Garden Design Quick Start Guide

by David R. Pearling Here is an excellent DIY designed garden in Southern California  We discovered this homeowner-designed and planted front yard during our daily exercise walks near our home in the Eastlake neighborhood of Chula Vista, near San Diego California. Denise, the homeowner, said that she and her husband created it in large part to eliminate the maintenance demands of their former front lawn. The result has been a complete success.  This garden is filled with easy-care shrubbery-with accents of color throughout. There is some nice hardscaping. This garden almost perfectly follows my five recommendations for garden design: 1) Have plan  2) Planted beds are everything  3) Never use plastic edging, cheap concrete blocks, or gaudy colored mulch  4) Hardscapes will make or break your garden  5) The finishing touches  This single-family home sits in a quiet neighborhood in a lesser-known area of metropolitan San Diego. The homes here are as nice ...

The kids are alright...  When we first noticed our fried fern last weekend, we feared we might lose it. All of the fronds had turned brown probably from the hot, sunny weather we've had.  Ferns prefer cooler, moist weather.  The dead fronds have been pruned. We have a heathy new fiddlehead emerging. Several weeks will be needed to fill in completely.  Here you can see the growth during the past four days.  Stay tuned.

We found this paperbark Melaleuca, 'Melaleuca quinquenervia' growing on a street nearby. Its peeling bark is intriguing.  The homeowner gave me permission to shoot. I Interesting bark and other horticultural characteristics can add that little extra to your garden.  These shots are looking straight up the trunk. Which do like? The black and white, or the color?  The blue sky above showing through the leaves is interesting. But lots of times black and white works, too.  Please contact me if need help with your garden or photography project.

Fern rescue...  The large fern in our patio container garden in Chula Vista, California was apparently fried during our 100 degree heat wave. By last weekend all of its fronds had turned brown. But not to worry.  As we pruned off the dried fronds (literally all of them) we found an emerging fiddlehead in the crown. It pops out more each day.  Ferns prefer cooler, shady, and moist conditions. When cooler weather returns we expect it to recover. It might need several months before it fills in again.  Please check back.

A re these little critters headed for a picnic? Actually, this column is marching 25 ft. (8m) away on the steps off our front door. This is far enough that we don’t need to control. We don’t have them in our home.  We did have a trail of ants just outside our front door. It appeared that they were seeking nectar that had dripped on the ground below our hummingbird feeder. We did apply an appropriate pesticide in that case. And we rinse the small area as needed. The ants have not returned.   If you have ants in your garden and not in your home you might not need to control.   When using any pesticide always read and follow label directions.   Please contact me for help with your garden or photography project.

We are growing two varieties of the milkweed plant loved by monarch butterflies. The caterpillars devour the leaves and in a few weeks we have many newly emerged adult monarchs flitting throughout our garden. It is very nice.  The first seeds were planted on July. We harvested them from the parent plant in our garden. It is tropical milkweed, Asclepias curassavica. This plant is a volunteer. It sprouted up by itself a few years ago. We simply let it grow. It grows quickly to 4 ft. tall and as wide. This plant is a monarch magnet. A few times each year the caterpillars strip the leaves as they feed. The leaves quickly grow back. The caterpillars create chrysalis. Wonderful adults emerge in two weeks.  These photos show progress during the first 24 days: Here are some photos from our garden in Chula Vista, California: However, we have learned that tropical milkweed is not a good variety for the San Diego area. It might harbor a disease, Ophryocystis elektroscirrha (OE), a debi...

Have you seen this new insect pest?   A recently introduced insect, the Ficus leaf rolling psyllid (FLRP) is attacking Ficus plants in San Diego County and Southern California. It is a tiny flying pest that damages Ficus macrocarpa (F. nitida). Our potted Ficus on our patio in Chula Vista, California had a severe infestation first seen in late July.  After consulting some university websites we learned the symptoms and gained insight for treatment. Pruning the affected leaves and disposing to remove the pests they harbor is recommended. In our case we had to reduce the overall size of the plant by almost half. The branch ends on the entire tree were affected. FLRP seemingly prefers newly emerged tender leaves.   Information about treating FLRP is sketchy. The pest is still very new to the U.S. Doing some digging on the internet we learned that two different pesticides may help: imidacloprid and Neem oil. We used both. Imidacloprid is a systemic insecticide. It is ...