Silver and Kay White walk past their soft-fruit net-house. Note that the roof is tied back: it will be rolled out when the first fruit ripens.

Last week, I shared with you an e-rant from Sally Fox, last year’s president of the garden club. She complained that, while in years past she enjoyed a large harvest of raspberries, “This year, I have harvested FIVE.  Why?  The birds came and ate them ALL.  But why? For two years we shared nicely. This year it is very different. Clues?”

So I asked around and, turns out, everybody is having trouble saving their raspberries from birds. Finally, I called Bob Norton, one of the founders of the Vashon Fruit Club. “Yes, I’ve heard that complaint from everyone, and I have a theory: want to hear it?”

Of course… 

Bob’s explanation has to do with our cool spring. This time of year, fruit-eating birds such as robins, starlings, and cedar waxwings eat predominantly the fruit of Prunus avian or bird cherry, also known as the mazzard. This wild tree, says Norton, is the parent of our domestic eatable cherry and is still often used as a grafting stock for orchard cherries. These tall, slender trees bloom in March, lighting up our woodland margins in clouds of dainty, dingy white.

This year, says, Norton, our spring was so cool that the bees didn’t emerge until after the mazzards flowered. With no bees to reach the flowers, there’s no pollination: thus, none of those wild cherries that the birds prefer to eat. Though robins, for instance, are adapted to eat primarily cherries, they’re certainly put a peck into any soft fruit they can reach—like your strawberries, raspberries, or currants.

“The problem is probably worse this year because we had such good bird-raising conditions last year,” Bob conjectured. “The birds had a good hatch and probably more chicks survived to this year, so now there’s more competition for food. They’re even in my plums, these days.”

So if you’ve got berries, you’ve probably also got birds gobbling them down. 
What to do?

The only real solution is to tent your berries with bird-netting. For raspberries, it’s probably too late, said Bob, but he warned, “blueberries are next, so if you want to keep them for yourself, better net them now.”

Bird-netting—black webbing at 1″ intervals—is available at our local hardware stores. My friend Sandy, who has grown blueberries for decades, thinks that draping the bushes in tulle—the same fabric as ballerina tutus—works better. “I clothes-pin tulle net fabric over them when they’re loaded with berries.  You can buy ‘bird proof’ netting, but the mesh on it is large enough that the clumps of berries get tangled in it and it makes picking the bushes a hassle.” 

Yes, when branches grow through the netting, there’s no way to lift the netting without ripping off leaves—and berries. And birds can get tangled in the nets, too. I recently participated in a discussion on www.growveg.com about that predicament, one which “G” had that changed her ways.

“ I’ve always shared with the birds, ever since I found a live goldfinch tangled in the previous years’ bird netting.  I cut him out and carefully picked all that black, sticky netting from his wings. He sat rather stunned for awhile on my hand and then jumped on my shoulder, where he sat for several minutes.  It felt like he was saying, “Thank you.”  I haven’t had the heart to use the nasty stuff again.”

Another good, though large-scale solution is to build a berry-house. You may have seen Kay White’s berry enclosure during the VAA Garden Tour: it’s a big square enclosure built with 8′ tall poles and lightweight wooden beams between them, with bird-netting wrapped all around it to make both walls AND a roof. To avoid collecting leaves, Kay’s crew leaves the net-roof rolled back through most of the year, unrolling it over the berries before the shrubs set fruit. It’s a permanent solution that works best if you have many shrubs; maximize the protection by including strawberry beds and grapevines in it.

Ken Miller and Barb Adams on the north end also put a net-house around their berries. He says, “We call it a “room with a view,” looking at all those nice berries. We too can roll the top back.”

I’m not going to net this year because my blueberry bushes are new and in their first year are supposed to be pruned of fruit anyway. Whatever berries escaped my notice, the birds are welcome to. But not next year!

I was going to attend a photography workshop at Anita Halstead’s garden this beautiful Saturday morning. But I’ve been over-subscribed this last month, so when my 14-year-old niece, touring our ravine garden, reached out to a flower and it was a STINGING NETTLE, I realized it’s my own garden (as well as Kelly) that’s screaming for attention.

And so, out with pruners, weed-wacker, and a guilty conscience to beat back July’s unruly growth. Now I KNOW I did a clean-up before the Garden Tour so that I wouldn’t come home and feel bad about my own garden. Yet here’s nettle leaning into the paths of the ravine, an ilex vomatoria blocking the way down my wooden stairs, and a retaining wall that’s disappeared under a rug of hairy geranium. You think you’re keeping the green tide at bay, but just like with the sea and ol’ King Canute, it will sneak its way in somewhere, somehow…

Dig The Reds at DIG

Noticing last week that DIG was offering 30-50% discounts on hardy perennials, I stopped in and asked her about perennials that will still put on a show this late in the growing season.

She waved her hand at “Any of these will work”—and I was Seeing Red. Her front tables was bursting with red penstemon, red montbretia, red sage, raspberry-red gaura, apricot agastache, and coral cape fuchsia. FIELDS of red dahlias surounding fountain, outdoor carpet, big gray ginger jar. That Sylvia: she’s a dab hand with color. Above left, that’s a penstemon with smaller cape fuchsia blooms on the right and montbretia foliage behind; red dahlias are on the right. Below are more dahlias and a lobelia laxiflora which, Sylvia says, “Hummingbirds just adore.”

lobela laxiflora left; red dahlias right

Speaking of “Seeing Red”…

I’ve had some good rants in my email inbox this week. Michelle of Pacific Potager sent me a notice about an organic farm in Washington that lost big crops to a compost they brought in that was contaminated with the herbicide Clopyralid. She wrote, “I know I feel crazy when people tell me what they are adding to their soil, what compost mix they are buying, what they have purchased to “make” their garden… as if they would KNOW what that stuff is…  I always advocate improving your soil in place, with cover crops, compost you make, etc… It takes longer, maybe, but you aren’t adding problems…”

I know when I’ve gone to pick up manure at local farms, I’ve asked whether they’ve sprayed their fields or given the animals any medications that might have passed through the gut still potent. If you’re uncertain about an imported soil amendment, test it in some small, out-of-the-way section of garden first.

And Not Seeing Red

Sally Fox, last year’s Garden Club President, wrote me about her missing raspberries.

“Last year I had HUNDREDS of raspberries — maybe thousands.  This year – I have harvested five.  Why?  The birds came and ate THEM ALL.  But why? For two years we shared nicely.  This year it is very different.  Carolina Nurik of Maury, who sells at the marke,t has had the same problem.  Clues?  Do we have to net our raspberries now?”

Pursuing the situation more, she wrote later, “I heard from Rob Patterson of Plum Forest that it might be because the wild cherry crop was so poor this year – so they have turned to our berries.  He has seen a correlation between cherry crops and berry attacks.” And yet later, “My former east coast riding instructor told me they always had to net their raspberries and that once the birds make a habit of attacking them, it is over – they will be back.”

Anybody else losing their berry crops to birds worse than usually?

Some Summer Reds on the Burton Peninsula

Driving back from DIG, I pondered that whole question of Summer Flowers: after the late spring bloom-party of roses, rhodies, lilacs, irises, and peonies, what’s going to give your garden equal impact during the Days of All Outdoors? Driving up the lead road to the Burton Loop, indeed the lawns looked a little, well, SPARE of flowers.

Still, there ARE some plants that are looking good right now. My favorite cottage near Guv’s Lane had this colorful collection around its chimney: a red rose, red valerian, thread-leaf coreopsis, and shasta daisies.

And around the corner to the left, once again I was Seeing Red: some Shirley Poppies, with red montbretia and more red dahlias behind. 

Lots of Red, Overhead

Finally, this beauty-shot is from Pt. Defiance Park. I had a little time to kill before catching the south-end ferry, so Mom and I walked through the Pt. Defiance Rose Garden. But the beds of hybrid teas and floribundas, though nice, can’t compete with the rose-covered pergola that leads to the entrance. Personally, I think Climbing Roses give more bang for the buck: just one plant will out-shine a bed of a dozen shrub roses. And a climber keeps your ground free for other plants.

So in your garden, if you want a color to ride the rising Green Tide of high summer, think RED. 

from left: Alex and Kathryn True, Little Story, mom Sarah Laine and Canyon, Leslie Patheal, Cathy Fulton, and Jenn Coe.

Jenn Coe put out the call for garlic harvesters last week, and wanting to see how mature garlic looks coming out of the ground, I wrestled the wheelbarrow into the pick-up and drove off to Happy Garden on Maury Island.

This was the site of last year’s Food Bank Farm, but the land-owner, David Kirkland, died over the winter and his children have other plans for the place. Meanwhile the farm-stand’s gone skeletal, the fields shaggy and blown, and the harvesting of the garlic felt more like plucking survivors from the waves of grain, clover, and thistle coming on strong.

Elephant Garlic

The harvesters were already hard at it when I arrived at the opening bell of 1pm. Mounds of elephant garlic—a leek, actually—were piling up in the trampled rows as shovels and forks popped them out of the ground. My, they were large: heads about 4″ across, the plants as tall as this busy younster who didn’t want to be photographed as he hauled his harvest to the nearest drop-pile.

Hauling the Elephant Garlic

You can see that the garlic has gone brown at the tips, and this apparently is the perfect stage to harvest. Ron Engeland, author of “Growing Great Garlic” who farms the stinking rose in the Okanogan country, says each green leaf represents one bulb wrapper—that papery stuff you have to peel from the garlic head to reach individual cloves—and if you let all the leaves fade to brown, your wrappers are fading away, too. Since you want those wrappers intact to protect the garlic from drying out, the perfect time to pick garlic is when more than half your plants are going brown at the tips of the top-most leaves. 

Since the elephant garlic was nearly all pulled, Barbara Stratton and I applied our forks and shovels to releasing the hardnecks and softnecks. From their magenta color, I suspect that the softnecks were the variety “Spanish Roja”, considered one of the very best. These you can braid, but not the hardnecks, which as you’d expect from the name stay stiff-necked from ground to truck. These are the heads where the cloves cluster around a central shaft, and they are the original form of garlic. Softnecks have been bred over the centuries for market trade; what we buy in the grocery store is probably the softneck ‘California Early’ or ‘California Late’ grown in Gilroy, California.

from left: Leslie Patheal, Cathy Fulton, Barbara Stratton, and Jenn Coe.

With the 500 row feet of garlic all pulled, we sat down to bundle the garlic for hanging in the barn now at the present Food Bank Garden on Wax Orchard Road. Though you can cook garlic “green” as soon as you get it out of the ground, it will keep only if you “cure” it in a warm, shady place around 80° with plenty of air circulation. In fact, the “experts” recommend using fans if your garlic is even a little moist or if there’s little air movement in your “curing” room.

When Jenn’s truck started to fill up, I tried counting the bundles of dozens and lost count at 65. Jenn said, “I know I’m putting more in a bundle than 12,” so I’m guessing we must have harvested 1200-1500 garlic plants. In 2-3 weeks after their “cure”, another work crew will brush the dirt off, peel back outer wrappers to a clean one, trim the roots and stem from each bulb, and crate them for the Food Bank.

Freshly exposed to what a mature garlic looks like, I went home and poked my fingers into the soil around my own garlic plants. Sure enough, there’s a nicely swollen bulb down there. But only 30% of my 24 plants have gone brown at the tips, so I’ll just pull away the drip-hoses to dry them out entirely before pulling the plants at the end of the month.

If any break open in the meantime, I’ll set those aside for re-planting. And come October, when Jenn puts out the call, I’ll go get another lesson in garlic farming and this time, learn to plant.

Hummm… but will it fit in my salad bowl??

I took this photo about ten days ago. Since then, this Red Romaine and its brothers have been bulking up in Row 5 of what I call “GreenDale Farm,” the vegie patch I get to help with at Bill and Lee Green’s alpaca ranch.  

For me, gardening in a different Island microclimate is an eye-opener. Because GreenDale Farm enjoys full sun and sandy loan soil, tilled rich with alpaca manure and maple leaves, the patch grows most vegetables bigger and quicker than my own hole in the forest. 

Watching how two different gardens grow is thrilling, stomach-filling, and sometimes downright scary. My home garden in the half-shade grows lettuce a’plenty, so the GreenDale lettuce, undisturbed, grows on and on to Gigantor size.  Blink, and the radishes turn into golf-balls. The komatsuna mustard grew from hand-long leaves to boat paddles in three weeks. 

And this Red Romaine—sheesh!—it’s like our Stuffed Moosehead of the Garden. Some prize-winner, sure, but what do you DO with the monster?

(below: Same Seeds, Different Soil.  In the circular inset, the slim, 6″ long leaves of the Red Romaine grown in my shady garden. The big Red Romaine towering over the ripe looseleaf in front of it, came from the same flat as the other, grown from the same packet of seed. What a difference soil and site make!)

Bill, my garden mentor, had the answer: braised lettuce. “I made it for breakfast the other day. Bacon and vinegar in a skillet, then throw in the chopped lettuce just till it wilts—delicious!” 

Wilted Romaine Salad with Bacon

Half a romaine this size feeds two for lunch amply. And like most cooked-greens recipes, this will shrink the lettuce to half its original size or less.

Harvest a big romaine or other lettuce that’s crispy, and wash carefully; cut or tear leaves into 1″+ strips, put in a big salad bowl. Cut three pieces of bacon into cross-wise strips, 1/4 or more wide.. Put in a big skillet, cook on med-high, and when it’s almost cooked through, take 1/2 cup of malt vinegar, pour it in with the bacon (careful for spatters), sugar it to make tangy, salt and pepper it, then pour this tangy sauce over the lettuce and toss until the leaves wilt. Serve immediately.

First, the News:

Cathy Fulton of Mariposa Gardens will hold an Open House & Potluck this Saturday, July 3rd to show her many sustainability projects such as the aquaponic (fish-growing) system, the permaculture guild, frugal container gardening, and bed-turning with a Broadfork. The Open House starts at 4pm, the Potluck at 6pm: bring a dish and maybe musical instruments for some jammin’ later. The address is 228 SW 209th Street, about 100 yards down Monument Road where you can park and walk up her rough gravel driveway. If you just want to help, she’s having a work party Friday to prepare, or you can be a “docent.” To contact her, visit http://mariposagardens.org. 

Greens on a Deadline

Are we on the cusp of real summer?

One hint is that the cool-weather crops, mature for a few weeks now, are showing signs they’re getting ready to bolt. My loose-leaf lettuce sprawls open, some spinach plants have seed-pods in their top-knots, the mustards and choi wave yellow flowers in the air. Even the Langley Farms’ cabbage, which over-wintered well, has chosen this moment to head up and keel over.

Yes, there’s a LOT of leafy greens out there, thanks to all the rain we’ve “enjoyed.”  After eating as much as two households can, Bill Green and I gazed over rows still stuffed with produce and decided to donate lettuce, spinach, cress, pak choi, and armloads of Komatsuna, an Asian mustard spinach, to the Food Bank. 15 pounds worth—felt good. 

And I wasn’t the only one: as I was loading bags out the front door into the Food Bank’s delivery van, another gardener heavy-laden with greens walked in the back door and called out “Can you use these?”

Who knew Spinach would be good with Strawberries?

Henry, head of Thriftway produce, approached me as I was digging for the second day in a row through the flats of Sakuma Brothers strawberries. “They’ve been flying out the door ever since we decided to sell by weight and put up the ‘take as much as you want’ sign.” He said the store will be getting Sakuma Bros. raspberries later today (Wednesday, 30th), with blueberries later, finally blackberries and boysenberries. 

If you’re lucky, you might also score some locally grown strawberries at the farmer’s market or at farm stands this weekend.

I’ve been enjoying the California organic strawberries this spring—in a green salad dressed with a fruity vinaigrette, they add good color and a tart, refreshing taste. In fact, they’re better this way than in a dessert.

But these are WASHINGTON berries, from Sakuma Brothers, the largest berry grower in Skagit County. And while not organic, these strawbs are truly Dessert-Worthy—all the way red, sweet and soft, and ripe THIS MINUTE. 

And only with such ripe berries can you understand why Italians love strawberries in balsamic vinegar. Here’s two recipes that marry the berries to this magic dark elixir.

Strawberry Spinach Salad

Wash and cut fresh spinach across the leaf into ribbons. Top with slices of plain feta cheese or dollops of creme fraiche (I’ll explain how to make that below). Place 6-8 sliced strawberries on top of the cheese and drizzle a vinaigrette of 1 tablespoon olive oil, 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar, S & P and a bit of sweetener.

Black-Tie Strawberries & Creme (fraiche)

You start this the day before with a pint of yogurt and two empty plastic containers, one a pint, the other just large enough to hold the pint with room below (We use pint and quart versions of salsa containers). In the pint container, cut a slit in the bottom that’s 3/4″ wide and shaped like a half-opened eye, not quite all the way across the bottom. Put a coffee filter on top of this, then the pint within the larger jar. Here’s your creme fraiche maker, cheap and simple.

Buy or make a pint of plain, rather stiff yogurt: Nancy’s yogurt works well. Pour yogurt into the coffee filter in the pint container until nearly full, then place the whole contraption into the refrigerator to let the yogurt shed its whey into the “well” in the quart container. In 24 hours, you’ll have a yogurt cheese that’s remarkably like creme fraiche, thick enough to stand up a spoon. Sweeten with sugar for a sweet treat, or season with savories, garlic salt, or herbs for a cracker spread.

(DON’T pour the whey down your plumbing: Cindy Morrison confessed in her recent cheese class that when she did that, cheese formed up in her pipes! So toss it into your garden beds or compost, or use the whey in bread-making.)

The next day, in the hour before dinner, wash strawberries, sweeten, and over them drizzle a scant tablespoon of balsamic vinegar. Mix and set aside for flavors to develop. 

After dinner, sweeten 1/4 cup (per person) of creme fraiche and layer in the bottom of dessert bowls. In a separate small bowl, make a chocolate paste with that squeezeable Hershey’s chocolate sauce you bought (for your kids, yah RIGHT!) and a tablespoon or two of powdered cocoa (sweeten if bitter); dollop a spoonful of that in each dessert bowl. Finally, artifully arrange the strawberries over the chocolate and sprinkle on a “snow” of sweetener if needed. A sprig of mint will dress this up nicely. And if you want to really amaze your guests, ask them if they’d “like a grinding of black pepper on that?”

Of all the gardens in the VAA Garden Tour, this one is the most relaxed—now that it’s done.

When Greg and Lisa Elliott moved in, the landscape around their house was a tangle of undergrowth beneath the trees, sopping wet from run-off coming from uphill. Today, it’s a landscape of soothingly flat lawns separated by rock terraces and wide beds, surrounded by paths Greg bushwacked through his forest.

When you approach, notice the two large coral-bark maples, brilliantly lime against the galvanized metal garage. Descend the steps down the center of Greg’s favorite border, now blooming with red-blooming heuchera against golden abelias and grasses. Framing the front door are two box-leaf azara trees, one variegated, one not; ‘Variegata’ lost much of its top in the winter storm of 08/09.

To the east is the first stone wall, created to ease the uphill water run-off; there’s a french tile at its toe. Mahonia, Cistus, Hardy Geraniums, and small trees punctuate it. Near the border’s center steps is another near-casualty: a snowbell tree now in bloom that lost its top when part of the willow uphill fell on it.

Opposite, against the house, is a series of variegated plants: Iris pallida, Hosta, and a surprisingly large variegated Buxus. At the SE corner, a Phlomis jabs its weird yellow flowers in front of a mounding golden Berberis. Beside the house, yellow dwarf Callas bloom. Uphill, yellow Asiatic lilies are just coming on. 

And around the corner, slightly up in the woods, a splendid dogwood tree—Cornus kousa—glows like the moon rising in the shadows, preceded by a purple Berberis contrasting with a Spirea bumalda ‘Gold Flame” in front.

This is a restrained garden, but all this variegation, silver, and gold, move the Elliott Garden from dull to sparkling. As you move to the west side of the house, notice the groundcover Corydalis lutea (yellow fumitory) covered with tiny yellow funnels against tear-drop leaves. These plants are descendents from the garden of Greg’s grandma, who died in 1970. “I kept the seeds in my desk drawer through college and beyond, and threw them on the ground here years ago.  I love that they self-sustain and move around the yard.” In fact, they’ve crowding up against a large stand of Solomon’s Seal. Also here is a Fatsia that once rose to the house gutters before being struck down by, again, that winter storm of 08/09.

Greg says, “the garden’s basically finished now,” but I get the sense there’s a new interest budding. In that favorite border, he wanted me to see two diminutive plants: a tiny Pagoda Holly by the steps, stubby at 16″ high and further on, what looks like a spray of evergreen fiber-optics. “That’s an Alaskan Red Cedar—it’s called ‘Whipcord.’ Isn’t it great? I got it from Portland Avenue Nursery in Tacoma. I really like their stuff.”

Maybe the Elliott Garden isn’t done after all.

EVEN MORE UPDATED 6/23:  Q13 ran the short piece on the Vashon Island Food Bank farm last night: click here to see the 2-minute video: 

UPDATE: Jenn phoned me with the news that Q13 TV is coming TODAY—that Tuesday, June 22. They’ll probably arrive with cameras 2:30-3pm. So come with weeding tools and in your “most authentic” gardening togs.

If you haven’t had your 15 seconds of fame yet, here’s your chance. Jenn Coe, farmer for the Food Bank Garden, send this message around this morning—

“Hello fellow gardeners,

I will be at the Wax Orchard Farm tomorrow afternoon and so will Q13 T.V.!  
They would very much like to meet our volunteers, so come, weed and be famous!!!
I will be working 9am to 11:30 or so and then again 2pm to 5pm.  Q13 is expected in the afternoon.  Call if you need directions.

You can also join us at the Sunrise Ridge garden on Wednesday 9 to noon and then back at the farm on Thursday morning, 9am to noon.  If you would like to help, but these times don’t work for you, please call so we can arrange a better time.

Jenn
384-0973

The Beachcomber published their story on the Food Bank Farm last week. I know that the media often steals story ideas from each other… somebody at Q13 must be reading our local rag!

Cool! I got a photo of my garden on the Facebook pages of GrowVeg.

Earlier this spring, I blogged on using www.GrowVeg.com, the online vegetable bed planning software and have been using the software ever since to plan and keep records. They send e-articles monthly, and this month were writing about strawberries. One reader asked about a better way to protect strawberry beds against birds, so I commented about the way I net my raised beds.

Emails from me, from Jeremy Dore, the creator of GrowVeg, and Brenda the Curious Reader criss-crossed the web over the next 24 hours. Upshot is, Jeremy posted a photo I sent of my net-protected raised bed in my kitchen garden, plus the entire description of how this netting system works. It starts “Do you need to protect your garden crops from birds?” and continues on with the “Read More.”

To see the photo and what amounts to a small article (was I EVER brief?), visit GrowVeg’s “wall” by clicking here.

[I blogged this garden and gardener before, on December 7, 2009: for the full entry (which describes the garden's design and creation), click here to see "Garden Club Award Winners." ]

Listening to jazz on this drippy Saturday morning, Jazziness is what comes to mind as a metaphor for  John and Colleen James’ garden on the Burton loop. It’s a syncopation of hot colors and contrasts, of ‘Hot Lips’ and ‘Black-eyed Susans’, with daturas blowing trumpets and bugles swinging low, presided over by a ginger jar pot-bellied and blue.

Colleen has been gardening here since moving from Gig Harbor in 2005, and she started propagating plants in 2008. She used to create jewelry, but when the family strain of macular degeneration set in, she transferred her creative drive to an art with a broader brush. “Have you ever seen the late works of Monet?” she asked me. “He had macular degeneration, yet his last paintings are BEAUTIFUL!” 

So is her garden. Because of her vision’s need, her plant choices provide plenty of visual punch. She adores dark plants—especially purple—using them as a dark foil for golden foliage and yellow flowers.

You can see such contrasts quickly if you hang a right around the corner of the garage. There, shaded from 10am onward, is her shade garden. Here above a dark carpet of purple bugle, the golden Japanese forest grass (Hakonechloa macra)and a golden lavatera light up the somber darks of Ligularia ‘yellow rocket’ and a black snakeroot at the corner—more teal than black here given the dearth of sun.

You might notice a little red-headed flower weaving in and out; this is Sage ‘Hot Lips’, which is all over this garden. As you exit the shade garden, head downhill to the house’s SE corner to see ‘Hot Lips’ full grown, a spectacle in red, white, and green. Next to it is another plant Colleen has much propagated, which she’s dubbed ‘Hot Pink’ after its neighbor. Colleen says ‘Hot Lips’ blooms from spring through frost, in full sun to partial shade, and literally REPELS deer.

This garden is open to deer, so Colleen’s garden design venture specializes in deer-resistant plants “though they can surprise you— this spring they’ve been eating my sedums!” (mine, too!) She’s found that deer don’t eat ligularias, hostas, japanese forest grass, royal fern or painted fern, or sweet box. I suspect one could add to that list her Japanese irises (Iris ensata), which she loves so much she propagated 350 of them last spring. 

 The garden slopes downward to the house, and there you’ll find the labor of Colleen’s winter: a greenhouse and benches with HUNDREDS of propagated plants she’ll offer for sale during tour. 20% of proceeds will go to VAA, the rest to help fund her “plant-aholic addiction.” She described the difficulty of getting Japanese iris to germinate—two striations, then mowing the tiny first leaves down to develop roots under grolites. “I just LOVE getting a seed to germinate.”

As you go back up the steps, try not to tromp on one of Colleen’s favorite fillers “that people don’t notice unless I point it out—the tiny daisy Erigeron, also known as fleabane or Santa Barbara daisy. It fills in so beautifully with little flecks of light, growing all over the place. It’s easy to yank out where I don’t want it, it’s not annoying, spills down through things, blooms all season.”

She also uses  ajuga—also known as purple bugle— as a ground cover. “It’s good growing against a succulent called golden “Angelina”  in the walkway—they’re pushy enough to fight each other.” And it’s so prolific that she’ll give people pieces of it, right out of the ground. So why not ask? And buy a few plants off her to support her “plant-aholic addiction” before the NW Perennial Alliance descends like a swarm later this summer. 

To get tickets to Vashon Allied Arts’ garden tour next weekend, June 26-27, go online to www.vashonalliedarts.org.

In so many ways, Sherene & Rick’s garden is an exercise in “Be Here, Now.”

When you come visit their garden on Indian Head, you’ll be handed a flyer that guides you down the “Meditation Path” they’ve created across their hillside. At its many stations, cued by quotation plaques and art, you can take in the distant view, the Wisdom of the Ages…

…and the inescapable feeling that while your thoughts may be high-flying, your feet are on precarious ground.

The Skillman/Zolno garden is on a high terrace of Indian Head, a forested slope of firs and maples, hemlocks and madrones, of leaf-muck clay and sandy pockets. Because it’s so steep, the soil wants to “Go Down There, Now” (it’s tried, at least three times) and so a garden has been developed to hold the land in place. 

Let’s take it from the top: the Salmon Gate, made by Rick Skillman, Valerie Willson & Penny Grist (artist credits for the many artworks will be on the flyer, so I won’t go on repeating them). The gate opens onto the head of a steep ravine where, in 1998, a large big-leaf maple fell, taking slopes, new paths, and brand-new stairway with it. To hold and restore this ground, Sherene replanted in natives like red-flowering currant, rhodies, nootka rose, and snowberry, which close to the paths is trimmed hedge-fashion.

As you wind down the stairs toward the greenhouse, you’ll come to a style of pipe-n-beam terracing that you’ll see throughout the garden. Three years after they moved here in 1995, their gardener Beth Kellner noticed sand eroding into the garage from the slope above. She recommended Al Bradley, rock and retaining wall specialist; he and crew drove rows of steel pipe 10-14 feet down into hardpan, then stacked 12′x4′ beams of PT behind the pipes (they’re masked by Rick’s wood-box “posts”).

When they noticed erosion around the south side of the house, Al started a new wall that ended up joining Rick’s goat-path to a plum tree he’d discovered east, buried under blackberries (the “Bodhi Tree”). That wall project laid down a path, which required a stairs, which needed a landing, on which Rick built a shelter, that now overhangs the pool that collects the waterfall that cascades down the stairs. One garden project suggested another.

Rick became very skilled at building wooden garden features, such as the Yogananda and St. Francis shelters. A devotee of Yogananda, he built the bench at the foot of the “Bodhi Tree”, their blackberry-rescued plum, and installed statues of Yogananda and the hermit saint Babaji. Beth and Sherene built a rock garden where the Yogananda statue sits today, and when Beth retired, Sherene took over all the gardening duties. She spends about 30% of her time now, gardening. (“70% prepping for tour,” she added.)

And they became art collectors. Down by the Dockton Overlook Deck, search for Rick’s “Sprite” garden of little figurines. 

The latest art, installed two weeks ago, is a railing of painted iron and blown-glass by Tacoma counselor/minister/iron-worker Chris Causey. The railing leads to the original lawn, which is ringed by perennials and two magnolias kept low against the view. Toward the back is an bellflower/astilbe/lily garden.

And there, you’ll find the latest bit of ground to succumb: it’s marked by a vertical field of foxgloves. This ground gave way in January 2009. Again, Al Bradley and Dave Stout battened down the ground, while Sherene and helper Norm replanted in natives, laying 25′ ladders upon the face of the slide for access to the slippery slope. 

Sherene, Rick, and their helpers have turned problems into opportunities. Take in their garden when you’re ready for inspiration and for the many rest-stops along their Meditation Path. And along the way, say a prayer for their garden: that it will “Be Here, Now” for the long run.

Tickets for the VAA Garden Tour, June 26-27, are available at the Blue Heron Art Center or online: www.vashonalliedarts.org.
Visitors should park above the garden on Pillsbury Road and enter the garden through the “Salmon Gate.” There’s limited “drop-off” parking at the bottom of a steep driveway.