- Author: Karen Metz
I spent the first days of the New Year inside fighting a virus. Much of that week was dismal and rainy. Although extremely grateful for the rain, the landscape was gray and drab when I looked through the sliding glass door. Suddenly I was struck by a jolt of color against all the gray. It was my Coral Bark Maple, Acer palmatum 'Sango-Kaku'. Its red bark glowed. A few days later when the sun came out, the color was even prettier in the afternoon when back lit by the setting sun.
I had been waiting for that moment for a long time. Years ago I bought an extremely small seedling at the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show. I wasn't sure how a Japanese Maple would do in our very sunny yard, so I didn't want to make a big investment and watch it fry. I bought a baby and put it in a pot. Well it didn't die, but it didn't thrive either. After several years it was still only about a foot and didn't have any dramatic red coloration. I was definitely disappointed. A friend of mine told me her tree had taken awhile to get started but then took off. I waited some more, still not much. Finally I put it in a bigger pot. The tree began to grow a little each year, but still I didn't have the coloration that I was expecting. This winter with the cold, the bark finally achieved that beautiful red, I had been waiting for.
Coral Bark Maples can get to 15 to 25 feet tall in the ground but in containers are more likely to keep to about 10 feet. I hope to keep mine in a container. The good news is that it has taken so long to grow, the back yard landscaping has grown up to provide some summer shade now. The tree has four season beauty with lovely leaves that turn colors in the fall and then, the beautiful red bark in the winter.
- Author: Patricia Brantley
The winter has come
The frost danger is clear.
Cover those plants,
so they'll be with us next year.
Bring small pots indoors,
But away from heat vents
For bigger ones outside,
You might build a tent.
If you have veggies in the ground
A floating row cover will do.
If your crops are in a greenhouse,
well…lucky you!
Now if you are wanting
To get that garden started,
And you just can't wait
Until the cold has departed
You might want to pull out
A seed catalog or two
And sit yourself down with a
Warm Winter brew.
You can peruse and dream
Of the sunny days ahead
As you plan and you scheme
About your new garden beds.
So cover those plants
And take care from the frost
Because soon in the garden aisles
We all will be lost.
--Patricia Brantley
- Author: Stan Zervas
Last year I moved to a little fixer-upper in Benicia and got in the bargain an old overgrown apple tree. The neighbors told me the apples were red and quite good but they didn't know the variety. Last fall I gave the best apples to the neighbor and got a pie in return. That's a tradition I really want to continue!
The house will be remodeled this spring and the only place to put the garage is exactly where the tree is currently located. Since the tree is too big to transplant I thought I would try to collect budwood and graft a new tree that I could plant elsewhere in the yard. This way I will at least save this variety of apple that I know ripens well in my location.
California Rare Fruit Growers is having a scion exchange on January 21 in Berkeley. Their website, www.crfg.org describes how to collect budwood that I can bring to the scion exchange. I searched the tree for 1 year old wood that was pencil sized or better. Since the tree has not been pruned in years it was full of spindly growth, but I collected the best I could find.
At the scion exchange there will be demonstration of grafting techniques and they might have appropriate rootstock available. My plan is to get their help to graft a couple new trees and continue our neighborhood tradition.
- Author: Launa Herrmann
I thrive when I'm doing. Writing. Gardening. Working. I enjoy actively participating in the busy routine and daily rhythm of living. But when something knocks me to the sidelines as a mere observer, I squawk like a crow. Merely watching my garden behind a window makes me cranky.
I imagine few gardeners out there — if they had a choice — would pick the “undoing” that injury and illness, disability and aging visit upon us, whether temporary or permanent. Until now I actually believed the propaganda that the more active we are, the great flexibility and mobility we have and “would always have” to do the things we love. I mean, isn't that why . . . gardeners don't mind muddy shoes and dirty fingernails that accompany preparing a bed for seedlings.
. . . gardeners don't mind how many times we uproot a pouting plant in the search for an ideal spot.
. . . gardeners don't mind the ongoing never ending re-envisioning and reconstructing of vegetable plots and flower pots, front lawns and backyards.
After all, you have to do something to harvest anything. You can't just be present. Unless you want to be stuck with the same bedding plants in the same place year after year, you ‘gotta do something different. A garden is not a set-in-stone completed project anyway. A real garden is always evolving — a work in progress.
But today — well, today I'm what's stuck. Sidelined. I didn't choose last year's injury or surgery, or last month's finger fracture or the other uninvited distracting dramas that play out in my life. I am “making do” though with this messy complicated time for just being. Mentally yanking my boots out of what has “undone” me and compromised my enjoyment of gardening. Hunting and pecking keys with one hand to type this blog. Pausing to open the blinds to see the glow and feel the warmth of sunlight against the glass instead of merely observing the passing rainstorm and my garden from behind a window pane.
And the Aha moment is there. Outside resting on the stone bench beneath the window ledge is a stem of rose leaves blown loose in the storm — glistening as if it were a crystal broach. I grab my camera to capture simple beauty seldom noticed because I'm too hyper-focused on doing.
- Author: Betty Homer
Recently, while driving through the East Bay, I was pleasantly surprised to discover a community farm located near San Pablo Avenue and Marin Avenue in Albany, near door to Berkeley. It was both unusual and refreshing to see all the greenery at this farm sitting in a swath of land located at a busy intersection. The sign outside read that this was the "UC Gill Tract Community Farm." This urban farm piqued my interest so I returned home to read up more about it. According to its websites at https://gilltractfarm.wordpress.com/ and http://ucgilltractfarm.wixsite.com/, "the UC Gill Tract Community Farm is a collaborative community project between the University of California Berkeley and the local community, focused on issues of food justice and urban farming." The website discloses that the overarching vision of this project is "to conduct collaborative community-driven research, education, and extension focused on ecological farming and food justice, and to foster equitable economies, a healthy environment, and increased resilience in vulnerable communities, both urban and rural." Educational events concerning food issues are held at the farm, and the farm can be booked for private events. Students at UC Berkeley are also able to take coursework for credit while working on various projects on and for the farm. But at its core, the purpose of the farm is to feed the local population and is open to the public for harvesting crops, purchasing vegetables, and for volunteering. Below are the hours of operation if you want to journey out to see this place for yourself and maybe pick up a few vegetables along the way:
Sunday 12:00 pm – 5:00 pm (Farm Stand 3:00 – 5:00 pm at San Pablo Gate)
Monday 11:00 am – 2:00 pm
Tuesday 3:00 – 6:00 pm
Wednesday 11:00 am – 2:00 pm
Thursday 3:00 – 6:00 pm
