Wednesday Vignette: Let’s drop by the Huntington

I'm all sorts of in love with this image from my December 2019 visit to the Huntington Gardens. It looks like I have a fancy camera with a fish-eye lens, right? But this was taken with my trusty old Sony Cyber-Shot point-and-shoot before it died, later, on this same vacation.

You guys the last week has been hard. We're all dealing with this strange new normal in our own way. For the most part I've been doing pretty well, and why wouldn't I? I'm lucky. I've got my garden, nurseries are open and pretty safe to visit. I've had lots of masked garden visitors, and most importantly I've not been sick, nor have my loved ones. My husband is still employed and my cobbled together freelance work is still rolling—nothing to complain about right? Right. Yet. I've been home for nearly six months straight now. I have never EVER been home for that long. Travel is so important to me. I miss my family, my friends, a change of scenery. I so want to get out on the road. But I also understand the importance of playing it safe. So home I stay. How are you doing?

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Weather Diary, Aug 25: Hi 82, Low 57/ Precip 0

Wednesday Vignettes are hosted by Anna at Flutter & Hum. All material © 2009-2020 by Loree Bohl for danger garden. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.

That's a lotta nepenthes!

Ya I know, but I had to! (a lotta / alata)...

I currently have five Nepenthes alata, I love them. They're both exotic and undemanding—and relatively easy to find, hence the fact I have five. 

Talking with a recent garden visitor I found myself explaining why I hadn't taken the jump into the vast world of the truly exotic nepenthes species via mail order—and realized it's the same for another obsession of mine, bromeliads.

I just don't need that hit of hunting down an expensive plant that may or may not survive my care. I'm a generalist (love all the plants! well, at least the cool ones) and—for the most part—I'm happy with the plants I can buy locally. 

It's the same with my agaves really, I prefer to find them in person rather than hunt extensive mail order lists for the hot new thing (hot new thing frequently means lots of dollar signs too). The fact I have fabulous nurseries within easy driving distance helps.

I hope you've enjoyed the images above of full-size pitchers and small ones that are still forming. The plant below went and formed a baby, a whole new plant...

And it's already got an adorable small pitcher.

My largest Nepenthes alata hangs on a trellis and thus is a little hard to see.

Or maybe a lot hard to see, ya, bad photo. It's in the dark triangular container on the right top of the grid-work trellis. The leaves are above the trellis about 7" and the plant hangs down below the tip of the triangle 5-6 squares, or about 15-18".

It's few pitchers glow...

Back-lighting will do that.

The only other type of nepenthes I grow is Nepenthes 'Miranda', she's grown a lot and I love those big, dark, leaves.

The pitchers are more colorful than the ones found on N. alata.

Both plants want partial sun/bright light and significant humidity.

Sadly any pitchers that develop over the summertime are usually dried up in the spring, when these plants go back outdoors. I just cant keep them humid enough in our house with central heating.

Luckily they don't hold a grudge and quickly get on with making new ones.

Weather Diary, Aug 24: Hi 81, Low 57/ Precip 0 

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

Andrew's Top Ten (Today)

After reading the July 2nd post "My Favorite Flowers: A Post By Facilities Manager"—over on the blog Chickadee Gardens—in which Tamara's husband, David, selected his favorite flowers, I asked Andrew if he would consider doing something similar. What, I wondered, would he chose as his favorites? He was able to chose from all the plants in the garden, not just the flowers, because there just aren't that many flowers in our garden! He pointed, I snapped photos, and he made notes about what qualified it as a favorite...

Manzanitas/arctostaphylos, he pointed at A. x 'Austin Griffiths', but said any of the three counted—I photographed Austin, with his little sister 'Monica' photobombing on the right, Andrew wrote: "Trunk color, smooth bark contrasted with cinnamon peels—plus I like how 'arctostaphylos' feels when you say it"

Opuntia species: "Flat slabs stacked at odd angles, memories of parents yard in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico"

Dasylirion wheeleri/Desert spoon

"Thin blue leaves with sharp teeth, domed crown—produces sotol"

Echium wildpretii

"Fuzzy leaf, fast growth to tall height and cone of 1 million blooms"

Tomatoes!  

"summer fun/sunshine for inside of me"

Aloe plicatilis, now Kumara plicatilis: "Bold trunk with giraffe-tongue leaves"

Pitcher plants/Sarracenia species

"Leaves like Dr. Seuss musical instruments"

(what are you laughing at?)

Tephrocactus

"No leaves, no trunk—drawn by a mathematician"

Corokia cotoneaster

"Hanford bonsai—thin angular with tiny tiny leaves, spaced out"

Haworthia tessellata

"Miniature, geometric, dinosaur pattern, pencil-thin bloomspike"

That's it—today at least. I'm sure if I asked him tomorrow I would get an entirely different answer.  Perennial favorites like Clifford (the Magnolia macrophylla) and Sammy (the tallest Yucca rostrata) were passed over, and I think it was a more interesting list because of it. I really enjoyed seeing what he saw, and how he saw it, as we walked around the garden—hopefully you saw something new too! This was a fun exercise that you might consider doing with your non-gardening partner.

Weather Diary, Aug 23: Hi 84, Low 58/ Precip 0

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

For a moment I was in SoCal...

Driving home one afternoon I suddenly got it in my head to do a take a quick detour past a garden I've visited a few times. Wowsa!

Will you take a look at that Agave americana 'Variegata'!

I'm not sure when it was I last drove by this garden, but things were not nearly this heavily planted on the back slope. Way back in 2015 the owners, Dale and Marilyn Latham, invited my then plant lust partner Patricia and I over for a look see and discussion (blog post here) about exactly what they might do on that extremely steep bit of land. Here's an image of what it looked like then, I'd say they've made some serious progress!

Since I was there I decided to drive around to the front of the property and take a look. My first visit to this garden—in 2013—was so stunning I figured it was probably worth checking out. I was not disappointed.

Not many Portlanders have a sago palm (Cycad) this large in their front yard.

I appreciate their steps to camouflage the plastic pot by wrapping it with burlap.

Isn't this extraordinary!?

Aloe marlothii

That's a sizable street-side container collection. 

Nice to see there are still aeoniums.

A sibling Agave americana 'Variegata' to the one on the back slope.

So many good things! 

Surely you can understand why I might have been thinking I'd taken a step through some strange (but welcome) travel portal and ended up in SoCal? And to think most of these plants are lifted and moved in the winter. Makes my efforts look like amateur hour.

Seriously amazing... 

A row of flawless Agave attenuata at the back, Agave multifilifera in the lower right hand corner. Dale if you're reading this your garden continues to impress!

Weather Diary, Aug 20: Hi 84, Low 64/ Precip 0

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