Category: Column: Josh Reilly

By Josh Reilly It’s June in the SLV. The Winter rainy season is over. Short of a miracle or a biblical apocalypse, there will be no rain from now until at least late September. Water, as everybody is now telling you, is scarce. The meaning of “average rainfall” keeps changing. With less water, can we still garden and enjoy the… Read More

By Josh Reilly There are plenty of ways to economize in the garden. Grow drought tolerant plants and water less frequently. Plant perennials, shrubs, and trees in Fall to take advantage of the rains and lower weed competition. Buy plants on the “Sale” table at your nursery or garden center. Grow plants from seed. Propagate your own plants from cuttings, seeds,… Read More

By Josh Reilly The UCSC Arboretum holds one of the largest collections of Australian, New Zealand, and South African plants outside their continents of origin. It also has a huge native California Garden, a collection featuring natives and drought-tolerant plants that do well in Santa Cruz area gardens, and a Succulent Garden, featuring plants from semi-arid regions all over the… Read More

By Josh Reilly Might as well call it “March Madness.”  You will be busy this month if you want: Spring vegetables in your garden Healthy soil Copious Spring flowers A tidy landscape, with carefully pruned plants, clean paths, raked beds and fewer weeds Persephone is venturing out from Hades. This month, higher temperatures and longer days make your garden more… Read More

By Josh Reilly February, the month of love and of Saint Valentine. We know little of Valentine, except that he lived in the 2nd century CE and lost his head after insisting on performing Christian rites in then pagan Rome. For his trouble (and accounts are gruesome), he was sainted about 300 years later, possibly on February 14. Valentine’s story… Read More

By Josh Reilly What are “bare root” plants? These are plants raised to maturity in soil for the retail nursery trade. Harvested during the Winter dormant season, the roots are cleaned of all soil, packed in wood shavings, paper or other absorbent material, and shipped in paper or plastic. They are displayed thus packaged at the nursery or in beds… Read More

By Josh Reilly You don’t have to encourage wildlife in the garden. It’s there already. In fact, you are probably trying to do the opposite, at least when it comes to raccoons, mice, squirrels, insects, birds that eat seedlings, and those twin scourges of SLV gardens, gophers and deer.  Other visitors, however, are most welcome, if a bit hesitant or… Read More

By Josh Reilly Fall is the season of bedrock Puritan virtues in the garden, like delayed gratification, preparedness, hard work, and thrift. It’s the best time to plant perennials, shrubs, trees, bulbs, many leafy vegetables, vines, and almost everything else (except bare root roses, best planted in January). In the San Lorenzo Valley, Fall brings the rain. Hence, savings on… Read More