Jeanne's triple lot plot

I served on the board of the Hardy Plant Society of Oregon with Jeanne DeBenedetti Keyes, and have heard a lot about her garden over the years, it was great to finally get to visit her place during a recent HPSO open event.

I was headed up onto the porch to photograph the plants there when Jeanne came out the door, being a good sport she let me snap her photo.

The Agave victoriae-reginae and metal dish planter is one Jeanne bought from me a few years back.

Jeanne purchased interesting creature from Dan Hinkley during the Cistus Summer Extravaganza and hadn't yet had a chance to pot it up...

"Sedum oxypetalum-the tree sedum from Mexico shared with us by our friends at Xera Plants, quickly forming a striking small branched specimen to 4' with stunning flaking bark, similar in effect to a small-foliaged Jade Plant. Winter deciduous; store cool, bright and dry during winter. Bizarre, beautiful, forgiving."

Another nearby treasure on a table...

Jeanne and her husband Kirk have the deep wrap around porch of my dreams...

From the open garden description: "Jeanne and Kirk’s garden surrounds a 1911 Craftsman Foursquare house, encompassing three 50 x 100 ft lots. The garden is naturalistic in style and methodology with many natives planted for birds and bees. Jeanne is interested in ecosystems and collects plants based on the geography of origin, site conditions, and many seasons of interest. The gardens are climate-adapted and are either drought tolerant or watered with drip irrigation or soaker hoses." Did you catch that part about three 50 x 100 ft lots? My lot is 45.38 x 111.2 (5,046 ft) so I have roughly 46 more feet to garden than the typical 5,000 ft plot, Jeanne has 3 times the average lot! Oh my.

More from the description: "The front porch garden, an area that gets a lot of hot, south-facing sun is a dry garden with plants such as Manzanita, Agave, Yucca, Grevillea, prickly-pear cactus, (Opuntia), and other sun-loving, drought-tolerant native plants. The Eastern front porch garden includes a collection of native ribes (flowering current) plants."

In the back garden (the one nearest the house) there's the garage as well as another charming out building (or two, gosh.. my memory is already a little foggy)...

A ferny spot...

Then a narrow pass-thru and your in another garden space the size of most people's whole lots!

"The back garden, on the north lot, now 24 years old, reflects an interest in Chinese gardens..."

The label said Pyrrosia lingua 'Keikan (Cockscomb)' (from Far Reaches) but I don't see it doing much of the "cockscombing". Still it's got great form.

Oh man... Daphne x houtteana, I swoon! (my plant died).

This is a first! I've never visited an urban Portland garden that has sidewalks on two opposite streets (on the north and south sides of the property).

There were palms...

And more pyrrosia.

Brassaiopsis cf. bodinieri (a little sun-bleached from a hot day).

I neglected to get the name of the mahonia, or the schefflera/heptapleurum in the background.

Fatsia polycarpa 'Needham's Lace'

Iris domestica, which I've failed to be able to grow multiple times.

I am jealous of every gardener with a grape arbor!

And (back in the garden around the house now) those with a fire-lookout fort in their back garden. How cool is that?

At ground level (no, I did not climb up).

Jeanne had described these rusted pieces of metal (part of an old tank on the property) but they were way cooler than I imagined them to be.

I really should have taken the time to climb up there...

Looking down the west side garden and more of the garden description: "The garden on the West side of the house expands the dry garden theme to include Australian/New Zealand plants. This spring, she [Jeanne] is working on two dry stream beds that will feed into the Ying/Yang sunken garden."

The carnivorous plant bog is planted in the end of the metal tank (we saw the side pieces above) sunk into the ground.

And one final shot as I made my way back around the front of the house. The gorgeous agave is A. ovatifolia 'Vanzie' and the tall thin spikes back by the containers belong to a yucca, perhaps Y. elata var utahensis according to Jeanne's records. Thanks for opening your garden Jeanne!

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