I am not in the desert southwest…

You’re going to look at these images and think I’m reporting from Arizona…but I’m not. These pictures were taken right here in the Portland area (Beaverton to be exact). Amazing, I would love to live across the street from this! My opportunity to photograph this garden came early in the morning, thus I was battling harsh shadows as the sun hadn’t yet risen above the trees to the east. Hopefully you’ll still be able to see what an amazing collection of plants has been combined here to create a most out-of-the-ordinary garden for this part of the country. The garden has been built up significantly from the surrounding area, all in the name of excellent drainage no doubt. As I was snapping the last couple of photos one of the neighbors, out to collect her newspaper, asked if I had seen it in bloom “quite the sight” she said. I’ll definitely be back, hopefully I’ll have had the chance to meet the owner by then and I can fill in a little of the back-story. Hope you enjoyed!

Sometimes you really do just have to ask “WWTT”?

At first glance it looks like a tricycle just abandoned in the front yard. But when you get closer you see it’s been chained in place. WWTT?

Oregon is rich in Independent Retail Nurseries…

Whenever I drive south, be it on Interstate 5 or a side road, I look around at the countryside I find myself filled with such pride to live in a region with so many growers, wholesalers and nurseries. I am actually driving along in my car grinning from ear to ear at the idea of it…they are everywhere; we are plant rich here in Oregon!

For week two of my “Support Your Independent Nursery Month” posts I want to highlight the hundreds of nurseries all over the state of Oregon. The Oregon Association of Nurseries (OAN) publishes a map which shows the location of member retail nurseries (not all Oregon retail nurseries are OAN members). I’ve got a couple of these in my car, just in case I have a nursery emergency (they can happen!). If you’re visiting the state and you want to arrive with your own copy you can get one, for free, by clicking here. They also have an interactive map on their website here and a list of public gardens in the state, here. Go OAN! Several of these wonderful nurseries have already signed up as contributing nurseries on plant lust, someday we hope to have them all on board! I would have loved to get out on the road and visit some obscure places to report on the nurseries, but lack of free time, and the fact that my car has been in the shop, kept me from doing so. Instead below I offer you an index of my previous Oregon independent retail nursery travels, in alphabetical order and linked to my most current post on that nursery. Meanwhile these photos were all taken at Cistus Nursery, where they’re having their annual “tough love” parking lot sale, with incredible prices, I had to go! (borrowed my husband’s car). The sale goes on all through the fall and as they say…go early and go often!...“Clearance sale highlights include: Everything! Our now traditional purging of odds and ends, excess crops, and various creatures slightly bruised and battered... some not so slightly... most interesting, many useful, and all very inexpensive! The sale begins on Saturday, October 1st at 10am and will continue through the fall as we'll continue to add to it throughout the course of fall cleaning. Come early and often!"
Get the idea this is a sale not to be missed? You're right!

Now on with the nursery visits...click on the name of the nursery to go along on my most recent trip to that nursery. Some of these are from my early days of blogging (April 2009), and some from just the last couple of weeks...
Al's Garden Center - Woodburn
Bauman's Farm & Garden
Bovees
Cistus
Dancing Oaks
Dennis 7 Dees - Cedar Hills
Dennis 7 Dees - Powell Blvd
Farmington Gardens
Fry Road Nursery
Garden Fever
Gossler Farms
Greer Gardens
Hughes Water Gardens
Joy Creek Nursery
L & S Gardens and Little River Nursery
Larsen Farm Nursery
Marbott's
Means Nursery
Oxalis
Pomarius
Portland Nursery Division Street
Portland Nursery Stark Street
Rare Plant Research
The Gardener's Choice
Treephoria

They say fall is a great time to plant (gives those roots a chance to get established when the ground is still warm and there is plenty of moisture ahead). So if you're in the Portland area please get out there and support these nurseries!

Here are a couple more photos from around Cistus the day of my visit (these plants are not part of the Tough Love sale)...

I’ve got Styrax envy…

It’s true, I do. Why? We inherited two Styrax japonicus in our hell-strip. I’ve blogged about what mess makers they are dropping flowers in slippery drifts, fruit that performs like marbles on the sidewalk and a form that has people (on the sidewalk) and cars (trying to park) fighting with the branches. They would be fine trees….someplace else, not in a hell-strip! (do you hear that Friends of Trees?) But just around the corner from us are three attractive Styrax obassia (thank you Lauren for the proper i.d.). These appear to be destined to grow in a manner which doesn’t impede sidewalk traffic. Their leaves are bigger (= better in my book) And their fruit (Berries? Seeds?) hang in a most attractive grape like cluster! Not only are they gorgeous but if you wanted to save yourself the trouble of cleaning them up it would be so easy to just clip them off! Unlike the everywhere growth of the fruit (Berries? Seeds?) or our trees. So yes I’ve got Styrax envy…

Learn from my mistakes #3…how turn a 15 minute job into an hour.

First of all you’ll need to repeat my “mistake #2” and once again buy a plant which you don’t have a place for. In this case it was the bargain Mahonia × media ‘Charity’ I bought for 50% off last month.

Approximate time of project starting 11:55 am….

Decide to place this plant along the north side of the house (possibly the second mistake in this process… will it get enough light?) and dig a hole, a big hole (a 5-gallon size hole). Once you’re done and you’ve placed the plant step back and evaluate. Realize you’ve just blocked your only view of the smaller Mahonia fortunei ‘Curlicue’… …along with the Himalayan Maidenhair Ferns and an ‘Angustifolia’ Hart’s Tongue Fern (I’m standing in the neighbor’s driveway to take this picture…a view I don’t normally get). Spend a few minutes to think about this mistake. Decide the answer is to flip the two Mahonias. Dig up the M. fortunei and one of the Maidenhair Ferns. Be sure to wear flip flops during the entire process…this slows down the digging, and adds an element of danger (especially on a graveled slope!)… Once the M. fortunei is dug up realize that you should never have planted it so close to the basement window. Fill in that hole and dig a different hole for the M. media‘Charity’ moving it ever so slightly towards the back corner of the house. Replace most of the soil you dog for the original hole, and replant the much smaller M. fortune there. Dig another small hole and replant the Maidenhair Fern. Stand back and realize you didn’t even check to see what the final size of these plants is expected to be. Maybe you wasted your time based on what size they are now, rather than what size they will be in the future. Pick up your tools and move on to the next project. Time – 12:54 pm