Previously in my Instagram Photos…
As always, let me know what types of interesting items you would like to see and I will keep an eye out for them especially. — Douglas
Get new shared links as I find them via my social media feeds:
- Garden / Introducing the Gardenwatch assistants for 2014
- Garden / Magnolias .. Spring in the Bay Area
- Garden / Planning Time: Get Your Garden Started With Seeds
- Garden / How to Replace Your Lawn With a Garden
- Garden / Great Design Plant: Curl-Leaf Mountain Mahogany, an Easy Evergreen
- Garden / Great Design Plant: Santa Rita Prickly Pear for Purple Appeal
- Garden / Meet a Lawn Alternative That Works Wonders
- Garden / 22 Beautiful Garden Gate Ideas To Reflect Style
- Garden / Xeriscape Gardens: How to Get a Beautiful Landscape With Less Water (7 photos)
- Garden / Days like these…
- Garden / Dudley brittonii “Giant Chalk Dudleya”
- Garden / The View from Above Descanso Gardens
- Garden / The 20-30 Something Garden Guide – A Book Review
- Garden / Charles Dowding’s No-Dig (And No Weed) Garden in Somerset
- Garden Inspiration From a Visionary Victorian (9 photos)
- Garden / 10 Easy Pieces: Herb Markers
- Garden / Easygoing Tulip Ideas From a Grand California Garden (10 photos)
- Garden / My Six Favourite Lettuce
- Garden / Plant Profile: Lavender Herb Growing Guide
- Garden / Rudbeckia Mania: Go Beyond Black-Eyed Susan in the Garden (7 photos)
- Garden / 5 iconic palm trees for home gardens
- Garden / Early Spring California Desert Wildflowers
- Garden / 20 favorite perennial flowers
- Garden / The Best Places to See Wildflowers Near L.A.
- Garden / 14 Crazy Places to Grow Edibles (17 photos)
- Garden / How to Harvest Rainwater for Your Garden (10 photos)
- Garden / 10 Easy Edibles for First-Time Gardeners (10 photos)
- Garden / 7 secrets to a great edible garden
- Garden / New landscape mag springs up
- Garden / Digging into the Archive of American Gardens by Susan Harris
- Garden Visit: La Formentera in Garrison, NY
- Garden / 10 Easy Edibles to Grow in Containers (11 photos)
- Garden / Great Design Plant: Blackfoot Daisy for Prettier Dry Ground (6 photos)
- Garden / Trend Alert: 10 Essential Gardening Apps to Download Now
- Garden / I always know it is truly spring when the California poppies bloom
- Garden / Gardening Myths & Misconceptions – A Book Review
- Garden / Advice on Canyon Farming From L.A.’s Vegetable Whisperer (9 photos)
- Garden / Datura
- Garden / 10 Favorite Shed Features for Comfort and Joy
- Garden / Warm Up Your Home With an Evergreen Windbreak
- Garden / How to Find the Right Native Plants for Your Yard
- Garden / Required Reading: The House Gardener by Isabelle Palmer
Garden Alphabet: Wistera
The epitome of Spring, the big, burly, grasping, sprawling and blowzy wisteria is a favorite in many gardens. You need a hefty trellis or pergola to host this (potential) monster of a plant. For that, you will be rewarded with an explosion of draping purple or white flowers that attract hummingbirds and bees and are an impressive indicator that Spring has finally arrived. Wisteria can be a bit fussy about blooming. It wants just enough light, water and nutrients. Too little (or too much) can turn it into a mass of green foliage but produce few flowers. Typically you want to prune Wisteria twice a year — once during its dormant period and again mid-season to keep its growth in control. For me, this means pulling its tenacious tendrils off of every surround plant and roof surface and tying it back onto the pergola where it belongs.
Wisteria
Wisteria (also spelled Wistaria or Wysteria) is a genus of flowering plants in the pea family, Fabaceae, that includes ten species of woody climbing vines native to the Eastern United States and to China, Korea, and Japan. Some species are popular ornamental plants, especially in China and Japan. An aquatic flowering plant with the common name wisteria or ‘water wisteria’ is in fact Hygrophila difformis, in the family Acanthaceae.
The botanist Thomas Nuttall said he named the genus Wisteria in memory of Dr. Caspar Wistar (1761–1818).[1][2] Questioned about the spelling later, Nuttall said it was for “euphony,” but his biographer speculated that it may have something to do with Nuttall’s friend Charles Jones Wister, Sr., of Grumblethorpe, the grandson of the merchant John Wister.[3] (Some Philadelphia sources state that the plant is named after Wister.)[4] As the spelling is apparently deliberate, there is no justification for changing the genus name under the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature.[5] However, some spell the plant’s common name “wistaria”.[6][7]
Genetic analysis shows Callerya and Wisteria to be each other’s closest relatives and quite distinct from other members of the tribe Millettieae. Both have eight chromosomes.[8] – Wikipedia
More information on Wistera:
Previously in Garden Alphabet:
- Acanthus
- Amaryllis
- Apricot (Prunus armeniaca)
- Azalea
- Banana
- Bonsai
- Bougainvillea
- Brugmansia
- Butterfly (Lepidoptera)
- California Poppy (Eschscholzia californica)
- Calla Lily (Zantedeschia aethiopica)
- Castor Bean (Ricinus)
- Caltapa
- Chives (Allium schoenoprasum)
- Clematis
- Camellia
- Currant (Ribes)
- Dahlia
- Datura
- Japanese Cherry (Prunus serrulata)
- Daffodil (Narcissus)
- Dietes (Fortnight Lily)
- Dudleya
- Echinacea
- Ecualyptus
- Freesia
- Fungi
- Grape (Vitis vinifera)
- Hibiscus (Malvaceae)
- Iris
- Joshua Tree (Yucca brevifolia)
- Kniphofia “Red Hot Poker”
- Lantana
- Lavender (Lavendula)
- Kousa Dogwood (Cornus kousa)
- Magnolia x soulangeana (Saucer Magnolia/Tulip Tree)
- Marigold (Calendula officinalis)
- Matilija Poppy (Romneya)
- Morning Glory (Convolvulaceae)
- Nandina
- Orange
- Orchid from the Southern California Spring Garden Show 2013
- Oriental Poppy (Papaver orientale)
- Polygonatum (Solomon’s Seal)
- Paperwhites
- Pineapple (Ananas comosus)
- Primula (Primrose)
- Queen Anne’s Lace (Daucus carota)
- Rudbeckia
- Salvia
- Squirrel
- Succulents
- Sweet Potato (Ipomoea batatas)
- Tomato
- Water Lily (Nymphaeaceae)
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Book Review: The Gardens of Venice and the Veneto from The Patient Gardener’s Weblog
The best book reviews give us a clear indication why we should read a book, its pros, its cons, its faults and its triumphs. Even more, it should entice us to read the book on our own, unsatisfied with the small glimpse we have been given in the review. We should want more. Helen at The Patient Gardener’s Weblog provides this an more. She details how this book addresses not only the garden of Venice themselves but also the history that surrounds them and their creation.
Since we have visited Italy (mainly Sicily) several times in the past, I am naturally attracted to anything Italian. Combine that with my interest and gardening and you have book that was sure to attract my attention. Helen’s review only makes me want to read it all the more. If you have a similar combination of interests, I think you will find it engaging, too.
From The Patient Gardener’s Weblog…
As a bit of an Italophile I was more than happy to receive a review copy of The Gardens of Venice and the Veneto by Jenny Condie. However, I did wonder if this book would have a limited market being about gardens in such a small specific area.
The book, on first glance, is your archetypal coffee table book. Large, relatively heavy and full of sumptuous photographs by Alex Ramsay. Unsurprisingly, given the location of the gardens the images groan with parterres, clipped hedges, citrus plants, statutes and the lovely pale coloured Italian villas. However, and it is a very significant however, the text that accompanies the photographs takes this book away from your average illustrated book of nice garden views.
Previously on Link Focus:
- Free art books online from the Metropolitan and Guggenheim Museums from MetaFilter
- 9 Practical Tips For Your iOS7 Device
- Trulia – average home prices, crime and school stats, commute time info and more!
- New Media | olloclip iPhone Telephoto + Circular Polarizing lens system from ThinkGeek.com
- Garden | Garden Bridge Over The Thames Moves Forward from Londonist
- Food | Hedgehog Cupcakes by Maria Olejniczak from Cupcakes Take the Cake
- Technology | Grab Over 500 Free Programming Books from GitHub from Lifehacker.com
Link Focus is a series that comments on some of the links I share on my social media accounts and here on the web site. To get these links as I find them, subscribe to me on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and elsewhere. Also look for the “My Favorite Things” posts that appear regularly in the blog. These include collections of links for each calendar month.
Get new shared links as I find them via my social media feeds:
Red Stick Dogwood (Cornus alba ‘Sibirica’)
Who doesn’t love a splash of red in the garden, especially during those long Winter months. Much like the red cardinal on the white show, this dogwood would look dazzling on a sunny, snow-covered day in the garden.
Discovered via Pinterest User, Dave Scholten
Cornus alba (red-barked, white or Siberian dogwood) is a species of flowering plant in the family Cornaceae, native to Siberia, northern China and Korea. It is a large suckering shrub that can be grown as a small tree. As a popular ornamental used in landscaping its notable features include the red stems in fall (autumn) through late winter, the brightest winter bark of any cornus;[1] and the variegated foliage in somecultivars, such as C. alba ‘elegantissima’, in which the discreet flat whitish flower clusters are almost lost in the variegated texture and dappled light. C. alba can grow to 3 m (10 ft) high, but variegated forms are less vigorous. For the brightest winter bark, young shoots are encouraged by cutting to the ground some older stems at the end of the winter, before leaves are open.
The plant is extremely hardy, to USDA Zone 3.
The following cultivars have gained the Royal Horticultural Society‘s Award of Garden Merit:-
More information on Red Stick Dogwood (Cornus alba):
Previously in the Interesting Plant series:
- Japanese Maple (Acer palmatum)
- Kousa Dogwood (Cornus kousa)
- Giant Chalk Dudleya (Dudleya brittonii)
- Sunrose (Helianthemum nummularium)
- Australian/New Zealand Tea Tree (Leptospermum scoparium)
- Brugmansia Sanguinea
- Calico Monkeyflower (Mimulus pictus)
- Colocasia Esculenta
- Acer palmatum ‘Sango-kaku’ (Coral Bark Japanese Maple)
- Linderniaceae (formerly Torenia) Kuaui Deep Blue
- Passiflora (Passion flower)
- Firewheel Tree (Stenocarpus sinuatus)
- Anemone
- Allium Cowanii
- Symphyotrichum oblongifolius (Purple Aster)
- Hemerocallis ‘Derrick Cane’ (Daylily)
- Agastache ‘Aztec Rose’
- Rudbeckia hirta Moreno
- Kalanchoe Tomentosa
- Albuca namaquensis
- Hosta ‘Remember Me’
- Dahlia ‘Clair de Lune’
- Lovely silver-tinged fern on campus of Oberlin College, Ohio
- Tricolor Beech (Fagus sylvatica Purpurea Tricolor)
- Climbing Hydrangea (Hydrangea anomala petiolaris)
- Eremurus ‘Lemon Meringue’
- Lupine “Sunrise” (Lupinus hartwegii)
- Chinese Fringe Flower (Loropetalum chinense)
- Streptocarpus ‘Harlequin Blue’
- Nigella damascena (love-in-a-mist, ragged lady)
- Epiphyllum (Orchid Cactus)
- Sempervivum ‘Westerlin’
- Gladiolus ‘Kings Lynn’
- Hosta sieboldiana ‘Dorothy Benedict’
- Begonia “Escargot”
- Asparagus Pea (Psophocarpus tetragonolobus)
- Rosa banksiae (Lady Banks’ Rose)
- Primula ‘Victoriana Silver Laced Black’
- Oxalis versicolor
- Poached Egg Plant (Limnanthes douglasii)
- Parisian Carrots
- Fritillaria imperialis Rubra Maxima
- Clematis “Fascination”
- Swiss Chard “Bright Lights”
- Georgia Rattlesnake Melon
- Dianthus Barbathus “Green Ball” or “Green Trick”
- Coleus “Religious Radish”
- Black Forest Calla Lily
- Black Bamboo
Interesting Plant is a series from A Gardener’s Notebook blog and podcast that highlights the most interesting plants I find in my Internet and real-world travels — Douglas
Previously in my Instagram Photos…
Previously in my Instagram Photos…
