Where Is Ketzel Levine?

1:09 PM ET | 01- 5-2009 | permalink

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Flower Phobia Cured By Fall Color

Back in June, while visiting the romantic garden of my friends Len Porter and and Peter Goldblatt, I confronted a chronic weakness I would have to overcome. Call it Fear Of Flowers.

I've justified it for years despite abuse from esteemed colleagues (just ask Nina Totenberg). I've even gone to great lengths to intellectualize it; consider this excerpt from my book, Plant This! :

As for choosing plants by their flower -- well, given the fickle nature of beauty, I trust this ornamental feature least of all...Which is not to say I'm perverse enough to covet a garden without bloom. But when you balance their capacity for transcendence with their utter unpredictability, flowers can break your heart. Obsessing over them is much like throwing yourself into an unstable relationship that has no real substance only dizzying sex.

Fine, so grow plants for their flowers...

On the whole, I still stand firmly by the idea that flowers are the icing, not the cake. But that's still no excuse for a plant lover like myself to cop out when it comes to choreographing color. On this first day of October, with nary a leaf turning crimson or yellow, I'm more grateful than I've been all year for the flowers now in bloom.

For my favorite color, orange, I've got the tender perennial lion's tail (above) and the low-growing, self-seeding annual Begonia sutherlandii. I'm also trying a variety of unusual, orange-tinged dahlias from Cistus Nursery here in Portland.

For magenta, I rely on that ever-blooming, always-scrambling, black-eyed Geranium 'Ann Folkard'.

And for blue, I vote with the hummingbirds: hardy salvias including S. patens, surely the truest bluest of flowers, and that towering giant for the back of the border, S. guaranitica.

1:06 PM ET | 10- 1-2008 | permalink

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Cat, Roof, Neighbor, Ladder, Labor Day

It's 5:30 am Labor Day morning and I hear Lulah crying. Which is odd, because I let her out at 4:30am and left the door open for her return. The crying continues so I get out of bed and check all exits/entrances. No Lulah, more crying. It takes me a few minutes, but finally I find her.

Now it's 6:00 am and I take out my only ladder. It's completely inadequate, i.e., total crap. I briefly consider getting out on the ledge below the roof to keep Lulah company, but having recently fallen down my own back stairs only to land on the basement concrete floor, I reluctantly forgo the risk.

I decide to e-mail my neighbor Paul, an early-waking walker who, like me, is often online. Never have I been more grateful for the invention of the Blackberry. Paul gets my message and goes into action.

Lulah, bless her, stays put while we prepare for her rescue. For a moment I think she looks amused, but she's not that cerebral. Certainly she's stopped mewing and is no longer pacing in distress.

9:28 AM ET | 09- 1-2008 | permalink

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Fear of Pruning

Pruning. It strikes a certain terror in those of us who love our plants and can't face doing anything that might harm, disfigure or discourage them. You know who you are. Funny, though, I never thought I was one of you until I hit a brick wall concerning my sorely overgrown manzanita.

With a big party of my own coming up this Labor Day Wkend, I knew it was time to tackle my exuberantly happy plant. Note that I didn't obsess over whether it was the right time of year to prune it; I've long gotten over that. Instead, I was taught years ago that the best time to prune a plant is when you're standing in front of it with clippers in your hand. Otherwise, the seasons roll by and the years roll by and before you know it the plant's so out of scale that all you're left with is the most drastic option. File under do what I say, etc....

The crew assembled two days ago during an uncharacteristically rainy summer day (I am not being facetious). The four of us discussed our options, everyone voting for their approach of choice. Ultimately, all our opinions came into play and we let loose on this wonderful specimen that -- none could deny -- had to be lassoed, even if the result (gulp) might be loss of life. Not immediately, but I'm aware it could happen, which is exactly the kind of trouble you can get into when you put off regular pruning.

Now don't expect to be wowed by the "After" shot; truth is, after two hours of four people pruning both this and several other shrubs, my garden actually looks relatively untouched. That gives you some idea of how exuberant it's become this summer, and as readers of this blog know, there's a good reason: the call of the wildflowers. No regrets here.

Now for an invitation you do NOT want to turn down: if you're concerned about what/what not to prune right now, operators with answers are standing by...

1:17 PM ET | 08-22-2008 | permalink

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What Do You Call A Garden Without Plants?

What What Eve Do, Part Five

I call it a respite. A worry-free moment. A garden with limitless possibilities. I also call it, mine.

If you've followed the What Would Eve Do series thus far, believe me, I know this is anticlimactic. But I will make good in my next installment, once I get back home (only a few days left) and really take stock -- and pictures -- of what Eve has thus far wrought.

3:08 PM ET | 06-19-2008 | permalink

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Order in the Courtyard

What Would Eve Do, Part Three

No matter how many books you read of the GARDEN DESIGN MADE SIMPLE! variety, no matter how many measurements you take or design principles you follow, there is nothing and I mean nothing easy about designing a space, let alone one that will be constantly changing every month of the year.

Perhaps I should clarify: there is nothing easy about designing an outdoor space alone. If How-To books work for you (they make me rigid and stupid), so much the better, you don't need to rope a lot of people into your process. But ask what Eve would do, and she'd answer, Brainstorm.

You don't have to brainstorm with experts. All it takes is a few imaginative and generous friends. But if what you want seems beyond the scope of casual converstaion, scout around for a local garden that wows you and contact either its contractor or designer.

I don't suggest you lure a whole lot of professionals over to your house and pick their brains without paying them for their time; what goes around comes around and you'll end up on the Avoid This Client list (word travels fast in the trade).

But I do think it's perfectly kosher to tell a designer you're soliciting different ideas and would like to buy an hour's consultation. (You could even ask if your payment might be deducted when you finally commit to that designer.)

After 90 minutes with Nani and Roy (pictured above), a lot of great ideas were proposed and rejected. Among the many things I have come away with are three questions worth answering when you take on a re-design:

1. What's your budget? Mine was $5K. And it was unrealistic.

2. What's driving your design? Could be the budget, could be a fantasy. Mine was the fountain and the narrow lot; it said to me, courtyard. You may need a playground for both kids and adults ... a formal vegetable garden instead of lawn ... a way to make a small space look larger, or a large space feel more intimate.

3. What do you want/don't want? I wanted tidy, easy to walk on, and dog-resistant. I didn't want to weed between pavers, I didn't want anything tracked into the house, and I wanted more hardscape than plants (my plant playground is the front yard). Also, I wanted the color of the hardscape to wed the house and fountain. Not much, right? But it helped me focus. Keep in mind that knowing what you don't want is an excellent place to begin.

After meeting with Nani and Roy and getting Roy's flagstone estimate ($8K-9K, too pricey and conservative for me), I began leafing through courtyard/small garden books and exploring the online work of well-known landscape designers. Let me say loud and clear I owe a great deal to a woman whose work I've never actually seen but have heard about, Bay Area designer Shirley Alexandra.

A few weeks later, I had finally envisioned my courtyard. The question now, did I have the guts to trust what I saw?

In our next installment of What Would Eve Do: tackling the "C" word. Commitment.

12:54 PM ET | 06-15-2008 | permalink

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The Fountain: Hear Me Roar

What Would Eve Do, Part II

Creating ambient sound is a terrific solution to environmental noise. In my case, the noise was so loud -- 40 young human beings embibing at picnic tables on the other side of my fence -- I didn't know what to do. So I called the City of Portland's Noise Noise Control Dept and got the name of its Go-To guy Paul Van Orden, then arranged for him to vist my garden one balmy, noisy night. The results were as follows:

Idea #1: Build a wall. in this case, one that would have to be at least half the width of the lot, @25'. That seemed like a lot of money for a very un-aesthetic result.

Idea #2: Outdoor speakers. To be effective, my own music would have to be uncomfortably loud. Of course I could point the speakers towards the revelers, but that seemed, shall we say, hostile. (Note: that was not Paul's idea, it belonged to my trouble-making friend Mar who didn't understand why I wouldn't just aim my hose at the fence and play Douse the Diners).

#3: Water features. How many, how big, what kind? Paul Van Orden's opinion was that in order for my ambient sound to have an impact, I'd need to make the loudest noise possible, meaning a BIG fountain with HIGH downspouts falling into a DEEP basin. Never mind that the entire space in question is barely 360 sq ft. The only kind of fountain that would make a difference would have to dominate -- audibly and visibly.

I'll tell you right up front that the cost of a fountain seemed a pittance compared with the trauma and expense of moving, the only other solution I could think of to mitigate living cheek by jowel with an outdoor cafe. I committed $5K to the project, Shadow Land accepted the challenge, and we let the budget and the desired effect (big and noisy) drive the fountain design.

Somewhere along the line, I decided I wanted the scuppers to be both at different heights and separated from one another by setting them in long rectangles of ceramic glass tiles. I found the brand and colors I wanted locally, then had to special order two of the colors online. It wasn't cheap but the payoff has been enormous, particularly at night when the lights on the fountain's bottom shine up through concentric cirles of raindrops and cast their shadows on the sparkling tiles.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. We're still in the building process. The guys showed me some scupper choices, I chose very basic ones in a powdered rust finish, and after looking at concrete color samples, we all decided that the fountain should be dark charcoal (knowing it would ultimately fade. That's the deal with sun-bleached concrete).

As for the basin, well, I knew that water had to fall a long way and into a deep receptacle. So that's what I've got: at 9.5' long and 2' deep, it's a watery tomb. And oh baby, does she sound.

As this mother of all blog items comes down the home stretch, I have just a few things left for you to consider if you want to try this at home.

In order to be able to turn the fountain on and off from the house -- a wonderful convenience, particularly with so much NW rain -- I had to cough up another $1K for the electrical work. What a shocker, not to mention an unbudgeted expense. Secondly, the surrounding garden was trashed in the process, and no one I mean no one was to blame. Creating a fountain like this turns the garden into a construction site. So in answer to the burning question, What Would Eve Do? She'd do the soundblaster first.

Was it worth it? Did it do the trick? The answer: YES! I am nuts about my fountain, it makes a massive yet evocative sound, and this year I'll put in aquatic plants to fill up its considerable bulk. It doesn't drown out the really high-pitched laughter nor the occasional screeching and screaming, but it fills in all the middle sound and erases at least 85% of the hubbub.

Tomorrow's installment of What Would Eve Do: taking an awkward narrow space dominated by a giant fountain and an orange house and figuring out how to pull it together into a garden.

1:26 PM ET | 06-11-2008 | permalink

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What Would Eve Do: Reviving A Neglected Garden

Tidy. How's that for a design principle? Not what you'd call imaginative or inspired. But after seven years of delicious chaos in my cramscaped (vs landscaped) front garden -- a 25'x50' space where spikey, fragrant, towering and flowering species continue to duke it out -- all I wanted from the side yard was an absence, not a presence. I wanted as few plants in the ground as possible and a hardscape the dogs could neither upset nor track into the house.

Every piece of property has its challenges, whether it's the soil, the neighbor's barking beagle or water-sucking, shallow-rooted trees. Mine is urban density, which has only gotten more intense since I moved in. A few years ago, my peace of mind went right out the window when a cafe opened round the block, its big draw a lot of outdoor seating which instantly put drinking, smoking strangers inches away from my back door.

Come 5pm weekdays and all day Sat & Sun, as many as 40 people with endlessly cloying good cheer would drive me to distraction. (In truth, to tears). I found myself becoming a disgruntled old biddy who scowled, unobserved on the other side of a 10' fence, wishing misery on their good time. Gardening out there was limited to weekend mornings before noon; once the Young People arrived, the noise was such I could no longer keep the windows open in the house.

By last spring, I had to do something: move, or throw money at a solution. I decided to stay put and create thundering, ambient sound.

Tomorrow's installment of What Would Eve Do: creating a 12' wide, 7' tall fountain without even a sketch of a plan...AND...the leftover ruined yard.

9:48 PM ET | 06-10-2008 | permalink

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Call it a Placesaver

It's Tuesday morning 1:45 am and I'm not entirely sure why I've stopped by at this Hour of the Snoring Beagle except to confess I took a vacation last week and did not bring you along.

I figured I'd just slip away quietly without my computer to hike and to sleep with abandon, then sneak back online like I'd never been gone. But now I find myself on the verge of feeling guilty for just taking off "without so much as a by your leave" (what does that mean, anyway?).

So I'm thinking this is a challenge in need of a solution since I will certainly go away without you again (it's not personal). Perhaps what we need...is...A Guest Blogger.

But who? You? So introduce yourself to the community and let us read some of your stuff.

Meanwhile, this is going to be a big week, the week we find out what Eve would do with my sorry side yard. Based on the trucks parked on the street outside my house, she would hire young men with big shoulders and get out of their way. Really, though, I am ready to take you along for my garden remodel which...has...begun!

Just let me get a few hrs sleep (it's now 2:38am; this meager offering took an hour?) and I will start the tale, What Would Eve Do, tomorrow...

5:45 AM ET | 06-10-2008 | permalink

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If You Lived Here...

...you'd understand why my garden is minus a gardener. It's not that I've crossed over to the dark side so much as I've become a zealous devotee of the wild side.

Every spring, sometimes as early as March, anyone listening can hear the call of the flora as it breaks bud along the Columbia Gorge. After twelve years living in the NW, that call's become deafening.

It didn't used to be this way. Time was, nothing could get me out of the garden come spring, particularly when I was gardening in D.C. where the race was on to finish everything before the weather turned like a rabid dog.

But as gentle NW rains continue to fall on my garden, lulling me into a false sense of of calm re: planting and mulching for the summer to come, I am nobody's gardener. Instead, I am a grateful witness to a miraculous if fragile world.

Of course not all the flowers in the Columbia Gorge are so bold and gregarious. Because of the continued wet and cold, a number of species remain reluctant to bear their souls.

4:00 PM ET | 05-28-2008 | permalink

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Hummingbirds: Name That Syndrome

I've refrained from mentioning my little "rats with wings" (yes, that's what an NPR colleague calls them, and with good reason, she says) until all the emotion died down. Not your enthusiasm, no, nor your pleas that I get back to plants (which I did), but my own sadness since the morning I woke up and found a syndrome in the place of nesting birds.

The good news is that I got to watch each of my two little tidbits flitter around the nest once they'd fledged, under the strict supervision of Mama. To witness such intimacy, so much flapping to get from branch to nearby branch ...

And the way Mama remained within inches of their every move once beyond the nest! I even got to see her feed them while she hovered mid-air, though in truth her maneuver reminded me of a far less romantic aerial refueling.

One of the sweetest things I witnessed was when the little guy left behind was rejoined by her/his nestmate after a long, cold day alone (how I suffered for her!). The next day, the proverbial nest was empty, and has remained so. But to my great joy, the family remains in my garden playing hide, seek and eat while enjoying the shelter of my dense Pittosporum 'Tall'n'Tough' as its primary habitat.

Though I am reluctant to call too much attention to "what the birds have taught me", I have had quite a few more wake-up calls re:turning fantasy and projection into fact. Shortly after baby #2 fledged, I couldn't find any of the birds. Nowhere. Not one. And earlier that same day I'd heard a scream, like a baby but not quite. So I immediately concluded the entire family had been massacred by a murder of crows.

Not.

Also, as you might remember, I was all in a flutter that one of the three original babies was dead. Another fearful projection made real. See for yourself, and blame me not! I am, alas, morbidly human.

Thanks to all of you who have encouraged me to hang with the hummers. I am late to the birding party, but I get it. I get it.

2:09 AM ET | 04-10-2008 | permalink

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Hummingbirds: The Video!

OK, this may be my penultimate post about the hummingbirds recently hatched outside my window. My wonderful web producer (he of the excrutiatingly high standards) has softly suggested I consider blogging about something else. Like — just an idea here — plants?

And indeed, I will (any day now!), but first let me invite you to see life through my eyes: standing on the front porch, crouched in a fairly miserable position, camera aimed at the action in the nest.

Here it is, unedited and unemcumbered (oh shut up already) ... the video:

11:18 AM ET | 04- 3-2008 | permalink

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Hummingbird Eyes

Watch a few young hummers in the nest long enough and they're bound to look your way ...

11:05 AM ET | 04- 3-2008 | permalink

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Down A Hummer

I've over-reacted before but for the life of me I can't find hummingbird baby #3. I don't know whether he's infinitely smaller and just not visible, whether she's been smothered beneath the other two, or whether it's lying somewhere dead on the round (I don't wanna look).

Even when mama comes by to feed, I don't see a third beak. Not good.

However, I both witnessed and captured on film one of the two happy bruisers trying out his wings. As soon as my blog producer shows me how to post video, I will.

As for that Riders in the Storm moment I promised (you guessed right! and wrong!), said producer pronounced it sub-prime so you won't be seeing it (his point being, you can't see it too well anyway). I am hoping he'll like the little wing-beater better.

Meanwhile...let's compare and contrast. From my Hummingbird folder (more than 300 pix and useless little movies), here's mama from March 20th.

And below, from April 1st, the ever-dominant sibling #1; very consistent behavior from the first time his beak popped up out of the nest.

I've actually managed to drag myself away from the beasties today since it's time to practice that separation stuff before everyone leaves home. We got a fabulous note yesterday on that very subject with an irresistible twist, can't wait to post it. Speaking of which, we are having posting problems on the site; I apologize that your messages from the last few days haven't gone up yet, any day now...

7:38 PM ET | 04- 1-2008 | permalink

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Tony Soprano's Ducks

Any of you Sopranos fans will certainly remember Tony's attachment to the wild ducks that took up residence in his pool. And the depression plus anxiety attack he suffered when they left ("those goddamn ducks").

Well, I get it now. I've become so invested in the hummingbird saga outside my window that I began suffering a certain self-indulgent melancholy this weekend when I realized they'd soon be gone ... and I'd be left behind.

Though I don't have anything nearly this good to bring to my own therapist today:

Tony describes a dream where a bird steals his penis — Dr. Melfi extrapolates from this to reveal that Tony projected his love for his family onto the family of ducks living in his back pool and this brings him to tears, to his consternation. She tells him that their flight from the pool sparked his panic attack through the overwhelming fear of somehow losing his own family.

Yeah, yeah ... meanwhile here in the real world, the three amigos in the nest outside my window are increasingly invisible to my camera's eye because new spring foliage on the tree they're in is filling in fast. That tree, incidentally, is Azara dentata from Chile, and in a few weeks it'll be giddy with slightly fragrant yellow pom-poms. Food for the kids? Not sure it'll suit their tastes. Anyone know?

I shot a short video this weekend while the little hummers rode out a rainstorm. Soon as I download the appropriate 60s hit (can you guess), I'll post the clip ...

1:30 PM ET | 03-31-2008 | permalink

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First Wing and a Prayer

Much to my delight, the three little hummers continue their journey on the planet. One is particularly good at pushing up out of the crowd at feeding time, so much so that I frequently can't even see the other two and wonder if there's enough to go around (what, me, the third of three?). But this morning there are three distinct tooth picks popping out from all the fuzz.

Still no wiser about hummingbirds -- except the advice I've gotten from you folks -- I am growing accustomed to the rhythms of their day and can generally grab a few shots at dinner time @5pm.

12:46 PM ET | 03-27-2008 | permalink

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Make That Three

All hummingbird babies present and accounted for; to watch the feeding is just astonishing. Does anyone know if I should put out a sugar water feeder so Mom doesn't have to work so hard? Both my grevillea and acacia are blooming -- as is the manzanita -- but I don't think they're exactly feast material. Suggestions most welcome; as I've said, I ain't no birder.

9:18 PM ET | 03-24-2008 | permalink

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Hummer of a Baby!

Just spotted the baby that hatched a few wks ago outside my living room window. Actually I can't see much but a fast-beating fuzzy lump, and a picture is impossible without pruning the obscuring foliage. So forget that...

Mother hummer has been increasingly absent; I now suspect she's on a shrub or tree nearby keeping watch. She was quite dutiful the other day during a particularly wet downpour; I'm happy to report that today's looking sunny (if chilly), altogether a good day to be a newborn in a snug nest.

11:56 AM ET | 03-24-2008 | permalink

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Hummer Scare

So you know about the Anna's hummingbird nesting right outside my window, right? When I went out an hour ago, she was gone. What a scare I had, knowing absolutely nothing about bird behavior and what she might be off doing. I thought I'd irrevocably aggravated her with all the picture-taking.

Anyway, Anna's back and here's a shot I from a little while ago with friend and neighbor Mar's camera. (Still haven't replaced my ruin.)

So I'm now thinking, webcam. Does anyone know anything about them? Would it be nuts?

9:35 PM ET | 03-18-2008 | permalink

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Hummer Outside My Home

While pruning over the wkend, I was continually dive-bombed by a gorgeous hummingbird. Couldn't figure it out. It took an eagle-eyed guest who stopped by to immediately see what I'd been missing -- a hummingbird sitting on her nest on a limb right outside my living room window!

Unfortunately, I left my little digital outside overnight and it's now dead in the water. But I'll replace it tomorrow so I can chronicle the life gracing my (oh, so) unworthy garden.

11:03 PM ET | 03-16-2008 | permalink

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Bloom and Bust

First, the bust. Progress of the side yard project, What Would Eve Do?, would thus far indicate that Eve wouldn't do a damn thing, at least not this week. Except perhaps obsess over the budget, or and whether or not her home was worth putting more money into, in which case I'm definitely channeling her energy.

Now the bloom. I only noticed this first one yesterday when I took out the short-tine rubber rake (my favorite tool) and started scraping off winter's brick-thick layer of leaves. Many of you will recognize this flower immediately, but let's give the more easily amused among us a chance to guess.

This lovely plant's complete invisibility in my garden, hiding as it does behind a variegated yellow phormium, is proof enough that it's time to get out the drainage spade and rearrange the perennials. Remind me, somebody, when I replace that beloved, misplaced spade...

And for delicacy #2, I've been watching this upright flower cluster burst open over the last few days. If you love the straight species in this genus as I do, you could i.d. this big-leaved girl from across the block. But that doesn't mean she isn't still a revelation when it comes to flowering shrubs.

4:32 PM ET | 03-13-2008 | permalink

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We Have a Winner

The spanking new series chronicling the re-design of my side yard is named:

WHAT WOULD EVE DO? Reviving A Neglected Garden

Thank you, thank you for the 150 suggestions you folks came up with in the past few days. So many great ones, and I intend to use quite a number of them, as I organize and record what I hope will be a primer for making imaginative use of boring, barren, and neglected garden spaces.

Runner-ups I look forward to working into the series include:

Order in the Courtyard!
The Plot Awakens
Till Tomorrow
The Lonely Fountain
My Other Yard is Fabulous
The Grateful Bed
Not In My Backyard!

And last, most certainly least: Ketzel Levine has a Bad Garden. Amen.

Starting Monday, EVE gets a seemingly generous budget which will likely turn out to be completely inadequate. And in case you missed it, find out why necessity really is the mother of invention: the backstory on the fountain.

2:13 PM ET | 03- 7-2008 | permalink

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Procrastination

I'm avoiding every conceivable commitment today.

From picking up the damn watering can (as you have strongly suggested), to deciding on the Garden Re-Do series name, to writing up the details of yesterday's first design consult with Nani (aka The Nani Diaries, as you so cleverly put it).

Instead, as the living room darkens around me, I'm sitting here like a lump eating peanut butter out of a jar and wondering where I'm going to find the energy and the money to get going on this garden project.

Which is exactly why the garden looks the way it does, duh!

Maybe this is part of the design process? Stucc-Oh'd? (That's from you, too). I've been envisioning this space for so many years, have solicited advice from so many smart people, and have planted it already in so many actual and imaginery ways, I can't see anything out there but my own lethargy.

I can't even commit to a budget. In yesterday's meeting I said "5 K". It seems a lot of money for a mere 360 sq ft (particularly after what the fountain alone cost me last year) but a beautiful courtyard will offset the downside of remaining in this house, and I really don't want to move.

You mean we haven't talked about that downside? About why I built that massive fountain to begin with? About my desperate need to mask the noise generated by the diners, drinkers and cigarette smokers who sit at outdoor tables on the other side of my fence? Like INCHES away from my life?

Yes, gentle readers, necessity really IS the mother of invention. And that's why my tiny side yard has a huge 7' high x 12' wide concrete fountain. Its recirculating water (driven by a monster pump through three wide scuppers which spill from on high) makes a VERY LOUD SOUND.

And yet, through it all, I can still hear the peanut butter calling....

7:54 PM ET | 03- 6-2008 | permalink

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The Unnamed Series, Day Two

I've received quite a few clever title ideas for my TP garden redux series as I tackle 360 square feet of precious outdoor living space. Thanks, guys.

My favorite thus far is "What Would Eve Do?", which we could also just call "Eve", as in how's Eve coming, what's Eve's budget, when does Eve break ground?

Although after my experience today with my friend and design consultant Nani Waddoups, I'm thinking it'd be better named Garden Jewel on a Gravel Budget.

9:34 PM ET | 03- 4-2008 | permalink

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Name That Series!

What series, you ask? The series beginning today, right now, here it comes...as I reveal just how wretched my side garden looks, take you step-by-step through my re-design process, and emerge at the other end with an urban courtyard that suits all my criteria.

Criteria #1: A Life Without Shame.

The garden seems the classic courtyard, only 12' wide and 30' long. Its centerpiece is clearly the three-spouted stucco fountain. That's a story unto itself, which I look forward to going into later in this series -- the design team, process, pix, price, the whole shebang. Today, though, I'm meeting with my design collaborator Nani Waddoups -- the woman who helped me choose my house colors, and who I must reveal as a very close friend -- as we get a few ideas and considerations down on paper.

Nani is excrutiatingly organized and detail-oriented, so I'm going to our meeting with nothing more in my head than a few years' worth of fantasies and a strong desire for change, trusting her to scribble it down and turn it into the beginning of an action plan.

As for Criteria #1, consider it addressed by the launch of this series. No more shame! But now I need your help. What is this design series' name? Your options do NOT include:

A Garden Makeover
Designing A New Garden

or any such boring invitation to what promises to be a lively process for all of us (and a savings account buster for me). My first thought is The Druthers of Invention, but no way will my cheery/cheeky web producer (have you met Wright?) use it.

But he might use yours...

1:29 PM ET | 03- 4-2008 | permalink

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F-E-C-U-N-D!

I admit the word doesn't have quite the energy of R-E-S-P-E-C-T — a la Aretha — but I could spell it out and shout it out all the same. After a month in D.C. (and I loved every minute of it), I am back in the Pacific Northwest. This place is moist, lush, dense with smells and is excessively, embarrassingly, unrelentingly fecund!

Having spent a good deal of time in Dumbarton Oaks, I was doggone delirious to walk my own Penninsula Park and discover so many of the same fundamental design strengths: exquisite proportions, elegant paving patterns, bold lines (primarily boxwood), and a strong sense of identity.

On top of that, all the beautifully pruned specimens in the sunken rose garden were breaking bud (leaf bud, that is), and the huge formal fountain was throwing off fireworks of water and light.

Yes, and the sky was dark blue (the cusp of evening), the old-fashioned street lamps were aglow, and the air was swooning with the fragrance daphne. Shrubs of the stuff are tucked throughout the park and as with all daphne, I could smell them without knowing where they were.

Plus, not a soul was in the park but me and the beasts. I still have to pinch myself that I live a few blocks away.

HOWEVER ... as I write from the isolation of an office where my only colleagues are canine, I am now keenly aware of the trade-off ...

AND SO ... given that the great joy of living here is the green of this Northwest world, I am recommitting myself to my long-neglected garden (I had back surgery a year ago and just never made it back into swing).

INTRODUCING: The Great Garden Makeover. Photos, interviews, step-by-step instructions, all here in the weeks to come on TALKING PLANTS! I'm collaborating with a few people and my first meeting is tomorrow, so I'll post notes shortly after.

11:22 AM ET | 03- 3-2008 | permalink

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Fried Bananas

Only once during my stay in Brazil did I eat bonafide fried bananas. They were fabulous, and in life bore no resemblance to my own, the foliage of which greeted me after my 20-hour plane trip home.

Certainly this dried and dessicated visage is nothing new; it's what happens to banana foliage here in Z8 if you don't wrap it. They once offered a banana-wrapping class at Portland's Classical Chinese Garden (guess who didn't attend); when it's done well, it is indeed art.

I prefer au naturale, but only because I'm tres lazay.

So let's contrast and compare, shall we? Above, what I came home to, and below, what I left behind.

I've got lots of stories and great shots I do intend to post, and soon -- any day now -- but I'm also trying to crank out the Morning Edition radio story from the Amazon, which cramps my blog time. Speaking of which, you guys have also been pretty quiet of late; is everyone en vacance?

8:52 PM ET | 01-22-2008 | permalink

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Author of 'Exodus' Honored by Plant?

Leon Uris (1924-2003) wrote the epic Exodus about the founding of the State of Israel. You probably never read it but you might have seen the movie with Paul Newman, Eva Marie Saint and the ill-fated Sal Mineo (poor guy, a roller coaster ride through Hollywood, then murdered during a botched burglary in his late 30's).

Until the end of the 20th century, I thought author Uris had a plant that was named in his honor: Leonotis leonurus. I figured the change of spelling at the end - from "is" to "us" - was some Latin mannerism.

WRONG.

Leonotis leonurus is a South African mint family member otherwise known as Lion's Tail or Wild Dagga, though I've never heard it called anything but leonotus (leeya NOtice). A valuable medicinal (I think it's particularly popular in South America), the trade calls it a "tender perennial" so you'll still buy it in the hopes that it won't die come winter, but for most of you it's going to be an annual.

I garden in Z8 where my leonotis has been surprisingly reliable year after year. Or it was before Zoe Mae moved in. Alas, she has chosen that exact spot where dear Leon is growing to plant her four padded feet and stare down anything that walks down the street.

This, of course, is unacceptable. Such a plant deserves much, much better, simply incomparable for the late fall garden when everyone but salvia's petered out.

And it's color! Pure, thirst-quenching orange. If you didn't know better, you'd think the plant in full flower was a fake: densely clustered spider-legged whorls of flowers growing in tiers along a square-stemmed stalk.

Check and see what others' experience with this plant has been in your area if you're skeptical, but I can't imagine you'll regret giving it a try. Once upon a time I tried a cultivar named 'Staircase' or 'Ladder' or Giraffe Legs', who the hell remembers, it was a towering 8' but way too lanky.

Stick with Leon's namesake.

12:29 PM ET | 11-13-2007 | permalink

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It's Flickr Pix Monday, Do You Know Where Your Dahlias Are?

So let's start off this deliciously wet Monday (at least here in Oregon) with the Talking Plants Flickr Pix of the Week...

And speaking of dahlias, there is none finer (nor more ubiquitous) than the red alarm in a dark night that is the dark-foliaged dahlia, 'Bishop of Llandaff'. Here's a quick shot just scored from the dripping front garden.

Meanwhile, amidst this jumble of August growth you might see the red flowers from a flowering shrub known as Abutilon in the background, left.

Care to offer your fellow gardeners your favorite dahlia picks with pix?

4:32 PM ET | 08-20-2007 | permalink

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A Limit to Leafy Greens ... or ... Enough already!

Inevitably, many of you will write to Talking Plants with your gardening questions. I have good news. You may well find your answers in the Why Did My Plant Die archives.

If you don't, the even better news is that we've now got this lively community of folks who've killed so many plants they finally know how to grow them. So I hope you won't go away mad if I beg off doing the answering, and instead defer to dirtier hands and more reliably retentive minds.

Though I would like to ask a question of my own.

What the hell am I supposed to do with an eight year old Embothrium coccineum that absolutely will NOT flower? It's got a posture-perfect upright form and is just the right fit for my entry courtyard, but it's not like I'm hard up for plants with green leaves...

Not that I have any intention of killing it (we've been together too long for such a betrayal), but I will move it come spring if the community so adviseth.

5:15 PM ET | 06-26-2007 | permalink

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