casa coniglio

Fallugia paradoxa (Apache Plume) coming into full bloom

There’s finally been some warm weather here. After weeks of what in my admittedly biased view has been unseasonably cool weather (nights of 33 degrees), the last couple of days have been in the 80’s. These temperatures mean that spring is truly here. In Albuquerque, that means also that the winds have come.

This is a particularly trying time for plants, who, in their excitement over the arrival of warmer weather, have put forth an abundance of fresh lush growth. This tender verdue is particularly susceptible to the dehydrating effects of 30 mph winds at 85 degrees (gusts up to 40), and even more so when these warm dry winds occur suddenly after a period of chilly weather. But that is the norm here. This isn’t the climate for a balmy spring. There are no gentle rains and consistently moderate temperatures. Spring here comes in a bang, a hairdryer blast warming the walk-in freezer. It can just as suddenly change again, and there can be a bit of snow or hail, and freezing temperatures for a couple of nights.

It is the wind at least as much as the temperature fluctuations that demonstrate the sturdy nature of native plants. These plants have been hesitant to put out new growth and this growth is tough, rigid even, while the non-native plants have been bursting forth with succulence. Of course this is a generality. The penstemon have been growing with a plumpness that belies the dryness of the ground (just how do they suck that much moisture out of the ground?). Similarly the dock’s fleshy leaves bursting forth from the deep root. Although the “garden perennials” put forth a burst of growth that is particularly pleasing to the desperate eyes of the green-starved, this growth wilts and edges brown under the relentless onslaught of the wind. Flower drop or are torn to shreds. Fleshy stems simply snap. The plants need irrigation immediately during the winds, or show displeasure by looking poorly or even dying. They can not wait for the next rains (which might not be until August), like the native plants can. Penstemon flowers are rigid enough to tolerate the dessicating winds, and the foliage has a waxy coating. Fragile Apache Plume flowers only last a day anyway. Chocolate flowers close. Many native plants just wait until spring is well underway, and the winds have died down before blooming.

But waiting is not one of the strengths of the gardener who longs for growth after the barrenness of winter. The penstemons and early cacti are a saving grace. But I’ll still have to have my tiny irrigated patch. My nosy neighbor comments, “I don’t know what you are doing out there, but I see you standing in your yard, looking, just looking and looking...” And that alone, indeed, is the pleasure of it all.

I love the look of Artemesia versicolor's foliage. It makes me think of coral, or seaweed. It doesn't make me think of seafoam, although Seafoam Artemesia is its common name. It's quite drought tolerant, requiring almost no water throughout the summer, though it does look better with just a bit of water. They say that the leaves are more curly with drought, but no matter what the water levels are, mine have never had curly leaves.

Camassia leichtlinii 'Blue Danube' was purchased during my mad "must buy something" spree last fall. I figured it would be perfect for that area where the water from my roof drains, and where my neighbor's swamp cooler dumps its water every night. It was very quick to appear in the spring, and the flowers are a medium violet blue. It doesn't carry as many flowers at a time as I expected from the pictures I've seen. Maybe it needs cooler temperatures and even more water, such as in its native habitat in the Pacific Northwest. Still, it's charming. I'll have to wait and see if it survives the summer heat.



This muscari appeared in a group of M. paradoxum. Obviously it's not M. paradoxum, which as in previous photos, is a dark dusky blue. The leaves of this one are shorter, somewhat twisted, and the flower stem is a short inch or two rather than the 6-8 inches of the M. paradoxum. The blooms are yellow, fading to navy however. It's cute, but it's another yellow in my blue garden.


Rosemary Gorizia has given a slow buildup to a fine show.


Artemesia versicolor, though not "blooming" is putting on its spring show of silkiness.


The blackfoot daisy (Melampodium leucanthum) is starting to bloom.


Euphorbia Redwing has lost nearly all of its red foliage color (only the stems have any trace of red now). The flower bracts are starting to expand. Another month and there will be hardly any foliage to be seen.


The Eriogonum umbellatum that was a beautiful burgundy red two months ago, shows no evidence of that color now. Leaves are a spring green, and flowers are yellow and minute.


The Apache plume (Fallugia paradoxa) is starting a burst of flowers. You can see why it is in the rose family. The flowers only last a day, but are immediately found by the bees. There is no worry about pollination. Soon the namesake plumes will appear.

A macro lens is a wonderful thing to have. I'm loving mine. There's a lot for me to learn in order to get the photos better, but it's all in fun. I need to get a better background, I think, and I'd love to have a flash set-up. Maybe do some portraits - of people, rather than the kids. Here are some photos of the kids.

This is Phalaenopsis equestris 'Rebecca' who was given to me by another blogger. It is a particularly nice form, in that the flowers are richly colored, are flatter than the typical species, and it is more floriferous and vigorous than the typical species. It's been one of the most successful phals in my collection. Phals tend to fade out after a few years for me, mostly because of the dryness and temperature extremes of my climate. The dryness makes the orchids irresistible to spider mites which decimate phals in a couple of weeks if not caught soon enough. The name equestris refers to the species habit of forming new plantlets on the tips of the flower spikes, which form roots that straddle a nearby host branch. It looks like a rider on a horse. Very cute, and easier to propagate than other phals for this reason. P. equestris flowers open sequentially, the spikes getting longer and longer as the older ones drop off. Although the plant can have 5-10 flowers open at a time ('Rebecca' tends to have more open at a time - mine have had up to 20), the blooming lasts months or even years before it ends in a plantlet. Flowers have a natural spread of 1-1/4".


Phalaenopsis Minimark 'Mendendall' is a cross between P. micro nova and P. philippinensis. P. micro nova is a cross between species P. maculata and P. parishii. Obviously, the cross kept the small flower size (natural spread of 1-1/4"), of maculata and parishii rather than that of philippinensis, and kept many of the spots of maculata. Of course that is relative, since P. parishii has flowers about 3/8" in diameter. Unfortunately, it didn't keep parishii's hinged jaw, which makes the lip wiggle in any breeze. It also didn't inherit P. parishii's grape-sweet fragrance.


This noid (unnamed and unknown parentage) Phalaenopsis is from Whole Foods, but is a nice compact plant. There are so many mini-phals out there, that I'm not even going to guess as to the parentage. Natural spread 2"


I've had an on-going struggle to photograph yellow flowers. The edges of the blooms always seem blurry, the contrast poor. I've been trying to capture this Laeliocattleya Love Fresh for a long time. Slc. Love Fresh is a trigeneric hybrid. Parents are Sophrocattleya Beaufort and Laelia briegeri. Sophrocattleya Beaufort is Sophronitis coccinea and Cattleya luteola. This is a complicated relationship, with the rupicolous (growing on rocks) yellow-flowered Brazilian L. briegeri, epiphytic (tree growing) greenish to yellowish flowers, Amazonian Cattleya luteola, and the Brazilian Sophronitis coccinea, known for it's exacting demands for anyone who tries to grow it outside of its native habitat. At least all the parents are from the same continent (or thereabouts). This is actually a very simple hybrid compared to some of the larger cattleya types. Nevertheless, it's also a cutie (natural spread 2-1/4") that is more challenging to photograph than grow. Alas, the flower stems are weak, and the flowers frequently droop.

Rosemary Blue Spires is turning into quite a looker. It's quite a bright blue, bluer than Gorizia, and darker than Frimley Blue.
The plant has a nicer form than the Tuscan Blue that I see around, although I suspect that what I see aren't true Tuscan Blue. They don't match the description at all, being mounding rather than strictly upright. The red-purple flowers in the photo below are faded flowers that have dropped off the redbud tree.


The second wave of Tulipa batalinii Red Gem is blooming. The plants in the shade are blooming about 2 weeks later than the one in the sun. That first one is fading now.


When the Eremurus foliage begins to brown, the flower spikes make their debut. Here you can just see one poking up through the leaves. It's very unimpressive at this stage, but just wait. By the way, the Philly Foxtail has failed again, even though the plant is as big as the other ones. Unless it makes a late push, I'll have to hope for next year, yet again.

Just photojournaling today. I had some thoughts about borderline plants today, but instead I'd rather just enjoy being outside and among the pretties.

Veronica tauricula is coming into its spring glory. I love this blue.


It's cute how the Eremurus leaves come together in the cold of night. Here, the morning sunlight is just reaching them.


This dark grape hyacinth (M. paradoxum?) is not as much an eye catcher as the brighter blue varieties (M. armeniacum), but I like it.


Heuchera 'Green Spice' isn't as dramatic as the newer hybrids, but it has plenty of drama of its own.


My redbud tree is blooming well this year.


Tulipa batalinii in a red form. I'd forgotten about it after the single bloom last year.I had thought that the small bulbs were weak and gave them up for dead after last year's lackluster bloom. It was ignored through the summer heat and winter cold. They are much tougher than I thought. I wonder why people around here don't get more excited about the species tulips? Our climate is pretty close to that of their native country's.


Rosemary Gorizia is starting to put on a better show than I thought it would.

In case you wanted more convincing on the gravel issue, here's a photo of my neighbor's front yard (they'll kill me if they see it here). The pale crushed rock is nice looking when you pick up a piece; it looks almost white in the sun of the west facing yard. The pinyon trees survive but don't look particularly happy. I wonder if they are getting heat stress or inadequate water for the heat. The debris underneath is a good example of what I mean by gravel being like white carpet, everything stands out. Maybe they should vacuum weekly, but removing that organic mulch might undermine the health of the trees even more as it removes any organic material decomposing under them and removes a moisture barrier (and who has time to vacuum their YARD weekly?).

Another serendipitous combination. I didn't plant the tulip. It existed when I bought the house, and just had a single small leaf that first year I moved in. A couple of years later, it bloomed in my blue garden. Yellow. I didn't have the heart to take it out. Last year, the yellow Angelina sedum appeared in another plant that I bought, and the snippets ended up here. In combination with the grape hyacinths and the Euphorbia characias, the tulip and the sedum make a nice scene, no? It will be better when the plants grow and multiply. Unless something gets taken out before then.

Serendipity: the faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries by accident.
Oxford American Dictionary of Current English

Designing plant combinations is largely knowledge: of growth requirements, local performance, climatic characteristics of the original plants or ancestry, color theory, knowledge of the subtleties of each plant variety and experience. There is also a significant portion of serendipity. Designers are well aware of this, keeping an eye out for serendipitous events, even setting up situations for serendipity to occur. In one of my studio classes, my instructor advised me to stop using the computer to design. She suggested that I return to the old method and use trace paper, pencils and pens, and freely sketch designs to take advantage of accidental occurences. I did. What resulted was a more expressive, exuberant expression of my idea.

Similarly, this is the difference between designing a garden (i.e. planting schemes) on paper, and designing on site. There is certainly value in designing on paper. There is just a time when it is just as pleasurable to just mess around in the garden. When that change occurs is a matter of personal preference, and project. In a professional project, there's less "messing around", and what I'm talking about is primarily one's own garden. It's one of the things that makes me say that to design well, you have to have a garden.

In your own garden, there is much more room for error. As with any design process, you find out many things that don't work in order to discover the things that do work. In the private garden, there is the freedom to move things around at will. There is the freedom to experiment, to do things without thought, and then deal with unsatisfactory events at will.

Of course there is another difference between the private garden and the professional design (among many): the plants in a personal garden may be plants that would never be used in a public scheme. The plants may be too fragile, too ephemeral, require too much care or maintenance, borderline in hardiness. But that shouldn't stop someone from taking advantage of the learning.

When Will went to Amsterdam in the fall several years ago, he brought back a few sacks of tulip bulbs for me. Intending them to be planted in my Blue Garden, he bought tulips that were said to be blue (that's like saying a rose is "blue"), and some that were said to be white. I allowed him to plant them ad-lib in the garden. When they appeared the following spring, the "white" tulips were a creamy yellow, and the "blue" tulips were a vibrant red-purple. They also didn't bloom at the same time, the yellow appearing first, then fading just as the purple tulips began to show color. The serendipity was that the color of the purple tulips exactly matched several things in my garden: the redbud flowers that bloomed at exactly the same time, and the red-purple of the Santa Rita Opuntia, which still had its winter color. Although they didn't match the blues in the garden, nor did they conform to my idea of the garden, the effect was not entirely unpleasant.




Last fall, I planted grape hyacinths (see previous post). In my haste I planted them wherever I found a space. To my surprise this spring, the grape hyacinths bloomed at the same time as the Veronica tauricula, in complementary shades of blue. This is particularly fortuitous considering the brief bloom season of each, in particular the veronica, whose display lasts less than two weeks. The grape hyacinths may last a bit longer, certainly longer than many spring bulbs.

I don't know if these combinations will ever be used in another garden other than my own. The veronica in particular is not a plant that I would consider for public planting. But you can bet that I'll keep my eye out for what is blooming around town to discover other serendipitous ideas.

Overall: not much bloom compared to the rosemary grown in California, but Gorizia and Blue Spires are showing some promise this year. Irene: dead, but it was planted in a pot. It survived until the erratic weather of late winter. I expect that it would do fine planted in the ground in a sheltered spot. Severn Seas: dead, even though it is supposed to be one of the hardier of the prostrate forms. This one turned brown at the first freeze, so it's not very hardy. The prostrate forms seem to do fine in lower elevation parts of town, but I don't see any that do well in my neck of the woods. Fortunately, I'm not very fond of the prostrate forms.

Blue Spires does indeed have very nice deep (for a rosemary) blue flowers and an upright form. Flowers have a pale stripe down the center. It is slower growing than the plain species, but this isn't necessarily a bad thing. It does not form a dense bush, but rather upright sculptural stems or "spires." There are lots of buds on this plant despite winter tip damage, so maybe in the next few weeks it will make a better showing. It's planted against a north wall, which would suggest that hardiness is quite good, but when things are planted on the north wall of a courtyard with a south facing aspect, the overall effect is to moderate the temperature swings that we get. Plants seem to benefit from the warmth accumulated by the south wall, but don't get the dramatic rise and fall of temperature, nor the dehydration of direct sunlight. So plants can be hardier on the protected north wall than on a south wall.



Gorizia has flowers that have a significant amount of pink in them, making them more of a lavender or even pinkish lavender than blue. Flowers seem to change color as they age. They would show better against a dark background such as a dark-stained fence or with dark evergreens behind. The flowers and leaves are supposed to be about double the size of normal rosemary, and although they are certainly larger, one-and-a-half is closer to the truth in my yard. The upright form is sculptural, like Blue Spires, yet a little bolder with its bigger leaves. Like Blue Spires, Gorizia had some tip burn from the winter, planted against a south facing wall. This is not necessarily a benefit to the hardiness of a plant, since it makes the temperatures vary more: higher in the day, but just as cold at night. Gorizia bloomed very nicely in late summer last year, and has lots of buds now, but I've been waiting for them to open for weeks now. Maybe soon.



Frimley Blue was planted in a pot. Over the summer it produced a few very pale blue/white flowers with darker spots. It was overwintered under the porch overhang and survived quite well. Under the open sky, who knows? The flowers this spring are much bluer, and it retains the spots. It seems to be a bit bushier than Blue Spires, and almost as dark flowers. I'm impressed. It seems to bloom only on the tips of the stems, but this may change if I give it more sunlight and as the plant gets larger.



Salem is a rosemary that is known for its hardiness in the northwest. It's supposed to have very bright violet-blue flowers. Although planted on a West wall, which increases the temperature swings that are harmful to plants, this plant survived nearly unscathed - one tip burned. This is better performance than Arp, which always survived winter, but with the tips of all its leaves burned - but, interestingly, not tip burn (the thing I didn't like about Arp was its weak growth habit needing yearly pruning, and inconspicuous pale blue flowers on grey leaves - but if it did grow rapidly). Salem hasn't bloomed for me this year. Perhaps it will give me a summer bloom, or perhaps it will take a year or two, as some do. Tuscan Blue, planted in this same spot, was removed because even though it grew well (suffering only tip burn from winter) it barely flowered. I'll have to try some cuttings of Salem in other parts of the garden, or in a pot.


This noid rosemary was purchased by Will a few years back, and has bloomed so profusely in his yard, both early spring and in summer, that I had to take a cutting and trial it in my yard. His plants are grown against a south facing, wind-protected brick wall, so his plants bloom just about as heavily as the plants I remember from California. My cutting is two years old, and produced no flowers at all this spring. Although young plants can go without flowering, I seem to remember Will's plants blooming strongly even when small. My plant suffered just a bit of tip burn from winter (as did Will's). It's planted against a south-facing wall. Will's plants are about four feet tall with bushy multi-branching habit and wide-spreading branches from the ground. Flowers are a pale blue, not as dark as I usually prefer, but lovely en masse.

Will's plant this year:

Even though a plant might look winter killed, or mostly winter killed, just wait. It might be better off than you think.
Remember the ceanothus from my Death Harvest 2008 post? Now it looks like it just acts like a deciduous plant. Still, I'm trying the hybrid 'Gloire de Versailles' this year.

Just to keep you updated, here's the Eremurus in morning light. Leaves are kinda nice, huh?