Arboretum to public: Grade me
The Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden, which was given a hard time in these pages, has called in experts to help canvas those who use the garden on what they think are its strengths and weaknesses. To that end, the consultants would like anyone interested to complete the following questionnaire. I strongly urge anyone who cares about horticulture in Southern California to take five minutes to do it.
Of course, the design of the questionnaire may not ultimately drive at the reason there is invariable sprinkler run-off coursing down Baldwin Avenue from the Arboretum, even after rains. The Arboretum is jointly run by the County of Los Angeles and a foundation that keeps a lower profile than a gopher in Antarctica. Missing from the questionnaire is any inquiry about the efficacy of this split leadership. Who among us has…
Does this look like a dump?
The Pasadena Star-News has the latest on Los Angeles County’s plans to clear cut 11 acres of native woodland for use as a dump site for sediment from the Santa Anita Dam. The Sierra Club, California Oaks, Pasadena Garden Club, Pasadena Audubon Society, Sierra Madre Mountain Conservancy and San Gabriel Mountains Chapter of the California Native Plant Society are circulating a petition to save the Arcadia grove of oaks and sycamores. Short comments are admitted by the petition. Mine, along with this briefest of background, boiled down to this: To keep our trash from reeking as it hits landfills, waste managers use lawn clippings as “Alternate Daily Cover.” These clippings could be composted and storm debris used instead. In other words, why waste perfect landfill material on pristine woodland? Objections that trucking sludge causes pollution are certainly valid but given that we already cart around our trash and yard clippings every week, I would…
November fully loaded
November dry garden events for Southern California are finally online here. Events include expert tutorials on native plant garden design in Santa Monica, Sun Valley and San Diego. (Run, don’t walk, to the Theodore Payne Foundation to book a place in Susanne Jett’s course — she designed Garden/garden for the City of Santa Monica.) There will be talks by Jessica Hall of LA Creek Freak on stream restoration, Ellen Mackey of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California on stormwater diversion* and Lili Singer of the Theodore Payne Foundation on native plant horticulture. There are plenty of restoration projects and, for those less enamored by the wild and more rapt by exotica, a new CEO will be talking about the future of The Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden. For native plant lovers, the Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden will be having its fall plant…
October fully loaded
Click on the ten for a full October calendar of plant sales, classes, lectures and hikes.
Big water
A report released Wednesday by the Pacific Institute shows how in a relatively modest pass at obvious waste, California could conserve more than one and a half times the amount of water used every year in Los Angeles through improvements in farm irrigation, city landscaping, more efficient appliances and plumbing upgrades. Thirty per cent of the opportunities were found in cities and the remaining seventy per cent in agriculture. The most intriguing part? The cost is a fraction of the allowance for new dams called for in the bills behind the now postponed state water bond. Click here to read the synopsis, and here for the report. Or to read why conservation is the first most universally logical step for Californians to take to insure their water supply in the future, click
