gardeninacity

Posted on January 9, 2015 by gardeninacity

Gardener Question Time

I’m very flattered that John at A Walk in the Garden and Snow Bird at Gardens and Wildlife nominated me for the Leibster Award. This is one of a number of awards that garden bloggers give to each other as gestures of appreciation.

If you enjoy my blog, I heartily recommend that you also check out A Walk in the Garden as well as Gardens and Wildlife. Two very informative and entertaining blogs with different geographic perspectives – one from the American Southeast and the other from the North of England.

In any case, part of being a nominee for this award is answering questions from the nominators. So that will be the focus of this post. First, for John’s questions.

1. How would you describe your gardening style?

Obsessive, impulsive, impatient, colorful, informal bordering on chaotic.

front garden, anise hyssop, purple coneflower, brown eyed susan — Grass path through the front garden: bordering on chaos.

2. What new plant have you been dreaming about planting this year?

A bunch of plants I probably have no space for, mostly shrubs and small trees: Hawthorne, Witchhazel, Red Buckeye. In terms of perennials, I think I will be planting things mostly that I already have. Oh, I would like to squeeze in some Camassia somewhere – I should have space for those.

3. What is the most important lesson you learned last year?

Taller plants that are late to emerge can be shaded out by shorter plants that come up earlier. Sounds obvious, right?

4. Flowers or foliage?

Flowers, flowers, flowers.

Anise Hyssop — Flowers, flowers, flowers.

5. What characterizes the ideal nursery/garden center/etc. as the best place to obtain plants?

Good selection, knows how to take care of the stock, avoids pesticides especially neonicotinoids.

6. Potting soil: buy or mix your own.

Buy. I’m lazy about this kind of thing.

7. How did your love of gardening begin?

My father, who grew up in an apartment in Brooklyn, loved to putter around in our suburban yard.

8. What training/classes have you attended to improve your gardening knowledge?

I had been taking classes at the school of the Chicago Botanic Garden with the intent of eventually earning a certificate in garden design. Unfortunately, my work schedule has made it impossible to take any classes since early last year.

9. What plants together produce your favorite color combinations?

Anise Hyssop (Agastache foeniculum) and Mexican Sunflower (Tithonia rotundifolia) or Butterflyweed (Asclepias tuberosa). Or Grape Hyacinth (Muscari armeniacum) and Celandine Poppy (Stylophorum diphyllum).

Celandine poppy, grape hyacinth — Celandine poppy with grape hyacinth. I just like blue and yellow.

10. What gardens are on your bucket list?

The Alhambra (Grenada, Spain), Longwood Gardens (Philadelphia, USA), Hummelo (Netherlands).

11. What is your favorite winter plant?

Plants with red berries – Winterberry (Ilex verticillata), Hawthorns (Crataeges sp.), Cranberrybush Viburnum (Viburnum trilobum).

And now for the questions from Gardens and Wildlife.

1. What is the worst injury you ever sustained while gardening?

Breaking a front tooth by hitting myself in the face with a plyers. Don’t ask.

2. How would you deal with wet, slushy, soggy leaves that refuse to be raked?

Leave them until spring.

3. Have you ever had an invasion of bamboo trying to colonize your garden?

No, but in her book Mrs. Greenthumbs, the late Cassandra Danz wrote that the only approach that works is to persistently cut the bamboo stalks off at ground level over a long period. Eventually the roots starve. Trying to dig them up is completely futile.

4. Do you have any irrational fears regarding an animal or insect?

I’m generally OK with animals and insects. My irrational fears are usually about people, and I’m not sure that they’re irrational.

5. Have you ever danced barefoot in the rain or hugged a tree?

Not really … is there something in your past you’d like to tell us about?

6. Do you believe that the moon can influence the growth of plants?

Never heard that before; I suppose anything is possible.

7. Do you have a favorite flower legend or superstition?

The one about how King Clovis of the Franks escaped an attack by following blooming irises across a river. This was why the iris fleur-de-lis became an emblem of France.

King Clovis of the Franks: saved by irises?

8. Have you ever used a plant medicinally?

Not that I can recall.

9. Which is more important to you, house or garden?

Garden, of course. Houses are a place to go when you can’t work in the garden.

10. Do you constantly talk/complain about the weather?

Probably. That reminds me of a joke regarding farmers who complain about the weather all the time. I heard it when I had a job that required me to travel extensively in Nebraska and the Dakotas. Anyway, here it is. Question: What do you call a basement full of farmers? Answer: A whine cellar.

11. What is the most you have spent on a plant last year?

I invoke my right not to incriminate myself.

So there you have it. In the next post we will return to Los Angeles.

46 Comments

Posted on January 7, 2015 by gardeninacity

More from the Huntington Library

I just didn’t get to spend enough time at the Huntington Library. We were probably there for only three to four hours total. The place is HUGE.

One of the massive buildings on the grounds of the Huntington Library.

Most of our time we spent at the Desert Garden. However, the grounds have 12 distinct gardens spread over 120 acres.

Not everything was fabulous. This scene with the grassy sward and the statues seems very out of place, like an imitation Versailles. Plus, how much water does it take to keep this lawn so green, and isn’t there a drought in California? I do like the distant view of the mountains, though.

There were a few nice Sasanqua Camellias in bloom. However, I had been hoping for masses of blooming Camellias. And aren’t some Camellias supposed to be fragrant? None of these were.

We spent some time in the Rose Garden, which I enjoyed.

It was a pleasure to see so many roses blooming in December.

Covered steps lead to the Japanese Garden.

We then headed to the Japanese Garden, though we just walked alongside without going in.

Chinese garden designers like faux barges like this one.

Finally we went to see the Chinese Garden, which was extremely crowded.

I like how the arches create circles when combined with their reflections in the water.

The Chinese Garden is all about rocks and water, paths and structures.

At this point certain members of our party started agitating for departure. I was disappointed not to see the Subtropical Garden, the Palm Garden, and the Jungle Garden. If we’d had a few more days in LA I would have argued for a second visit.

I realize that this is turning into a grumpy post. Possibly that is because I spent an hour yesterday morning trying to open my car doors that had become frozen shut. Or because the low temperature tomorrow is predicted to be -9F (-23C), with a wind chill of -30 (-34C). Schools will be closed because of the bitter cold. Take me back, California!

Next post: LA’s Original Downtown.

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Posted on January 4, 2015 by gardeninacity

Desert Garden at the Huntington Library

Some time ago I wrote a post about why I don’t plant succulents in my own garden. Ever since then, I have felt the presence of an invisible host waiting to pounce and shout, “Aha! Now you admit the error of your ways!”

Approaching the Huntinton Library's Desert Garden. — Approaching the Huntinton Library’s Desert Garden.

We saw the Desert Garden at the Huntington Library on the Monday before Christmas. This garden is fun, exciting, fascinating, and visually powerful. But did it make me change my mind? Read on to find out.

Once the estate of a California plutocrat, the Huntington Library is now a privately run institution featuring extensive gardens, art displays, and libraries, all open to the public. The Desert Garden, covering 12 acres, was the inspiration of William Hertrich, the estate’s chief gardener in the earlier part of the 20th Century.

2014-12-22 16.33.55 — The cacti present an intriguing mix of rounded and columnar shapes.

During our visit there two qualities to this garden that really stood out. The first was the complementary and contrasting shapes and textures of the plants.

The other was the way the spines (which are considered leaves by botanists, if you want to get technical) caught the light.

Flowering Aloe behind a stand of Aeonium.

Flowers are a relatively minor aspect of this garden, but there were a few that caught our admiration. They stand out that much more since they are relatively scarce.

Sometimes the colors of the cacti themselves could be arresting.

The way these flowers are stuck on the stem makes me think of Mr. Potato Head.

These guys look like they could be new Muppet characters.

On the other hand, some of the cactus flowers struck me as awkward or even comical.

Did you know there were cacti that should climb? — Did you know there were cacti that could climb?

Here's another one. — Here’s another one.

There were a number of plants that seemed particularly strange.

The plants in this garden were collected from all over the world. However, they were grouped by aesthetic criteria only, not geographically. Even so, I have to say the garden was lively with birds, though we didn’t get any pictures.

This will give you some idea of scale (of me versus Danny and David, that is).

So do I recant my succulent heresy? Not really. I am thrilled to have visited the Huntington’s Desert Garden, it is a wonderful place, and yet I could never forget its essential strangeness. Strange to me, in any case. I have visited great gardens such as Giverny and Great Dixter and thought: if only this were home. Or at least, if only I could make my home more like this. I did not have that reaction to the Desert Garden, as marvelous as it is.

54 Comments

Posted on January 1, 2015 by gardeninacity

A Vision Made Real: Watts Towers

We visited the Watts Towers on the Sunday before Christmas. Watts Towers are the remarkable creation of an immigrant tile setter named Simon Rodia, who worked on them from 1921 to about 1954.

There are seventeen towers and other structures on the property, the largest being about 90′ tall.

Watts Towers seen from the adjoining park.

The towers were created entirely by Rodia using hand tools only. He fashioned them from rebar wrapped in chicken wire and packed with mortar. The rebar he bent by hand, sliding the rods under railroad tracks to hold them steady.

Simon Rodia. Photo from www.wattstowers.us. — Simon Rodia. Photo from http://www.wattstowers.us.

He then covered his creations with a mosaic made from all manner of common items – sea shells, broken bottles, odd bits of tiles and ceramics.

Rodia also used all kinds of objects to create patterns in the mortar.

Including his tile setter's tools. — Including his tile setter’s tools.

What I found so moving about Watts Towers is that it came entirely from a private vision, and was done with no audience in mind. Rodia did not consider himself an artist, he simply had an overpowering need to create something that would make this inner vision real. He worked on his own property in a poor neighborhood where he had a tiny bungalow (the home burned down but the towers remain) and received no notice from the outside world before his creation was essentially complete.

A baptismal font decorated with broken bottles. Rodia eventually became a Pentecostal minister.

Why Rodia needed to create his towers is something of a mystery. When asked he said, “I wanted to do something big and I did it.” He came to the US from Italy as a young man in 1895. Gradually he moved west, working in coal mines. rock quarries, and lumber camps along the way. In California he worked in construction as a tile setter.

He had a family, which he abandoned after the death of a child.

Rodia likely had his vision in mind when he bought the property in Watts. He specifically wanted a triangular-shaped plot of land. To him the towers were the masts of a ship, though to me (and many others) they suggest cathedral spires.

In the 1950s the city government wanted to demolish Watts Towers as a hazard, but community leaders were able to prove that the Towers were structurally sound (tow trucks equipped with cables could not pull them down). And so Watts Towers remains, next to a small park and community arts center.

Rodia wrote his initials, "SR" on several places around the towers. — Rodia wrote his initials, “SR” on several places around the towers. If you look carefully you can see it in five places in this picture. There is also the date 1921, when he started work on the Towers. Below are the words “Nuestro Pueblo”, which was Rodia’s name for his creation. It means “our town”.

What surprised us was how few people were there. You can see the towers only through tours led by volunteers. On our tour there were seven people, four of whom were Judy and I and our boys.

Houses across the street from the Towers.

Staff at the arts center told us that many LA residents are reluctant to go to Watts, which is thought of as a high crime neighborhood. This is very unfortunate, because the area immediately around the Towers seemed perfectly safe, and our family never felt uncomfortable.

Rodia's bungalow burnt down, but the entrance remains. — Rodia’s bungalow burnt down, but the entrance remains.

I did feel something of a bond with Simon Rodia. Though my garden will not outlast me as his creation outlasted him, it is also a realization, considered extravagant by some, of a personal vision. I probably do care more than he did about gaining the appreciation of others, but it is first and foremost something I do for myself.

47 Comments

Posted on December 30, 2014 by gardeninacity

What We Had for Christmas Dinner

When we take our family Christmas trips, we try to cook a Christmas dinner that reflects to some degree the region we are visiting. Since we rent a house, it’s no problem to cook for ourselves.

At Me Gusta Gourmet Tamales, you can buy your tamales warm or cold through a window that opens on to the sidewalk.

We do a little research to figure out the menu. In the case of Los Angeles, we decided on tamales as our main dish. We did not try to make our own tamales, though. Instead, we bought them cold at Me Gusta Gourmet Tamales in a part of Los Angeles called Pacoima. We drove over there after visiting the Huntington Library in Pasadena (there will be a separate post on that visit soon).

For some reason, we thought these two places were close to each other, maybe because they both begin with “P”. (We are not very strong on LA geography.) They are not at all close, nor does Pacoima bear any resemblance to Pasadena. But Me Gusta was a good place to get tamales.

We got a dozen tamales: red pork, green pork, peppers and cheese, and corn. They were all very good, though the corn tamale is basically corn meal stuffed with sweet corn kernels. My favorite was peppers and cheese. The tamales come wrapped in corn husks and should be steamed to reheat. They kept just fine in the fridge for a couple of days.

Ingredients for green salsa before going into the oven.

Though the tamales came from a store, other foods we prepared ourselves. Danny made a green tomatillo salsa. This required roasting tomatillos, onion, hot peppers, and garlic in the oven. Tomatillos look like green tomatoes when you remove the outer husk.

Then you mash them up together in a food processor, adding some cilantro and fresh lime juice. Delicious, but be careful how much hot pepper you put in there. In our case, two peppers was too many.

Brown mole and green salsa. The salsas in the styrofoam containers came from Me Gusta, they were ok, but not as good as what we made. — Brown mole and green salsa (on the right). The salsas in the styrofoam containers came from Me Gusta, they were ok, but not as good as what we made.

Danny also made a brown chile-chocolate mole from paste bought at the Grand Central Market downtown.

Research online indicated that a good side dish for tamales is jicama and orange salad. This is pretty simple to make. Here’s a recipe.

The tres leches being poured onto the cake.

Finally, we made a tres leches cake for desert. This is just a regular white cake, with a mixture of whole milk, condensed milk, and evaporated milk poured on top. UPDATE: Judy tells me it’s NOT a regular white cake, so just look at the recipe. Here’s the recipe we used.

So here’s our dinner table about mid-way through our meal. We are pretty informal about these holiday dinners. Did I mention the huge steamed artichokes? We bought those at the farmers’ market. We ended up having tamales for breakfast and afternoon snacks the following day.

So how was your Christmas dinner?

Next post: Watts Towers.

27 Comments

Posted on December 28, 2014 by gardeninacity

Hollywood Farmer’s Market

So on our first day in Los Angeles we went to the Hollywood Farmers’ Market. I’ve been told that farmers’ markets are part of the LA lifestyle, and this was the closest to where we were staying. I admit to being a little jealous of people who can go to to outdoor farmers’ markets throughout the year.

We parked a few blocks away on Hollywood Boulevard, which was not what I expected, not glamorous at all. It’s a bustling commercial street, a little run down, with a lot of tacky gift shops in the mix.

In the sidewalk were the stars of the Hollywood Walk of Fame. I found these to be underwhelming, though we did have to take a picture of the star for Mr. Rogers.

The Hollywood Farmers’ Market, on the other hand, is most impressive, packed with vendors selling fresh local produce in late December.

The oranges really were far more delicious than what we buy at the supermarket at home.

There were some artistically arranged lettuces and other attractive vegetables. We bought some fresh artichokes for our Christmas dinner.

In addition to produce, there was a wide range of vendors selling street food for noshing. Danny and I shared a plate of Salvadoran pupusas, which are like cornmeal pancakes with various toppings. Danny is drinking watermelon lemonade.

After the Farmers’ Market we headed up to Griffith Observatory, which was not too far away. Griffith Observatory turns out to be a popular spot in LA, which means on a Saturday there are throngs of people.

The views from the observatory are fabulous, or would have been if the day had not been so hazy and foggy.

Interesting that the observatory was built in 1935 as part of Roosevelt’s New Deal. If it were proposed today I doubt it would be built. Personally I think it is unfortunate that public works in general seem to have become so controversial.

Next: Watts Towers.

12 Comments

Posted on December 26, 2014 by gardeninacity

Greetings from the Huntington’s Desert Garden

We’re heading back to Chicago tomorrow, today we’re going to the Getty Center. The Huntington Library gardens were a highlight of the trip. More after we return, of course.

24 Comments

Posted on December 24, 2014 by gardeninacity

Happy Holidays!

7 Comments

Posted on December 22, 2014 by gardeninacity

What We Saw in LA

Yesterday we visited Watts Towers, the creation of an immigrant tile setter working by himself without much notice beyond his immediate neighbors. More after we return to Chicago.

From Watts Towers. The tallest tower is over 90'. — From Watts Towers. The tallest tower is over 90′.

13 Comments

Posted on December 21, 2014 by gardeninacity

We’re in Los Angeles!

All four of us arrived here on Friday. Among other things today we visited the Griffith observatory. Here’s a picture (it was kind of a cloudy and misty day).

I’ll post a few more pictures while we’re here, with details to follow after we get back home.

gardeninacity

Notes from a wildlife-friendly cottage garden

Gardener Question Time

More from the Huntington Library

Desert Garden at the Huntington Library

A Vision Made Real: Watts Towers

What We Had for Christmas Dinner

Hollywood Farmer’s Market

Greetings from the Huntington’s Desert Garden

Happy Holidays!

What We Saw in LA

We’re in Los Angeles!

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