The dry garden: “Spontaneous urban vegetation”

Weeds do so much cooling, aerating and stabilizing of vacant lots and roadsides that Harvard horticulturist Peter Del Tredici has taken to celebrating them as “spontaneous urban vegetation.”

But when a mother lode of seed from these fast-breeding, water-hungry plants germinates in a garden, particularly a drought-tolerant garden in Southern California, it’s war. It’s a water war.

By weeding after winter rains, you can allocate water to the right plants and cut off the thirsty interlopers. You’ll snare the seeds of weeds before they can spread. You’ll also clear out a sweaty little under-zone of greedy greens that block air and light from the plants that you want to thrive.

Click here to keep reading The Dry Garden in the Los Angeles Times. Or click here to read about Tredici’s intriguing new book “Wild urban plants of the northeast,” keeping in mind that, thanks to us, many of those plants now exist in the west.…

April uploaded

Hikes. Tours. Bugs. Plants. Landscape design courses. Spring. Southern California April dry garden event listings newly loaded. Or click here for March. If you have an event that you would like added to the calendar, please e-mail details to emily.green [@] mac.com.

Manufacturing a mirage

Source: The Weather Doctor. Click on the image to be taken to a tutorial on, for want of a better word, "real" mirages.

No news is no news, unless you’re selling water in the desert, in which case, you’re probably pretty good at making it up. Hats off to Cadiz, Inc for today announcing the name of the drilling company that they will prefer for a groundwater mining project that hasn’t undergone environmental review yet. Making premature announcements is one way to make the project look further along than it is for shareholders, but the main intent seems to be to stoke local political support for the project by dangling the promise of jobs.

The week that was 2/28-3/6/2010

Before and after the flooding in La Faute sur Mer (France). Source: Spot Image. The SPOT 4 satellite acquired an image on March 2nd that reflects the extent of the flooding on the coast and the island of Ré. Click on the photos to be taken to Spot Image.

“We have winds this strong every year, but what wasn’t emphasized by the French government, or weather services, was the fact that the winds would be combined with a high tide.” — French hotelier Mario Hamelin, “Atlantic storm Xynthia kills dozens in Western Europe,” Los Angeles Times, March 1, 2010

“We have to ask how in France, in the 21st century, families can be surprised in their sleep and drown in their homes.” – French President Nicolas Sarkozy, “Europe storm death toll at 62; France hardest hit,” Associated Press, March 1, 2010

“High tides are higher today.” — Chris Bergh, director of the Florida Keys…

Notes on a skirmish

Goliath wasn’t really trying, didn’t really want to win and it never really was a contest. That’s the upshot of the response from the Southern Nevada Water Authority after a proposed amendment to do with its massive haul of water awards out of central Nevada failed to pass during the special session of state legislature, which closed early Monday.

Those opposing the amendment along with the SNWA’s proposed pipeline into the heart of the state claimed a huge victory. Dozens of Vegas lobbyists turned away! A great day for justice, the small man, everything good!

The Las Vegas water authority shrugged it off, saying that it had been working for the amendment in Carson City simply to help a beleaguered state natural resources agency protect thousands of water awards threatened as a byproduct of a nuisance suit brought by the pipeline protestors.

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