By Denise Seghesio Levine, UC Master Gardener of Napa County
First, a disclaimer. While there are many wonderful landscape and garden designers who are Master Gardeners, I am not one of them. Garden design is still pretty experimental for me even after all these years.
After taking seminars and classes and reading books and articles on designing a garden, it seems to all come down to questions. Where are you? How much space do you have? How much time do you have? How much water do you have and where does the sun shine? Are you in town or does your garden blend into the surrounding landscape? Do you need fences and do you have deer?
Are you craving a colorful, disheveled explosion of flowers and a whimsical cottage-chic retreat, or the stark repetition of agave plants and background of gravel for a calming, low-maintenance, meditative space? Do you have a blank canvas of a subdivision plot around a new house, a corner yet undone in an otherwise well-established garden, or even just a deck, patio or balcony to bring the outdoors in? A well-designed garden can be a haven, create an attractive frame and curb appeal for your home and provide privacy so it is worth taking the time to think about it.
I have a longtime friend, a botanist and herbal gardener, whose familial roots trace back to an old Scottish castle. Several years ago, he was honored to be tasked with restoring and recreating the historic gardens that used to surround the family castle. The gardens had been abandoned decades, if not centuries, ago.
His garden restoration design was guided by necessary historical references. The boundaries were set, the plant lists were recorded, the scale was predetermined by the magnitude of the stark, angular castle and the steep terrain that sloped up to it.
We usually do not have such dramatic limitations and can branch out into our garden wish list with more abandon. Yet, if you have a new garden space to create or a tired spot to enliven or recreate, many of the same principles apply.
Garden designers consider contrast, proportion, balance, repetition and rhythm. Colors, enclosures, structures, shapes and textures are fun and necessary considerations as we imagine garden spaces. And depending on personal preferences, other criteria may be included.
I recently read an article about the original garden design at Disney's Epcot Center in Florida. Given that Epcot Center is built upon acres of swamp, Disney's main concern was mosquito control. To that end, none of the plants used has leaves that collect water. Mosquitos breed in standing water and not even leaf puddles are allowed in Disneyland. All the plants have waxy, sloping leaves and shed water into the mulch below.
But back to Napa. How can you pull your different garden spaces together so, at the end of your design journey, there is a feeling of cohesiveness and harmony?
Often this is where path and hardscape choices come in. Paths and outside living areas can be purely utilitarian or add to the whimsy or mood of your garden. Certainly, a straight concrete or aggregate patio or path lined with stark agaves has a different feel than redwood rounds or soft wood chips with nodding ferns and forget-me-nots softening the edges.
Look at your garden from all vantage points. Will the area be a private space enclosed with plants or open to a larger landscape? Perhaps the space you are designing is your view from a kitchen, living room or bedroom window. Drag a chair out, grab a cup of coffee or an evening beverage, and spend some time imagining. This is the part I am good at.
One mistake many new gardeners make when trying to achieve a colorful, diverse garden is to plant just one of each. Nature rarely does that. Planting in groups of three, five or seven is a basic, although flexible, rule for a natural look.
Stroll through your favorite nursery for plant ideas and advice. On hikes, note what grows together in nature. As you walk around your neighborhood, note which garden styles and plants you like. When considering a plant, learn its preferred sun exposure, soil requirements, watering needs and rate of growth. So many questions.
In our new Napa County reality, it is also a good idea to incorporate FireWise design principles. No shrubs or trees close to your foundation. Keep landscape trees limbed up. Avoid planting pampas grasses, resinous shrubs or other highly flammable plantings. Look online and at the University of California Cooperative Extension office for a list of FireWise plants. There are abundant magazines, books and online sources for diving into garden design on your own.
Workshop: “Sustainable Vegetable Growing” (Four-Part Series) on Sundays February 23, March 1, March 8 and March 15, from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., at the University of California Cooperative Extension, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Napa. For more details & online registration go to Online registration (credit card only) or call 707-253-4221.
Workshop: “Step-by-Step Garden Design” on Saturday, February 29, from 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m., at the University of California Cooperative Extension, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Napa. For more details & online registration go to On-line registration (credit card only) or
Mail-in/Walk-in registration (cash or check only) or call 707-253-4221.
The UC Master Gardeners of Napa County are volunteers who provide UC research-based information on home gardening and answer your questions. To find out more about upcoming programs or to ask a garden question, visit the Master Gardener website (http://napamg.ucanr.edu) or call (707) 253-4221 between 9 a.m. and noon on Mondays, Wednesdays or Fridays.
However, sometimes carpenter bees bore into lumber or trees to make nests and may damage structural wood or leave unsightly holes and stains. Multiple bees may use a common entry hole, tunneling several feet into wood to create chambers for their offspring.
Read more about these insects in the Pest Note: Carpenter Bees. http://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn7417.html
- Author: Mary Louise Flint
One of the best ways to reduce pest problems in and around buildings is to construct or retrofit structures that keep pests out in the first place. This concept has been a pillar of integrated pest management for many years. Pest-resistant buildings reduce not only pest problems but also the need for pesticide applications. Unfortunately, architects and builders had few guidelines about how to design and construct such structures.
To address this issue, the San Francisco Department of the Environment and the International Code Council developed an online publication, Pest Prevention by Design, which provides the first comprehensive resource on pest-preventive building design tactics.
- Bird-resistant light fixtures
- Bird deterrents on light fixtures
- Bird exclusion devices
- Motion detectors on exterior lights
- Timers on exterior lights
- Reflected light rather than direct light
- Direct exterior lighting only for essential areas
- Yellow (sodium) exterior lights
All pest preventive design elements are based on minimizing entry of pests into buildings, making pest inspections easier, and eliminating or minimizing the food, water, and harborage vertebrate and invertebrate pests require for survival. These basic principles, which should be followed throughout all areas of building construction, include:
- Understanding local pest pressure
- Analyzing the physical context for each building situation
- Designing for the necessary pest tolerance level
- Using durable, pest-resistant materials
- Designing for easy inspection
- Minimizing moisture
- Sealing off openings
- Eliminating potential harborage sites
- Engineering slabs and foundations to minimize pest entry
- Designing buildings to be unattractive to pests
The guidelines were assembled as a database that can be updated over time but currently are distributed as a stand-alone document. The San Francisco Department of the Environment led the project, funded through a grant from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The department assembled an advisory committee of experts from across the United States with expertise in pest control, architecture, engineering, green building, IPM, and public policy who searched literature, professional manuals and publications, and Web sites for information. All content went through a peer review process. The department plans to pilot test the guidelines in San Francisco housing developments and incorporate the guides into green building checklists such as Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED).
To download a free copy, visit the Department of the Environment's Web site, http://www.sfenvironment.org/download/pest-prevention-by-design-guidelines.
(Originally published in the February 2013 issue of UC IPM's Green Bulletin)
Pests invade homes for varying reasons during autumn and winter. Common outdoor species such as Argentine ants, Oriental (or Turkestan) cockroaches, sowbugs and pillbugs, springtails, and millipedes, may simply be escaping harsh conditions such as freezing temperatures or small-scale flooding. Some insects, especially true bugs (Hemiptera); such as boxelder bug (Figure 1), bordered plant bug, milkweed bug and other seed bugs, false chinch bug, and various stink bugs, naturally seek out dry, protected cracks and crevices within which to spend the winter. In the landscape, such sites may be beneath loose tree bark or deep within firewood piles, but structural gaps, cracks and crevices may be warmer, drier, and thus even more attractive to these overwintering bugs.
The best way to prevent nuisance pests from invading structures is to exclude them by sealing up possible entry points. To keep pests out, special attention should be focused on doors, windows, foundations, chimneys, roof joints, shingles, vents, and conduit ports. Door sweeps (Figure 3) and threshold seals can be installed to eliminate gaps under and around doors while new screens, weather stripping, and expanding foam may be necessary to seal up gaps in and around windows. Instruct your customers to seal up all cracks and openings on the outside of the structure, using appropriate sealant materials for the site and situation. These materials may include mortar and cement products (for hardscape gaps), roof cement (for sealing chimney flashings), elastomeric sealants (for large gaps at joints subject to movement), expanding foams (for hard to seal gaps and for conduit ports), and caulks (for small gaps and joints where no movement is expected) (Figure 4).
It is also important to eliminate landscape conditions that may favor pest presence and buildup. Certain plant species may serve as food sources for true bugs in the summer and fall, allowing populations to build up locally; identify these plants and remove and/or replace with alternative species. Eliminate excess moisture near structural foundations and entryways, and reduce potential pest habitats, such as thick vegetation, wood chips and other organic mulches, and firewood piles, by moving them at least one meter away from structural perimeters and entryways.
Teaching your customers about structural exclusion and habitat modification techniques for management of seasonal nuisance pests will promote sustainable and long-term pest prevention while protecting their homes, communities, and environments from unnecessary pesticide applications. By steering them towards the right products and approaches you will build customer satisfaction and loyalty for years to come.
For more information about managing specific pests, see the UC IPM web site.
To read additional guidelines for how to design or build pests out of structures, see the publication Pest Prevention by Design.
[This article originally appeared in the November 2014 issue of UC IPM's Retail Nursery and Garden Center IPM News.]
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