China Doll September 29, 2009

"China Doll" Radermachera sinica is known as a delicate houseplant. I have had this one in the Toluca lake garden for several years. Jan planted it about three years ago as a smallbush. I was amazed how well it is taking to pruning. Take a look.

Unlikely Applications

Two days before Christmas in 1944, American soldier John DiBattista a member of George Patton’s Third Army, 4^th armored division was manning a 50-caliber machine gun working to make a break through the frozen countryside of Normandy . Never knowing when to engage, the heavy cover was never on the gun. This made the weapon readily available for attack, but unbeknownst to DiBattista, the hard winter nights would render the gun useless. As German soldiers fired on DiBattista the gun was frozen so solidly that the bolt didn’t go back far enough to pick up another round. Against all odds DiBattista urinated on his weapon and fired on the enemy successfully.

He urinated on his machine gun.

When I read this account, I felt better about urinating outside the lavatory. When you spend lots of time in the garden and you have to go…why not. And after all, it probably saved Sergeant DiBattista’s life. I think our social indoctrinations make this taboo for many of us. There is also a point of view that it’s better to urinate outside and save the water involved in the flush. But how about the garden? Can a little pee here and there make for better blooms? I can say that the idea of making a perfect tomato sauce from my Carmel Valley Garden tomatoes, which have been fertilized with my personal brand of liquid fertilzer, bothers me. But then when the circus passes through town I am the first one at the elephant tent, filling a couple of burlap bags. So should I get over it and pee away?

Here are some intetesting urine facts from Emma Cooper,

“Every day, gardeners across the world flush away a valuable and sustainable source of fertilizer for their plants -- urine. Urine is a good source of nitrogen and other minerals and, providing it is used correctly, is completely safe. Using urine as a fertilizer saves money, fossil fuels (used extensively in the production of chemical fertilizers) and water (no need to flush!). It also cuts down on river pollution -- urine is a major source of nitrogen that contributes to river eutrophication if expensive denitrification is not used at the water treatment plant. And it's not a backwards step, it's space age technology -- NASA has used urine in hydroponics systems!

1. Keep it separate. The golden rule with urine use is to keep it separate from other bodily wastes. Urine is clean and needs to be kept that way. Pee in a bottle, or invest in a urine-separating toilet.

2. Use it fresh. We all know that stale urine smells. That's ammonia, and it's made from nitrogen. The smellier your collected urine, the less nutritious it will be for your plants, as well as being unpleasant to apply.

3. Always dilute. Urine is too strong to be used neat on plants. Dilute at least 5:1, and it can be diluted up to 10:1 for use on tender plants and seedlings.urine fertilizer

4. Water at the roots. It's good practice when watering not too splash the leaves, but to water at the roots. This saves on evaporation, and dry leaves are much more resistant to disease.

5. Spread it around. Urine can be salty, and using too much of it in one place can harm plants. Use it throughout your garden so no one area suffers from an overdose, and don't use it every time you water a plant.

6. Feed hungry plants. The plants that will benefit most from urine fertilizer are the ones with the highest nitrogen requirements. Try it on leafy vegetables like cabbages and cauliflowers, corn, or anything that needs a quick pick-me-up.

7. Other uses. Neat urine is too strong to be used directly on plants, but it can be used as a weedkiller; a few applications, especially if used on hot days, should finish off your weeds. It can also be used neat as a winter spray for fruit trees, to discourage fungal diseases.

8. Activate! A final use for urine in the garden is as a compost activator. The nitrogen in urine will speed up the composting process and kick start a slumbering heap.

Emma’s notes are beneficial. A couple of personal notes…

I tried the pee as weed killer on some unwanted growth on my front patio in Toluca Lake. It didn’t work and I think it’s why my neighbor Fernando’s wife blushes when we see each other on the street. I also cringed at the part that says that urine is beneficial as a winter spray for the fruit trees. I don’t know why but I get creeped out at the idea of urine overspray on a blustery fall day in the Valley. Emma’s notes did clear up something that I don’t know why I didn’t think of earlier. I had always just thought that all urine applications in the garden should be applied with my own applicator. This obviously is not the case and not practical (and in many cases not physically possible) so of course the dedicated hudson sprayer is the best solution and easily provides for proper dilution as Emma recommends.

My take on the whole situation? I am happy Sergeant DiBattista saved himself by peeing on his gun, I appreciate Emma’s comprehensive research, but for me, I will continue to pee in the garden but for the moment limit my deposits to the compost pile.

Tomato Stories

There must be a million tomato stories this time of year.  Recipes, gardening hints, and of course...just stories:

An old Italian man lived alone in New Jersey .  He wanted to plant his annual  tomato garden, but it was very difficult work, as the ground was hard.

His only son, Vincent, who had helped him in the past, was in prison. The old man wrote a letter to his son and described his predicament:

Dear Vincent, 

I am feeling pretty sad, because it looks like I won't be able to plant my tomato garden this year. I'm just getting too old to be digging up a garden plot. I know if you were here my troubles would be over.  I know you would be happy to dig the plot for me, like in the old days.

Love, Papa

A few days later he received a letter from his son.

Dear Pop,

Don't dig up that garden. That's where the bodies are buried.

Love,

Vinnie

At 4 a.m. the next morning, FBI agents and local police arrived and dug up the entire area without finding any bodies. They apologized to the old man and left.

That same day the old man received another letter from his son.

Dear Pop,

Go ahead and plant the tomatoes now. That's the best I could do under the circumstances.

Love you,

Vinnie

An 18 day trip to the East coast found us spending four days with Alexis in the little college town of Northamption, Massachusetts.  Northampton is an old town and the most impressive plantings are really the seemingly ancient trees that lucky for me were in their full regalia.  Unlike the year round West coast gardens that I have come to be used to, here there is a definite "closing time" for the gardener.  I guess it's this gardener's hibernation that makes East coast gardenistas really enthusiastic when spring hits.  Not only do you see people outside in their shorts ( even if it is a little chilly for shorts) working their gardens but theses gardeners have had a long winter to consider their future plantings and in many cases start the seedlings in their windows as the melt begins.  When Alexis had asked me to help her plant her Northampton garden, I had imagined a pastorial plot, that would have long rows of different vegtables.  My greatest fear was where to get the hekp to do all the digguing it would require.  It was a welcome surprise when I realized that Alexis garden would be a small patch in the front of her house that had great sun expsoure.  The garden area, that was now quite overgrown,  had at one time been a well watched and maintained area.  Buried under years of dirt and that seasonal Western Massachusetts ice were brick borders and even a early version of weed control fabric.  There were also some interesting plants that were either perennials or weeds and recalling Ralph Waldo Emerson's definition of a weed; "A plant whose Virtures have not yet been discovered," we plotted the tomatoes randomly around the long term inhabitants of the garden.   Alexis had gone the route of starting her tomatos from seed, some thing that I have never done.  Now, several weeks after the planting Alexis comments how her neighbors plants are looking robust even in the not hot enough climate, and her seedlings are dependant on applications of fish emulsion and TLC.  This consternation will quell when at the end of the season all things are equal, and Alexis will have the sense of accomplishment of having nurtured this amazing fruit from seed and not a Home Depot Garden Center six-pack.  

Parkway Update (It's working!)

Thank God for little sisters, even if they are over 40.  

The parkway is flourishing very nicely.  I am watering it through the sprinkler system twice a week.   The California Poppies came up first.  Actually I believe the poppies may be responsible for smothering some of the other seedlings.  In addition to the orange of the poppies and the pink of the Clarkia, the blues and purples are expected soon.  We shall see.

  

I am considering eradicating what's left of the grass  patch in my back garden, without the use of chemicals or extensive labor, as I listen to Jon Bansen, a third generation dairyman, talk about how he raises his Jersey cows without antibiotics or chemicals.

Jon Bansen says that 60 years ago there was no need to push organic farming because that's all there was.  I'm at the Seattle Green Festival and Bansen is the speaker at a seminar called "Organic Farming."  The seminar  isn't specifically about organic farming.  Specifically it's about raising Jersey milking cows organically.  Which is ok with me, I just wish they had billed it that way.  Bansen as it turns out, in addition to being a contributing writer for Graze Magazine, is also the West Coast regional leader of Organic Valley Farmer Ambassador Program and one of the Cooperative's Dairy executive committee representative for the state of Oregon.  So as it turns out Bansen's cooperative is one of the country's largest organic food makers, Organic Valleys.  Again all this is fine with me, his talk was informative and convincingly from the heart.  I just wish they had called it something other than Organic Farming.  All of these Green Festival festivities and these organic seminars are making me think more about my real problem of getting rid of the grass.  

The grass has to go because like my parkway, under the guise of environmentalism, I want a maintenance free garden.  getting rid of the grass, going with a three inch covering of small pebbles, and letting the sprinklers only hit the perimeter vegetation.  Guise or not this is a water saving sustainable re design.  Anytime I want to plant something I can scrape away the pebbles, dig it in and put a dripper right to it.  Simon and Bailey can relieve themselves in an emergency and a scooper or a hose off drains in into the earth.  Jeff Werner warns that my grandchildren might prefer to play in the grass.  If that becomes the case I will scrape up the rocks, apply top oil and sod it out again.  

After two weeks of no water on the grass, it continues to flourish.  The treatments are either too toxic or too costly.  I feel the best solution is to hire of band of workers to dig it out.

Under The Cloak Of Environmentalism

Mow, blow, and go.

That's how my friend Paul Henman described the gardeners he had just hired to maintain his property on Kings Road, above the Sunset Strip. These guys don't pick particular bedding plants for a particular season, or plot out an English garden. Most don't know the difference between an annual and a perennial. They mow the grass, blow the clipping, and go off to the next gig. In fairness to this genre of the gardening trade, they are relatively inexpensive and fast. With respect to the Master Gardeners of Southern California it seems that the majority of he work force are the mow, blow, and go guys.

My favorite was a man I employed between 1984 and 1999. Gonzalo Mayoral billed himself as a landscaping expert trained in Mexico by un jardinero principal. Based on his boasts I would let him, and pay him, to pick plants and layout schemes for my garden areas. Some worked, some didn't. Most didn't. Gonzalo Mayoral was a mow, blow and go guy. He did work for us from the time our daughters, Alexis and Sloane, were babies and well into their teens. So it came as no surprise when as a momentary enterprising teen, Alexis announced that she would take over the mowing. Gonzalo was out. Alexis was in. Alexis went to college. Sloane, whose prowess with blade wielding machinery was an unbearable thought and was less enterprising, totally rejected the idea of mowing. Suddenly I was the mow and blow guy, I had no place to go. This lasted better than five years. Oh, its great exercise. Well not as good as a hike in Griffith Park or getting beat in a rousing match of tennis. It's a bore. An idea flashed.

Under the cloak of enviromentalism, after all the gas fumes and the wasted water were quickly becoming politically incorrect, I decided to eliminate the chore of mowing and blowing. I started with the parkway. A parkway is many things. In my neighborhood it is the strip of grass between the street and the sidewalk. Mine was a strip of over watered, over fertilized, crab grass that needed weekly mowing. The only purpose that I saw it fill was a bail out area for a shaky kid on blades, a skateboard or the first trip down the sidewalk without the training wheels. It was also the first indicator, a realtor told me, of curb appeal. So whatever I did it had to look good.

I began by installing some drought tolerant plants, removing large areas of the crab grass aromund them. In the grass-less perimeters I sowed wild flower seeds. Now there was less grass but I still had to mow and now negotiate my mower between the plants. No good. The people came from the Toluca lake garden club and put in a magnolia tree. They didn't comment but I think they were whispering about my unfinished masterpiece. I started to remove the grass. Every blade every root. Tedious and extremely boring. Neighbors were staring as I sifted soil from the roots. I called Tony the handyman and in three hours he and his sidekick Jose had all the grass removed.

Oddly enough Balboa Brick across from the Van Nuys airfield sells bark chips. I was shocked that it took 26 bags of the stuff to lay in a 3 inch covering. The guy at the yard had suggested that I buy a scoop (the contents of a front loader). I rejected his advice and it cost me twice as much. Now it's a strip of plants, wildflowers that are on the move, all surrounding a youthful Magnolia tree. In the spring and early summer is a mass of tangled wild flowers that look nearly as good as they start to die off as they do when they are in full bloom. In the sumer and winter its a neat brown area that hosts the perennials which are in permanent residence. The maintenance consists of pulling the stray blade of grass, kicking the bark off the sidewalk and picking up the styrofoam cups the busboys from the local greasy spoon leave behind. Mission accomplished. Now the back garden...

In 1997 I visited Jesuit priest turned anti-war activist 74 year old Philip Berrigan in the Federal Prison in Portland Maine.  He had just beat the computers on a nuclear powered naval vessel with a ball-pean hammer and then marinated the wreckage in his own blood that he had collected in baby bottles in the months prior to his "action".  He talked to me about a lot about the evils of war and frequently quoted the prophet Isaiah 2:4, and harped on Isaiah's mantra to "pound swords into plowshares", a concept in which military weapons are converted for peaceful civilian application. (A bizarre concept!)  As peaceful  a man he was, he seemed to have (and his "actions" took on) a violent edge.  I thought about Phil Berrigan when I read last week about Guerrilla Gardening. The concept is simple enough.  Find a patch of land (any size) that is barren or ignored, clean it up, plant some seeds, water it and create beauty where there once was ugly.  Why though the name, "Guerrilla Gardening"?  Why take something nice and give it a violent edge?  The website for the Los Angeles Guerrilla Gardening chapter recommends going on night missions and the story in the Los Angeles Times  talks about a group of school kids who were held by LAPD until backup arrived, then released with a warning.  Would this have happened if their mission had been "Barren Dirt Make-Over" instead of "Guerrilla Gardening?"  Would their (the school kids) attitude have been different?  Now the school kids have formed a group called The South Central Resistance and their saying is, not too unlike, "pounding swords into plowshares", "protect the plants at al costs."  Yikes.  Both the Los Angeles Times story and the LAGG website are worth checking out, especially the part about how to manufacture seed bombs.  For me I am going to find a piece of neglected earth and see how I can quickly and inexpensively make it beautiful; but I won't refer to it as Guerrilla anything.  

February Planting Phase One (Carmel)

The University of California publishes a Vegetable Planting Guide for Santa Cruz County.  As it happens, on the Central Coast the planting times and seasons for Santa Cruz County and Monterey County are the same.  This then becomes my guide for planting.  In January I put in seeds for radishes.  This last weekend (Sunday, February 1) I put in seeds for Pole Peas (Sugar Snap), Beets (Detroit Dark Red), Cabbage (Dwarf Blue Curled Scotch), Butterhead Lettuce (Buttercrunch), Carrots (Nantes Coreless), and bulb sets of Red Onions.  The Peas and Beets got an ample mix of my latest compost and everything got a light sprinkle of dry organic fertilizer.  Although the soil is still damp I gave the planting a light sprinkle.  The pictures here show the garden plot in a wide shot and the closer shot is the location of the new seed plantings.  From the left; Lettuce/Kale, Cabbage, Beets, and Peas (note the poles.)  The Carrots are at the foot of these rows and the Onions are in a small separate area.  I was somewhat surprised that the onion bulbs are planted a mere two inches apart.  I hope I read this right.  Before the month is out I hope to sow some Parsley seeds.  Then, the plan for March os Broccoli, Cauliflower, and perhaps Spinach.

A few gardening principals:

#1  Always organic; no chemicals, pesticides.  The guy who owned the Carmel property before me lived here for fourteen years.  He just drank beer and delivered mail.  So I feel the soil is pure.

#2  Plant from seeds. There are times I use seedlings; tomatoes, artichokes, but I really like the feeling of growing from seed.

#3  I am trying to avoid annuals.  Maybe because I am getting old and feeling that it's easier to have perennials that just keep coming up. I also enjoy rescuing plants.  Nothing too serious just taking abandoned or near death plants and planting them somewhere in my system.

#4  Use compost made on my property as much as possible.

#5  I want to believe that drip irrigation is the best thing in the world, but after 20 years the jury is still out.

I have decided once again to emulate my daughter Alexis and try having a blog.  The title, Vince In The Dirt, refers to my gardening experiments...successful and failed. At the very least it will provide me with a garden diary; unless it goes the way of conga drums and piano lessons and gets abandoned.  All of my gardening takes place in Toluca Lake, CA and Carmel Valley, CA.  Toluca Lake plantings are consistently roses, wildflowers and occasionally fava beans, tomatoes, blueberries and currently radishes.  In Carmel Valley I try to keep with native perennials, wildflowers and a large vegetable patch.