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Dear Jeanne,

I'm writing to say thanks for a couple of your columns. I enjoyed the one about California Flora Nursery, where I hope to shop for some native plants for underneath my oaks.  Last week you mentioned a product produced in Petaluma, was it oystershell lime? Please remind me and tell me where I can purchase it. I have about 600 square feet of vegetable garden space in my backyard.  Any other ideas of stuff I can mix in to nourish that soil I'd appreciate hearing from you.

I am fighting gophers back there, and they are gaining the upper hand, so any ideas about that I'd listen to also. Would planting some gopher spurge help? Couldn't hurt, I guess.

Anyway, thanks for you column. I am enjoying it now that I know where to look for it.

Regards, R. H.

1. Oystershell lime
   Ask for oystershell lime at your local Novato garden center.
2. Vegetable Garden Soil Fall Care
   Water well with patience.

• Digging in well rotted compost or mulch and worm castings every fall or early spring is the best way to produce good soil for a vegetable garden. Have your soil analyzed for pH and nutrient content if you like, but building good vegetable garden soil often takes several years.
• Consider growing a nitrogen fixing cover crop such as fava beans or peas that can be turned over in late winter to further enrich the soil.
• I swear by alfalfa pellets which is relatively inexpensive. Bob Tanem likes this too. You can purchase alfalfa pellets in big bags from a feed and grain store. I spread it on my veggie garden, perennial beds and roses in the fall. Alfalfa pellets expand when wet and decompose slowly. When spreading alfalfa pellets around your plants, keep them a few inches away from stems.

1. Gophers

• Cats can sometimes be effective gopher catchers but they are not dependable.
• There are some bulbs like daffodil or aconite that gophers don't like. Daffodils are good to plant under oaks because they can go dry in the summer.
• Gopher spurge is reportedly a deterrent but you can't have it everywhere. Gopher spurge (in the Euphorbia family) has milky sap that is irritating to humans.
• Castor oil based repellents are reportedly somewhat effective.

Some Novato gardeners are near open space where gophers are a continual problem.

• Gopher Cages: This works against gophers, plant everything in gopher cages or line planting holes and raised beds with chicken wire, hardware wire (1/2 inch or smaller square openings) or fiberglass cloth available from a hardware store. Make sure the wire extends up out of the soil. 

You have a large garden. Consider converting to raised beds or divide it up so that portions could be lined and double-dug at the same time. This means digging out one area or row, lining it with wire, then replacing amended soil into the trench.

Nanette Londeree's rose garden in Novato has over 800 healthy organic roses. Most have been planted in gopher cages or wire lined beds. If she rushes and plants one directly in the ground, gophers find it and chew off the roots.

Vincent DeJohn watches gophers pass by his garden. He can laugh at them now, his wire lined raised vegetable beds keep them out completely.

Gopher traps and poisons are only temporarily effective and not recommended. They harm the innocent along with the guilty.

Further info: Master Gardeners (415) 499-4204, Marin Rose Society, www.marinrose.org, California Flora Nursery, www.calfloranursery.com.

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Organic Care for a Healthy Lawn

Water deeply, less often
Long, slow-rate watering periods that may range from 5 to 20 minutes (possibly alternating on-off cycles to prevent run-off) encourage your lawn to root deeply and better withstand periods of drought or heat.
Skip days between watering so the lawn can dry to prevent disease or fungus growth and discourage insect pests.
Water between 2 to 8 a.m. to prevent evaporation loss.
The North Marin Water District can help you determine optimum watering duration based on water flow rate and type of soil. Contact: (415) 897-4133.
Feed with an organic fertilizer
Organic fertilizers are made of plant or animal materials that break down slowly so that the lawn grass can take nutrients out of the soil as it grows. Compost tea can be used as fertilizer and has anti-fungal properties.
Read instructions and ingredients carefully. Feed up to four times a year. Fall is an important time to fertilize with the smallest amount recommended. Too much fertilizer causes damage.
Mow high with sharp blades
A clean, sharp cut prevents infection.
Trim high and more frequently for a vigorous weed resistant lawn: 1.5 to 3 inches.
“Grasscycle” with a mulching mower. Mow about once a week, cutting no more than 1/3 height. Leave short clippings in the lawn to become fertilizer. Don’t try this when grass is long or “thatch” results.
Aerate when needed
Aerate your lawn every two to four years if it has thick “thatch,” undecomposed organic matter near the soil level. Thatch causes drainage problems and mushroom growth. Aerate by hand or rent machine lawn aeraters to remove small plugs of grass so water and nutrients reach the soil better.
Prevent Weeds, Hand Weed, Tolerate Weeds
Mulch heavily, four inches, around the edges of trees and lawn. Pull mulch a few inches away from the base of shrubs and trees. Use a long-handled weeding tool. Mow weeds along with the lawn. Corn gluten is a natural pre-emergent added to organic fertilizers and effective against weed seeds.
Convert to an “Eco-Lawn”
An eco-lawn may include white or red clover, fescue, native grasses and wildflower seeds such as poppies.

Low-mow Flowering Lawn Mix
80 percent dwarf fescue
20 percent dwarf yarrow (Achillea tomentosa)
Prepare soil, broadcast seed; rake to cover lightly, water daily until two inches high.

Remove lawn, plant native or low-water use gardens
North Marin Water District provides the ongoing “Cash for Grass” program. www.nmwd.org.

Examples of organic lawns: The Marin Civic Center and Harding Park Golf Course in San Francisco utilize organic methods and Integrated Pest Management practices.
Further information: Marin Beyond Pesticides, www.pesticidefreezone.org

Otis, a six-year-old Norwich Terrier, romps on Ed and Jocelyn Mainland's organic lawn. Low-maintenance plantings include lavender, lantana and society garlic.

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America was still largely a rural country during WWII. Many families had Victory Gardens in small towns and major cities. It’s time to renew the concept. Petroleum is used in the manufacture of pesticides and chemical fertilizers. Food is becoming more expensive to grow as well as to transport to market.

Years ago I left my home in New York and drove across America in pursuit of the California dream. Traveling through Kansas, miles of sunflowers bordered farmlands. Along the way, I stopped in Lecompton, Kansas (outside of Lawrence) and visited my grandparents. I didn’t know it would be the last time I’d see them. Before they retired they farmed acres of soy, alfalfa and corn.

Grandpa Raymond rested on their porch steps and we talked about his apple trees and the few cows left from his dairy herd that he still called by name. The subject turned to organic farming.

He drawled in his soft low voice, “Well, Jeanne, our farms were organic when we started out. My father’s farm was organic. We fertilized with cow manure and never sprayed. We didn’t have a big problem with bugs. Sometimes we’d have a bad season but it would pass.

Then the salesmen showed up and sold us chemical fertilizer and pesticides and we started having locusts. Insects came back, more of them. It took more chemicals every year to keep the farm going. We couldn’t stop. I want to tell you we never had that many bugs before we used pesticides and that fertilizer wore out the soil.”

His generation lived into their 80s and 90s with relative good health. His children’s generation battles cancer.

We can learn to like the irregular appearance of organic produce. We can enjoy tree and vine-ripened fruit as though eating it for the first time, fresh from our gardens or picked that morning from local, organic farms at the farmer’s market.

Our children can make the link between plants and animals and what they eat. My daughter prefers peapods that she picked from the vine. When her friends come over in the summer, they race out to the fruit trees to see what is ripe.

Mom had no idea what the big deal was about figs until she’d tasted them ripe off the tree in my backyard. My friend, Kirsten, writes of the joy and pride on her children’s faces as they carry chicken eggs to her in their hands, warm from the nest.

Novato is a gardener’s paradise, create a garden refuge where our children and pets are safe and our food is rich in flavor and wholesome.

Vote with your dollars at stores; ask for organic food grown locally.

Visit the Farmer’s Market on Tuesday (May to October on Grant Avenue). Sample sweet fruits trucked in from area farms, look for the ugliest heirloom tomato and hunt for the most amusing squash shape.

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Fall/Winter Planting

Go bulb crazy!

Last fall I planted hundreds of bulbs and the pay off was spectacular, from December’s delicate narcissus petticoats to late summer ixia pinwheels of color. I concentrated on bulbs that could survive with little or no water in the summer and would naturalize.

Bulbs are easy to care for; their only maintenance is cleaning up foliage after it dies back. They are great under shrub and tree drip lines, interplanted with perennials or planted beneath lawn, annual or wildflower beds.

Narcissus (daffodils) bloomed first. I planted a mixed bag in different locations of the yard. One variety after the other bloomed from December into June. I particularly enjoyed the dwarf varieties, which were ideal for a rock garden area. Crocus bloomed along a pathway in January followed by muscari, tulips in March then Dutch iris in April.

Bright poppy-like ranunculus bloomed from late spring into summer. Alliums (onion relatives) flowered in late spring, early summer. I left the dried stalks on and the kids find them fascinating. Summer stalks of crocosmia bloomed at the same time as watsonia. Watsonia resemble gladioli but are better suited to our climate. Anemones bloom in fall, their daisy-like appearance well deserving of their nickname windflower. These prefer some summer water.

Bulbs have arrived at garden centers; more are coming in every day. Read instructions or pick up a tip-sheet so you know how deep to plant them. A general rule of thumb is to plant them two-three times as deep as the bulb is long in an area with good drainage. They don’t like wet feet.

Want year round color in a container garden? Layer an assortment of bulbs with staggered bloom times at their various depths into a single large pot.

Best bets for deer and gopher resistant bulbs: narcissus and allium. They also naturalize and are drought tolerant.

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Consider the deer

Deer are hungry now. Their food is scarce this late in the dry season. They will eat anything you plant. If you have deer in your neighborhood they will find your tender young plants and demolish them. You may as well set out a tray of deer hors d’oervres.

So when do you plant if you have deer?

• Plant in January or February well after the winter rains arrive. At that point there is plenty of food for deer. The worst of our light frosts are normally over. Rainy months remain with plenty of time for a healthy root system to establish before hot, dry days arrive.
• Use a deer repellent at the time of planting. The dreadful smelling Liquid Fence^TM with putrescent eggs is rated the most highly effective. The odor is strongest at the time of application and does become tolerable.
  

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Plant low-water use, easy care natives

Fall is a wonderful time to plant natives, with increased odds for success. Days are cooler and shorter but it is still somewhat warm. This allows native plants to establish a healthy root system without heat stress. As weather warms in spring, they are ready to take off.

Novato’s native chaparral shrubs and flowers are encountered on sloping hillsides and along creek bay-woodlands with decaying leaves and logs. You can re-create this environment by building berms (earth mounds) or digging in mulch before planting (such as oak or pine) or compost to improve soil drainage.

Manure or nitrogen enriched mulches should be avoided when planting natives. Most California native plants will suffer if they are overfed. When applying mulch for weed reduction and water conservation around native plants, do not dig it into the soil, but lay it on top. A layer up to four inches is adequate. More than that is not only wasted but may actually invite disease.

California natives selected by nurseries for our region make ideal lazy gardener plants, thriving on neglect. The worst thing you can do is to give them too much attention.

Spotted at California Bay: Magenta colored Japanese barberry (Berbera) next to chartreuse Coleolema “Sunset Gold,” a type of breath-of-heaven with pink flowers in the spring. Not native, but low-maintenance and drought tolerant, these vividly contrasting small shrubs look great in the landscape.

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Landscape to save energy

Landscaping to block heat can cut cooling costs by 15 to 50 percent, according to the Department of Energy, while beautifying your property.

Tall deciduous trees (they shed their leaves in the fall) with spreading crowns on the south side of your home shade the roof from midday sun. Shorter trees to the west block lower rays of afternoon. Shading paved areas with trees, shrubs or trellises with vines lowers the temperature of the air around your home.

Evergreens provide year-round shade and act as a wind block in winter. Deciduous trees drop their leaves when it's cold to let winter sunlight through. What and where you plant depends on your microclimate and the home site. Draw a simple plan of your yard and bring it to your local nursery for expert advice.

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Winter vegetables, clay soil and pH

Bok Choy and chard planted from seedlings into a large pot can supply you all winter and through next summer. Cut leaves off near the bottom and the plant will continue to grow. Plant out broccoli, cabbage for late fall, early spring eating and ornamental cabbage. Onions and root crops won’t be ready till spring.

Armstrong Garden Center is selling heirloom Eastern European, cool weather tomatoes that bear in 50-60 days (by Thanksgiving). Let me know how they do for you. They are taking orders now until October 31^st with a 15% discount for “bare root” fruit and roses. These arrive in January and are sold potted up in a pulp pot.

This year I want to have winter vegetables especially snow peas and lettuce. Raised beds and pots may be the best way to cope quickly with clay soil and poor drainage. It takes time to build good soil with compost and organic amendments.

Don’t forget the Sluggo^TM iron-based snail bait or copper tape. Softhearted gardeners prefer to put out a saucer of beer so their snails die happy.

Mark Erikson, manager at California Bay Nursery in Ignacio, remarked, “You can’t beat this climate but it has the worst soil anywhere.” He recommends mixing in gypsum Soil Buster^TM  at planting and amending with compost.

Most veggie garden plants prefer a neutral pH between 6 and 7. I checked my soil pH in different areas of the yard recently and it was not what I expected. Clay is normally somewhat alkaline (above 7 pH). My pH was 5.5, somewhat acid. How could that be? My soil is still pretty much clay-like. Time to add lime next time I add compost.

The flat, flood plane areas of Novato where I live have been substantially altered. The original plant community pre-farm probably resembled prairie with oak stands. My garden has been in constant use since 1948. Previous owners, and myself, have added all kinds of organic matter. This is what has lowered the pH into the acid range. No wonder my acid loving plants are happy and my veggies have been struggling.

For clay soil that is too alkaline, Erik Asakawa, manager of Armstrong Garden Center at Rowland, recommends cottonseed meal. It not only neutralizes the soil, but also adds nutrients while it improves drainage.

We know the rains are on their way. Of course you will renew your mulch where needed. You don’t want to raise weeds do you?

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September 14 Hedge Alternatives to Privet

Neighboring Glossy Privet (Ligustrum lucidum) hedges tower over fences and houses.

That is what privet hedges do best: invade, multiply and infest. This plant should be outlawed. These unruly plants need frequent trimming. Don’t turn your back on them for a minute.

Privet blooms in the spring for weeks. Their pollen-laden white plumes and nauseatingly sweet aroma torment allergy sufferers. Their miniscule flowers then deposit a layer of crunchy brown litter, a month later countless pepper-like seeds fall. Birds spread the seed throughout the neighborhood.

Privets sprouted by the thousands after the lengthy rainy season this year. Thankfully, the seedlings pull up easily when small. Be kind to your neighbors and don’t even think about planting privet. There are other, smaller privets. All varieties prefer heavy watering and produce those rude flowers if untrimmed. Foliage and flowers are toxic.

Here are a few better-behaved low-water use hedges that can be easily shaped.

How about a low-maintenance, fast-growing California lilac (ceonthus) hedge? Their dark waxy green leaves in varying sizes show off their springtime blue flowers that last for weeks. Of hundreds of ceonothus varieties there are a few recommended for hedges that are regularly found at local nurseries. These generally require good drainage. You can improve drainage in clay soil by digging in mulch or compost and/or planting in a raised earth berm.

These ceonothus prefer to go dry during summer months: C. ‘Blue Jeans’ to 7ft. Pale blue flowers. Tolerates clay soil; C. ‘Ray Hartman’ to 20 ft. blue flowers; C thyrsiflorus ‘Blue Blossom’ to 20 ft., light blue flowers. These two tolerate summer water and have dark blue flowers: C. ‘Concha’ to 7 ft.; C. thyrsiflorus  ‘Skylark’ to 6 ft., has a long bloom season. Victorian gardeners thought enough of the exotic California lilac to import them, where they are now integrated into English garden landscapes.

Hopseed bushes grow moderately fast. A single hopseed bush can spread to cover an area 15x15 feet within a few years. Unpruned, they form a tall fountain, narrow leaves appear to shimmer in the wind in shades of green and bronze. Pruned, they appear as a dense hedge. They do produce some seed litter when mature.

Evergreen euonymus are slower growing and require little pruning to keep them in line. They are useful as foundation plantings in border gardens, trained as a multi-trunked small tree, or planted in neatly trimmed rows. There are many varieties, including groundcovers, with yellow and white variegation. Some prefer sun, some semi-shade. Some are dwarf and others reach 15-20 feet in height. Deciduous varieties can provide fall color.

Small-leaved Barberry (berberis), evergreen and deciduous may reach 6 ft. They require a bit more watering but will tolerate low-water. They do have small thorns. B. thunbergii or Japanese barberry are the low red-leafed hedges you see around town. As individual untrimmed plants they are attractive fountains of bronze, yellow, green or red. A red-leafed barberry is wonderful to use as an accent plant in an otherwise green foliaged landscape.

Bamboo oldhammii can reach 40 ft. and is sometimes used as a privacy screen. It is a rapid-growing, non-invasive, very attractive, clumping timber bamboo with 6 inch long leaves and 4 inch wide culms. It tolerates heat, sun, semi-shade and does not need as much water as most bamboos. It is cold hardy to 15 degrees. It is usually available at Bamboo Sourcery, open by appointment in Sebastopol. Contact: (707) 823.5866, www.bamboosourcery.com 

Garden Tour reminder: The Garden Conservancy sponsors Sebastopol Open Day, Sunday, September 18^th. Five spectacular private gardens emphasize low-water use plants and habitat gardening. www.gardenconservancy.org/opendays.html has further information. $5 admission fee at each garden benefits the Garden Conservancy.

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Left: Variegated Bowle's Mauve, Right: Orange Erysimum with Aeoneum

Erysimum linifolium ‘Bowle’s Mauve’ is a lazy gardener’s friend. You’ve seen them: bright lavender snowballs of color from early spring late into fall. These natives of Spain and Portugal have phlox-like flower spikes and live for several years before they need replacing. Reaching 2-3 feet tall and 4-6 feet wide, you may prefer the ‘Compact Bowle’s Mauve’, about half the size.

Occasional light pruning keeps it in shape. I planted one in a sunny west-facing garden 10 years ago. The original plant was pulled up after becoming woody and its self-seeded progeny has multiplied to three. Easily grown from seed or cutting, avoid planting it near open space as it may spread into the native landscape.

When I removed a tired ‘Bowle’s Mauve’ I was mystified. How did it survive? Its root system seemed shallow and small compared to the plant. Stems were hollow and rattled together. Blooming continuously during our dry summers, they can be planted in a xeriscape. Mine are planted among manzanita, lavenders, Salvia greggii and bearded iris. They are compatible with mixed succulent plantings and roses.

Modern hybridizers have introduced varieties you can occasionally find at local garden centers. E. ‘Variegatum’ features striped leaves and two-toned flowers, tan to mauve. E. ‘Pastel Patchwork’s’ flowers are pink, lavender and yellow combinations on the same plant. E. ‘Fragrant Sunshine’ has yellow flowers and gray-green leaves. E. ‘Citrona’ may be orange or yellow with dark green foliage. All require sun and good draining soil.

Erysimum is in the mustard family. The word Erysimum comes from the Greek word eryomai meaning help or save, and refers to its medicinal properties. It contains a chemical similar to digitalis, too powerful to use as an herbal remedy. Over 80 varieties of Erysimum are native to Western Europe, central Asia and America from Colorado to the western coast of California.

Yellow-flowered California natives include E. aspereum, Western Wallflower, found in the foothills of the Sierras under pinyon pines and at meadow edges. E. insulare, Dune Wallflower, is native to San Luis Obispo, and planted to stabilize dunes.

It is a most literate flower. “Orange English Wallflower” by Robert Herrick in the 1600s: “Why this flower is now call'd so,/List, sweet maids, & you shall know./Understand this firstling was/Once a brisk & bonnie lass,/Kept as close as Danae was:/Who a sprightly spring all lov'd,/And to have it fully prov'd,/Up she got upon a wall,/Tempting down to slide withal:/But the silken twist untied,/So she fell, and, bruis'd, she died./Love, in pity of the deed,/And her loving-luckless speed,/Turn'd her to this plant we call/Now the flower of the wall."

Here is William Wordsworth in the 1800s: "Of meek repentance, wafting wall-flower scents/From out the crumbling ruins of fallen pride." In the 1960s Wilhelm Lehmann wrote about the multi-colored “Wenlock Beauty” Alpine Wallflower "The sundial has no time/to measure time; Into the mouldering ground/it has sunk/As if wallflower perfume/has made it drunk." 18-inch tall and creeping,‘Wenlock Beauty’ has been used successfully in low-water use landscapes.

Erysimum chieri, English wallflowers tend to be more fragrant. They may be red, orange, burgundy or yellow and are often seen in garden borders. They need more water than E. linofolia. Native to the Mediterranean and known there as the Aegean wallflower, it traveled with invading Normans to Britain in the Middle Ages and is found in the walls of castle ruins. Other names used in Ireland and Scotland include Cheiry of Keiry, Bee Flower, Heart's Ease, Yellow Violet, or Yellow Sweet William. It was also called Yellow Stock Gillyflower because the flowers were scented like gillyflowers (carnations).

The former genus name Cheirianthus is still occasionally used. This is Latin for handflower, because it was carried in the hand during medieval festivals. It is a symbol of doomed lovers and faithfulness. A 14^th Century Scottish legend tells that Elizabeth, daughter of the Earl of March, dropped a wallflower from Neidpath castle to signal her lover, the son of King Robert III, her father's foe. Elizabeth fell to her death as she climbed down the castle walls. The young prince left Scotland and became a wandering minstrel with a sprig of wallflower in his cap.

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