July dry gardening events
WE CAN change the world … by treating it sensibly and artfully. What’s more, for Western gardeners, it’s fun. Click here for a full calendar of dry gardening events around Southern California. If you like the look of the Epilobium californica pictured below and blooming now in native gardens across the region with scarcely a drop of water, don’t miss Lili Singer’s “Look Ma, no lawn!” courses for the Theodore Payne Foundation.
Lili Singer of the Theodore Payne Foundation
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The Dry Garden: Watering native plants in summer, or not
WHILE most Southern Californian gardens require more water in summer, native gardens need less. In fact, they take so much less that if you haven’t watered a native plant to death, then you probably haven’t tried native gardening. It’s a rite of passage, closely followed by the second rite of withholding all summer water — and killing the plant that way.
This is not to suggest that native plants are hard to grow. They’re just easy to kill. The key to reaping their beauty and benefits without watering them to death is understanding summer dormancy.
For the rest of the story in this week’s Los Angeles Times column The Dry Garden, click here.…
Santa Barbara Botanic Garden gone to the dogs?
MISSION STATEMENT: “The Santa Barbara Botanic Garden is an educational and scientific institution fostering stewardship of the natural world through inspired learning, rigorous scholarship, and premier displays. With an emphasis on plants native to California, the Garden advances the knowledge and understanding of plant life and provides a rewarding experience for visitors.”
And so, last April, the Garden Board of Trustees sacked its *Director of Nursery Operations and Horticultural Outreach but kept on a highly paid publicist. The upshot? Doggie Bagel Brunches.
*CORRECTION: An earlier take of this posting reported that the trustees sacked the Director of Horticulture. This is incorrect. The person sacked was formerly the Director of Horticulture but at the time of dismissal was Director of Nursery Operations and Horticultural Outreach. The text was amended accordingly.…
Santa Barbara on fire – against board of trustees of botanic garden
- The Santa Barbara Botanic Garden was developed to showcase native plants and the natural beauty of California. Source: SBBG
THE MAY fire that damaged an estimated two thirds of the 65-acre Santa Barbara Botanic Garden masks deeper damage being done by the garden’s Board of Trustrees, claimed an article in Saturday’s Santa Barbara Independent and responded to today by the garden’s Chairman of the Board, former Arizona Governor Fife Symington.
Every public garden has its politics, but the castigation came from one of the best known names in California horticulture, Owen Dell, Santa Barbara landscape architect* and author of Sustainable Landscaping for Dummies.
In the article, Dell claimed that the current board of trustees has squandered resources on costly land acquisition, constructed a controversial folly that divided the community, operated with a board missing seven of the legally required 15 trustees and concentrated spending on high salaries for …
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