My Garden Diary

Pruned another rose in back. Soon, I'll have to start pruning roses that are still blooming.

Pruned the two grape vines at the bottom of My Hill — the 'Perlette' and 'Black Monukka'. The 'Flame' grape at the top of My Hill will have to wait until I am exceedingly ambitious.

One of the Shasta daisy cuttings (14 Dec) is quite dead. On the other hand, the 'Simply Marvelous' rose cuttings (11 Dec) are sprouting leaves. Of course, it's too soon for those woody cuttings to have roots.

Filled the green trash bin with leaves from the front of the house and the side walkway. I need to rake the back lawn, but the wind was blowing too strong to leave piles of leaves on the ground.

Pruned two of the seven roses in back. Four other roses there are still blooming. The seventh is the climbing 'Peace', which is so large that it will be a task by itself.

I don't know what has been blowing on the wind. As I compose this, I am having my worst hay fever attack in years; and my wife has had four asthma attacks in the past 24 hours.

Pruned three of the six roses in front. The other three are still blooming.

Raked leaves, both in front and back. In back, I only did half the lawn; tomorrow, I plan to finish the lawn. The green trash bin for the county's composting program is almost full, so I'll likely have to pile leaves on the paths and patio.

The Shasta daisy cuttings (8 Dec) do not seem to be surviving. I think I took them at the wrong time of the year. Perennial cuttings generally do much better when taken in the spring.

Broadcast generous amounts of gypsum over the smaller portion of my front yard (8 Dec), the teardrop bed in back, around the gardenia (G. jasminoides 'Veitchii'), and around each individual Camellia sasanqua in the east and rose beds. I also broadcast some soil sulfur in the camellia and teardrop beds and around the gardenia and C. sasanqua. This completes all the soil treatments that I am planning for this winter.

Lightly trimmed the Australian tea tree (Leptospermum laevigatum). I generally avoid any pruning of my broadleaf evergreens at this time of the year because cutting promotes new growth that will be damaged by our night-time frosts. However, a few branches on the tea tree were interfering with the paths around the teardrop bed.

Potted the Shasta daisy cuttings (10 Nov). I already have plans for what cuttings I will attempt to root next.

Broadcast gypsum over the main part of the front lawn and in the camellia bed in back. As it dissolves and leaches through the soil, the gypsum (calcium sulfate) reacts with the clay in the soil to make it granular and porous. This improves drainage, the ability of roots to spread, and the movement of nutrients. I will treat other areas soon; but I won't be as thorough as last year, when I used over 150 pounds of gypsum.

Raked more leaves in front.

Had my favorite tree service come to prepare an estimate for trimming my five largest trees. I can't get onto the schedule for the work earlier than this coming February.

Spread a mixture of gypsum and soil sulfur around the liquidambar tree (L. styraciflua). This will help prevent chlorosis next year.

This past Thursday, my wife looked out our bedroom window and saw the gardener next-door using a leaf blower (an abomination that should be made illegal) blowing leaves from our neighbor's front lawn onto our driveway. I confronted him and told him to clear up his mess from my property. He claimed the leaves were all from my oak tree (Quercus lobata) and he was merely returning them. However, the mess included leaves from the street tree in front of the neighbor's house. The gardener raked up most of the mess and removed it. The house is a rental, and the gardener is employed by the landlord and not the tenant. I talked to the tenant, and she will convey my complaint to her landlord. She indicated that the gardener's performance in other ways has been quite unsatisfactory.

The recent Santa Ana winds piled leaves of all kinds into drifts, just as winter winds elsewhere create snow drifts. The Tree has not yet started to lose its leaves; otherwise the drifts could have been waist-high. I again filled the green trash bin with leaves.

Fortunately, the winds here were not as severe as elsewhere in southern California. Locally, I saw no trees uprooted, power lines downed, or buildings damaged. The winds here were not as bad as in January 2003.

Yesterday, raked leaves in front into three large piles. Today, I packed as much as I could into the barrel that had been used for grass clippings. The rest of the leaves went into the green trash bin for the county's composting program.

I need to visit the local garden plumbing store to fix the drip irrigation that was damaged when the dead rose stump was removed from the front rose bed.

So far, we are slightly ahead of last year in terms of rainfall but definitely behind last year in terms of winter chill.

Those easterners who deride us in southern California for having no fall color obviously do not know where to look for color. While we do not have masses of the same tree in this urban area, individual trees are striking with pale yellow (birch), bright yellow (ginkgo and Modesto ash), flame (crepe myrtle), and multicolored confetti (liquidambar), just to identify a few. This past week, I took a photo of my Japanese zelkova (Z. serrata) at the peak of its fiery display. Sometimes, I think those easterners are merely jealous, resenting our mild, snowless winters.

Arranged to have the red fescue (Festuca rubra) lawn in back mowed this coming Saturday, generally a once-a-year event. The gardener will also remove the rose bush stump (22 Sep) in front.

Broadcast gypsum in front adjacent to the house, where long-established shrubs are struggling because the soil has become too compacted.

Started to rake leaves again (30 Oct), but a very annoying fly kept dive-bombing my ears. I finally quit and went inside.