By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

Panayoti Kelaidis, the senior curator of the Denver Botanic Gardens, approached the Broomfield, Colorado seed company, Botanical Interests, about offering a new line of seeds to preserve native and threatened species some time ago. 

The partners in this project took their time before introducing this line to make sure the offering was a group of plants that homeowners would have success with -- drought-tolerant, easy to care for, and beautiful.  The series is now here, and it was worth waiting for.

Below are three species from the series.  As usual, Carolyn Crawford's gorgeous botanical artwork makes you want them all.  There are a dozen more species in this welcome new line.  Check them out here.

By Jim McCausland, Sunset Magazine

Question I have some beautiful indoor plants. I'd like to add different colored stripes to the leaves. These are big plants (pretty much trees) with long green leaves. I think it would be a cool art project to paint different colored stripes (one per leaf) on them.

Will this kill the plant?

Any advice on a paint that wouldn't harm it it? I just like art projects and think it would be cool to have different colored stripes on the ordinarily green leaves. Any advice would be helpfull!

Thanks! —Brian

Answer For more than a decade in Europe, and about 5 years in the United States, growers have painted live poinsettias (pictured above) for the Christmas market. They use a proprietary paint formula. But florists also use paint—a lacquer-based spray paint that is widely available—mostly to color cut flowers without damaging them. Sold under the Design Master label, it's also listed for use on foliage. I personally haven't used it, so I can't give you any personal experience that speaks to its performance on live plants over the long haul—but it's promising. Give it a try and send me pictures.

—Jim McCausland

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

The Japanese persimmon (Diospyros kaki) is worthy growing for its beauty alone even if you don't think you like the fruit.  Our Western Garden Book summarizes its virtues this way:

"It reaches 30 ft. tall (or more) and at at least as wide.  Has a handsome branch pattern and is one of the best fruit trees for ornamental use; makes a good small shade tree and is suitable for espalier.  Leaves are light green when new, maturing to dark green, leathery ovals 6-7 in. long.  Foliage turns vivid yellow, orange or red in fall (even in mild climates).  After leaves drop, brilliant orange-scarlet, 3-4-in. fruits brighten the tree for weeks and persist until winter unless harvest."

If you live in Orange County or close by, you can find out more about persimmons at the annual Persimmon Party held in Pitcher Park in Old Towne section of the city of Orange.  It will be held this coming Sunday, November 15th, noon to 3 p.m.  There will be fruit and baked goods for sale and other persimmon products -- persimmon salsa sounds intriguing.

Pitcher Park, if you've never been there, is pretty charming all by itself actually.  It's a small park in the middle of a residential area that shows evidence of its original rural origins.  When Henry and Grace Pitcher gifted the property to the city of Orange, the city decided to maintain the barn -- it is now the Orange County Fire Museum.  They also retained Henry's original honey house, where the Orange County Beekeepers have an exhibit and store gear.  Here's a hint of what Pitcher Park looks like.

If you can't come to the Persimmon Party, but I've made you hungry for persimmons, try some of Sunset's persimmon recipes.  Or try this Persimmon and Cinammon Oatmeal recipe I found on the White on Rice Couple blog while browsing for a full image of a persimmon tree. (The top left photo is their image.  So are the two below.)

    
By Julie Chai, Sunset associate garden editor

At the recent Late Show garden show, we were thrilled by all the inventive displays. There were so many amazing creations that it's hard to narrow them down, but here are a few of our favorites. Above, garden designers Suzanne Biaggi and Patrick Picard created the Future Feast with edibles planted right into a tabletop. Produce doesn't get any fresher than that!

We also loved the way designer Beth Mullins turned tires inside out and used them as planters in her display:

By Jim McCausland, Sunset Magazine

A garden can be a consuming passion—at least until you feel it consuming you. When Val Easton found herself in that spot, she knew it was time to move on, this time to a gem of a low-maintenance garden she made for herself. It kept her passion for gardening alive and spawned a terrific book, The NEW Low-Maintenance Garden (Timber Press, Portland, 2009; $19.95).

Because the book is rooted in Easton’s personal and recent experience, she makes her case with formidable authority: “Somewhere along the way to plant collecting and competitive gardening, we forgot the ancient notion of the garden as a place of respite, an oasis remote from worldly cares and chores. We forgot nature’s ability to soothe, renew, and nurture.… [Her] ability to work her magic on us is dependent on our slowing down and looking closely, not on our constant efforts to improve upon her.” Easton calls gardening as it was meant to be “the feast we forget to partake of.”

In the end, she found that low maintenance wasn’t about gardening lite—she wanted “the exhaustion ... taken out, not the fulfillment”—it was instead all about design. Thus her mantra: “Design before plants, think geometry, and invest in infrastructure.”

So how did all this work out in her own landscape? The book gives you a peek through the lens of Jacqueline Koch. In addition to vignettes of Easton’s own garden (see below), you get a look at a passel of other high appeal, low-maintenance gardens and parts of gardens that are scattered like jewels across North America. You look and say “I want this,” realizing that your desire has everything to do with the sanctuary garden that Easton is calling you back to. Low maintenance is just the part of the equation that gives you the time to enjoy the sanctuary you create.

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

 Though it has been over a year since our blog post on Dymondia margaretae, the carpet-flat South African ground cover shown below, we are still getting comments and questions about it because more and more people are taking out all or part of their lawns and looking for substitutes.  

Phil's recent question seemed like one a lot of readers might have.  I quote him below:

"We have a space of about 200 - 300 sqf.  We purchased flats of Dymondia for it. What size clumps should be planted and what should be the correct spacing? The area had a lawn before which we sprayed a few times and lightly tilled. We are in Southern Cal. about 15 minutes inland. What would be the expected time frame for it to fill in and what's the best way to handle grass that keeps growing through? "

Though I have literally seen D. margaretea in hundreds of gardens--and liked it every time--I don't have it in my own garden and had no personal experience regarding growing it.  So I went to an expert, Randy Baldwin, general manager at San Marcos Growers, a wholesale nursery in Santa Barbara that propagates the plant.  Here's his answer.

"I tell people to plant this plant as close as they can afford.  But, if the area is irrigated and the soil decent, this plant can grow fairly fast, and a one-foot spacing would be adequate.  It would fill in within 6 months, assuming you planted in late winter through spring in an area with full sun and regular irrigation.  Buy flats if you can and cut them into squares.  As long as each piece has nice roots, they can be as small as one inch.  But test out a few to see if you need to make bigger squares to get clumps with roots before cutting up the whole flat.  If you can't find flats, break up one-gallon plants into multiples.

Regarding weeds, this plant can eventually do a good job smothering out new weed seed grasses, but when the Dymondia is young and there is space between plants, diligent hand-weeding is a must.  Site preparation ahead of time really is the key, though.  You need to get rid of the grasses that were there before you plant.  If you are dealing with Bermuda, it often takes repeated treatments of an herbicide used during the grass's growing season and while it is being irrigated so that the Bermuda thoroughly takes in the herbicide.  There are selective post-emergence herbicides that work on grasses that do not harm broadleaf plants, but my observation is they don't do a great job in controlling Bermuda.  Also I am not sure whether Dymondia is tolerant of these herbicides.  If a homeowner wantsto go this route, they should talk to a pest control advisor for specific recommendations.  And, even so, I would test a small area first before treating the entire planting."

Thanks, Randy, for such a thorough answer.  I'm sure a lot of our blog readers will find this immensely useful.

By Jim McCausland, Sunset Magazine

Photos © Log House Plants, 2009

Ornamental kale can make as much impact with leaves as other plants do with flowers. Taking advantage of that, Log House Plants has released a remarkable Dutch series of Kale that can be lightly pruned to take the illusion still further.

You plant these about 6 inches apart, and after they reach about 6 inches tall, you start pruning off the lower leaves so that each plant gets that long-stemmed, flower-at-the-top look. (The flowers, of course, are really just colored leaves.) Once plants reach a foot tall, support each with a small stake. Pretty amazing, isn't it?

Just plant it in gritty, fast-draining soil and it should survive a winter that would take out all other agaves. The principle (which is the same for many plants) is that it can handle the cold as long as its roots don't have to contend with constantly soggy soil. 

Expect it to grow about a foot tall, and to produce offsets that extend its width to 15 or 20 inches in the ground. This is also a great pot plant.

Starting December 1st, you can mail-order Agave 'Sunspot' from High Country Gardens in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Or preorder now by mail or phone (800/925-9387).

By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

Okay, I lied.  When I posted about Susan Van Atta's new book, The Southern California Native Flower Garden recently, I said I had decided on a replacement planting plan.  I had the one on the left in mind.  But, as I said in the post, this is a hard book to put down, and now I like the combo on the right just as well.

So, what do you think experienced native growers? 

Shall I go with Plan A, on the left:  Oceanspray (Holodiscus discolor), Heuchera maxima, and five-fingered fern (Adiantu aleuticum)?

Or Plan B, on the right:  Spicebush (Calycanthus occidentalis), Acalypha californica (California copperleaf), and Roger's Red grape?

I live in Sunset zone 24 and the area in question gets good morning sun and is in light shade in the afternoon.  I have silty loam soil.

Please advise.