tall and wide the plants gets, what kind of cultural conditions it needs, whether it snores. I want to be an informed consumer.

So how do you explain the following images without assuming that either a) the label was written in Arabic; b) the person read the label but thought they could sweet talk the plants into growing contrary to its GD; C) they looked forward to endless weekends of pruning, resulting in a hideous green box flanked with dead brown branches; or D) they ignored the label?














These delightful specimens are both in the genus Juniper – hearty evergreens (conifers) that will grow just about anywhere. The lower, mounding one is genetically programmed to achieve a height of 18 inches and a spread of about 8 feet across. “Cool, I think I’ll plant it a foot from my driveway and three feet from the next juniper! I’m sure if I talk to it nicely, it will behave as I instruct it. Maybe enroll it in plant obedience school.”














Dude – the bed is three freakin feet wide! Do you think there might be, oh, I don’t know, a few hundred attractive plants out there that will thrive in your climate with little or no care, look drop-dead-gorgeous, and grow to be a couple of feet tall and three feet wide?
















Better yet, here’s its big cousin, Juniperus chinensis ‘Torulosa’ (Hollywood Twisted Juniper).














My book says, “15 feet tall by at least 8 feet wide. Attractive, twisted form; give plenty of room.”

“Sounds like a great plant. I have a two-foot wide bed under the eaves, next to a narrow walkway. Let’s take it home!”

Continuing my rant: Just as we have societal rules about what constitutes public decency, can’t we make some effort to end horticultural blight? Can I be deputized to arrest the perpetrators and initiate the gardening equivalent of the Darwin Awards? Can't these people be put out of my misery? It's ugly, it's wasteful, it hurts the plants.

So do us all a favor. Read the label, ask a knowledgeable nursery employee (yes, there are many) for more information about the plant. Realize that short of taking night school classes in genetic engineering and messing with the DNA, the plant’s gonna do what the plant’s gonna do. Life would be SOOOOOOOOOOO much better for all of us if you’d pay attention to the genetic forces that are completely in command.

Gotta take some Tylenol. Later, skaters.

Passion in the Beds - Unleash the Red!

Need another dose of color theory as planting season progresses? How about playing around with RED! Hot, energetic, bloody, angry, sinful, passionate RED! Like a piece of raw meat thrown into the garden, I watch the energy amp up.

Many of my students and clients get a little nervous when I bring up this touchy subject.

“I don’t like red. It’s too intense. I read somewhere that it could make my kids disobedient,” says the timid gardener.

“Huh? What have you been reading in the check-out line? Really, it’s good for you. It warms things up and creates a little emotionally punch,” says the daring designer.

“What if it scares my neighbors?” she asked, plaintively.

“Okay, let’s compromise. We’ll start with a splotch of red, but we’ll bring in some tints and shades to downplay it a bit.

“Tints and shades!?! Why didn’t you say so. Boogie down witcha bad ole red!,” shouts my now-emboldened client!

Red: Add white and it’s “Hello Kitty” time. Pink, like little girls’ jammies and Easter hats. How can THAT do any harm? How about we darken it with a bit of black and take the palette toward burgundy? Seems logical – Burgundy, France, is known for its wine, wine is served at garden parties, garden parties are fun, so let’s have some fun.

Now we’ve got an array of the primary hue, the tint and the shade. Let’s see how it looks when we throw ‘em together.



The maroon bougainvillea in the back is visible from a block away. Framed in the foreground by two spectacular, intertwined varieties of roses (one is variegated from maroon through light pink and white) and the combination is a study in variations on red.



Just around the block from the bougie/rose composition is a great little object lesson repeated with Pelargoniums. The fading red turns to maroon, with a gradation from red through pink.



The Chinese Saucer Magnolia takes care of itself, gently blending from maroon through pink on the same petal. Makes my job easy.



And this Lantana camara 'Christine' takes us through ranges of pink with a touch of lemon thrown in.

If, for some reason, you want to mix it up a bit more, but still want that connecting thread that makes these colors so easy to work with, how about stepping over one notch on the color wheel to orange? Add the tint to the palette and you’ve got apricot; add the shade and you have rust. Warmth and diversity without too much heat.



A red pelargonium acts as the anchor that moves the composition from red to orange, then off to lighter tints.



It doesn't take much more than a mixed seed packet of nasturtiums to bring a bed to life. Warm colors and their close relatives.



Hat's off to lantana again for taking care of the blend all in one plant. Use this shrub as the foundation of a warm color scheme and we can venture out into yellows and back to reds effortlessly.

Gotta go. Hope this fills in some gaps for readers.

[Red grid public domain image from Wikipedia]