By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

Euphoriba characias `Tasmanian Tiger' is a plant I've admired ever since it was introduced to the trade but for some reason have always talked myself out of buying.  Though every Euphorbia I've grown has been unkillable--and `Tasmanian Tiger' gets good reports as well--somehow it seemed too delicate for my garden.  I couldn't imagine this refined creature  sharing space with rosemary, lavender, agaves, and the rest of my rather macho Mediterranean plants.

But something Steve Brigham, owner of Buena Creek Gardens nursery in San Marcos, said at the last San Diego Horticultural Society meeting struck me as just right.  Though `Tasmanian Tiger' does fine as a garden plant, its striking appearance practically demands that it be the star of a container planting, says Brigham.  And, to make the most of its creamy variegated leaves and flowers, he'd suggest black and chartreuse foliage plants as companions.  Doesn't that give you lots of ideas?

A black potato vine, such as Black Pearl, perchance?

combined with a golden thyme?

Or, black mondo grass, perhaps.

Combined with `Angelina' sedum.

Or a dark-toned dwarf flax, such as `Platt's Black' and Helichrysum `Limelight'.  Or `Zwartkop' Aeonium and, but, you get the idea.  If you come up with combinations you like even better and plant them up, send us photos of the results.

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

This is just to celebrate that there are still bees in our gardens.  This bee appears to be enjoying aloe pollen and was photographed in a Tucson garden.  Andre Baget took the photo.  His wife Lisa, a friend of mine, sent me the photo.

By Jim McCausland, Sunset senior garden writer

There’s a beguiling look, sound, and scent to feed store-nursery combinations that I just love, especially this time of year. As soon as you walk through the front door you’re in a different world, surrounded by indoor plants, bins full of bulk soil amendment, stock tanks full of newly hatched chicks, seed racks, and a chalk board announcing specials of the day and whatever message the owner happens to have for loyal customers.

Pistils Nursery in Portland, Ore., is such a place. Just northeast of the intersection of I-5 and I-405, it’s on a narrow lot dominated by a lovely old two-story building painted green. The store has all the charms mentioned above (including the chicks), plus terrariums and more conventional containers, most already planted.

Slip out the back door, and a few curious chickens will take time out from bug patrol to welcome you to the nursery proper. It’s neat as a pin and loaded with things that should probably be in your garden. Start with the sawdust-filled pots full of bare-root strawberries and cane berries, and move on to the red-flowering currants and Clematis armandii, which is at is fragrant, flowery best this week. Beyond them a small universe of edibles and ornamentals awaits you.

About 20 percent of Pistils’ nursery stock is grown within a mile, and most of the rest is from the Willamette Valley—a smart take on the fresh-local approach that started with restaurants and makes excellent sense for nearly everything else we buy. Pistils can even hook you up with a local carpenter for a custom fence or gate.

This nursery is worth a stop for anybody going through Portland on I-5, but if you live nearby, put this on your short list of neighborhood treasures.

Info: Pistils Nursery, 3811 N. Mississippi Avenue, Portland; 503 288-4889.

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

The Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix is opening its latest attraction, The Sybil B. Harrington Cactus and Succulent Galleries, Saturday, April 5.  The massive shade structure, designed by landscape architect Steve Martino, will protect the Garden's more delicate cactus and succulents from the Sonoran desert's harsh summer sun.  A unique underground heating and cooling system, designed by Dr. Tom Schleifer of ASU and the firm University Mechanical, will further protect the plants from severe changes in the elements. 

The 28-foot-tall canopies of the structure are massive enough for the Garden's most impressive specimen plants, such as 22-foot-tall mountain pipe organ (Stenocereus montanus).  The red columns that support them are the perfect color to accentuate the blues and grays that predominate in desert plants.  And the orientation of the structures make the most of the Garden's desert vistas.

Scott C. Scarfone of Oasis Design Group designed the plant displays in each gallery.

By Jim McCausland, Sunset senior garden writer
Photos © Darcy Daniels, Bloomtown Garden Design

Sometimes a tatty garden space looks almost too dismal to tackle. That’s where a good garden designer like Darcy Daniels comes in: she has the vision to see what’s possible and the experience to make it happen. In one corner of Grant and Suzanne Malin’s Portland garden, Daniels chose a fairly simple solution that used bamboo to quickly screen out a neighbor’s house, a curving gravel path to draw visitors into the garden and keep them out of the mud, and perennials and sedges to fill in around the edges with texture and color.

To keep the bamboo in bounds (it’s a spreading species), Daniels has it surrounded by a plastic root barrier that extends well underground and a couple of inches above ground.

She doesn’t conceal the top of the barrier with mulch because surface roots would eventually crawl through the mulch and over the barrier; instead, she screens the barrier with low perennials such as bergenia.

More on landscaping with gravel

More inspiring paths

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

For pico de gallo and other fresh salsas or Thai and Indian cooked sauces, the serrano is still my favorite chile.  It's got just the right amount of bite.  But a few summers ago I fell in love with the poblano, a chile that barely registers on the Scoville heat chart.  1,000 Scoville units vs. the serrano's 10,000 to 20,000.  You don't eat poblanos raw. You char away their thick, waxy skin first by blistering the chiles directly over a flame, grilling in a dry skillet, or sticking under a broiler.  I find the broiler method the easiest.

Then you have lots of great choices.  Cut the roasted chiles in strips to eat as a cocktail snack atop a tortilla chip or snack cracker along with a slice of jack or other mild cheese.  (A lot of my crop got used that way.)  Or you can stuff the chiles and bake them--the poblano is the chile traditionally used in chile rellenos.  Or make rajas, roasted chiles with onion and melted cheese served in tortillas. Or make a green rice.  Or a crema poblano.  Or a soup.  It's all good.  I got pretty addicted to the smoky taste of roasted poblanos by harvest's end actually.

I've been able to find seedling plants at nurseries pretty easily in my area the last few years.  (Spring plant sales at public gardens, such as the Green Scene at Fullerton Arboretum, are also good opportunities.)  But, if you can't find plants, there are plenty of seed sources.  The illustration shown here is from Park Seeds on-line catalog. Seeds of Change is another good source. You might find this chile listed as ancho in some catalogs.  Or as ancho/poblano. 

It isn't as confusing as it sounds.  When the chiles are green and you use them in the ways described above, they're called poblanos.  When the peppers are allowed to turn red on the plant, they're usually dried before being used in cooking.  In this dried form they're called anchos.  Anchos are used in dishes like moles. 

What really is confusing is that supermarkets often call this same chile a pasilla, which is actually an entirely different chile pepper.  The pasilla is slim and nearly black.  Never mind what the supermarkets call it.  If it looks like the chile shown here, it's a poblano.  Buy some and try out some of the recipes listed above.  If you do, I bet you'll want to grow the plants.

By Jim McCausland, Sunset senior garden writer

Robert Kourik is crazy about roots. He’s studied them, collected specimens that are displayed all over his property, and now written a remarkable book about them. Called Roots Demystified (Metamorphic Press, Occidental, CA, 2008; $25), it is based in part on meticulous, decades-old drawings of actual root systems from many kinds of plants.

In support of the drawings and the theme, the book includes a mountain of trivia, to wit:
—Half or more of the total mass of many trees is below ground;
—Growing root tips (caps) produce their own lubricant that helps them force their way through the soil;
—About 90 percent of a tree’s roots typically grow in the top 18 inches of soil, and in some forest trees, half of that grows in the leaf litter above the soil surface (so keep your trees well mulched);
—Some trees send roots down 200 feet, and out many times the radius of the tree’s canopy.

You get the drift. Yet Kourik’s prupose isn’t to amaze you, but to instruct. To that end, the book is filled with practical tips for gardeners that are geared toward making the soil a better environment for roots. Along the way, Kourik necessarily covers composting, weed control, watering, no-till vegetable gardening, planting, and much more.

I recommend this as a standard reference. You can get it from the author at www.robert-kourik.com; $25 includes tax and shipping.

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

San Diegans have an opportunity to learn about some of the rare fruits they could grow in their privileged climate--tropical guava, passionfruit, jaboicaba, wax jambu, pitahaya.  And the education is free of charge.  Starting on March 26, on the fourth Wednesday of each month, the San Diego Chapter of the California Rare Fruit Growers will hold free introductory classes on every aspect of growing rare fruit from the right selections for your garden's microclimate to what to do with your unfamiliar harvest  Classes will be held at 6 pm in Room 104 in the Casa del Prado building in Balboa Park. 

For more information and the full schedule of classes go to the Chapter's website.

By Jim McCausland, Sunset senior garden writer

A killer deal awaits any garden lover willing to go to the Eugene/Cottage Grove area next weekend. Sponsored by Village Green Resort in Cottage Grove, it includes lodging, dinner, breakfast, and tours of some of the area’s best nurseries. Total package: $69 to $89 for two.

Village Green Resort in Cottage Grove was a place your grandparents probably loved if they traveled through Oregon much. Eventually it fell onto hard times and lost its lustre — and that probably would have been the end of it if garden-struck Moonstone Hotels hadn’t bought it and turned it around. (Moonstone also bought and is refurbishing The Oregon Garden in Silverton; word on the street is that Moonstone’s owner excels at hotels so he can fund his horticulture habit. I believe it.)

As part of Village Green’s renovation, Moonstone gave garden director Cindee Eichengreen the mandate to revitalize its gardens, and she’s made a great start. Friday evening she’ll be giving a seminar on garden design. Saturday the resort has arranged visits to Log House Plants (one of the West’s most innovative growers), Territorial Seed Company, Northwest Garden Nursery (you’ll see the best hellebores anywhere here), Gossler Farms Nursery, and Bloom River Nursery.

For reservations, call 800 343-7666 and say you want the Great Garden Escape package March 28-29.

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

The scent of garlic sizzling in a skillet always makes your mouth water.  But somehow the same scent isn't so attractive in an ornamental plant. 

Lots of gardeners in Sunset Western Garden Book climate zones 13-24 and H1, H2 grow Tulbaghia violacea (society garlic) anyway just because it's so darn tough.  But you can have a similar look without the nasty-smelling leaves by substituting Tulbaghia fragrans, suggests San Diego landscape designer Amelia Lima.  (Though the botanically correct name is T. fragrans, we'll stick with T. fragrans here because that's how most growers categorize it.)

Tulbaghia fragrans has grassy foliage likes its cousin society garlic but its leaves are longer, thicker, and more gray-green than blue-green.  The plant's habit is also a little looser.  So the effect, says Lima, is more "gardenly' or "cottagey."  The example shown here is from a Rancho Santa Fe, Calif., garden she designed.

Like society garlic, T. fragrans has small, trumpet-shaped, lavender flowers.  Only these are very sweetly scented; some people say they smell like gardenias. They also make excellent cutflowers. 

Tulbaghia fragrans blooms from winter through early spring.  It won't be as easy to find as society garlic, so you may have to ask your nursery to special order T. fragrans.  But I know it's still out there.  (In my area of Southern California, Magic Growers in Pasadena propagates it, and Capitol Wholesale Growers does in the San Jose area.  So far I haven't come across a catalog or online source, but if I've overlooked one, please let me know.