November’s first rains start the season I call Clouds and Light. After months of brilliant blue, sunny skies, the weather and wildlife are the stars of the show… The garden is buttoned up, the last of the garden’s produce picked and there is a rest for the gardener, finally. With the Peckinpah Ridge as the…
One year of seeds brings seven years of weeds! Three things will make your life easier when it comes to weeds in your garden… #1 Mulch I use mulch around the plants in my garden as a lazy way to manage weeds. After three years of mulching your garden, you’ll see that your weeding chores have lessened…
Hello! Just wanted all my blog followers to know that I have switched from WordPress.com to WordPress.org and now my url is www.sierrafoothillgarden.com. What led to this change? First, I found that I need to go back to work temporarily…hopefully for just a few years. This is a big change in lifestyle for me, since…
It is a commonly heard in casual remarks on gardening topics and maintaining a landscape in the Sierra Foothills that Manzanita and other chaparral plants must be cut down and removed because they are so very flammable. Yes, it is important to clear 100 feet of defensible space around your home, and yes, Manzanita can…
“The more people know about bats the more they’ll care about them.” Sitting out tonight, while watering, I noticed a few mosquitoes and moths flying about in the half light. I hadn’t realized so much that bats could see the same insects as I, yet, here they were, swooping and darting around the big sky…
or …Why I remember a Sunset Magazine article from 1999. A few months before we bought our place here in the shadow of Peckinpah Mountain, I read an article called ‘What to plant under native oaks and pines?’ Do you still have the September 1999 issue of Sunset magazine? No? Well, if you live in…
The natural meadow in the second year By that, I mean, this is the second year that I have weeded but not planted here. I’ve planted my 5 year old garden in irrigation zones. The area around the house gets the most water and has the most ‘non-native, but Mediterranean plants.’ We’re on a slope…
I’m only mentioning my impressions of the house pad prep, because to tell it all would be very boring. Although,….we country folk can talk for hours amongst ourselves about the details of our septic installations and well digging. Those subjects, especially the depth and gallons per minute for your well are hot topics among the flannel…
Butterfly gardeners begin this way….they see a colorful butterfly in their garden and start paying attention. They want to see more so they wait and observe during the spring and summer. How can they see more kinds, they wonder. That’s how I began, I’m sure. Once you begin observing, you notice more and more about…
First views of my garden at the first of April…. First views is the brainchild of Town Mouse, with the idea that wider views will give a better idea of what our gardens look like and a record of how they change throughout the year. Join in by visiting her post here! *** I have…
The table centerpiece catches snow and adds a bit of color to the natural beauty beyond.…
What I thought might be buckeye or elderberry, turns out to be pokeweed! Darn! My sister helped my identify this by punching in descriptive words into Google images. How did it possibly get here, so close to the native forest at the edge of the property? American Pokeweed, Phytolacca americana, is native to the Eastern US…
Across the valley, where Willow Creek flows south, there is a tall sugarpine that becomes backlit at a certain point in the morning. It must be on our side of the mountain, but far below. Here it is in November: Early morning, February 15th, I woke up to see everything covered in a frosting of…
Gophers and other living garden pests can drain the enthusiasm from the hardiest gardener in the California Sierra foothills. To have your beloved plants eaten from below can be very discouraging. Once, while relaxing on the patio, I came suddenly alert by a waving plant in the distant garden bed. On a windless day, a leafy…
While going out to photograph my ‘first views’ of February in my California mountain garden, I already know that my predictions of January 1st,…that we’d have snow by now, are false. My photos are for Town Mouse’s meme, First Views. Visit her post, and sign in to the Mr Linky tool there to join in! …
The first photo is from a set taken this month after a small fire broke out in the valley a mile up from my California mountain garden. It shows a Ponderosa pine tree superimposed over the column of smoke. The second photo shows the same tree appearing through the gathering storm. Welcome rain! The valley…
We took this photo up on the hill above our house, in the California Sierra foothills on Tuesday. There is still fire danger out there and you can see the burned trees from 12 years ago. This smoke above was from a stolen car set on fire. Fire slowly spread through our property in August 2001 before we…
“In the woods.., a man casts off his years, as the snake his slough , and at what period soever of life, is always a child. In the woods, is perpetual youth. Within these plantations of God, a decorum and sanctity reign, a perennial festival is dressed, and the guest sees not how he should…
