Joy of Blooming Perennials

 This week on “In the Garden with UC Master Gardeners”, you are in for a real listening treat! UC Master Gardener and show host Teena Spindler devotes the entire hour to the “Joy of Blooming Perennials.” Her guest is Horticultural Consultant and “The Plantsman,” Nicholas Staddon. He is an expert in new varieties of nursery plant material available in Southern California. And “spokesperson” he truly is! In his infectiously witty British way, he will tell you what is so joyful about growing the one category of plants that will bring you color and texture to your garden year after year without replanting. That is the nature of perennials versus annuals and biennials. This show continues with creating beauty in your garden as recent shows have spotlighted. Tune in for a joyful experience! 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Welcome to In the Garden with University of California Master Gardeners. I'm Tina Spindler, your host for today, a University of California Master Gardener, and I have a really exciting guest in the studio today, whose name is Nicholas Stadden. Hello, Nicholas. Thanks so much for coming today.

SPEAKER_03 0:41

Tina, the greatest of good days to you. We've been trying to do this for weeks or months, I think.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

This is so fun. Nicholas is going to talk to us today about uh one of my favorite, favorite topics in gardening, and that is how to use perennials in your garden effectively. And also in our times of uh increased concern about water, how to use them efficiently.

SPEAKER_02 1:04

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 1:05

Just want to give people a little bit of info about you, Nicholas. First of all, Nicholas probably knows more about perennial plants than anyone I know. He's shaking his head, but he's being very modest. He is a horticultural consultant, uh, a self-proclaimed plant nerd, which I think we all aspire to be, plant nerds, right? Uh, and an awesome public speaker, as our listeners will soon hear. Um, he's currently actually embarking on his fifth career, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:34

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 1:35

And uh but mostly he says his career currently is about honing his passion for all living things. Because his current office happens most of the time to be his backyard. That's right. Because that's where he gets cell phone reception, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:49

No cell phone reception inside our houses. So when the cell phone rings, I have to go outside. And I have one spot where I've got like a chair I sit in, and you watch all this activity in the gardens, the bees and the butterflies and the birds. So it's um it's been a uh it's been an unexpected positive. It really has. You get to see what's going on.

SPEAKER_01 2:09

Instead of going to an office, your office is now outside where where your career has been anyway, dealing with plants. But your actual office gets to be outside of it.

SPEAKER_03 2:19

It's really fun, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

Well, um, Nicholas uh to my excitement, has brought uh many different uh books and uh periodical publications, and so he's gonna share with us today uh basically how to use perennials uh in your garden. And what I have found in the last few years that the older I get, the more I get away from annual plantings and the more I gravitate towards perennials because they last for many seasons.

SPEAKER_03 2:50

And they're pretty.

SPEAKER_01 2:51

Then they're very pretty, especially the ones that you've introduced uh to the world through through your careers at at different uh uh growers and nurseries. So anyway, let's get started.

SPEAKER_03 3:03

Just far away, right?

SPEAKER_01 3:04

Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 3:05

So so so for those of you at home, the first thing you need is uh a pen and paper or a pencil, because we're gonna have some uh I'm gonna put some things out, uh, whether it's ideas or names of publications or names of plants, that it's gonna be great for you to write down. And and you know, the last time we spoke, we we kind of um uh we can we uh conspi a little bit because we actually said, why don't we do some podcasting out in people's gardens and in botanical gardens or in garden centers and kind of talk about what's going on.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

Yes, I hope we get to do that in the future. Um we frankly, the little group that does this radio show had never thought of doing on-location podcasts. So I'm gonna put a bug in everyone's ear and see if we can figure out the technology to do that.

SPEAKER_03 3:55

That would be a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

It would really be fun.

SPEAKER_03 3:58

Yeah. And you know, I guess we could I guess we could cheat and we could have things like you know, like like horses' hooves, like, you know, the horses crap and the crunch of gravel. We've got to have all the sound effects for this, right? Because then you're there, yeah. So uh well what what I've done, um I I bought like a whole bunch of props with me that I thought it might be fun to show. And uh I've always been uh an avid rever reader, and it uh it drives my bride bonkers because I have this big library at home, and if you're in the plants, you have lots of books and stuff like that. So uh one of the things that's changed in my jobs is I'd I would travel probably for about seven months out of the year, and wherever I went, I'd buy a book.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_03 4:37

And then sometimes I'd buy two books or three books, and so you know the house was getting piled up with books, which is a big bone of contention with my bride, because she says to me, Well, you're never gonna read them, and I said, But that's not the point. They're a great resource center, you know. So, anyway, that that's an ongoing argument, everyone at home. If you have the same problem and you have a solution, please call me, right? And help me.

SPEAKER_01 5:01

Let me tell my husband, there are worse addictions, right? Being addicted to garden books and garden catalogues is in the in the scheme of addictions not that bad.

SPEAKER_03 5:10

That's right. So what I what I've got in front of me, um that there's some really fun books. Um one of the hottest books on the market is called Bringing Bringing Home. Sorry, correction. Bringing Nature Home.

SPEAKER_01 5:24

Which I don't have. I don't believe I don't have that one yet. I've got to go out and get it.

SPEAKER_03 5:28

It's a great book. It's written by uh um Professor Douglas Um Talame, T-A-L-L A-M-Y. And for those of you listening at home who were at the Master Gardener Conference in Yosemite, the good professor actually presented there at the conference. At the conference. And his book is primarily written with a focus on the East Coast and the Midwest, but so much of it is applicable to what we're doing over here in California. And like all of us, we're all heading, and many of us have reached that point where we're not using any chemicals in the garden. I guess you could say we're gardening organically, but but we know to reduce the amount of chemicals that we're using in our garden, we're gonna have a we're gonna have more bees, we're gonna have more uh hummingbirds and caterpillars and butterflies, we're gonna have more things that eat plants, but that's okay because all these things attract the living creatures that we love so much. They make, you know, we get the emotion out. So this book talks about how uh to really create a sustainable garden. So bringing nature home. Uh, then I'm gonna put that one down on the table. There it goes. The next one is a fabulous book by um a lady who some of you might know called Nan Steerman. And Nan has been a long pal of mine and a great uh guiding hand as well. Uh one of her second book that she wrote is called California Gardener's Guide, Volume 2. And it's just for the California garden. And uh lots of uh trees, perennials, shrubs with the ornamentals, and we're actually gonna we're gonna go to the perennial section today and talk about some of the perennials that she suggests and how we use them.

SPEAKER_01 7:18

And I have that book, and I love that book because it is specifically for California, and the way that it's arranged is so simple in that it has a page for each plant that she's talking about with the photo. And so for those of us who have ADD and you know don't want to read through a lengthy, you know, tome, it's just organized, incredibly easy to follow.

SPEAKER_03 7:41

It's per great, it's perfect. I love it. You you should have written the foreword for this. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:46

Maybe next time.

SPEAKER_03 7:47

You might have done that. I don't know. And then uh uh uh for the um for the for the real plant enthusiasts, more for the native type plants, uh this book is called California Native Plants for the Garden. Uh three authors, Bart O'Brien, uh Bart, who was the curator of plants for the Rancho Santa Ana Botanical Garden for many years, and Bart has now moved up to the Bay Area where he's running uh a botanical garden up there. David Frost, F-R-O-S-S, who is a superb um plantsman and owns a nursery called Native Sons, which is uh north of Santa Barbara, right?

SPEAKER_01 8:29

Yes, and and I mean you can find their plants in a lot of nurseries, and I've had great luck with the ones I've been super sharp as well, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:36

And then um one of my favorite uh lady plants people, lady plants ladies, and her name is Carol Bornstein, so B-O-R-N-S-T-E-I-N. And I had not seen Carol for years, and signed up last autumn to a uh to a day at the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History, which I'd never been to before. It's kind of down near downtown. And blow me down if I didn't bump into Carol, and Carol is now the curator of plants there.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Oh, I didn't know that.

SPEAKER_03 9:14

Oh, she's that that would be a great place for a podcast. Fantastic. So it the site is actually the building, is the old library of Los Angeles. It's it's a beautiful um building full of all the things that you find in the Natural History Museum, exquisite gardens, absolutely exquisite.

SPEAKER_01 9:33

Which have recently been redone.

SPEAKER_03 9:35

Yes, they're spent millions on it. And uh so Carol's the curator of plants, she's a great lady. She's the you know, she'll stop what she's doing, um show you round, talk to you about the plants, etc. And then if you're into roses, because we all we all love roses, if you're into roses, they have a huge rose garden, which is some big trialing and evaluation rose garden for LA. I didn't know this. Must be like two acres. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:02

I mean hundreds of roses.

SPEAKER_03 10:04

Yeah. So so once again, so California Native Plants for the Garden by Um Bornstein, Frost, and O'Brien. So that that's a killer read. And then drop that on the table. We've done that. And then um one of my favorite books by a chap called Bob Perry. Bob Perry is an educator and plantsman and consultant, and he wrote the Bible for us for California Plants. It's called Landscape Plants for California Gardens. And it is, I think, the um the absolute must-have for all of us. Uh it's got literally thousands of plants in it, um, exquisite pictures, uh, whether um the plants are in flower, whether they have berries, when the berries ripen, great narrative uh supporting the pictures. And then he's also um put, I think it's the cut the uh sunset garden zones in there.

SPEAKER_02 11:02

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 11:02

Which I must confess I struggle with. I'm trying to learn them. But I think so so many people uh use those as a as a benchmark. But this is a must-have book. It's a pretty heavy book.

SPEAKER_01 11:14

It's a tome. Yeah, it's quite a tome. Yeah. It needs two men and a small boy to help you carry it from the bookstore to your but the good news is, as I've never not found a plant I was looking for in in that book. You know, whereas other books are limited in their scope, so you may not find something that's a little less common.

SPEAKER_03 11:36

It's it's great, isn't it? It is. And you've got trees and shrubs and perennials and all sorts of things. And then um and then c kind of quickly. I don't know what you're all subscribing to, but but here's some of my picks. So Pacific Horticulture, which I think we get four copies a year of. Um it's under uh kind of new editorialship. Uh as of a couple of years ago, they're doing a great job with the magazine, talks about California plants, plants from Oregon, and then uh Pacific Horticulture. They have seminars that you can go to and that hear great speakers and stuff like that. And then uh the American Horticultural Society has a super magazine called The American Gardener. Now, yes, they focus a little bit on California, but it's really fun to learn about what's going on in the Midwest and on the East Coast and back in the southeastern part of America. And they also have their gardens at a place called Alexandria, which is about an hour from Washington, DC, in a fast car.

SPEAKER_01 12:39

That's right.

SPEAKER_03 12:40

And I it's on the banks of the Potomac, and the view is just awful. Oh, this gorgeous river. It's about two miles across with big trees. I mean, it's it's lovely. When I say awful, I'm being sarcastic.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

They have they have green back there.

SPEAKER_03 12:59

Yeah, that's lovely. And then uh Fine Gardening put out by Taunton Press, which is a wonderful book. And I'm I'm very um humbled because I've actually just written my first article for these people. So I'm really excited. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

What issue will it be?

SPEAKER_03 13:14

Well, it it it it's uh my top four plants to put in my garden for 2017. Oh, yeah. So they it it's really it's a very it's a very pictorial magazine.

SPEAKER_01 13:26

And and when when will your article come out?

SPEAKER_03 13:27

Do you just I think it's in in the autumn.

SPEAKER_01 13:30

In the autumn.

SPEAKER_03 13:30

Yeah. So what what they do is they they ask uh regional experts, and right now um Tina and I are looking at a a regional pick for the Northeast, because they go around America. So the lady from the Northeast has picked out four of her favorite plants Bloodroot, Nodding Onions. Nodding Onions. Where do they get a name like Nodding Onions? But they live in the Northeast. So and uh anyway, so that that's that's a great magazine. Um the the the magazine that I believe is going to become probably the number one garden magazine in the United States in the next few years is called Garden Design. And garden design had been around for a great many years, and for one reason or another, they got into trouble, and they were bought out by a very enterprising guy, and he now has created this magazine four copies a year, no advertisements. Uh it it's just exquisite.

SPEAKER_01 14:31

Oh wow, I'm looking at it. It is exquisite.

SPEAKER_03 14:33

The photos are gorgeous. They're really great. And um and then um so so here's um here's something you probably need to sleep on. And uh Tina just joined the Royal Horticultural Society.

SPEAKER_01 14:48

Because uh I went on a trip with a number of Master Gardeners in May, and we went to the Chelsea flower show, which was on my bucket list of the show.

SPEAKER_03 14:58

How fun was that?

SPEAKER_01 14:59

It was I was awestruck and speechless, but we joined the uh Royal Horticultural Society to get our tickets, and so now I'm a member. It's and I feel very royal and elegant.

SPEAKER_03 15:11

Well you've got your crown on. You've got your diamond tiara on today. Yeah, we dress good for everyone, right?

SPEAKER_01 15:17

On the radio, it's so important.

SPEAKER_03 15:19

Yeah. Yeah. So the um the uh the Royal Horticultural Society, there's lots of benefits, but one of the most important benefits is a magazine that you get on a monthly basis. You get to see what's going on in Europe. And also they publish articles about America and gardens in Japan, all over the world. You get to see what's going on in Europe, and there are so many plants that they talk about that we can grow over here. So, for instance, uh I've got the July copy in my hand, the June copy had this wonderful spread on lavenders. Oh, perfect. Half the lavenders they talked about are lavenders we're using in California. So it's really an it's an exquisite magazine, and the members of the RHS get to go to the Chelsea Flower Show, but they reserve the first two days for the membership only.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

And we went on the first day.

SPEAKER_03 16:16

It was first. Well, I've never I've never got to the first day. That's fantastic. Did you meet the queen?

SPEAKER_01 16:21

We did not meet the queen, no.

SPEAKER_03 16:23

Did you see the queen?

SPEAKER_01 16:24

We did not see the queen, no. We were we were just looking at gardens, but it was uh no one gardens like the English. It's kind of goodness thing. It was over the top. Yeah, it's fun.

SPEAKER_03 16:35

Yeah. So so uh so that's called the Get Magazine. And then you know when I was at the newsstand the other day, I picked up a couple of uh Sunset, they do these um what would you call this?

SPEAKER_01 16:46

Like periodicals or and and their uh specific focus. They'll each have a specific focus.

SPEAKER_03 16:53

Perfect.

SPEAKER_01 16:53

So I think they have the magazine that comes out every month. Yes. But in addition to that, if you look on newsstands, you can see Sunset publications that have a specific focus, like the ones you're holding.

SPEAKER_03 17:04

There we are. And the two I picked up, what one is outdoor living, because my bride wants to um she wants to create a a more um user-friendly garden. My my garden is an organized jumble, you know, lots of plants. It's a bit of a plants mess. It's kind of a mess, you know. So outdoor living. So it talks about patios and furniture and maybe bring in a bit more structure. And then a really super publication that's called Small Yards Big Ideas. And then when you're done with them, okay, you can keep them, or what you do is you open the front cover and you sign inside your name and then you give it to your best friend.

SPEAKER_01 17:47

Oh wow, what a cute idea! That's it.

SPEAKER_03 17:49

And the condition that you give it to your best friend is that when they have read it or got some information out of it, they sign it and then they pass it on to their best friend.

SPEAKER_01 17:58

That idea. That's a great idea. I have a little garden club. I think we'll start that every meeting. People bring the publications that they're you know kind of finished with and pass them on.

SPEAKER_03 18:10

Giving books is really is really fun. So I I I don't know about you know Tina or or myself, but I've you know developed this pretty big library and I'm I'm in anguish at the moment because you know my my nephews and nieces, they're all back in England, and it's okay, so you know I've probably got like a hundred or like a hundred and twenty-five books, and there's some good books in there, because I like to have them if I can sign by the authors. So it's like, what do I do with this library? I guess I'll have to give it to Master Gardeners.

SPEAKER_01 18:38

Oh, we would love it. That's kind of a we have a little library at the end of the year.

SPEAKER_03 18:42

That would be a fun thing, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:44

Yeah. So if you ever do want to get rid of some of them, we would gladly take them.

SPEAKER_03 18:48

Good. So so I guess our goal, I think we're we have to be out of here by about half a six tonight, and the time right now is about ten after eleven. So for those of you at home, so quickly into the kitchen, get a couple of sandwiches, get the lemonade poured.

SPEAKER_01 19:05

Sadly, we only have an hour, but but we have um we still have a lot of our hour left. And I think what um would be great for our listeners, because I know when I first started gardening, uh, you know, you go to the nursery and the annual plants are always the ones that catch your eye because those are uh grown by the growers who bloom inside you know the the six packs or the four inches or gallons or whatever.

SPEAKER_03 19:31

And they're beautiful. And they're beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 19:32

And so you grab them and you plant them, and you may or may not realize that they're only gonna last you a few months because they are annual and they are meant to, you know, be done in one season.

SPEAKER_02 19:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:45

And the perennials um sometimes are in bloom at the nursery, but sometimes they're not. And so it's a little bit more of a challenge for especially a beginning gardener to know the value because you see a six-pack of Shasta daisies, and it's like, eh, you know, because they're not doing anything. They're just these, you know, green little plants. So um I think if you could introduce our listeners, uh, especially those who are newer to gardening, you know, what a p a perennial plant is and how you plant it and what you think about in a garden when you're trying to design and create with perennials.

SPEAKER_03 20:26

Sure, sure.

SPEAKER_01 20:27

That'd be a good place to start.

SPEAKER_03 20:28

Okay, okay. So so I guess this is kind of like a game of bingo where they say, eyes down, look in, here come the numbers. So I I think right from the get-go, uh, perennials have been on this wave or crest of opportunity in America for the last twenty or twenty-five years. And what has happened is that there have been some very enterprising breeding programs that have come to light. Thank goodness. And the many of these perennials that were created twenty or twenty-five years ago are still being sold today. And I I'm always although I'm in I'm in the new plant business, that's kind of my primary focus. But if you said to me, Nicholas, how do you recognize a good perennial? So you go shopping at your local um independent garden center and what you would do is you'd watch what perennials they carry for two or three years. Ah now now the history book will show. I have a so because I'm in the business, I get these kind of secret catalogues from growers and I have developed my top ten kind of grower catalogues. The unfortunate thing is that because of the cost of producing catalogues, you know, sometimes, you know, it's too expensive, so you go online. I like to look at the paper catalogs.

SPEAKER_01 21:53

I do too.

SPEAKER_03 21:54

Yeah. But so so what'll happen is you'll see what pat what catalogues they ca sorry, you'll see what perennial. They carry in their catalogues year after year after year. So, to give you an example, there is a marvelous company in Santa Fe called High Country Gardens. Yes. Ask him a question online and David will send you a catalogue. He is a superb plantsman with a really, a really great eye for perennials. And I would put my head in a noose and say every single perennial that is in his catalogue will be a winner. And somewhere in the region of about probably 60 or 70% of those perennials will work beautifully for us in California. So I've developed this series of catalogs where I watch what perennials stay in these catalogs for like four or five years. A lot of perennials will disappear after one or two years. They just don't hold up in the garden. So don't be afraid to go garden peeping. Okay? Now you have to be careful when you're out there garden peeping that you don't get arrested by the local police, okay? Because people might not like you leaning over the fence or looking through a hole in the wooden fence. See see what your neighbors are growing. Go to other neighborhoods. Uh look for well-established clumps of perennials, right? Go to the local botanical garden.

SPEAKER_02 23:26

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 23:27

Yeah, um, Huntington Library is a marvelous place to go. Uh the L. Arboretum, and these are great because these are day trips for you, and they've got restaurants there, and you can get something to eat and stuff like that. And so you see some wonderful things. Look at the perennials that are being used in a full sun position. And look at the perennials that are used in shade or dappled shade. So it's a very versatile group of plants, very rewarding, emotionally fulfilling, colors of the leaves, colors of the flowers, etc. Um, in Southern California, we're blessed because a lot of the perennials will give us some type of interest all year round.

SPEAKER_01 24:10

But that's the thing I love if you choose the right perennials. I'm a flower person, and so I can't.

SPEAKER_03 24:16

I would never have guessed.

SPEAKER_01 24:17

Can you imagine that? And so I'm always looking for the flowering part of the plant. But I have now learned that if you choose your perennials wisely, you can get both a show of color, but in the off-season, you can also have some beautiful foliage, which is not the case if you're just dealing with annuals. Yeah, that's it's one and done.

SPEAKER_03 24:39

So that's that's true.

SPEAKER_01 24:40

Good good research uh leaves you with options for a garden that looks great all year long.

SPEAKER_03 24:47

Great. So so uh if you said to me, Nicholas, g give us a quick plot that springs to mind. Um hookaras are a great example. Exactly. You know, in in in the colder regions of America, um hookaras or coral bells is the common name, you know, they'll they'll be completely deciduous, but in California, many of them will hold their leaves during the winter months and they'll give you some you know beautiful show. A perennial, just quickly going back, I should have explained this at the beginning. So an annual is a plant that lives just for one year normally. I mean, sometimes if we have a real mild winter, I guess we have mild winters here. So uh they winter over, but when they come back that second season, they look pretty ratty, so pull them out. So a perennial is a plant that comes back year after year after year. And most perennials will last, I believe, four or five years. Um I have a geranium rosanne, which you know, I I wasn't gonna talk about her, but we will talk about her. Don't don't let me forget. Behind her back, yeah, behind her back. I have a um uh a geranium rosanne that's been in my garden now for nearly eight years, which is incredible. That's a long-lived perennial. In Europe, uh the annual market is spiraling downhill out of control. Europeans are just discovering perennials, and the annual market has collapsed because everyone wants to buy perennials. We're we're also seeing a fantastic trend and it's called the the the an let me get this right, um the annualization of perennials. And so what's happening is instead of people putting annuals in containers, they are putting perennials where they would normally have put their annuals. That's where you get the annualization of perennials, right? But you're leaving them in those containers for you know two or three years, or leave them in for a couple of years, and then during the colder season, you can remove them, quietly divide them and place them in the garden, or give them to a friend, you know.

SPEAKER_01 27:05

Which I think is so, so exciting to me because the older I get, the less I want to replant every season. It it becomes exhausting if you're constantly having to do that. And with the perennials, you have these options of creating these containers, these exhibits that look good for a much longer period of time. So let's get back to this new concept of, or relatively new concept, of designing containers, which you know a lot of our listeners in Southern California don't have big yards, or they don't have the time or the water these days to take care of big yards. And so this idea of having very nice containers full of perennials that will give you a show for a long period of time, I think is fascinating. It's lovely, isn't it? Just what our listeners are interested in. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:02

So I I I've been um I have a uh an infatuation with containers. And uh containers really came rushing to the market probably about 10, 15 years ago. I mean, they've always been out there, but um, a lot of people went over to Vietnam and to uh Thailand and places like that and got very large containers made inexpensively. Interesting. And so, you know, containers were always quite expensive. So the first thing that happened, and these are top quality containers. So the first thing that happened was the price was lowered, you know, more people started carrying containers, they became more affordable for those of us that love to garden in containers, and also they started having different colored containers. Good Lord! What?

SPEAKER_01 28:52

You know, not not just terracotta.

SPEAKER_03 28:54

Yeah, that's what containers used to be, didn't they?

SPEAKER_01 28:57

Right.

SPEAKER_03 28:57

So suddenly we saw all these great containers that were red and blue and green and yellow and white, you know, and these are highly glazed containers. So you could buy plants that you put into these containers, and the plant color accentuated the color of the container, and the container colored accentuated the plants that you put in the container. So if you said, well, give me an example, right? So Santalina. Grey Santalina that has a pretty uh yellow flower. So let's just imagine that you took a bright blue, highly glazed container and just filled it with gray Santalina that had these pretty yellow flowers. So you've got this wonderful silver color of the Santalina and the pretty little yellow flowers with this heart-moving colour of this blue container. I mean, they really jump out at you. It's very, it's really it's soft, it's it's pleasing, it's soft on the eye. So I think that um the whole opportunity of putting perennials in containers is tremendous. And what I would encourage you is to unleash your creative side. Now you might be sitting at home and saying, Well, I don't have a creative side.

SPEAKER_01 30:17

So that's what I usually say.

SPEAKER_03 30:20

So yeah, you all do. You all do. So it's just literally a case of going down, going down to the garden center or the home center, getting a cart, finding a container that you like the look of, putting it in your cart, and then going around where you find the rows of perennials and just saying, you know, that perennial would look pretty in this colored container, and just start buying.

SPEAKER_01 30:46

You know, Nicholas, that's the best advice because um I am not good at design, love plants, pretty good at taking care of plants, propagating, etc., but not good at design. And my sister, who's an artist, told me, because she has marvelous containers, of course, because she has an eye for this, and she told me, she says, all you have to do is exactly what you said. Get the art, put the container in, and she says, and just arrange the plants and choose them and just look at them and see if you like it. You don't have to tell yourself that you're good at design, just look at it. Your your eye will tell you whether it's something that is attractive. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 31:22

It's easy, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 31:23

It's really easy when you do it that way. But if but if you go and you just go to the garden center and you're completely overwhelmed with all the plants, it it's almost you know too overwhelming to accomplish anything. So it's better if you look at your cart as a little mini garden and and design right in your cart.

SPEAKER_03 31:41

Exactly. This is the well, I think we're going we're going in the right direction, right?

SPEAKER_01 31:45

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 31:46

So, so um a really a couple of important points that when you're container gardening, uh don't forget at the bottom of the if the container doesn't have a hole, make sure at the garden center that they drill a hole for you. Absolutely. Don't leave the garden center without that hole being made. And if the can if the guy says, well, you know, we can't do it for you, then go back to the container side and get another container with a hole in it, because it's got to be able to drain. And then when uh the soil, you've got you've got to have a you you've got to have a soil that actually will hold some moisture. So I always go for like a an organic type mix, something you know that that looks good. A lot of garden sensors will have a recommendation, so ask them what they recommend. And then uh before you put the soil in, make sure you put a piece of broken pottery over the hole at the bottom. So that will allow the uh the water to drain out. Um don't uh don't use, you can buy these little fiber circles, right, that come in a pack. And I I would suggest not using those. They're fiber circles. You can actually put them over the hole. What'll happen is the soil will actually clog the fiber up and it won't drain.

SPEAKER_02 33:02

Yeah, there you go.

SPEAKER_03 33:02

Um and then so when you buy your perennials, you know, they're gonna be small, right? In a four-inch, whatever it might be, you might buy a gallon. But remember, these perennials are gonna grow. So don't don't put, you know, I I always do perennials to excess. Okay. I have this saying that too much is not enough. Okay? Too much is not enough.

SPEAKER_01 33:23

And you always see one more that you need to get.

SPEAKER_03 33:27

So so don't uh yeah, these perennials are gonna grow. So when you've this you know when you've got your first container, just go back and get another one. Okay, make sure you've got the the primary breadwinner's credit card upon your person. Okay. And then here's the deal: if you get caught, right, if you pull up to your home and you've got containers and all these pots uh and uh perennials and and sacks of soil in the back of the car, right, and and the primary breadwinner comes out, whether it's a boy or a girl, right, man or woman, and says, What? What are you doing? What what's are these for us? Fib, don't tell them the truth. Tell them, no, these are for Mary or George down the road, and I'm just looking after them.

SPEAKER_01 34:10

Or they'll be right back.

SPEAKER_03 34:11

That's it. And then just wait a couple of days and do these in the garden, right?

SPEAKER_01 34:15

Spread them out at different locations.

SPEAKER_03 34:18

Don't don't be afraid to use perennials that will trail. Uh there are some very beautiful perennials that will trail or sedums or or the non-invasive ice plants, delospermas, that will trail down the side of the container that will look great. Um and and if you're gonna put these on the patio where people come and have a barbecue or they have a libation or a glass of uh lemonade in the evening with you, put them close enough where people can actually reach out and touch the plants.

SPEAKER_02 34:48

Oh what a good idea.

SPEAKER_03 34:50

There's there's so much there's so much about the the touch and the feel and the textures. Yep. Yep. And um it it's kind of uh kind of exciting uh when you when when your guest sit down sits down or your family member or even yourself and they have a container of perennials nearby, watch. Watch for the plants that they read out, reach out and touch. Because, you know, as a as a gardener, you're your garden's for you, right? I mean that that's the most but it's also for the people you love. You know, they enjoy it too. So watch the plants that they go to, plants that they touch and reach, because then you can have more of those.

SPEAKER_01 35:31

And I and I especially liked your comment about not being afraid to do trailing plants because uh I know the the containers that attract my eye the most are the ones that have um different heights and different textures. And uh I'm sure you've heard the phrase thriller, filler, spiller. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And if you just remember that little phrase, thriller, filler, spiller, and you choose your perennials and you make sure you have a thriller, something that is either brightly flowering or or great foliage or tall, and then you have the spillers that come over the end. And then fillers, you know, to fill it in and make it look lush and full. I think that's for those of us who are not naturally design talented, just remembering those three things allows pretty much everybody to create a really attractive. It's a good guideline, isn't it? Or garden, I mean in your garden beds as well. Yeah. So so what do you advise folks to do in terms of care of these perennials once once they've got them planted?

SPEAKER_03 36:35

Okay, so so so pertaining to care, per perennials are they're pretty self-sufficient, which is the good thing about them. And and when you're planting them, I would certainly advise mixing in um some slow release fertilizer. And slow release, all these slow release fertilizers, they're heat and water sensitive. So when it's warm uh and when you're giving a little bit of water and what have you, that's when they release their nutrient. Um as these perennials fill in, uh, yes, their roots are gonna grow, but their foliage or flowers is also gonna shade the soil. So that alone is gonna hold more moisture in the soil. If it's just bare soil and the sun's beating down on it, that's gonna dry out a little bit. So I think the rule of thumb would be that during the growing season, you're probably gonna give your um perennials a drink twice a week. It's you know, many of them are very drought tolerant, which is great. And if they're water sensitive, they will quickly let you know, because you know, the the the leaves will look a little bit droopy, the flowers will kind of go down. You can also use a product, and I can't remember the name, and Tina, I know you're gonna know it, which is um you can mix these granulas and they and they digest the water.

SPEAKER_01 37:53

They they absorb water and then they release it. Perfect. Yeah, perfect. And there's a couple different brand names, but but I can't remember them now. I don't remember them. Yeah. But but you can look for um, you know, their water retention additives that you can put in the soil.

SPEAKER_03 38:07

And and if you're and if you're kind of on the technical side, which I'm not, you know, from a from a nearby sprinkler, you can get these great attachments. Uh let's say you've got soaker hoses, whatever, you know, you can bring a uh soaker hose or a sprinkler into your container, and then when you put on your other irrigation system, it will water the container as well.

SPEAKER_01 38:28

Especially if you have a drip system, those are pretty easy to add to and you know run a little line up to up to the pots. Which I never do because I'm lazy, but you know, it's it's a great idea for those who are more handy than I am.

SPEAKER_03 38:43

True, true. But but let me address that.

SPEAKER_01 38:46

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 38:46

Because part here's the deal. Um gardeners at home, we need to remove this phrase yard or yard work. It's gone. We are not using that anymore. What we use is the term gardening.

SPEAKER_02 39:02

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 39:03

And we get to go gardening. We don't get to to do gar uh to do yard work. And I think it's so important that if you love the plants, that you're gonna be out there tending and nurturing and watering is watering is very therapeutic.

SPEAKER_01 39:19

Oh, it's so stress-relieving for me.

SPEAKER_03 39:21

It really is.

SPEAKER_01 39:22

I think that's why I purposely don't learn how to do irrigation systems.

SPEAKER_03 39:25

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 39:25

It's because I like to hand water myself.

SPEAKER_03 39:28

It's a good way. And also where when you're w when you're watering, you're looking at your plants, you're looking at them in detail and what have you. And all of you at home, I know you've had this happen. You've been out there with the watering can, or you've been deadheading, and look out, here comes Miss Hummingbird. She will, she'll come right up beside you, or in the evening you might be out there and a sphinx moth or a hawk moth, right? Uh I call them hawk, H A W K moths. You guys call them hawk, a hawk moth, right?

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Oh, but we love listening to you talk.

SPEAKER_03 40:05

You know, or or there'll be a butterfly that comes along and they're just completely oblivious of you being there. So that's the fun.

SPEAKER_01 40:12

It's it's uh an opportunity to discover things. I mean when I was out hand watering um a week ago, I stumbled upon a couple dozen swallowtail butterfly larva on my table. And and if I had not been hand watering, if I was just letting the sprinklers do it, I wouldn't have seen them. So you know, it really is, you know, you as a person are the best thing for your garden.

SPEAKER_03 40:36

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 40:37

And it's the best thing for you. It is in return.

SPEAKER_03 40:39

It's called horticultural therapy.

SPEAKER_01 40:41

There you go. It's a real thing.

SPEAKER_03 40:42

It is. Yeah. So here look, get this. Doctors in England are now having a serious discussion, serious discussion about prescribe prescribing not pills, but gardening as a method of um healing and wellness, etc. So can you imagine your doctor prescribing, Mr. Stadden, you are gonna do five hours in your garden this week. Huh?

SPEAKER_01 41:14

How about that? I'm gonna tell my husband that. Dinner is not made because I had to take my gardening medicine.

SPEAKER_03 41:22

That's it. It's good.

SPEAKER_01 41:23

Well, Nicholas, we have about ten minutes or so left. I know, it's going so fast. And so, what I would really think everyone would love is you could go through some of your favorite um perennials that we could experiment with in our yarn.

SPEAKER_03 41:38

So, um and so for all of you, I I I think I I'm actually I I've I've got Nan Nan Stearman's book out, which which is called Um California Gardener's Guide, Volume Two. She she must have done a volume one if there's a volume two, right? And what I did was I actually went through this because you can use this as a resource, and there's some great perennials. One of my favorite perennials are artichokes, you know.

SPEAKER_01 42:02

The eating kind.

SPEAKER_03 42:03

The eating kind.

SPEAKER_01 42:04

Wow, so you get a double benefit from that.

SPEAKER_03 42:06

You actually get more. Okay, so so artichokes, I I love their prehistoric look. You've got these great leaves, you've got the fruit, you know, that you can boil and use them as a starter for your dinner table. Uh once the fruit goes to seed, you've got these exquisite flowers. Huge purple, blue flower heads. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. They're magnets for honeybees. The native, the native honeybees, the indigenous honeybees, and the bumblebees will favor these over anything else in your garden. And for those of you that are into flower arranging, harvest the flowers at the end of the season, bring them indoors, and you can use them in your dried flower range.

SPEAKER_01 42:47

Oh wow, I've never tried that.

SPEAKER_03 42:48

It's a great plant. And then uh, you know, you really need to plant, uh you really need to um, you know, trim them up at the end of the season. I've actually known people that have had artichokes in their garden for a lot of years. They're really quite long-lived, quite long-lived. And there's some new varieties out that supposedly that have more fruit than their predecessors, but I look for the older ones. Oh, yeah. Yeah, because they they get bigger. I mean, they'll get like four or five feet tall. Huge. They they also bring a wonderful element of silver or grey into your garden. So if you have gre maybe you have too much green, maybe you have a bit more blue. Silvers uh will bring the blue element out, they'll bring the gold element out in the garden as well. So it's artichokes, and everyone carries artichokes.

SPEAKER_01 43:35

What a great idea. I would not have thought of that.

SPEAKER_03 43:37

Now, now the other one, an old old plant, Acanthus Molus. Um the common name is Bears Breach. And um I think there's another name, uh Grecian Grecian pattern plant. Oh, that one I didn't know. I know Bears Breach.

SPEAKER_01 43:51

I think that's what Californians know in.

SPEAKER_03 43:55

The plant is as old as dirt. This is a must-have for your shade. your shade area as a perennial. So you've got these wonderful huge leaves, right? That they're probably about, I don't know, two feet long and like a foot wide. They're magnificent. The flower stalks will get four, five, six feet high.

SPEAKER_01 44:13

That's what I love about them. They great bring a vertical element to the garden.

SPEAKER_03 44:18

They do. And and they are extremely drought tolerant once established. Now I didn't know I've discovered that quite by accident. There there is a bear's breech on Baranka in Azusa, right, in full sun. And this bear's breech gets the edge of a sprinkler, it's right by the road, it gets reflected heat. And in the springtime when it's cooler, the plant looks incredible. In the summertime it gets burnt to a crisp and when the temperatures cool down in the autumn away this plant comes back again. And it's been there for ten years.

SPEAKER_01 44:55

Oh my gosh. Yeah. I need to get some of these.

SPEAKER_03 44:57

Yeah so this is absolutely a a must-have. Important g give her plenty of room because she'll get to be quite a large plant. So that that's a must-have. And then g Galadias, I I am a real fan of Galadias. There's been some exceptional breeding of Galadias that have happened in the last 10 to 15 years. The plant that changed all the breeding was one that was called fanfare, F-A-N-F-A-R-E. And fanfare had tubular flowers or tubular petals instead of the petals as we know them. Wow. Very compact, very long blooming season. They've now got there's the regular fanfare, there's an orange fanfare, there's a red fanfare.

SPEAKER_01 45:43

So these would be great for containers.

SPEAKER_03 45:44

Oh fantastic. Yeah. Hummingbirds, butterflies love them. And then you've got the regular flavours. There's one called Arizona Sun. There's a killer plant called Oranges and Lemons. Absolutely to die for. Some of the flowers are this kind of orange lemon yellow gold color.

SPEAKER_01 46:03

Oh what a great combo.

SPEAKER_03 46:04

Fantastic. And and they they actually have quite a long stem on them. So you can harvest the flowers because they're repeat bloomers, harvest the flowers and get a really small container maybe just two or three inches high and you can have a small pose of Galadia flowers.

SPEAKER_01 46:21

Now you're talking my language I love to bring flowers inside the house that's cool.

SPEAKER_03 46:25

So we call those migrating flowers. Migrating they migrate in and out okay and and then of course the asclepsis or the butterfly milkweed. Now I must confess I'm I I I need to do more research here. There are a number of native asclepsis or butterfly milkweeds and more and more of the nurseries are starting to carry to carry them. There are actually four of them that are indigenous to California. Now the the native asclepsis they're not terribly beautiful to look at but of course we all know how important they are.

SPEAKER_01 46:59

For the monarchs.

SPEAKER_03 47:00

Yes so and so you've got the other what I call the more tropical asclepsis which have bright gold flowers or bright red flowers. Silky gold is um the uh a yellow one I think there's one that's called red butterflies which has a red flower. Now I it is what it is well known that on these more tropical cultivar selections that we should treat them as herbaceous. So that is to say once a year we would go in and we would cut them back and let them put their new growth out. It's important that the new growth and the flowers on the new growth that's very important for the butterflies. So um sort of go online or ask your local nursery expert.

SPEAKER_01 47:43

And that's a good point to let people know that that a number of perennials do need to be treated in a herbaceous manner. And that is cut back in order to rejuvenate them for the next season.

SPEAKER_03 47:55

And so so what what do we do with all the trimmings and the cuttings? They go on to the well we can compost the compost heap right so the compost heap that'll be that'll that'll be another conversation. Exactly we we we have a separate show on composting so lots of um lots of pentstamens I'm a real fan of pentamens the one that I've become uh really interested in is called the foothill pentaman which is actually native to our area it is and for those of you that if you ever drive the 605 freeway so north of the north of the 60 going north up to the San Gabriel mountains on the right hand side of the road on the so you get on the 60 and you turn onto the 605 and you go north there are some incredible native communities of the foothill pentamens underneath some of the power lines. And I'm not it it's it's uh where where there's a gravel pit there where they've disturbed some of these gravel pits or they've left the areas and right beside the freeway you're driving along and you see this big big cloud of purple you have to be really careful because you're doing like 70. You're probably doing 85 Tina because I hear you're pedal to the metal in your car. Right? But you see these great communities. So what you have to do is find out where these communities are and then when the plants go to seed you hop the fence and you hop the fence and you gather all the seeds.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

And hopefully not get arrested. Get arrested.

SPEAKER_03 49:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:30

Well it's all for a good cause and one note about that because I I do plant that in my yard and it does not like to be irrigated a lot. So be sure I put mine next to open space where I don't do a lot of irrigating tried them in the flower beds that get a little more water they don't like it and tend to poop out. So that's that's a good point.

SPEAKER_03 49:52

Yeah good point.

SPEAKER_01 49:53

Not too much water.

SPEAKER_03 49:55

And then I I got a real uh a real reminder you know uh because of the job I do with kind of a lot of new plants sometimes you forget the older ones and so in fine gardening uh I was because I get my copy um you know four or five times a year and I read about what people recommend and someone was recommending Virginia and I you know I haven't heard anyone talk about virginia for probably several years.

SPEAKER_01 50:23

And that was in my grandma's garden.

SPEAKER_03 50:25

It's a great plant you know dappled shade these marvelous cabbage like leaves which are shiny and uh if you get just the smallest amount of winter chill they turn a great red or ruby red color. They have the most exquisite flowers in the early springtime that you know I mean they raise like they're sort of anywhere from eight to ten inches above the plant and they come in clusters. And there's some new varieties of Virginias now. Ooh that's you know that have instead of having the soft pink flowers they have rose red flowers. Oh my gosh I think there's one called Bressingham ruby Bressingham ruby which is really really great. So um it's not just about the new it's about these older ones. So Virginias love a doppel shade position if you've got a container for a doppel shade position that works as well.

SPEAKER_01 51:18

You know we have about one minute left do you want to pick your favorite if we haven't already talked about your favorite perennial? I know it's too hard.

SPEAKER_03 51:28

It's like asking a little geranium rosanne.

SPEAKER_01 51:31

Okay let's talk about geranium rosanne.

SPEAKER_03 51:33

So geranium rosanne uh was actually identified as the number one perennial in the world about three years ago. It's a it's a whole show to tell you how that process works. Geranium Roseanne will do well in a dappled shade or full shade position. She will do well in a full sun position. But personally I think she likes that dappled shade position. Buy a one gallon plant in in one year the plant will be about three feet across and about 15 inches high. She has thousands thousands of blue purple blooms and she's probably like a a a 10 month out of the year bloomer. And the reason is that she is the first ever seedless geranium so she will do beautifully in California if those of you are lucky enough to have a a mountain home or you have a home up in Minnesota where you go to for the summer she's down to USDA zone four. So she's hardy to about like 30 below and she'll do beautifully for us in Southern California.

SPEAKER_01 52:39

She is one versatile lady.

SPEAKER_03 52:40

She's an extraordinary plant extraordinary so um I now it it the most exciting way to use her so uh flower carpet rose right let's say you've got flower carpet roses or you've got an another long uh blooming rose just go and put geranium roseanne in a space and she will climb out of that space and she'll start to climb all over these roses right so what happens is you've got flower carpet you've got red or white or uh yellow whatever it is and then you've got these beautiful geranium blue flowers in amongst all these other flower carpet type colors it is absolutely a divine mix. Your friends will come to your garden they will look at this and they'll go Tina where did you get that idea? And Tina will look humbly at her feet and say I don't know but it wasn't easy.

SPEAKER_01 53:36

No, I will give you full credit for the whole in fact we have so much more to talk about perennials I'm gonna extract a promise from you to come back and do another perennial part two show. I'd love to thank you in the future so anyway thank you so much for coming I've got a whole page full of notes here for myself and I'll re listen to the podcast to to glean all of the things that I I didn't get to write down.

SPEAKER_03 54:01

Thanks again look forward to coming back. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 54:03

Thank you