Thursday, June 4, 2020

A place for Holboellia coriacea 'Cathedral Gem' to climb

If I told you this is a photo of our backyard would you believe it?

It was taken sometime in September of 2005, right after our neighbor to the backside cut down a huge amount of laurel and built a fence. See the bare soil at the bottom the fence? That area had been under laurel. We lost a wall of green leaves and gained a few feet of property, along with a cheap ugly fence. For the record we had just moved in at the end of June...

The bamboo stock tanks along the back side of our patio were put in as a knee jerk reaction to how ugly that fence was. Here they are shortly after installation, before the patio was a reality.


Fast forward 15 years and a lot has changed!

However some of the fence was still visible. I wanted to grow a vine on it but there was nothing for the plant to grab a hold of.

That is until we put up these pieces of expanded metal...

I wanted something light that wouldn't damage the fence (it's not ours) and found a long piece of flexible metal. Andrew helped me cut it in half and came up with a genius mounting method. Three pieces of bamboo screwed to the fence space the screen out far enough from the fence that the vine can twist around the metal.

I actually planted the vine last summer, after Monrovia sent me some plants to trial, it's Cathedral Gem Sausage Vine, Holboellia coriacea—vigorous stems to 25ft long. Although this area doesn't get a lot of water, so I doubt it will be all that vigorous.

They actually sent me two plants and I couldn't come up with a long term place for the second to live, so it's here—yes, it is planted in a container, because getting a shovel in the soil here is next to impossible.

It's quite happy...

Maybe too happy?

Nah...too happy is fine for awhile. Maybe there will be flowers and namesake sausages this year?

Weather Diary, June 3: Hi 74, Low 54/ Precip 0

All material © 2009-2020 by Loree Bohl for danger garden. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.

15 comments:

  1. Great solution! You've created quite the jungle there. I love seeing the before and after shots–what a contrast!

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  2. Seeing the old 2005 photo (still have that metal bench?) is a jarring! I'm pretty sure you are much better off without the Laurel. I gained some 60x12 feet of garden after removing rampant, long neglected and over grown Laurel. I love the metal you use for vine support. Was it found in one of those repurposing warehouses?

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    1. No, I sold the bench back in 2010-ish. I loved it (it was a gift from a former boss), but I just couldn't find a good spot for it in the garden. The metal was purchased at a scrap yard.

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  3. If it gets going where you don't want it to you can get your snips after it. It is a pretty vine. I would love to see the sausages. Sounds interesting.

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    1. Exactly! One can always rein in an unruly vine.

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  4. No, I'd NEVER have recognized that first photo as your garden if you hadn't disclosed it. The screens were a brilliant solution. I've got a similarly ugly fence on our north side and actually no clue whether we own it or our neighbor does, which is an interesting question. It and a 90-degree extension that divides my cutting garden from my northeast dry garden is literally the only fencing on our entire lot.

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    1. Your lot feels so private and contained...who needs fencing when plants and property contours can do the work instead?

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  5. I love the metal screens, always looking for something for vines now that my go-to shop for all things garden+metal is no more. Great idea. Love the before pic too.

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    1. Oh no! Losing a trusty resource is hard.

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  6. What a change and for the better too. Fun to look back on how you have added and changed your landscape over time. Ingenious way of getting the vine to grow on the fence.

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    1. There was so much lawn when we bought this place. Weedy lawn.

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  7. Love your ugly fence solution-my entire garden is ugly fence surrounded. But the before photo-I had a hard hard time figuring which fence it was. I would feel victorious if I were you.














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    1. So did you figure out it was at the very back of the property?

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  8. We just had over 240 ft. of ugly fence put in last month on one side of our yard. besides us, it was 3 neighbors who paid their 1/2 of fence bill. Glad the shrubs and clematis trellis's are filling out. Hope to stain it darker in fall so it doesn't glare at us anymore!

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