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14 12, 2021

Jerusalem Sage

2025-02-22T15:34:08-08:00Categories: Garden Plants, perennials|Tags: , , , , |

Although each species has a common name of its own, plants of the genus Phlomis are often called Jerusalem sage whether they hail from Portugal, Morocco, Turkey, or Israel. These are summer-flowering shrubs, subshrubs, or perennials with felted or woolly, sagelike leaves, many with serrated margins and silvery undersides. Whorled clusters of small, usually downward curving, two-lipped flowers are displayed at intervals along upright stems. Flowers are followed by ornamental seedheads that persist through the winter. Phlomis fruticosa (Jerusalem sage) In the garden Jerusalem sages blend well with many other low-water, sun-loving plants, especially the salvias and

1 12, 2021

Evergreen Euphorbias

2025-02-22T15:36:20-08:00Categories: Garden Plants, perennials|Tags: , , , , |

It may seem surprising that evergreen euphorbias aren't used more often in commercial and public landscapes, where year-round good looks and ease of maintenance are so highly valued. Euphorbia characias (Mediterranean spurge) All of these evergreen subshrubs have fairly predictable shapes and sizes, a neat, almost architectural habit, and extraordinary color combinations that both offset and complement many other plants. Although the floral show is a spring and summertime event, the sculptural quality of the leaves and stems makes evergreen euphorbias especially effective in the winter garden. Perhaps the failure to include the shrubby euphorbias in commercially

21 07, 2021

Teucriums Are Deer-Proof Too

2025-02-22T17:52:19-08:00Categories: Garden Plants, perennials|Tags: , , , |

Those of us with unfenced gardens adjacent to wildlands usually learn the hard way which plants are ignored by browsing deer and which, without special protections, are not. It may seem that our choices in plants are rather limited, but lush and lovely deer-resistant gardens can be made. Madeira germander (Teucrium betonicum, in flower) with sages and santolina Perhaps the widest range of deer-resistant options for summer-dry climates lies within the Lamiaceae, or mint family, which includes among its more than two hundred genera many plants that are widely used in gardens where summers are dry --

25 02, 2021

Rosemary

2025-02-22T18:11:21-08:00Categories: Garden Plants, shrubs|Tags: , , , |

In our continual search for new and unusual plants for our gardens we tend to forget, or to reflexively dismiss, the old, reliable standbys. Rosemary needs no care, has no "down" season, and can last for decades. It is quite content to play a supporting role in any garden scheme and it comes in varied heights and habits. Salvia rosmarinus Prostratus Group cascades over walls There are prostrate or cascading rosemaries as well as upright forms of many sizes. Flower color varies from pale or bright blue to pinkish lavender or even almost white. The fine-textured, intensely

26 04, 2017

Oleander

2025-02-22T17:40:00-08:00Categories: Garden Plants, shrubs|Tags: , |

Nerium oleander Every so often it is worth reconsidering a once wildly popular plant that, apparently for no reason other than overexposure, has fallen completely out of favor. Agapanthus is one of those plants. Oleander (Nerium oleander) is certainly another. Overplanted in housing developments and along freeways in the 1960s and ‘70s, oleanders now seem to be seldom planted except by those who appreciate the dense screening provided by their lush evergreen foliage, their lengthy period of exuberant flowering, and their robust constitution. Oleanders are astonishingly tolerant of drought, reflected heat, wind, salt spray, poor soil, neglect,

21 12, 2015

Lavenders

2025-02-22T17:11:49-08:00Categories: Garden Plants, perennials|Tags: , , , |

Masses of Lavandula 'Provence' draw the eye toward a pot and distant sculpture Lavenders are so at home in California that it’s hard to believe they’re not native here. Lavenders have green to grayish green or silvery gray, narrow, softly toothed or smooth margined aromatic leaves and upright stems of tubular lavender, purple, pink, or white flowers. There are many species and dozens of named varieties in the trade. The best known and most widely grown is English lavender (Lavandula angustifolia), a woody perennial subshrub, two to three feet tall and four feet wide, with long, narrow,

14 05, 2015

Echium candicans

2025-02-22T17:30:31-08:00Categories: Garden Plants, shrubs|Tags: , , , |

Echium candicans (aka. E. fastuosum) (Pride of Madeira) flowering along dirt path in summer-dry waterwise garden At its most luxuriant in mid to late spring is Echium candicans.  Hailing from Madeira and the Canary Islands, this magnificent plant has spread into wildlands and untended landscapes in some coastal California areas and is sometimes mistaken for a native. Big, bold, and fast-growing, this ultimately massive shrub can overwhelm a small urban backyard at maturity, but if you’ve got the space and appreciate vegetative drama, this is a plant worth considering. E. candicans grows quickly to six or eight

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