danger garden: June 2020

Tuesday, June 30, 2020

The generosity of friends...

Back in May, maybe late April, my friends Laura and Charlie Heldreth dropped off a metal light fixture shade. They've used a few of them in their garden and were curious what I'd do with one of my own. Oh the possibilities! All sorts of ideas were running through my head. Here it is after being cleaned up...

It's quite large, 2.5 ft wide at the top and just over a foot tall.

As I said, Laura and Charlie have several in their garden. Here's one used as a raised planter in their stock tank pond...

And a pair used as planters on wooden plinths. As you can see they've painted them a dark color.

I'll admit, all the possible uses I dreamt up were of the planter variety. I knew I had the perfect place somewhere in the garden. But then I was moving some things around and it occurred to me just how much I hated that orange parsons table under the shade pavilion. It dates back to 2014 when the Garden Bloggers Fling was in Portland. I needed a table to hold some refreshments and picked it up on the cheap at IKEA thinking it was good enough for that use. Six years later and I was still using it! Not because I liked it, but because I couldn't find anything better.

Maybe the light fixture shade could go here? I tried it and the size was right. I showed it to Andrew and we brainstormed about what color to paint it and what to use as a table top. I wasn't excited about painting it, but it seemed the easiest solution. That is until Andrew said, "well, it's probably aluminum, why don't we strip it?"... "we", meaning "he"...

And so he did. Nasty chemicals were used, we won't dwell on that part of the story.

Because eventually the shiny metal was revealed, and I was thrilled with the new table base.

Here the top is just cardboard, I made a pattern from which we planned to get an aluminum top cut.

My original idea was that the table's top—perhaps made of wood—would cover half of the opening, the other half would be open to soil in which I would plant. I still love that concept, but my ever practical husband convinced me it was an impractical idea. The issue being the weight of the soil, and the fact we have to move the table in the fall when we turn the shade pavilion into a greenhouse.

Our next idea was to get a top made and cut holes in it, holes that I could insert planters into. I spent a face-masked hour at the big box store looking for something uniform in size with a rim that would rest on the table top surface. These were the winners, galvanized "reducers" and terracotta pots—oh and of course I picked up that poor agave that was languishing in the houseplant section.

The terracotta idea won; silver base, silver top, silver planters...too much metal! I'd use the terracotta but paint it, to add another color to the scheme. At first I thought the planters would all go to one side.

But again, Mr. Practical pointed out the manner in which the edge of the base tapered in could potentially make that an issue. They moved to the center...

Andrew sketched out the design and sent it off to SRC for fabrication, these are the same folks who cut the pattern for our agavegate.

Meanwhile I painted, and planted, the terracotta pots...

All done, and I hated it.

Why? It just didn't feel right. Too silver, too prissy. Too early 2000's—back when I was first starting my container collection and still used a lot of terracotta I "jazzed" them up with painted rims. I felt like I was regressing.

I went back to the drawing board and tried other options.

And came up with this...

Rusty steel pipe planted with Asplenium trichomanes, the two small terracotta pots (painted the same color as our house) stayed, but were planted with a couple cryptanthus. A rusty round adds more color...

If you page back up to the earlier reveal, or the original parsons table, you'll see a galvanized cylinder that had been taking up space in front of the table since the 2014 version. It had to go, it was blocking too much of the new table. But then things just looked empty...

So a rusty plough disc was pulled into the vignette and the bromeliads that had been in the terracotta pots found a home...

I also pulled a couple of other pipes into service as planters, because I do appreciate a certain consistency of materials.

The old galvanized cylinder moved off to the side of the shade pavilion where it holds another bromeliad or two...

I'll admit, there's a part of me that wishes I'd have used this gift as a planter in the garden. But there's another—larger—part of me that's thrilled to be rid of the table I'd made due with for years and to have this new, fabulous, table...

It's the perfect height for a beverage, or your feet—that is if you're sitting in one of those chairs and want to put them up.

Thank you Laura and Charlie!

Weather Diary, June 29: Hi 73, Low 52/ Precip 0

Monday, June 29, 2020

Podocarpus matudae "blooms"...

I hope you won't mind a couple more photos from Old Germantown Gardens. I took this particular photo because I've always loved this combination of Tetrapanax and Podocarpus matudae.

I stepped in closer to photograph the leaves—this a conifer, but those aren't needles...

...and that's when I spotted these!

Blooms? But on a conifer? It turns out podocarpus are generally dioecious, with the male pollen cones and female seed cones on separate plants. So I'm guessing these are early seed cones? Don't you think they look like children with their heads bent reading?

Naturally as soon as I returned home I had to go investigate my Podocarpus matudae (a gift from Sean Hogan) to see if it had any of these strange "blooms"...

Yep...there they are!

Little kids, holding a book.

Crazy! So I guess my plant is a female as well? Our neighbor to the north has a podocarpus, just a few feet from my plant. It's not a P. matudae though, interesting...

I'll be watching those little blue-headed, reading kids to see what comes of them.

Weather Diary, June 28: Hi 72, Low 56/ Precip 0

Friday, June 26, 2020

More from my visit to Old Germantown Gardens

I really only intended to take photos of the blooming lilies, but when faced with an extraordinary garden, well, pictures just kind of happen!

I believe this garden is 2-acres in size. The pair who garden here, Bruce Wakefield and Jerry Grossnickle, have been working this land for nearly 30 years. Every time I visit I am in awe of what they've created.

I had just talked with Bruce and Larry about the wildlife in the garden, and then this guy shows up. They have a deer fence but also deal with raccoons and rabbits. As I'm now dealing with a bunny that looks a lot like this one, I was all ears for any ideas they had for ways to keep my garden safe.

This beauty was identified as Podophyllum 'Red Panda'...and it's so red! Shockingly so. Makes my 'Red Panda' look like a dud.

Eucomis bicolor, I covet this patch of pineapple lily goodness.

Wollemia nobilis

This crazy chipmunk was determined to ignore me and get at all of whatever it was eating. So cute though.

Finally, the xeric garden...

I was surprised to see these agave so overtaken by other plants. They look perfectly happy though, despite all the rain we've gotten over the last month.

This one had a visitor that was quite happy to stay put, not minding me one bit.

Time to head up that pathway...

Oh but first I must stop to admire the Nolia hibernica 'La Siberica' bloom, I'm sure it must have been more striking in it's heyday. Oh and it looks like a Yucca rostrata is going to be blooming too...