Summer's Coming: Time for Some Sacramento Vegetable Gardening

It's that time again, time to experience the miracle of life!!!

There's something fundamentally satisfying about growing veggies (actually, anything) from seed! Like many gardeners, I have hoards of them ... and collect them, buy them, trade them, and sigh over them. They're little treasures that are an essential part of life. You may have noticed during ... (sneeze) pollen season or while watching dandelions floating on the wind, however, that Mother Nature really produces in abundance to ensure the continuation of the genus and species. Lots of seeds! Lots of pollen! A-Choo! Why so many? Mother Nature has to depend on accident and chance, and compensates with waste!  As gardeners, we can play the game to provide all the elements that little seed needs. Cool, huh?!? Sometimes, the growers give us a head start and we get to take that 6-pack of chard or 1 gallon tomato home from the nursery, dig a hole and Voila! Instant garden, no waiting! Still satisfying ...

Getting Started

My suggestion is to start small ... plant just a few things, gain some experience and confidence and keep it simple. I say this from experience. Sacramento gets really hot come July/August, and you may be happy to only have to care for 1 tomato plant and some basil. If you live in an apartment and don't have your own bit of earth, you can try balcony gardening if you have a south or western exposure (most veg need 6 hours of sunlight). EarthBoxes can help overcome the watering problem inherent in living on the 5th floor.

Vocabulary

 Part of learning any subject is getting familiar with it’s basic concepts and it’s own special vocabulary. Much of this information is on the seed packet itself.

Warm Season Crops - summer vegetables that can be planted now are warm season crops. The general rule is wait until the nights are consistently above 50 degrees, or you can sit on the ground comfortably.

• Tomatoes, tomatilloes
• Beans - pole beans, bush beans of every sort!
• Squash, melons, cucumbers, zucchini
• Peppers, hot and mild
• Eggplant

Cool Season Crops: in the fall or early spring one can grow cool season crops. 

• Lettuce and other greens (spinach, micro greens, arugula)
• Kale, broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes, brussels sprouts
• Onions, garlic, leeks
• Potatoes, carrots, turnips, radishes, beets, peas

Germination Time: how long before that little seed wakes up and starts pushing out its first root, stem and leaves.

Maturation Time: how long it takes before that young plant matures and can be harvested. Some examples:

• Cool season snap peas need about 65 days,
• fast-growing radishes, about 3 weeks,
• Micro greens (great on pizza with goat cheese and sun dried tomatoes) can be grown indoors or outdoors, and take just 25 days!
• In the case of that artichoke up above, it can take up to 8 months to produce a crop, but will then continue producing year after year … and be a lovely ornamental plant in the garden as well!

Average First and Last Frost: this is the historical average for a particular area, and it's frequently the growing window, because few veggies grow when the temps plummet!  In the Sacramento Valley, this gives means on average, a growing season from mid-March to mid-November, which is why California produces more than half of the country's fruits, nuts and vegetables! My husband’s Swedish ancestors, who lived in Minnesota, at best, had from May to September. No dawdling for them! Dedicated gardeners in the colder ranges are more likely to have greenhouses and start vegetables from seeds so they can jump start the season. I’d love a greenhouse, but don’t really need one…sigh. To find out what your growing window is, click here for average first and last frosts by state.

Gardening Zones, a term you’ll run into rather quickly in garden books or discussions. (There are actually two zonal systems … the U.S. Department of Agriculture system, which charts the average annual minimum temperatures across the U.S., and the AHS (American Horticultural Society) system, which classifies regions based upon the severity of summer heat. Both of these are valuable, and are used to determine what sorts of plants are most likely to thrive in an area, but most gardening books refer to the USDA zones.) I live in USDA Zone 9, which is like Italy and the Napa Valley. I can, and do, grow grapes! Garden magazines usually speak to a large audience with different zones ... enjoy the pictures, but know your zone!

Pollinators, Beneficial Insects, Companion Plants and Planting by the Light of the Moon ... So many things to be curious about, so many places on the Internet to lurk and learn. I leave you to your own devices with a few suggestions to get you started ...

•  Companion Plants for Your Vegetable Garden
•  Attracting more bees and pollinators to your garden
• Botanical Interest's "Save the Bees" Seed Mix
• Companion Planting Improves Gardening Efforts
• Renee's Garden - Kitchen Garden Design for long Sacramento summers

This summer, why not start your own Victory Garden? Come harvest time, don’t forget the victory cry, “I GREW IT MYSELF!”

Cal State Flower, Food and Garden Show

Well ... the gardens are ready, vendors setting up, show opens tomorrow! Here's a peek at my garden, La Casa Verde...

 
Come join us, I think it's going to be a great show. The speaker line-up is fantastic! Check it out on the show website. I've worked long, hard hours putting this together and have had some marvelous help, including Bobby Alvarez of Granite Valley Landscaping, Jorge Lozano of Jorge Lozano Art, Victor Herrera of Custom Concrete Designs by Victor, my fellow blogging buddy and vegetable gardener (this is her corner of the display!), Jennifer Hammer, of Jenn's Cooking Garden and especially my husband, Wayne, who showed off his true farm boy roots ... lug'n and shovel'n and haul'n stuff around. Hard work, but somebody has to do it!!!! Thanks, honey.

Getting Ready for the Cal State Garden Show; La Casa Verde

Much time spent looking at color swatches and books...

 but now the s... hits the fan. here's the empty hall at Cal Expo. It's depressing, certainly not encouraging. ("Why did I chose such a large space!?!")

 ...so that's what a sheetrock wall looks like on the inside ...(doesn't Steve have nice legs?).

 6 pallets of these babies.

 Victor takes a break from paving.

 Rory on the eve of his 30th birthday, taking a break from mudding my walls.

 Yikes! That's too much yellow!

 Say hello to Jenn. She's been such a help! She's also going to run a ticket give-away on her blog, Jenn's Cooking Garden (where she blogs about her veg garden).

More pictures tomorrow. Come to the show!!!!!

Catching up with Geno's Garden

I haven't posted in awhile, but I haven't been idle! Not me! I've got several projects in the works, including my upcoming garden display at the California State Flower, Food and Garden Show (April 7-10).
Here are pictures from last weekend's adventures:

(detail of Tunisian window from Riley's Antiques at the Antique Trove in Rocklin)

wonderful recycled material sculpture at Pottery World in Loomis. This guy is about 5' tall. His partner was equally guapo (handsome) as he played his bass.

well... To tell the truth, I'm doing this from my iPhone in the car, so don't know which pictures will show up. But, there should be the window, the sculpture, a red Farmall Cub from High Hand Nursery, and a marvelous display patio from Green Acres (Jackson Highway &  Power Inn). (two pictures, note the wonderful water feature!) Like much of life, this a learning experience!

Wordless Wednesday: It's A Daffodilly Day!

Flickr photo credit: PresleyJesus

Thanks little bag o' bulbs!

You may be interested in a related post from the back of the stack: Plant Now for Spring Daffodils.

Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!
Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.

Coming Soon to Your Sacramento Neighborhood: The Lovely, Border Forsythia

Forsythia x intermedia, Border Forsythia

Classification: woody broadleaf deciduous shrub

Origin: hybrid cross from F. suspensa and F. viridissima (both native to China and Korea)

Sunset Zones: 2 - 11, 14-16, 18, 19

Structure/Form: mounding, arching, fountain-shaped. Spreads by layering, so has the ability to establish clusters.

Density/Texture: dense

Mature Size: 6 - 10' (depending on variety) tall, and equal width or wide depending on variety).

Growth Rate: moderate to rapid

Foliage: opposite, elliptically shaped leaves with fairly prominent serrations. These leaves are approx. 3 - 5" long, dark green on top/pale green undersides. The stems have lightly colored glandular bumps or scars, "lenticils", and the mature stems are hollow, but solid at nodes (like bamboo).

Flower, Fruit, Seeds: 4-part trumpet-shaped yellow to golded yellow flowers run the length of the bare branches before the leaves appear. The flower display lasts about a month between February and April.

Uses: accent, background, informal hedges, espallier (very nice look), cut flowers, winter forcing (budded branches can be forced for blooms).

Propagation: cuttings, layering occurs naturally (horizontal stems start rooting where they touch damp soil)

Care & Maintenance: as with many basal growers, thin at the base (prune after bloom 1/3 of the stems to the ground starting with oldest branches and weak or dead wood). Looks best without cutback, but will tolerate pruning.

Cultivated Varieties: 'Spectabilis' (deep yellow), 'Lynwood Gold' (tawny yellow), 'Spring Glory' (lighter bright yellow)

Comments: like the flowering quince, the early blooming forsythia is a delight with it's yellow sprays in the late winter/early spring landscape. After it blooms it is rather non-descript, but blends nicely with other background shrubs. 

Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!

Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.

Panama Pottery

It's the "gathering ideas together stage" for my California State Flower, Food and Garden Show garden display. I'm thinking Modern Mexican, so I'm looking for Mexican pottery, maybe sculpture ...

I loved these pieces in the window at Panama Pottery,  locked up in a metal shed. For sale?

 I also really liked the fountain made with a copper basin attached to a metal gate (by Jorge Lozano of Lozano's Art in Sacramento)!

These strawberry jars might work ... I'm  incorporating edibles in my landscape... vegetables, citrus ... hmmm.....strawberries?

I was told that the inventory is low at this time of year (January/February) but really picks up starting in March and April. I saw a large volume of pots on hand, so it must be crowded in the spring. The company carrys a wide range of pottery, handmade terra cotta that they fire on site, as well as Talavera pottery, imported from Mexico ...

and, a wide range of imported pottery, both rustic and glazed.

It also has sculpture ...

classes (mosaic, clay hand building and wheel throwing, for teens and adults),

and, if you're ready to go big time with your ceramc art, studio spaces that are available for rent.

 ...lizards, clay knife holders, and a peek into one of their storage lockers for their resident potters,

who get to use their beehive kilns. Very impressive!

If that's not enough variety for you, one of their potters is also a farmer who brings in fresh eggs and seasonal produce available on Saturdays, sometimes. Check them out, they're happy to have visitors, even school tours! Panama Pottery, celebrating its 98th year in business!

Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!

Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.

To Cal Expo for the Home and Landscape Show!

Lest forget ... here's a 2 for 1 savings from the Sacramento Bee for this weekend's show!

I'm excited about this weekend's Northern California Home and Landscape Show. Having done a garden display for last year's inaugural, California State Flower and Garden Show, I have enormous appreciation of the work that goes into creating the landscape showcase gardens. Having cozied up with various merchants at the show, I know what it takes for them to arrive, set up, and involve their businesses in these ventures. I'm a backstage baby, I love knowing what goes on on the other side of the curtain!

So, tomorrow I plan to attend. I won't see it all, cuz that wears me out, but I will see the 3 featured gardens and attend a couple of workshops. Absolutely! One of the garden displays will feature the parasoleil panels of my friend, Theodora of Living Green Landscape Design. Theodora and I worked together last year, and plan to encore that this year. I love her stuff! She's working with Roberta Walker who is known for her drought tolerant landscapes. (I'm also looking forward to Roberta's  talk at 4 o'clock, Lush Gardens Using Low Water.)  I'm eager to see Verde Creations' garden, as well, and its many water-wise features: "...drought tolerant plants to save water, permeable surfaces to recharge ground water and reduce run-off, and efficient irrigation practices." The third garden is by ProScapes Landscape and Design.Their design looks charming. That's all I can say so far! My final activity (or perhaps first, depending on what time I arrive) is Michael Glassman's talk at 2, Add Instant Curb Appeal, Focus on the Front Porch. Since I have a huge interest in revitalizing our front yards, especially in a "green" way, I'll be taking lots of notes, believe me! I don't think I'll be able to make it for this one, but, my other recommendation would be the Sacramento Bee's, Debbie Arrington's talk on roses, Sacramento Roses 101: Everything You Need to Know to Grow Great Roses.

That's my Saturday plan. Theodora's spending the night at my house (yea) so we'll be a-buzz about all things gardening. And, perhaps, a glass of wine, or two?

Spending next week pruning dormant roses ... gotta be done. Need any help with yours?

Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!
Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.

Wordless Wednesday at the WPA Garden

... a quick trip to/thru the WPA Rock Garden at William Land Park to seek pictures of different varieties of flowering quince ...

and, as a bonus, my favorite, the green dotted, "Summer" Snowflake,

 and, the, "what is this"? Seriously, I mean it ... do you know what this is?

... but, then, sometimes we want words, now, don't we? From the Rock Garden's own, Daisy Mah: "It's a native coast silk tassle Garrya elliptica 'James Roof' which burned pretty badly this summer, but sure is lovely with it's male catkins."

Spending the week pruning dormant roses ... gotta be done. Need any help with yours?

Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!
Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.

Flowering Quince

Chaenomeles japonica - Japanese Flowering Quince

Origin:  Japan and other parts of Asia

Characteristic: mounding, arching, somewhat open. Most are thorny.

Size:  varies, can be up to 10' or low growing at 2 - 3'

Foliage:grows alternately along stems. Ovate to oblong, up to 2: or more. Serrated margins. Stipule (leaf-like growth at base of new leaves that falls off as true leaf matures). Medium green, with pale green undersides.

Flower, Fruits and Seeds: solitary flowers all along the stem appear prior to new leaves. The species is deep pink to red, but many colors are available in varieties ... salmon, yellow, apricot, pink, white, bi-colored pink and white, etc. Fruit is a pomo (similar to apple).

Environmental Preferences: full and part sun, likes regular moisture, acidic pH and organics.

Uses: accent, specimen, cut flower, indoor forcing, formal and informal hedges, japanese gardens, utility (jams and jellies), blossoms attract birds

Pests/Diseases: Indistructible

Propagation: seed, cuttings

Pruning: can take pruning to shape or limit growth at any time, but bud and bloom season is a good time for the job, as the branches can be used for indoor arrangements.

Sunset Zones: 1 - 21

Comments: In the Sacramento area, flowering quinces are one of the earliest of the blooming shrubs, breaking bud around the end of January. It is a delightful, bright spot when the days are overcast. After blossoming the larger shrubs can become gangly, so don't be afraid to keep it in check with your pruning tools..

Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!
Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.

Roses in the Sacramento Valley - Part 3

...we've got some work to do ... grab your gloves and let's get at it!

Essential Pruning Tools

Leather gloves – invaluable for protection when dealing with thorns!
Pruners – hand-held shearers that can cut up to ¼” stems. Most gardeners prefer by-pass over anvil-styled pruners.
Hedge Shearers – like a giant scissors
Loppers – long-handled pruners, can reach inside rose to cut back the old, dead or diseased canes up to 1 ¼” in diameter.
Small pruning saw – a special gardening saw, you may need if you’ve got some gnarly old rose canes.

A Few Rose Terms

Cane – a rose stem, flexible when new, hardens with age. The really old canes become unlikely to generate new growth (canes, and eventually flowers)

Dormant Stage – comes from latin, dormir, “to sleep” Roses have a hibernation stage in the winter when they stop growing. This is best time to prune them.

Dead Head – removing spent blooms (promotes more blooms - mostly a summertime thing)

Pruning Roses

Whereas all roses will benefit from having dead, diseased or twiggy growth removed, many of the shrub, groundcover or landscape roses can be shaped pretty quickly after that with your loppers. Your hybrid teas, will need a bit more sculpting. The time to prune your roses is before they start to wake up from their winter dormancy and put out new growth. In the Sacramento Valley and many of the temperate parts of our state, this will best be done between late December and early February. Since the hybrid teas are the most popular roses, and most likely to be in your garden, we're going to concentrate on them.

Pruning Your Hybrid Tea Roses

These roses (like my sister's roses above) will need to be aggressively cut back to 3 – 5 sturdy stems, or canes in the dormant season (now). This will allow a good structure to support new growth in the spring. Here’s how:

If the rose hasn’t been taken care of for a while or still has a lot of leaves on it (like in my California garden), cut everything back to about 3 feet from the ground. This will allow you to see what you’re doing on the next steps. Remove any remaining leaves.

• Cut back any dead canes (branches) to their base.
• Cut back any crossing or rubbing branches (these can create wounds that allow disease to enter) to their base.
• Cut back diseased branches to below the troubled zone. A dark center in the middle of the branch can be evidence of rose borers that have tunneled into your branch.
• Remove any stems smaller than a pencil; those skinny stems will be too floppy to support new growth.
• Choose 3 – 4 canes and eliminate the rest. Don’t cut below your knees, unless you’re going all the way!
• Using a slanting cut (45 degree angle), prune the remaining canes to an outward facing bud, ¼ inch above the bud. These canes will be about 2’ tall.

 photo credit: Farmer Fred (Hoffman)

• You don’t need to paint the cuts.
• Clean up all leaves and cuttings and throw in trash, not the compost.

(On the other hand, there's my climbing Cecile Brunner rose, that grows every which way ...over the grape arbor, along the power lines, up the liquid amber. As you can see it's a beautiful display, during its one big hurrah in the spring, after that, it's a wild race to see whose going to win . So far, it's Cecile.)

Caring for Your Roses

The big question: chemicals or organic control? But before that's addressed, the thing to know in life, in your garden, with your body, is that the best defence against illness and disease is being healthy. With plants that means regular water, cleaning up the garden so pests aren't harbored and infection can't spread from diseases in the leaves, mulching to keep soil from drying out (4 - 6" is recommended), making sure you "feed" them (they need their minerals!). Planting they where they get their required daily sunshine and making sure they have good drainage. It's the same with us. Good nutrition, good sleep, exercise, water ... you know the drill. It's the same for our plant friends.

So, to reiterate, what do roses need? Sun (at least 6 hours ... and like many plants in our Sacramento summer gardens, they might like a wee bit of shade in the hot afternoon), regular water - drip is best, make sure you time your system so that the entire root zone gets watered a couple of times a week, good drainage (if your clay soil is really a bog, your roses won't like it, try a raised bed), mulch in your soil so it doesn't dry out. These things will go a long way to prevent diseases and pests from attacking your beauties. And they need some sort of fertilizer, whether organic or chemically based, applied at the appropriate intervals.

As to handling diseases and pests that get by your healthy regimen, there are great organic products as well as natural predators (like lady bugs) that are available at your local nursery, and there are chemical-based products that combine fertilizers with pesticides as well. I'll be adressing this subject in the spring, as well as as identifying the most common rose problems. But, you've got enough right now to get started.

Have fun in your garden... it's almost spring!


Want More? In case you missed it ... here are the links to the other 2 parts of this series on roses in the Sacramento Valley: Part 1, an introduction, and Part 2, where we discuss types of roses, great rose retailers, public rose gardens and some useful online resources. Hope this is useful in some way. Feel free to call me if you have any questions, or would like some in-your-garden help.

Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!
Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.

Roses in the Sacramento Valley - Part 2

Roses are beautiful and can help us to create gardens full of color and fragrance. According to the Sunset Western Garden Book, it's "undoubtedly the best-loved flower and most widely planted shrub in the West and all other terperate parts of the world." However, when you start learning about roses, it's easy to be washed overboard, and drown in the ... Sea of Too Much Information! If you're lucky, however, there's a Sunset Garden Book nearby!

Knowing what type of rose you're looking at will give you prediction on how often and when it will bloom and what kind of pruning and care it will need. This post will cover some basic info about the different types of roses, where to see roses, buy roses, learn about roses. The next, and last part of this series, will cover how to prune and care for your roses.

Here's a breakdown of the 6 major groups, caged from that book of books, my Sunset Garden Book.

Six Types of Roses

Modern Large-Flowered Roses (Hybrid Teas and Grandiflora): long-blooming rose, most cut roses sold by florists, great single flowers for cutting garden or the floral trade.. These have been developed by rose breeders to have a loooong blooming period with increasingly more and more disease resistance.

Modern Landscape Roses (Floribunda, Polyanthas, shrub roses, hybrid musks, ground cover or carpet roses): these are roses that produce clusters of roses, rather than single roses, thereby creating a big landscape effect..

Old Roses – any rose that existed before the 1st modern rose was introduced in 1867, either old European or Asian in origin. (Gallica, Noisettes, Tea, Alba, China roses, Hybrid perpetuals...whatever, the big thing, is they were there before the modern rose fiddling began in 1867. So, there)
Modern Climbing Roses (either natural climbers with large flowers or climbing sports of bush roses): – climbers have sturdy stems, ramblers grow long flexible stems yearly (often used on low fences), pillars are like climbers, but not as tall (frequently grown on a post or a pillar-like structure as a garden accent).

Miniature Roses -good for containers and window boxes or as ground-cover type plants. These are replicas of larger roses, grown to 1 - 1.5' tall.
Species Roses - (wild species roses) These are roses that have retained their originality, free from cross-breeding influence of other roses. One example is the Lady Banks Rose, Rosa banksiae, that you can see in full glory in the spring at the Sacramento City Cemetary.

Public Rose Gardens

One of the lovely lanes at the City Cemetery where you can see historic roses of all descriptions, with names like Grandmother's Hat and Hoffman von Fallersleben. There's also a perennial plant garden and a native plant section at the cemetery. It's a peaceful place. If you've never been there, I think you'll like it.

• McKinley Park Rose Garden
• California State Capitol Park - World Peace Rose Garden
• Sacramento City Cemetery - Historic Rose Garden

Shopping Places!

It's Bare-Root Season! While the roses aren't in bloom, they are inexpensive, and a lot of nurseries are having sales. Big box stores like Home Depot and Lowe's have bare-root roses in stock right now, but the independent nurseries have the best selection and the newest varieties. These nurseries will also have more established, larger, mature roses ... always nice if you want instant satisfaction! Many of these nurseries are offering pruning classes in January and  February, so you can ask questions and see how it's supposed to be done while you're there, SHOPPING!

Windmill Nursery

Capital Nursery

High Hand Nursery

Talini's Nursery -

Jackson and Perkins

Bushnell's Garden Nursery

Some Great Online Resources

A useful online tool for pictures, terms, trivia … www.helpmefind.com/rose.
Lifetime master gardener, 2 local gardening radio shows: meet The Professor, Farmer Fred (Hoffman) (Hint: while you're at it, check out his recommendations of the best 10 roses for Sacramento)
Rose Images A great source for pictures and information on roses!
Don’t let those roses be lonely…give them a few friends! Companion Plants for Roses
The Sacramento Rose Society - lots of info and links useful to us Valley folk

Buddy Up with Other Rose Lovers

My choice is the Sacramento Perennial Plant Club...which meets at the Sheppard Garden and Arts Center on the last Thursday of the month. This month's meeting includes a presentation on the Best David Austin Roses for Sacramento. But, there are lots of clubs and they're all happy to welcome new members and guests.

Want More? Here's the link to the other 2 parts of this series on roses in the Sacramento Valley: Part 1, an introduction, and Part 3, where we wrap it all up with a discussion of tools, terms, pruning techniques and the best way to keep your roses healthy and disease free. Hope this is useful in some way. Feel free to call me if you have any questions, or would like some in-your-garden help.

Call if you need some help with your rose pruning
Whether you need garden design, coaching, seasonal maintenance or planting, Geno's Garden can help!

Call me at (916) 764-5243, or email hansonja@aol.com.