No Cone Christmas Trees!

Ten years ago, me and my friend Sluggy figured out that we both loved Christmas and secretly wanted to go out and dork up the holiday season. We lived in Davis and drove out to Winters to one of the only cut-your-own-tree lots we could find. It was totally weird!

Since the weather isn't that cold in Winters, it was sunny and kind of warm while we wondered around and tried to find a tree we liked. There was a tractor thingy that was dressed up like a sleigh and it would drive around and pick up your tree if you wanted it. The scary thing was that it was blasting the most neurotic Christmas music, like something out of Willy Wonka.

Once we got the trees in our houses, there were tons of sappy bugs all over it, since these evergreens weren't really made for the warm weather. But bugs be damned! We were going to enjoy those hard won trees!

So, 10 years later, every year without fail, we drive out to find ourselves the best of the weird trees out there! I can't stand to see those horrible Christmas tree lots with cone-shaped trees that all look the same, like they were shaped that way.

We started dragging our other girl friends out with us, and now it's just tradition. Breakfast at he Buttercup Pantry in Placerville, wine tasting, tree cutting at our undisclosed favorite Apple Hill location, beers at Jack Russell and Z pies for dinner.

It is one of my favorite days of the year and always having a unique little sparse tree that I cut down myself has got to be the best part of the holidays!

I know that the more green thing to do is buy a live tree, but our little farm we go to is just a wild bit of hillside that they let grow however it grows! I thinks it's the best of both worlds.

Random Tropic Plant, with Feelers

I have no idea what kind of plant this is...other than 'tropical'. It's one of those generic ones you can buy at Home Depot for $1.99 in a little 4" pot. Well, I have had this one for quite a few years and it's living despite me.

When we first moved into the condo around 4 years ago, it lived on a stool next to the bar, with stuff on 3 sides. Not a whole lot of hope for sunlight, but it seemed to do just fine. Forget to water it, just fine. Hit it every time I am grabbing something, just fine. After surviving so well, I thought it deserved an upgrade.

Now is lives on the counter in the kitchen. It strains around the wall to get to the sun, but it's never had such great leaves.

In my humble opinion, Home Depot should be allowed to sell these in pots. It hates that part. It doesn't have a strong truck...just lots of these feelers that are trying root a couple feet away from the pot. I had to make a tee pee structure to tie it all together, cause it just wants to crawl around on the 'tropical' floor.

I cut off the feelers once they pass the perimeter of the plant. They try to attach themselves to the way, counter, itself. Whatever it touches. It's really not a great houseplant other than I can't kill it and it's kind of big and lovely right now.

So, I will keep it and keep trying to tie it up to itself to keep it out of trouble. Hmm, that sounded wrong.

Planter Box, Charleston SC

I was just in Charleston South Carolina for a conference. I have been there a couple times before and each time, I am amazed at how different the plants are there. Coming from the Sacramento Valley, lush ferns are just not seen unless there is an unending devotion to keeping them alive.

We were walking around the old part of town, down by the Battery, and this is just one of many window planter boxes that were brimming with very happy ferns, elephant ears and other moisture and shade loving plants. It was just gorgeous - and you could tell, there wasn't a lot of maintenance going on. Just the right plants in the right place. Sometime people are just so good at this!

Bird of Paradise, blooming

Finally! Back in early September, I posted about my bird of paradise and that there where possible flowers growing. It is now about 2 1/2 months later and the first of the two have bloomed. I really love these flowers cause they are just weird.

Now that it's cooler outside, the second flower is growing really slowly. I don't think it will actually make it's way out until February if its makes it through the winter.

Fern in the Urn

Kangaroo Fern: Phymatosorus diversifolius.

When we first moved into our condo, my mom and I went shopping at the wholesale florist cause it's cheap and fun. We went a little crazy and ended up with lots of stuff including medium sized banana plants (which I overwatered and killed, by they by) and a great little Kangaroo fern in about a 6 inch pot.

I've never had great luck with ferns, because I can't keep that evenly moist soil they love so much. But this one was on the leathery side, not the soft feathery side so I figured, what the hell? And then I found a kick ass, red ceramic urn that would fit perfectly on this weird little square of railing in our stairwell to the loft.

So began the Fern in the Urn.

It gets really great morning light through this otherwise useless round window no one can reach, and after almost killing it a couple of times I figured out a way to get that evenly moist soil. Two tricks really.

1) I have a jug of water that lives right below it and I water it every time I go upstairs to work. Of course, if I'm not working up there it starts to die.

2) I bought this super cheesy LED water sensor for $8. It flashes when the soil is drying out.

Between these two things, it's been growing like mad for 4 years now. It sends out little fuzzy feelers, trying to grow more, so I trim those about one a year. I think I should probably transplant it sometime, but it's doing really well, so I keep not doing that.

It's pretty gratifying to keep a fern alive and I love that it is taking over our stairwell!

Pumpkin Seeds Sprouting

This is so weird.

I carve pumpkins every year, it's just tons of fun. And I also make one for the Zoo to use for our Halloween event. This year, I am doing it early to use as a photo shoot piece.

So, I am digging out the innards and find a green leaf. I stared at it and was trying to figure out how it got in with my pumpkin guts. Then I found more.

About a half dozen seeds had sprouted inside the pumpkin! They looked like bean sprouts. Have you ever seen this before?

Patience is a virtue...

I've had this plant for probably ten years now, but I had no idea it flowered. I've long since lost the info tag that must have come with it, but I looked it up and think it's a Peperomia obtusifolia.

It's been an indoor plant all it's life, until this year when I put it outside for some reason... it's been getting much more sunlight and water than it ever has, and here's what happened:



OK maybe flowered is a stretch of our normal idea of flowers...those spikes comng up out of the plant are the flowers.

Spider Plant

I have a number of small spider plants all derived from a plant my boyfriends Dad had 10 years ago (I think he still has the plant). They chug along, living life, but not always well. There are usually bouts of dry soil, soggy soil, and less than ideal lighting throughout their lifetime which stunt their growth, and make them a little sad.

One of these spider plants was outdoors during our one unusual night of winter freeze last year (in the east SF Bay Area, it is indeed rare to have a freeze...) and it died.

well, I thought it died anyway, I don't have a picture of the dead palnt, but if you imagine a terracotta pot with a few little brown shrivled blades sticking out of the dirt, that's pretty much what it looked like. I never got around to taking it out of the pot, or bringing it inside... and in the spring it came back lush, and beautiful.



When I moved to a new space in our office at work, I decided to bring it in, since there was a perfect window for it to live in. It was extremely happy, and all my coworkers thought I had a seriously green thumb ;-) but really, it was just good luck.

Hummingbirds on the Condo Porch

Okay, this is so cool! We live in a condo, so as you can imagine, there isn't a lot of green right around us. We are next to a park and wetland, but if you look off our porch, nothing but asphalt, stucco and other non-natural substances.

So, consider my surprise when hummingbirds started visiting our little tiny porch!!! They just love the aloe flowers that I posted about earlier and they come back every few days to try out the new blooms that opened up.

It makes me happy to feed some wildlife and actually have some nature happening at our condo. Score one for the plant covered porch!

Elephant Ear Plant

My little Elephant Ear plant was a random Home Depot purchase about 5 years ago. It never seemed very happy in our other homes, but it likes the little spot it's in now. We have a stair case that goes down to the garage and we keep our wine there, since it doesn't get any sun light. There is a little window, but since everyone who walks by can see in it, we keep the shades closes most of the way.

The Elephant Ear just sits right next to the window and gets its little leaves through the blinds every once in a while, then I turn it.

It has two stalks, and a few months ago all the leaves went through their normal growing/dying routine, but nothing new was sprouting. There were just two stalks. I figured they weren't dead so I cut back on the watering and over the summer it just sort of looked sad.

Then a few weeks back one leaf sprouted - nice and adorably small compared to what it was. And now I have four leaves, two on each stalk. It totally looks better than ever!

I have no idea how it happened, but it has come back to life and looks like a whole new plant. Maybe it's just glad I didn't kill it.

Neglect

I have been spending every waking moment at work for the past 10 days. My plants are suffering something awful. I actually get a day off tomorrow and a good portion of it will be spent on trying to get my plants to forgive me and not die.

Wish me luck.

Flowering Aloe Plant

I must have gotten this aloe plant back in Davis, when we were living in an apartment. That puts at 10 years old. When we moved into a Duplex, I planted in the ground, since I thought it would be happier there. It was.

After living in the ground for two years, I did the unthinkable. I dug it up and took it with me when we moved. Surprisingly, it survived just fine and started growing some new leaves. Three years after that, we moved into our condo we are in now and it took off like a crazy plant!

I have transplanted it twice in three years, and also trimmed off about a third and gave it to a friend. It has already out grown the pot again and seems like I need to chop off another section. You can't even see the damn pot under it anymore!

The craziest thing is that since we have lived here, it flowers about twice a year. One very long stalk starts growing and sprouts small, tubular bell-like orange flowers on a spike. the tallest it has gotten is about 4 1/2 tall.

It just started to sprout again and it is always out of the oldest part of the plant. I think it is trying to tell me to re pot it again, so I guess I should put that on the list of things to do.

The Little Spruce Tree - Epic Fail!

My sister-in-law got this little spruce tree as a Christmas present a few years ago and thought I might want it. (You know, after I keep writing these stories, I wonder why I would ever have to buy plants. People just keep giving them to me!)

Anyhoo. It lived in a very small Terra cotta pot, which I had a hard time keeping moist enough and sometimes it would have dead spots on it.

I finally transplanted it into a glazed ceramic pot which it loved. Since spring of this year it has been totally happy! Super soft, very blue, growing like mad. I was so proud! It was turning into a perfect little Christmas tree and I had planned on bringing it in for the holidays.

Then I went on vacation. My mom was watching our place and watering the plants. I don't know what happened. I usually run my hand across it when I go out to water, it has such a feathery feel to it. When I came home, my hand just crunched against it. Super dry, super dead.

The main branches are still alive, but all the little square leaves are toast. I rubbed all the dead stuff off and am hoping I can get it to come back to life. If I had to guess, I think it actually got over watered. What a bummer.

Here it is at the beginning of spring, it grew to twice this size before it died.

And here it is now. Boo.

Bird of Paradise

So, my mom bought this bird of paradise plant way back in 2002. It was in a little 6" pot, and it lived on my porch and I watered it every once in a while.

When we moved into our condo, I replanted it into a tall Terra cotta pot that was about 8" at the top. Not a huge move, but better than nothing! It live on my porch and looked very happy. After a good long while, I decided to transplant it again. To my surprise, it was so root bound, with those super thick and fleshy roots, that I had to break the pot to get it out!

Lesson learned: it wants to be replanted more often.

I was in a 3-gallon pot for a while, then upgraded to the 5-gallon pot. That made it really happy and last winter, it finally flowered for the first time in 6 years!

You can usually see the new leaves coming in, they sort of have a spiral look to them, and then unfold after a while.

I was outside tonight, finally giving my plants some love and noticed something that didn't quite look like a leaf. No spiral, more like little inverted Vs. I think I have two flowers brewing.

There was creeping thyme in the pot with it, but was sucking up too much water, so I took it out about a month ago. I think that is was finally made it try to bloom since it wasn't fighting the herbs anymore.

So, I guess we will see what happens! I will be very excited to have it bloom again. Cross your fingers that I don't screw it up before then.

The Giant Ficus

Ficus is actually a genus name for the whole entire fig family. What kind of ficus do I have? The rescued kind. It looks like every other Ficus you see in the houseplant area of Home Depot.

This was another rescue plant from a zoo keeper at work back in the winter of 2005. From what I remember, this tree had belonged to her grandmother, and she was trying to keep it alive, but their house just wasn't getting enough light. She had heard about the African Violet that I saved, and I had taken some other plants over the years, so she approached me.

She said it was about 5 feet tall, and since we had just bought a condo with a 2-story living room and tons of windows, I knew it would fit.

We loaded the tree in my Volvo and I took it home. When it was finally in the living room, my boyfriend looked at it and asked me what the hell it was....It looked bad. Really bad.

From one side, it was covered in leaves, so much so, that the main branches had bent over and were growing toward the ground. The other side? Completely dead...really dead.

First thing I did was water and fertilize it. Next step - trim the hell out of it. I took off the first two feet of branches on the trunk, cut off the branches that were growing back down, trimmed the whole front side, and carefully cut all the leafless branches that were actually dead. It look like a badly shorn sheep with a couple of legs missing, but I was determined.

When people came over they always commented, "Nice tree", in the most sarcastic tones they could muster...it looked like crap. This video is the only proof of how crappy it was - look behind the cat...

The crazy thing is that every Ficus I have ever had, has dropped it's leaves in protest every time you did something wrong. This Ficus barely ever does. Maybe 6 leaves a years, it's really weird. So, soon enough, it started growing new leaves, and tiny branches sprouted out of the dead side.

I took a few years, but now it looks almost perfect. There is still a small thin area, but unless you are looking for it, you don't notice. It is way over 7' tall now, and I trim it down about twice a year. It's one damn happy Ficus.

3-foot-tall sunflower

I tried to grow sunflowers from seed this year, I picked two kinds a large, edible yellow, and a smaller, redish toned one. The traditional one was supposed to be 10 ft high, and the smaller one 5-6 ft high.

I started them in small re-used pots (which I later read you should not do as sunflowers do not like to be transplanted). Despite this, I successfully transplanted them multiple times into larger and larger pots, then into the ground. At each stage I lost some, I personally snapped the stalked of a couple, the squirrels took care of a few of them, and the high winds in our area took care of some others.

I finally got them in the ground, but the gardeners killed the last of the remaining large yellow type. So all I was left with were the reds. This is the healthiest and most successful one of the four that are still in the ground. It is only 3 feet tall and the bloom was maybe 3-4 inches across.

I'll count this as a victory, but hopefully will do better next year...

Four Avocado Trees & Sprouting Seeds

About six years ago, I wanted some new plants, but was saving up for a house and didn't feel like spending the money. A cafe in Arcata, CA - where I went to college, had every available flat space packed with avocado plants... they just saved all their pits and kept planting them. I figured I could do the same.

So, I tried the elementary school method of poking toothpicks into either side and letting the bottom rest in water. That yielded me a moldy pit in a glass. In hindsight, I think I didn't have enough light in my double wide.

Next step: search the web. I found someone who swore by a very low-tech method. Wrap your pits in a very damp paper towel, stick them in Ziploc bag and throw them under your kitchen sink. By the time you remember they are down there - a few weeks or more - they've sprouted.

And it totally works!

I had four perfectly sprouted seeds. Root on the bottom, white sprout on the top. I planted them in some small pots full of dirt and they have been growing ever since! I have only transplanted them once, and trimmed their roots once in six years.

All four of them are living on my window sill, and in the last couple of months, each has started to take on it's own shape. Until now, they all looked about the same. Now one is trying desperately to grow branches, with no leaves on the bottom. Another one has leaves the size of my head, and the other two are top heavy and bottom heavy respectively. Not really sure what they are doing...

They seem like they want bigger pots, but I don't have any - nor the room to put them. They will just have to do with the pots they have for now. Folks keep asking me if they will bare fruit, but I really doubt it since they just came from a regular grocery store and usually their produce doesn't actually go to seed in a productive manner.

This is the last post about the kitchen windowsill. Next time we start a whole new area!

Green Roof in Portland

So, this has nothing to do with the plants that I have, but it is really cool!

We just got back from a trip to Portland, and we stayed in a great HI hostel in the Hawthorne district. They are the greenest place I have ever stayed, from recycling to nontoxic cleaning products to reusing everything under the sun, and the best - a green roof!!!

They installed the green roof with a grant from the city. It's a three story older house, and the second story roof is completely covered in plants, with a drip system. Not only regulates the house temperatures, but filters the rain water to be even cleaner.

Our room was on the second floor and had a small balcony, so when we sat out there, it was like we were in a garden. And it was much cooler.

Here is a picture of the sign that is on our balcony railing, you can see the plants - but if you didn't know, you would think it was on the ground, not one story in the air.

And their gazebo is a cobb structure, with a green roof as well.

Carpenter Bees and Nicotiana

By Guest Blogger - TheJenny

Bees have become frequent visitors to our yard ever since we eliminated our lawns 2 years ago in favor of more interesting and diverse plantings. My favorite buzzy visitors are the enormous carpenter bees. For the longest time I was erroneously referring to them as bumble bees. After a tiny bit of internet research, I discovered bumbles are covered in body fuzz. My bees are not so fuzzy. Just huge (nearly the size of a silver dollar coin), and shiny black. Their favorite nectar in our yard is that of the ornamental nicotiana that springs out of the ground every summer under the pine tree in the backyard. They spend hours hovering around the violently bright fuchsia-colored blossoms. It's quite nice to sit and watch (although not too closely). But carpenter bees rock. They're solitary critters that defy gravity and I like the way they shimmy around doing their business with the nicotiana flowers.

My parents have always had gorgeous landscaping wherever they've lived. And I share my mom's enthusiasm for having plants everywhere. But the plantings of my youth lacked bees, and any plants that were deemed "messy." So having my own space to experiment with has been an nice adventure. Our front and back yards are quite small yet we've been able to attract a wide variety of different insects and even the random hummingbird with our plant choices. Bees, butterflies, moths, mantises, ladybugs, aphids (boo), scale (double boo), and so many more. I could certainly do without the leaf-eating grubs at times, but it gives my Bob something to tease me about.

Te Leaf Plant From Hawaii

My mom went to a Hula competition in Long Beach last year. An old school mate of hers from Hawaii was helping orgainze it and wanted my parents to come down.

They had a great time hanging out with all the Hawaiians and I think it made my mom miss her childhood growing up in Hawaii.

There was a type of fair/bizarre set up with all things Hawaiian, and my mom got to talking to a woman who makes leis from Te leaves. Of course, in traditional Hawaiian generousity, she gave my mom stalks for three different varieties of Te plants.

So, of course I ended up with one. It looked like a mini stick of sugar cane, or a Slim Jim depending on your background. I stuck it into a free wine glass with some water and month later, lots of roots were growing.

I trasplanted it into a terra cotta pot, and at first, it just looked ridiculous. A stick with a couple of small leaves. But after a while it has started to actually look like a plant.

And I like it. It came from one of those moment rooted in random kindness from strangers, so I like it. I hope it hangs in there and survives for a good long while.

Another Orchid - Rescued

My very fantastic boss left to take a better job, and as she was clearing out her office (which was a marathon, not a sprint), she brought a little pot into my office and sort of held it out to me with this look of, "Will you take this?".

I knew it was an orchid and it had about 4 good leaves with some dead ones underneath. I took it an boldly declared, "I bet I can get this to bloom." She looked skeptical, I didn't blame her.

Since my only other orchid was rocking some amazing blooms, I figured they could live together. Now the violet, space ship orchid, and charity orchid all live in the window sill. It's getting crowded.

I cleaned it up and took it out of the pot it was in. The orchid was actually in a good, well ventilated plastic pot, with the air slits in it so those air roots can breath. The problem was, it was nestled in a decorative ceramic pot that was super snug and was suffocating it.

Now, with some air and regular watering, it has grown 3 new leaves, and some nice chunky new roots are growing.

Still don't know if it's ever going to bloom, but if it does, I'll send a picture to my ex-boss. She will be so proud.

Space Ship Orchid - Holy Crap It Bloomed!

The Zoo has a plant fest on the first Saturday in March every year. I love working it because I basically spend the middle of the day roaming around, talking to all the plant societies and getting my mom to buy more plants.

Last year (2007), I wandered over to the Orchid Society. From my experience orchid people are a little crazy. For plants that supposedly bloom when neglected, those people baby them. So, I wasn't really excited about buying one, even though my mom is a big orchid freak. (Well, she loves them, but I get my lazy plant person genes from her).

But of course, there was a really cool one that bloomed green with a small purple/red center. They looked like space ships to me. I asked what it would need and they said "It's just like an African violet". Well hell, since I did so well with my African violet, I broke down and bought it. The tag says Epi. Green Hornet, lancifolium x cochleatum. Whatever.

It bloomed for a few weeks after brought it home and nestled it next to my violet. Then it sort of turned boring. Just keeped watering it and letting it live with the violet. I have to fill a bucket to water my porch plants, so it gets soaked from the bottom up once a week or so, with some extra water splashed on it's little finger-like air roots.

Then one day in March a little spike appeared and I knew it wasn't a new leaf. Just looked different. About a month later the first little bloom popped out! It was awesome. I was feeling super, uber green-thumby!

July has come and it's still blooming. There have been about 10 blooms that have come and gone, with about 4 left to open from what I can tell. I am going to glue it to the violet. Those crazy orchid people pinned me for what I was, a little helpless, and gave me some great advice.

Snake Plant Flowers

By Guest Blogger - TheJenny

Sansevieria. Snake Plant. Mother In Law's Tongue. When I first read about this common houseplant over a decade ago, the description said "Thrives on neglect." That, my friends, was the plant for me! And apart from not have any rigid watering requirements, it has a lovely sculptural form that works well with modern decor, a nice compact vertical habit which allows it to fit into even the most cramped quarters, and does fairly well in rooms with very little light. Snake plant is my favorite houseplant. I currently have four at home and several at work, many of which I have given as gifts to co-workers that claim they have "the black thumb." I'm convinced that it must be a prehistoric plant in nature because, like cockroaches, you'd be hard pressed to kill one.

But who knew they flowered!? I mean yeah, you see the fancy botanical illustration on Wikipedia with the lovely flower stalk...but I've had a few of my plants for 10+ years, and I had never seen it flower. Then it happened. This summer. This particular plant has an envy-inducing location in the front window and gets really nice filtered morning and afternoon sunlight. It's been in it's current pot for about 7 years, which is another reason I love sansevieria, they like to be cramped. So imagine my astonishment when I see a funny little flower spike coming out of the plant on the side nearest the window. The flower stalk was about 16 inches long and had slender stick-like white flower buds all over it.

The flowers only opened at night and closed back up during the day. They had a delicate fragrance that smelled a bit like lilies and the actual flowers were quite adorable. When open the thin flower petals curved all the way back to the stem. So cool! And the entire blooming process took almost a month, which made it even better. When I asked others if they had ever had a snake plant flower, the response I got from everyone is "really, they flower?" Exactly.

In the end, I'm not sure what I did "right" to get that plant to bloom, so I don't know if it will happen again. And I'm not sure I can precisely duplicate the neglectful pattern of events leading up to the bloom. If it never happens again, at least I took pictures.