Succulents and More™

Happy Halloween, everybody! I was trying to think of a gardening- or plant-related topic that goes with Halloween. Then, as I stepped out the front door and saw the bowl of Graptopetalum paraguyense , I had it: ghost plant! That’s a pretty fitting plant to write about on Halloween. I bought this particular specimen in late January , plopped it into a shallow bowl and set it by the front door where it gets bright light but very little direct sun. It has thrived in this sheltered location, and its leaves are light turquoise and pale purple hues (very hard to render accurately in digital images).     While the bowl is to the side of the walkway, people—and especially our dog—sometime bump into the ghost plant. Its leaves fall off at the slightest touch, so this isn’t really the best spot for it. For months I’ve been thinking of moving it; however, since I do enjoy looking at it every time I come through the front door, it’s still in the same place. Graptopetalum p...

This summer, as if by magic, a lot of potted plants have accumulated on the flagstone walkway that goes from the driveway to the front door. I love the look of pots massed together, but with Halloween just a day away, I thought it prudent to do a quick cleanup in this area. While none of these plants would seriously injure any trick-or-treaters, I’m more concerned about the health and safety of the plants . You never know what kind of mischief human ghouls and goblins might be up to! The potted cacti a couple of photos down are especially tempting. Knocking them over would be sooooo easy! This is what the bend of the walkway looked like this morning...   …and now. Granted, I could have removed a few more pots, but this should be fine.   Here are five potted cacti perched on top of the fence. Normally not a problem, but a little nudge is all it takes to knock them off their perch.     So I put them away for the time being.   Whe...

The giant clumping timber bamboo ( Bambusa oldhamii ) in front of the house has been going great guns this year. It’s hard to believe it hasn’t even been in the ground for two full years! Click here to read more about this particular specimen and to see photos of its progress. Bambusa oldhamii on 9/11/11 While the jungle look has its charms, I decided this morning to do some trimming to let some light and air into the center of the clump. My initial goal was to remove some lateral branches from the bottom to make the culms more visible. Somehow I ended up letting out my inner Edward Scissorhands and in addition to removing branches I also cut down the oldest—and thinnest—culms as well as a couple of thick but short culms (late shoots from last fall that didn’t mature before the winter and lost their tops to frost). The difference from before is dramatic. You can now see the culms and the clump looks more balanced. Bambusa oldhamii on 10/29/11…     ...

Do you sometimes find yourself absolutely brain dead at the end of a work day? While we all want to find intellectual fulfillment in our work, the reality is that some days are just stultifyingly boring. As the co-owner of a translation company, I deal with a lot of different materials on a daily basis. These are the subjects I worked on today: terms and conditions governing the use of photos for a mobile weather application; how to get a $50 Internet security software package for free; the new Yahoo! Autos web site; how to handle frozen neurohormone samples (centrifuge and aliquot them without 30 minutes of collection); reporting hepatic events in an experimental study of patients with acute heart failure (WTF are hepatic events anyway?); the latest trends in intelligent emergency response systems. Not to mention the fact that a client now needs translations into Icelandic! All of that may sound interesting, and it is—in the abstract. But some days are just too much, and my poor head...

In my earlier posts about the UC Santa Cruz Arboretum I covered the South African Garden and the Australian Garden . After we left the Australian Garden, we found ourselves next to a series of greenhouses. They’re not open to the public, but I took a peek through a fence and saw a whole slew of succulents. I have no idea what kind of research they do there; maybe they just propagate more plants for their succulent garden (see below)? New and old world succulents Lots of echeverias on the tables, and columnar cacti on the ground Since these greenhouses are off limits to the public, there was nothing we could do beyond taking a quick peek. Right on the other side of the parking lot for the administrative offices and conference room, I spotted a couple of curiously shaped dome greenhouses and several stands of clumping bamboo. As bad as my eyesight might be getting in real life, my “bamboo eye” is as acute as ever! Clumping bamboo next to one of the domed greenhouses ...