A Garden Grows in California

12 Nov '07 12:55 am

Mark!! It makes the Earth SO small and friendly, by " jumping" to your garden, just after having visited Gordon's Canada Autumn garden!! And knowing about my N. European one! All of them are Autumnals, but look at the climate differences! And their results!! Of course, mine and Gordon's are far more different than yours!

Your garden STILL glows ,Mark!! I just love ALL photos and parts of it!! I feel like I just walked around with you!! Very Happy

11 Dec '07 2:48 pm

Well I've been preoccupied at school and I've still got this week and the next before we go to break. However, tonight I'm in good shape and I'm going to make posting here a reward for myself for all that hard work. We went to a Xmas party with a bunch of friends Saturday night and that made me realize the holidays are actually pretty close now.

I found a bunch of photos of my garden from early on in its evolution (scanned in) so I thought it would be fun to display them with pictures of the same area over the last 4 or 5 years since I've been taking digital shots.

12 Dec '07 5:45 am

I often wish I had taken more'before' photos,Mark...I enjoy looking at yours so much.The birch corner with its luxuriant foliage is beautiful.You have created a wonderful oasis of calm....Are you sure the pretty shrub is a Teatree though?
dixie.

12 Dec '07 11:40 am

Maybe we call it by a different name? Mine is a cultivar (forget which one) of Leptospermum laevigatum. It has nice, gnarly branches and trunk and fine, redish folliage almost like pine needles. It blooms heavily in June every year. It says in my Sunset book that it is native to both New Zealand and Australia.

While I had my book open I turned a few pages to look up Lavatera. I thought I recognized the name, its the one I've heard called Tree Mallow. I have a bad association with that plant which I can't make at all when looking at your's. I'll have to look these over again in light of your Barnsley.

15 Dec '07 4:49 am

Wonderful to discover your old pics, Mark. I need to take time off to study them. Much as I love tea trees, they are notorious diers [die-ers??), at least in SA. I remember my mom and my uncle discussing the fact back in the 60s. Then I planted my umpteenth one in the Rosemary Border......... it did not survive the harsh winter!

15 Dec '07 7:37 pm

The teatree(Leptospermum) is also known as Manuka here.
It is a wonderful plant but its properties have not been fully understood till recent years.In particular the honey made from the manuka flowers.It is like no other honey.It has been discovered to have miraculous antiseptic healing properties,and was trialled in the Waikato hospital for applying to injuries.Apparently the wound-dressing containing manuka honey is now used in many countries.
I use manuka oil/honey skin products such as soap and shampoo.
Google 'Manuka honey NZ ' for more information.
Manuka wood is also used in smoke-houses for fish and chicken-delicious.Also nothing like billy tea boiled over manuka wood!
Dixie.

16 Dec '07 1:57 am

Gee Jack, I didn't think of the Tea Tree -Manuka that is- as all that fragile temperaturewise. Since I didn't know enough to worry about it on cold nights for the last dozen years or so I guess there isn't any reason to start now. We have a native tree here in California which is short lived anyway but all the more so if it recieves much summer water. Of course it has evolved to make do without water through the summer but apparently it isn't root rot that hastens its demise. Rather it just grows and lives out its life faster under garden conditions. The one that I grew delighted me by growing very fast and it just covers itself in large goldy yellow flowers every year. But then it died suddenly after just a few years. Our native Ceonothis also live longer without extra water.

Dixie I had no idea about the healthful qualities of the honey originating from the Manuka. That there should be lots of it does not surprise me. When my tree goes into bloom each June it is just covered in bees of every sort. They absolutely love it. On the otherhand I don't think the bloom period on my cultivar lasts all that long, maybe a month or a little more. Is that true of this species in the wild I wonder?

16 Dec '07 1:59 am

I neglected to say that the native flowering tree that lives and dies fast is called Flannelbush, Fremontadendron I think.

16 Dec '07 2:09 am

I love the name. Very appropriate! I enjoyed them in England but have never seen any here. The teatree dies from more than just cold. I believe it resents root disturbance. Be it as it may, we've never had one live longer than two years for whatever reason. Teatree oil is a very popular natural antisetic and immune booster here - I've never heard of the honey being marketed locally though!

17 Dec '07 4:43 am

How beautiful your garden has evolved with your own creativity, style and labour of love! Bravo, Mark! Thanks for sharing the before and after captures to illustrate the wonderful improvement over time.

A Garden Grows in California

SUCH an Autumn lovelyness!!

The Back Path over time

before and after

Australian Tea Tree

Tea trees and old pics

Leptospermum

Oops,

Flannelbush