Grevilleas of the Perennial Border

/
Grevilleas of the Perennial Border

Our gardens experience a brief second spring in the weeks between the first wet storms and the cold weather which usually arrives around winter solstice. Leucadendrons and Grevilleas are perking up and starting to make a statement. These plants grow with little irrigation in poor, sandy soil. They require excellent drainage and are frost-tender, but in sandy, coastal, drought-tolerant gardens, they can’t be beat. They bring color, texture, and stature into the winter border.

Read More

Fall Blooming Salvias

/
Fall Blooming Salvias

The glory of our borders right now are the late-blooming Salvias. Salvias bloom here at the GFE all year long, as the fall-blooming ones give way to the winter-bloomers. Spring is a burst of color, and the native Salvias start, finishing in summer. By late summer, most of the California native sages are dormant, and their place is taken by tropical sages, many from Mexico and South America.

Read More

100 Words for Drought Tolerant

/
100 Words for Drought Tolerant

As water policies and practices come under more and more pressure from increased demand and shrinking resources, we need one hundred words for drought tolerance. Part of the task of the Garden for the Environment is to refine what this word can mean, and experiment with real world plants, soil, weather, and exposure to find out which plants can thrive with little or no reliance on summer irrigation. 

Read More

Go Outside and Play!

/
Go Outside and Play!

What makes me wake up breathless with excitement is the eye-crossing beauty of the garden. It is more lovely to me than any artwork, because it is alive, fragile, and swiftly passing. The generous beauties of the garden may knock me out with a texture or color combination. But the next day, when I bring a friend to look, its perfection may be gone. The urgency, delight, and sorrow of time passing is more vivid to me in a garden than anywhere else.

Read More

Helichrysum Eradication

/
Helichrysum Eradication

Snuggled into the border of the Garden for the Environment, by the corner of 7th and Lawton, a glowing mound of lemon-yellow, wooly foliage covered the ground for many years. The bad news is that licorice plant (Helichrysum petiolare) has been listed officially as an invasive exotic, and no matter how useful it may be in the garden, it is no longer an appropriate plant for environmentally savvy gardeners to grow.

Read More

Fog City Gardener

/
Fog City Gardener

The mixed weather of June is over, and July and August in San Francisco are the months of fog, fog, and more fog. For gardeners, this means that just as gardens are really kicking into high gear in other parts of the country, and producing a year’s worth of warm season crops like corn, tomatoes, and melons, along with giant dahlias and roses, many San Francisco gardens have a letdown.

Read More

Nostalgia and the Transplanted Gardener

/
Nostalgia and the Transplanted Gardener

Like many Californians, I am a transplant from another climate zone. The plants in my personal stories - the lilacs, maples, and lawns of New England - were ones I wanted in my California story. But unfortunately, people travel to different climates more easily than plants. To connect with the gardening stories from my family’s past, I have to look deeper than the specific plants.

Read More

Spring Blooming Bulbs for Bay Area Climate Zones

/
Spring Blooming Bulbs for Bay Area Climate Zones

It’s too much to expect us to give up our tulips and crocuses “cold turkey.” Yet, this annual planting spree followed by throwing out the bulbs can’t last in a world were sustainability is the new byword. That’s why we need a substitute: beautiful, graceful spring flowering bulbs which are suited to our climate so that they can naturalize, returning year after year.

Read More

What's in a Name?

/
What's in a Name?

The names of plants are important. So you want a sage in your garden. Do you want one that is eight feet tall and drought tolerant with bright red winter flowers? Or do you want a plant that stays four inches tall, likes shade and moist soil, rewarding you with blue summer flowers? Or do you mean the culinary herb that is used in Tuscan bean soup, Salvia officinalis?

Read More

California Natives Show Off Their Winter Colors

/
California Natives Show Off Their Winter Colors

Many people, when they think about native plants, conjure up a vision of rangy, sparse, weedy looking shrubs. And sadly, many native plants have been set out around town in well-meant projects and then neglected, giving native gardening a bad name. But native plants, when well-cared for, can produce as many graceful, magical effects as plants from anywhere else on the planet.

Read More

A New Gardening Year

/
A New Gardening Year

In the final days of January, the buds were swelling on the purple plum trees that grace San Francisco streets. The tiny new moon heralded the Chinese New Year, marking the beginning of another growing season. By the time this newsletter reaches its readers, the plum trees will be in full bloom, as clouds of pink blossoms assert Mother Nature’s confidence, despite a dry winter in the watershed and in the economy.

Read More

Blessing of Rain

/
Blessing of Rain

December brought the blessing of rain, and a few cold nights; just enough to let the plants know that it is wintertime. In our microclimate, the year is like the proverbial snake eating its tail. Fall’s colorful leaves still persist as the first spring blossoms make a tentative trial. In just a few short weeks, we’ll see our first plum blossoms, and then the year will unfurl again, as it has so many times before.

Read More