The Dry Garden: ‘Sustainable Landscaping for Dummies’
The idea that suburban gardens might be “sustainable” came late to Southern California. Modern Los Angeles was sold on the promise that anything grows. Exotic plants were status symbols. Sunshine was constant, and the only worry about water was finding plants best suited to go next to the swimming pool. More than a century later, the fantasy style is out. Sustainable is in. There’s only one problem. What does sustainable mean?
Landscape architect Owen Dell has cut through the eco-babble to offer not just a definition, but also a how-to book. The Santa Barbara-based author of “Sustainable Landscaping for Dummies,” published by Wiley this year, begins by defining sustainability.
Click here to keep reading this week’s Dry Garden column in the Los Angeles Times.…
Flower report
As a particularly handsome crop of fall roses finish and the thick, almost sickening gardenia-notes fade from blossoms drying on the coyote bushes, throughout December, South Africans plants will dominate the flowering cycle in the Californian mediterranean garden. Jade and aloe are entering their winter flourishes, while the bird of paradise remains at constant attention.
Among California natives, be they false starts or early bloomers, some manzanitas are already decked out with delicate bell-shaped flowers and the earliest of the ceanothuses are covered with their signature cobalt blue blossoms. From the Mediterranean, lavender that has been left to adapt to local rainfall cycles will be verging on a vivid fall bloom, with salvia officinalis already in flower.
If you haven’t scattered your wildflower seeds yet, get out in front of the rains this weekend to …
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