Friday, May 23rd, 2014 Issue 21, Volume 18.

INLAND EMPIRE Palm trees survive well in the Valley and can be found lining majestic driveways as well as providing a tropical, ornamental touch to a front or back yard landscape.

One of the greatest benefits of a palm tree is that it does not lose it leaves all at once and can provide instant beautification to just about any spot in a landscape. Most importantly, palm trees are low maintenance plants. They run a close second to conifers in the level of attention they require beyond the basics. And, to top it off, theyre fairly easy to plant, too.

Let there be light

All plants have preferences when it comes to light. Some like full sun, while others prefer shade. Palm trees are no different. Its important to research the type of palm one is planting; otherwise, the results may be less than satisfactory. Fortunately, there are more varieties of palms than one can shake a frond at they vary in size from small (10 to 20 feet for a Windmill Palm) to very large (the 50 foot tall, aptly-named Queen Palm).

Planting a shade-loving palm in full sun produces a burnt and eventually dead tree; while planting a sun-loving palm in the shade gives you a weaker tree with a thicker trunk and stretched-out leaves.

The highs and lows of temperature

Another concern people have with the tropical-appearing palm is temperature. Actually, palm trees grow in almost all climate zones, depending on the type of palm. As with light, good research into temperature needs or better yet, asking an expert is crucial to having a healthy, happy palm tree.

Soil

Most palms fare pretty well in both soil types, acid or alkaline. There are a few that are more particular in their needs. The Queen Palm, for instance, prefers acidic soil. However, with the amazing variety from which to choose, it should be no problem selecting the perfect tree ones soil type. One piece of advice for all palms: the soil must have good drainage. Using a soil amendment such as Kellogg Palm and Cactus Mix when planting in pots or mix with the native soil when planting the ground will help give the new palms good drainage.

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Palms provide feel of the tropics to the Valley

Thursday, May 22nd, 2014 Issue 21, Volume 18.

FALLBROOK Palm trees survive well in Fallbrook and can be found lining majestic driveways as well as providing a tropical, ornamental touch to a front or back yard landscape.

One of the greatest benefits of a palm tree is that it does not lose it leaves all at once and can provide instant beautification to just about any spot in a landscape. Most importantly, palm trees are low maintenance plants. They run a close second to conifers in the level of attention they require beyond the basics. And, to top it off, theyre fairly easy to plant, too.

Let there be light

All plants have preferences when it comes to light. Some like full sun, while others prefer shade. Palm trees are no different. Its important to research the type of palm one is planting; otherwise, the results may be less than satisfactory. Fortunately, there are more varieties of palms than one can shake a frond at they vary in size from small (10 to 20 feet for a Windmill Palm) to very large (the 50 foot tall, aptly-named Queen Palm).

Planting a shade-loving palm in full sun produces a burnt and eventually dead tree; while planting a sun-loving palm in the shade gives you a weaker tree with a thicker trunk and stretched-out leaves.

The highs and lows of temperature

Another concern people have with the tropical-appearing palm is temperature. Actually, palm trees grow in almost all climate zones, depending on the type of palm. As with light, good research into temperature needs or better yet, asking an expert at Grangettos Farm & Garden Supply in Fallbrook is crucial to having a healthy, happy palm tree.

Soil

Most palms fare pretty well in both soil types, acid or alkaline. There are a few that are more particular in their needs. The Queen Palm, for instance, prefers acidic soil. However, with the amazing variety from which to choose, it should be no problem selecting the perfect tree ones soil type. One piece of advice for all palms: the soil must have good drainage.Using a soil amendment such as Kellogg Palm and Cactus Mix when planting in pots or mix with the native soil when planting the ground will help give the new palms good drainage.

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Palms provide feel of the tropics to Fallbrook

cleaning

Ellen Sturm Niz TODAY contributor

7 hours ago

FeaturePics.com

We have all been there: You spent hours planting a flower bed or manicuring the lawn, only to have the family pet wreak havoc on the whole thing. Sharing a yard with a dog or cat does have its challenges, but with a little careful planning, you can create an outdoor space that both humans and animals can enjoy. Check out advice from gardening experts to start this summers outdoor experience off on the right footand paw.

Designate a pet-friendly section

Save yourself the headache and design a landscape around your dog or cats behavior, suggests gardening expert gardenerMelinda Myers.

Take dogs, for instance, who tend to trample over the same patch of grass until its muddy and worn. Instead of planting something beautiful over their stomping grounds, work with the running path.

Mulch to reduce the mud if he has worn the grass down to soil level, Myers says. Then strategically place plantings next to the running path to create some added beauty.

One important thing to note: Avoid cocoa bean mulch, which can be toxic and even deadly to some dogs, and wood mulch, which contains lots of twigs that can puncture your pets mouth, she adds.

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Dog eating the grass? 6 ways to pet proof your lawn and garden

CAROL LINK | SPECIAL TO THE TIMES I snapped a shot of a bird flying around and landing in our backyard. Although I enjoy watching birds, I cant identify many, except for hawks, eagles, owls, redbirds, bluebirds, blackbirds, finches, robins, killdeers, wrens and a few others.

I suppose the word casual would best describe my bird watching. I am not a serious birder or ornithologist by a dictionary definition, but I enjoy watching birds as they flit and float about our yard. I dont watch birds through binoculars or a telescope, although I do use a zoom lens for taking bird photos. Generally, I observe birds with my naked eyes, and I enjoy listening to their songs and chirping.

Because we live on several acres in the country, we have a very large open yard. One recent morning, I looked out the kitchen window and saw what (at first glance) resembled blue Easter eggs scattered on the ground. Quickly, I realized a flock of bluebirds had landed in our yard and were pecking in the grass, nibbling on bird feeders, flying about the yard and sitting on tree limbs.

Ironically, I had seen the same thing a few years ago, only that time, a flock of redbirds had landed in our yard and were dispersed all around.

My thought then was that it appeared as if a load of red Christmas ornaments had been spilled all over the yard.

Early this spring, when Oscar was sitting in the office at the computer desk, directly in front of a window, a hummingbird flew up and hovered, looking at him, as if to ask, Where is my feeder? Im hungry!

Thirty years ago, right after we moved here, Oscar and I were working in the back yard when a mama quail sauntered across the yard, with a group of baby quail running along behind her.

Another time, a small bird slammed into the den window and dropped to the ground. From the window, I could see the little bird, lying on the ground, completely still, appearing to be dead. Oscar went out and picked up the little bird, placing him in the palm of his hand. The bird was lifeless. Using his index finger, ever so gently, Oscar rubbed the birds chest. First, the bird moved a little, then he aroused completely and flew away. Oscar had performed CPR on a bird and saved his life.

Each year, in early spring, to make sure each little hummingbird is well-nourished until they migrate south in the fall, we hang nectar feeders from the back porch. We can see the tiny birds from our kitchen table as they feed. Watching them is one of Oscars favorite pastimes. At times, though, he gets frustrated because there always is a bully sitting on a wrought iron post, protecting the feeders from all comers and chasing the other birds away, in an attempt to keep all the sugar-water for itself.

To attract birds to our landscape, we have situated colorful birdhouses throughout. A couple of bird feeders are suspended from a tree out back, another one is hanging in the gazebo and bird baths are in several locations.

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CAROL LINK: Make your landscape attractive to birds with color, feeders, plants

When five of the nation's leading landscape architects gathered before their peers last weekend in Berkeley, the projects they discussed were located in Massachusetts and Minnesota, China and Spain.

But if there was no overt Bay Area hook, no matter: The issues and ambitions on display can be applied to any 21st century metropolitan region like ours, where the most challenging frontiers for growth lie in struggling with issues of growth and change; where the land in question is high-profile and politically charged.

"The art of landscape architecture can mean making our cities into places where everyone has a sense that they belong," said Kathryn Gustafson, whose past work includes a portion of Chicago's Millennium Park. "If you build really beautiful parks, people go to them. They have fun; they use their cars less. That's part of sustainability, too."

The afternoon of presentations was organized by Berkeley's Peter Walker, who was hosting a multiday gathering of executives from America's larger landscape architecture firms. To conclude it with a twist, he arranged for five practitioners to each present a current project that illustrated what they saw as today's design issues.

Gustafson selected the retooling of a rail yard in Valencia, Spain, into a grand crossroads where six neighborhoods will converge, drawn by paths and waterways into a hub with cultural buildings and a high-speed rail station nearby.

The Bay Area connection was indirect but palpable, given the similarity of the site to what San Francisco's Mission Bay once was - a 300-acre rail yard - or the leftover industrial nature of Pier 70 on the central waterfront.

Mission Bay has been criticized for unimaginative design that fits into restrictive planning rules from the early 1990s, while Pier 70's still-evolving design could be scaled back if voters next month approve Proposition B, which locks into place height limits for property owned by the Port of San Francisco.

Those spaces are shaped by politicians and interest groups as much as designers. Architecture and planning can take a backseat to community demands, with developers then whittling back the quality of buildings and parks to ensure a profit.

But the designers on hand Saturday kept returning to another element of city-building, a word rarely heard in today's public forums.

Beauty.

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Artistic landscape architecture brings a sense of belonging

The yard is blah.

It needs a certain something to give it curb appealand make it more useful and enjoyable.

But dont expect to grab shovels, trees and paving bricks at the local big box, spend a weekend afternoon horsing stuff around and then getting a satisfactory result.

To get a good resultwhether a do it yourself project or letting the landscaping professionals do itit takes a number of steps, but one in particular: Planning.

Dont start landscaping without a plan even if you intend to do the work in stages, HGTV advises in 7 Top Landscaping Donts. Know where your hardscaping (the inanimate features of the yard) needs to go, allow room for access by delivery or work vehicles, and, where theres going to heavy traffic, put plants in last.

Thus, delay the trip to Lowes, the Home Depot or one of the areas several greenhouses before beginning. Remember, people go to school to learn how to landscape properlyand artistically.

Further, landscaping is more than just some trees, shrubs, flowers and a weed-free lawn. As Topeka Landscape notes on its website at topekalandscape.com, the choice of landscaping elements is broad: deciduous trees and shrubs, evergreen trees and shrubs, vines and groundcovers, grasses, perennials, annuals, rock, walls and patios.

Add in further luxury items like fountains, pools, fire pits, kitchens, walkways, fancy planters and gazebos and the complexity of the project compounds.

Though a simple or complicated plan, one local horticulturist and landscaper says having a design focal point is key.

Its a point of interest that youre creating, said Kirk McFadden of Urban Prairie Lawn in Eudora, Kansas. You want something thats a little out of the norm. Thats where your eye will go.

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At Home Living: Careful landscaping creates curb appeal

Fort Worth, Texas (PRWEB) May 16, 2014

BRIT, the Fort Worth Water Department, and NBC 5 are partnering to sponsor the second annual EcoScape residential summer landscape contest to find the homeowner with the most creative, attractive, and water efficient lawn in the area. The contest runs from June 14 to August 16 and will be judged on three key criteria:

1.Design aesthetic appeal; composition; use of color and plant variety;

2.Water Conservation efficient irrigation/water use; use of non-vegetative materials such as fences, walls, walks, etc.; use of native and/or adapted plants; reduced turf area; and use of mulches; and

3.Appropriate Maintenance healthy landscape, no weeds; plants pruned as appropriate.

This is an effort to raise awareness of wasteful water usage and to challenge area homeowners to create water efficient landscape to reduce water consumption. It is estimated that half of the total household water use during the summer months goes to landscapes.

Residents with 1,000-square-foot (or larger) front yards are eligible and are invited to submit their water efficient yards that use native/adaptive plants and mix according to color, aesthetic appeal, and plant variety.

Fort Worth residents put more than 4.3 billion gallons of water into landscapes last year during the summer months. Despite how that sounds, weve made headway in Cowtown and for that reason alone, we wish to invite everyone to be part of this contest, assures Micah Reed, Fort Worths water conservation manager.

The EcoScape Contest is open to residential landscapes within Fort Worth city limits and Fort Worths wholesale customer cities, including Aledo, Bethesda Water Supply Corp., Burleson, Crowley, Dalworthington Gardens, Edgecliff Village, Everman, Forest Hill, Grand Prairie, Haltom City, Haslet, Hurst, Keller, Kennedale, Lake Worth, Northlake, North Richland Hills, Richland Hills, Roanoke, Saginaw, Southlake, Trophy Club Municipal Utility District, Westlake, Westover Hills, Westworth Village and White Settlement.

Applications are available online at the City of Fort Worth Water web site (http://fortworthtexas.gov/EcoScape/).

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BRIT, City of Fort Worth, and NBC 5 Team Up to Sponsor Second Annual EcoScape Residential Summer Landscape Contest

Residents of Foster City and those in the Mariners Island area of San Mateo are asked to refrain from watering their landscape while the Estero Municipal Improvement District temporarily shuts down its water transmission main Monday, June 2 through Monday, June 9.

The shutdown is required to facilitate the relocation of the existing water main that supplies the residents in the area. During the shutdown, the district will utilize backup water supply sources, which include its water storage tanks, a smaller water main and emergency water main connections with Belmont and San Mateo. The change in water supply may stir up sediment in the pipes and although the water is safe to drink, it may appear cloudy or discolored during the shutdown. Generally, running the tap for a few moments should clear up the cloudiness.

If the problem persists call the districts yard office at (650) 286-8140. For more information contact Associate Civil Engineer Laura Galli at (650) 286-3280.

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Residents asked to refrain from landscape watering

Photo by HANDOUT

A path meanders from the yard and through the woodland area, ending at a bench. (Courtesy Peggy Krapf/MCT)

Photo by HANDOUT

Perennials and ferns planted around a timber retaining wall add a natural, rustic look to the landscape. (Courtesy Peggy Krapf/MCT)

Anne Baker lived to garden.

It's what she knew, having grown up on an 1840's family farm in northwest Washington, D.C., and she did it well, according to her husband, Dave.

"She was always growing stuff," says Dave, 73, of his wife, who died at age 69 in October 2013.

"In our first apartment, she had houseplants all over the place, including a 1938 pothos that's still going strong."

A woodland garden at their home in Williamsburg, Va., was Anne's final passion. After moving into the house in 1999, she was determined to win the war on deer and voles, creating what she hoped would be an oasis of the plants she loved most _ hostas, ferns, irises and daylilies.

"I have a list of more than 300 species of plants she planted," says Dave.

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Diggin' In: A garden legacy

An adequate supply of high qual-ity water has become a critical issue for the future prosperity of Texas. Booming populations have increased the demand on the state's already limited supply of high quality water. In addition, seasonal fluctuations in rainfall and periodic droughts have cre-ated a feast-to-famine cycle in Texas.In an attempt to reduce the excessive water use, Texas Cooperative Ex-tension is educating Texans on the principles of Earth Kind landscaping to help preserve and protect our most valuable natural resource. Traditional landscapes may incorporate one or two principles of water conservation, but they do not utilize the entire concept to reduce landscape water use effectively.

Earth Kind landscapes need not be cactus and rock gardens. They can be green, cool landscapes full of beautiful plants maintained with water-efficient practices. The same green Texas-style landscape which we are accustomed to can be achieved and still conserve water.

Start With a Plan:

Creating a water-efficient landscape begins with a well-thought-out land-scape design. Sketch your yard with locations of existing structures, trees, shrubs and grass areas. Then consider the landscape budget, appearance, function, maintenance and water requirements. Local landscape architects, designers, nurserymen and county Extension agents can help in this deci-sion making. Implementing your landscape design can be done gradually over several years.

Soil Analysis and Preparation:

To increase plant health and conserve water, add organic matter to the soil of shrub and flower bed areas. This increases the soil's ability to absorb and store water in a form available to the plant. As a rule-of-thumb, till in 4 to 6 inches of organic material such as shredded pine bark, peat and rice hulls. For trees, however, incorporating organic matter is not necessary; for large turfgrass areas, it is not economically feasible.

Plant Selection:

Select trees, shrubs and groundcovers based on their adaptability to your region's soil and climate. Texas is blessed with an abundance of beautiful native plants which are naturally adapted to the region. Most have lower water demands, fewer pest problems and less fertilizer needs than many nonadapted, exotic plants brought into Texas land-scapes. Through the support of the nursery industry, native Texas plants are becoming more available in retail nurseries and garden centers. Com-bining Texas natives with well-adapted non-native plants is a key to a beautiful, interesting landscape which conserves water. See our Web site for a comprehensive listing of drought tolerant plants for your area. http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/earthkind/

Grass Selection:

When considering a landscape's water requirement, it is impor-tant to note that turfgrasses require more frequent watering and maintenance than most other landscape plants. Carefully select grass according to its intended use, planting location and mainte-nance requirements.

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Creating an Earth Kind Landscape