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I Went to a Garden Party….
AAUW Garden Tour Saturday was the AAUW Garden Tour. What a glorious day. I expected about a hundred visitors, and made 120 handouts. Sometime in the early afternoon I guess they ran out, and I didn’t know about it for awhile. I made 25 more for the last two hours, and have five left. One of the docents said that some had been turned back in during the morning. Every couple probably took just one… wow, that’s a lot of people.
I’d been talking to the garden all week, asking the blooming plants to hold that thought for a few more days, and encouraging the nonblooming ones to get a move on. The plants did what I asked! There were so many flowers out Saturday, it was amazing. Heirloom roses, Gideon’s Trumpet, ranunculus, herbs, wildflowers, and waterlilies. The garden, apparently, also was also all for proof in advertising, as in standing behind the NWF Habitat sign on the front gate. So many kinds of butterflies and dragonflies were out for the first time this year that people remarked on it. In the afternoon, there were sightings of a king snake all over the property; I think it had to have been three kingsnakes. One was moved from the refreshment area, but he came back, and then as I was standing by the pond talking to some ladies one came past us. Another was sighted up in the driveway. Roger sighted a gopher snake. No one shrieked or complained; either these were hardy people, or the idea that this was a habitat yard made them keep calm. It also backed up my claims of letting snakes deal with gophers and rodents! One man spotted a baby bunny under the Withy Hide bench. By one o’clock, it was funny. It was as if a button had been pressed to turn the garden on, and all the features were working! What a glorious day.
Jacob (Aquascape Associates) and Roger (landscape architect) and I answered questions for most of the day; the last four visitors left at four. So many people asked questions about permaculture, soil, beekeeping, cob ovens and rain catchment that I know that I couldn’t answer everyone’s questions. Of course there were some who like a tidy, orderly garden, and that is fine. If everyone came away with some idea how to work with nature rather against it, to use chemicals less, to grow organic food, to repurpose, to compost their kitchen waste and weeds, then what a lot of small ripples of good will come of it.
Thank you to my dear friends who helped prepare the garden so that it looked stunning. And thank you to the snakes, butterflies, bees, dragonflies, birds, bunnies and who-knows-what-else that came out to perform for the visitors! And thank you to everyone who visited! No casualities; all good.
Here are some photos, although my camera doesn’t do the colors justice:
AAUW Garden Tour 
Welcome! Look at photos of how it was. 
Main entrance walkway 
Walkway into the Nest 
One of the many trails 
A palm sitting stump between guilds by the driveway 
A green melon under variegated lemon, with native grasses. 
Quail hut, with privacy boards up. 
Status and wildflowers across the stone walkway 
Cool spot under the upper pepper tree 
Roger and visitors by the Withy Hide 
Some of the first visitors of many 
Pickerel blooming in the little pond 
Gideon’s Trumpet keeping blooms and aroma until the tour 
Jacob teaching about natural ponds 
Baby bunny under the Withy Hide bench 
Roger answering questions 
View from the Bee Garden gate 
Cool spot under the pepper tree You May Also Like
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Catching My First Bee Swarm
Today was warm but very windy, and I was stealing some time to work on trellises I’m building for the passionflower vines (another story for another time, and definitely for the humor section). The area I was working in was close to my house. Inside an enclosure for my trashcans there stands a stack of nine extra bee supers (or boxes). Last year a swarm moved in and I’ve let them stay since they were so happy (and had so much room!). I have a hive and two empty Top Bar hives down in my specially planted Bee Garden; why should a swarm go there when it can be near trashcans? So today I’m out there trying to unroll a roll of cattle wire without losing a finger, and I hear a loud buzzing. I looked up to see bees flying in ever widening circles around the trashcan enclosure. Normally they are in and out in a straight line (a honey flow) when gathering pollen. I wondered if they were being attacked or bothered by something because in my mind it is still early in the year. Then I remembered it is March already! The hive was swarming.
Can you see the swarm? Right in the middle. Just before a new queen hatches, the old queen takes a group of bees (depending upon the size of the hive, it could be 20,000 bees) to go find a new home. First they exit the hive and find a place to rest and reconnoiter. This is when people see them hanging from trees, underhangs, trashcans, whatever. Scouts are sent out to find a good place to stay. Sometimes they will stay where they are, even if it isn’t a good idea, such as the underside of a palm frond which a swarm built comb on for a short time some years ago in my yard. This swarm mercifully gathered in a guaje tree just opposite the enclosure.
There they are. I let the wire go and realized how unprepared I was. I hadn’t completely finished preparing the bars for the top bar hives (so much to do!). My daughter and I have kept a hive for years. I really wanted that swarm, and although I’ve read about it and watched YouTube videos about it, just haven’t captured a wild swarm myself. I decided to try and get them.
First, I ran inside and rewatched a YouTube vlog on capturing a swarm, just to refresh my memory and boost my confidence. Then I ran down to the bee garden and prepared a top bar hive. I moved it to a better location, poured oil in the cups it sits in to keep out ants, and then finished preparing the bars. I’d serendipitously purchased craft sticks just yesterday ( a special stop at JoAnns), and I rubbed old wax into the grooves to make the craft sticks stick. Top bar hives have no foundation like Langstroth hives. The bees are encouraged to build their own comb, using the bit of craft stick hanging down from the bars as a guide. This is a healthier way to for bees to live when captured. Then I dropped a few drops of lemongrass oil into the hive; bees really like it and are attracted to it. I also smeared a little organic honey inside for some instant food. This sounds so smoothly done, but actually there were a dozen trips between the bee garden at the bottom of the property, the house, the shed and the swarm, all done in a crazed, frantic and nervous sort of way. A mad woman. Again I’m grateful for good neighbors.
Top bar hive, with craft sticks waxed onto the underside of a bar. I suited up in full bee gear. Many people catch swarms without protective gear, or with just a veil. When bees swarm they are the least likely to attack because they aren’t defending a hive. They are clustering around their queen, not wanting to be separated from her. However, since I now swell up dramatically when stung, I decided to take no chances.
Hi. Fortunately the bees weren’t high up. I dragged out a stepladder and found a smallish cardboard box.
Fortunately within easy reach of a stepladder. Standing on the ladder and shoving the box under the swarm, I shook the branch, knocking the bees into the box. When I thought I had most of them, I carried the box, full of crawling bees, down to the hive. I wish I could have taken a photo, but with the thousands of bees in the box I didn’t want to go get the camera and fumble with it with my gloves; I didn’t want to hurt any of the girls and they needed to be relocated before they took flight. I shook the box into the open top of the hive, and then put the top bar lid on. There were still bees back on the tree. I didn’t see the queen, and I really needed to make sure I got her. I shook in the rest of the bees and then carried them back down to the bee garden.
I shook the cardboard box of bees onto the ramp. I didn’t want to open the hive again, so I propped a board up to the entrance holes, then shook the box of bees out onto the ramp. Bees will climb, and climb they did. I used a bee brush to carefully collect bees that had clung to the outsides of the hive, and dumped them on the ramp, too. There was quite a traffic jam for awhile.
Traffic jam of bees climbing up the ramp into the opening. Eventually all the bees were in. I removed the ramp and cleaned up… not a sting. Actually, once I first climbed the stepladder I felt and heard the lack of anger in the swarm. They weren’t making a high-pitched angry buzzing noise. Tradition has it that you should talk to your bees; make sure to tell them about any change in the household. So I talked to them as I transported them down to what would hopefully be their new home. Just before dark I rapped once on the side of the hive and all 10- or 20-thousand of them hummed at me. If I got the queen and they are happy, then they will stay. Otherwise they’ll swarm again. No bees were harmed, and the few left up by the tree wondering where the old queen went were close enough to the old hive to go back, and make their allegiance to the new queen.
Almost all in. 
The girls are spraying pheromones to mark their location. I came inside feeling good about gently relocating them, and had some dark chocolate to settle my nerves! Then I went on to wrangle with the wire and the trellises, which was far more trouble than moving a swarm of bees.
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Garden’s One Year Anniversary
Happy Anniversary! One year ago on Feb. 1, 2011, I signed a contract with landscape architect Roger Boddaert (760-728-4297) to create a permaculture garden. For twelve years I’ve had this sloping property that was covered in weeds and worthless Washingtonia palms. Not only do these 2 acres slope down to a barranca, but it was filled in due to catching all the rainwater that runs from the street and properties above. I have to give credit to friend Gary B., who brought up the subject of permaculture in a conversation the year before. I’d heard the term and thought I knew what it was about, but months later when I was researching what to do with my property I remembered him mentioning it, and looked it up. I found what I was looking for. I’ve been an organic gardener for many years, have owned chickens for their eggs, have refused to till the soil so as not to kill microbes, have worked naturally with animals and plants, have created habitat, composted, recycled, collected rainwater… and all of that was permaculture. And so much more. How can one not be attracted to the term Food Forest? Certainly not a foodie and gardener like myself.
What happened on the property starting the week of Feb. 1 for the next six months altered the land so that it is truly two acres of habitat. It is useful, it is natural, and it is beautiful. Roger’s team led by Juan built beautiful walls of urbanite, planted and hauled, worked in scorching sun and frosty mornings and made what was dreamed into reality. An integral part of the garden has been diverting the water from erosion points and into rain catchment basins and natural ponds, and that is where Aart DeVos and Jacob Hatch of Aquascape (760-917-7457) came in. They also installed the irrigation. Dan Barnes did the rough and the precise tractor work (760-731-0985) and I can’t recommend his experience and skill enough. Fain Drilling dug the well (760-522-7419) and the wonderful sheds were built by Quality Sheds of Menifee (http://www.socalsheds.com) .
Along with some volunteer help from Jacob, I am the sole caretaker of the property. I am planning the plant guilds, weeding, improving soil, moving problem plants and trees and, did I mention, weed? Oh yes, then there is weeding. On Saturday May 12th, the garden will be on the Garden Tour of the Association of University Women of Fallbrook, and hopefully many people will be inspired to go organic, to create habitat, conserve water and grow extra food for the Fallbrook Food Pantry. We’ve come a long way, baby!
The following photos are comparisons between the precise location last year at this time, and today.
The property last February. 
The property today. 
Sophie and General loved all the excitement. 
They love the new gardens and pond even more. 
My veggie beds with the old sheds behind. 
My veggie beds with the new sheds and greenhouse behind. 
Where the big sheds were: everything usable was reused. 
New sheds that aren’t a safety hazard, and the greenhouse. 
The lower area with shed debris (lots of mowing area!). 
Hey, there are ponds there now! 
Not much for the neighbors to look at. 
Quite a lot for the neighbors to look at! 
Access to the old oak was hazardous. 
Palm stairs lead past the oak to a birding area. 
Stonefruit were old when I moved in. 
New stonefruit adorn what is now the Bee Garden. 
An erosion area sloping down to the barranca. 
Water won’t flow through here anymore. 
Lots of mowing and palm frond removal. 
Not so anymore. 
Horrible looking debris failed to hold back the embankment. 
Palms were used to stabilize the new paths and camoflage the supports. 
Old unstable stairs led to washout areas. 
New railings, stairs and urbanite retaining walls lead to another viewing area. 
The view from my balcony. Part of the old shed remains. 
Hey, there’s a pond there! You May Also Like
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Crazy-Pot Seeds
Crazy-pot mixture of veg seeds Today, the palindromic 11/11/11, was also Veteren’s Day and a day between two rainy weekends. A perfect day for spreading lots of seeds. With winter rains on their way in a month, it is important to hold the topsoil with rooted plants, and why not use a cover crop that also fixes nitrogen? My choices were hairy vetch and a tall native lupine.
Native lupine and hairy vetch seeds I would also have liked to use white or sweet clover but sources were sold out early this year. Both my choices will have flowers that offer plenty of nectar to bees, be lovely, hold the soil, set nitrogen, and can be, if needed, sacrificed. When you ‘sacrifice’ a nitrogen-fixer, you can either turn it under or cut the tops, leaving them in place on the soil surface to decompose.
Plant guild waiting for seeds I don’t agree with disturbing my soil microbes any more than necessary, so I won’t be tilling ever again. When you cut a nitrogen-fixer, the roots release the nitrogen they hold into the soil as the tops mulch then decompose bringing lots of nutrition to the soil surface. Vetch should be a winter crop, and lupine a spring crop, if they can tell the difference here in San Diego!
Mixing seeds with mushroom compost My method for spreading these two was to mix handfuls of each with a bucket of mushroom compost, and hand spread it in the most bare and most unfertile areas.
Broadcasting lupine and vetch seeds mixed with compost Adding the compost, I thought, helped the seed distribute more evenly, gave it a little cover since I wasn’t going to rake it in, and disguised it from birds a little.
The girls. Once done, I decided it was also a good time to do something I had been looking forward to doing for years: spreading old veggie seeds. I’d done a little of this in a raised veggie bed, with some success. I have so many old packets of veggie seeds that I’m not going to use in the raised beds (I have all organic seed now), and I can’t believe that it isn’t viable. If they sprout seeds found in ancient Egyptian tombs, then I’m sure mine can sprout, too. This seeding is a very important step in the edible forest garden.
Many old winter crop seeds This year’s abundance of herbs, squash and tomatoes has been fabulous… I still have some ‘feral’ tomatoes putting on enormous fruit which I pick, polish and eat out of hand in the garden while I’m working.
Pumpkins and squash on their way to the Fallbrook Food Pantry I opened all the packages of seed for cool-weather vegetables, such as carrots, radish, dill, broccoli rabe, and lettuces. Some such as garlic chives and onion I separated out and sprinkled near roses, since alliums are a companion plant for roses and help ward away aphids. The rest of it was mixed up in a lovely crazy-pot of seeds. I didn’t mix with compost this time, as there were fewer and smaller seeds involved. I sprinkled them then covered them with soil using my foot… the professional way to plant!
Scattering veggie seeds I am eager to see what comes up after the rain this weekend. It truely will be an edible landscape. Even if I allow the veggies to go to seed, the blooms will all be excellent bee food sources, especially the carrots and dill. None of these were nitrogen-fixers, because I used all the extra peas up in the vegetable beds this spring (see archives) improving the soil. Beans, and other warmer-weather seeds I’m holding back for February or March planting. I do have sweetpea seeds to plant out, but the lupine and vetch will be working their magic anyway.
Embankment with ragweed, now seeded with lupine and vetch 
Under the soil is now daffodil bulbs, lupines, vetch and mixed vegetable seeds About ten years ago I had a short story published in the young person’s magazine Cricket called Taking Tea with Aunt Kate. In it a girl lived with her mother who was a wild, messy gardener, spreading seeds all together and having veggies and flowers mingling in riots of color. The girl’s aunt is, by contrast, perfectly coiffed and takes her to a formal ‘high tea’ at a prestigious restaurant. The girl decides that she can be a little of each woman, a little wild and a little formal. I think I’m that child! I clean the dirt out from under my nails so that I can go to the opera.
I’ll be walking the garden in the next few weeks, waiting for tell-tale sprouts (and trying to figure out if they are weeds or not!), and watching the bare areas come to life. How fun!
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Nitrogen-Fixing Plants
Sweet pea If you’ve read my posts from this spring, you’ll have endured me going on and on about peas and beans and how they fix nitrogen in the soil. For those who nodded off during those episodes or who have just tuned in, I’ll go over it briefly.
Some plants have the ability to fix nitrogen in the soil. Actually, a type of bacteria called a rhizobia invades the roots of plants in the Fabacea family and a few others, and fixes atmospheric nitrogen in nodules on the plant’s roots. This is beneficial to both the plant and the bacteria, a process called mutulism. It also benefits whatever grows around the plants because, when the plant dies, the nodules release their nitrogen into the surrounding soil. In the case of long-lived shrubs and trees that fix nitrogen, as roots die off or are replaced, they release their nitrogen.
An edible forest garden is one where man mimicks the dynamics of an old-growth forest. Why? Because forests succeed without the aid of fertilizer, tilling, mulching, irrigation or any interference or ‘help’, as it were, from man. How does it do this? The plants that grow complement each other, providing what each other needs. These relationships are called plant guilds. You can create plant guilds, substituting plants that provide food for humans. In a guild there is a taller tree which provides shade and leaf droppings (mulch), shrubs which provide more shade, mulch and habitat for animals and insects, plants that fix nitrogen in the soil, plants that have long tap roots called ‘miner’ plants, because they take up nutrients from deep in the soil and deposit them on the soil surface when their leaves die off, plants that attract pollinators, and plants that are ground covers to regulate heat and moisture. Using permaculture practices for water harvesting and organic gardening, when the guild matures it should be almost completely self-sustaining.
Say you want to plant an apple tree. That would be your tall canopy tree for the guild, which drops leaves as mulch. Beneath it, you could plant a shrubby herb such as rosemary (another edible), daikon radishes (miners, leaving the cut leaves on the surface after harvesting the edible root), bush beans (legumes) and herbs such as dill, parsley and basil, some of which you allow to flower for pollinators. As the tree grows, the plant guild can widen and others planted.
Beans There are many plants, trees and shrubs that fix nitrogen in the soil. All beans and peas including soybeans and fava beans do; when the plants are finished cut them above the soil so the roots stay put and decay where they are to release the nitrogen. Cover crops such as clover and hairy vetch are grown and turned under to improve the nitrogen in the soil. If you are from the Southern California area, perhaps you’d be interested in knowing what native plants are nitrogen fixers.
Ceanothus (California Lilac) at Elfin Forest The native Southern California nitrogen fixers include: ceanothus, lupine, deerweed, California peashrub (endangered) (lotus), and redbud. Non-natives that are commonly used are alders, acacias, calliandra, sweet peas, guaja, and many more, as the Fabacea family is very large. Use any of the natives in ornamental gardens and not only will you be improving the soil and the vigor of the surrounding plants, but providing much needed habitat for our native birds and insects.
Try building plant guilds; it is challenging and fun. Many combinations of plants are suggested on permaculture
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Bouquets for Birds and Butterflies
Lilliput zinnia At the beginning of this summer, the new subterranean drip irrigation system was installed on my property. It features tubing with holes at either twelve or twenty-four inches apart. When it runs (from my well) it leaves circles of dampness polka-dotting the soil surface. I had purchased two packets of wildflower seed, one with a selection of plants to attract bees, and the other for butterflies. Mixing them together, I figured that they wouldn’t fare well scattered, at least this year. My daughter and I pressed seed into many of the wet spots and hoped the rabbits wouldn’t notice.
What happened was a delightful surprise, as only a garden can provide. In many locations around the yard grew mixed bouquets of wildflowers.
Mexican sunflower, cosmos, nasturtiums, zinnias, surround a white calla lily If we had separated selected seed and planned the planting, nothing so beautiful would have come of it. Although many species either didn’t emerge or were eaten, the most common survivors were zinnias, cosmos and borage.
Cosmos, borage, zinnias and alyssum. I was amazed and thrilled; I had purchased a borage plant and then fed it to the rabbits (at least, that is what they thought). Here now are borage plants all over the yard, their royal blue, cucumber-flavored flowers dipping modestly behind the flaunting cosmos.
Sweet basil, cilantro, dill and zinnias In fact, I now have several very hearty sweet basil plants that put the carefully cultivated plants in my raised veggie beds to shame. There is also dill and cilantro growing well even this late in the season.
Cosmos, sweet basil, zinnias, borage, camellia balsam, alyssum There are some plants in the bouquets that haven’t reached maturity yet, so there may still be some surprises. The only flower that emerged that I didn’t recognize and had to look up was camellia balsam (Impatiens balsamina). Two stalks of it, one pink and one red, give these ‘arrangements’ a vertical line.
Camellia balsam (Impatiens balsamina) Although not all of these wildflowers are native to San Diego, or even California, they provide food for birds, bees and are host plants for butterflies, providing the caterpillars food, a place to form their chrysalises, and nectar for the mature butterfly. Bees like small flowers with little drops of nectar too small to drown in, with a nice landing pad of a petal close by. Everything in the carrot family works well. Here are some suggested flowers to plant:
For butterflies:
Mexican lupine, Mexican sunflower, borage, calendula, camellia balsam, scabiosa, cornflower, milkweed, parsley, crimson clover, aster, coreopsis, cosmos, prairie gayfeather, purple coneflower, sweet sultan, sneezeweed, sweet William, bishops flower, black-eyed Susan, dill, snapdragon, yarrow, bergamot, cleome, verbena, and butterfly bush.
For bees:
Cosmos, sunflowers, borage, coriander, Siberian wallflower, dill, coreopsis, poppies, gaillardia, zinnia, sweet basil, purple prairie clover, globe gillia, catnip, lemon mint, black-eyed Susan, goldenrod, lavender hyssop, bergamot, yarrow, mint, California buckwheat.
Be sure to plant flowers that bees love away from paths and walkways if you or your family want to avoid contact with the bees.
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What Bugs See
To veer off from the vacation photos, I thought I’d talk about bugs! I’ve been working in the garden a lot and watching the myriad types of insects drawn to the various flowers blooming all over, and it reminded me of something amazing that I learned last year. The way flowers look to us is not what most insects and birds see. The flowers are bright and showy, but they offer up visual clues to pollinators through colors and patterns that can only be seen with eyes that see UV light. Humans can’t. We can’t assign colors to UV light in the way that we understand them, so when photographing with UV light we substitute our colors to show the change in patterns. The markings on the flowers are guides to where the pollen is, like lights and painted lines on airport runways. Just as baby chicks’ mouths are large and brightly colored to show mom and dad where to put the worm, especially on the inside as they gape and wait to be fed, so have flowers made sure that the pollinators get to the right place for pollen! The differences between what we see and what insects see can be startling; there is a whole hidden world right before our eyes, just as there are supersonic and subsonic sounds that we cannot hear. Elephants make subsonic noises that other elephants can hear miles away, but we aren’t aware of it.
Below are photos taken with and without UV light by the brilliant Norwegian scientist-cameraman Bjorn Roslett. Remember that the UV colorization is man-made to show the difference in patterns. More technical information can be found at his site here: http://www.naturfotograf.com/UV_flowers_list.html , with lists of types of flowers and what approximate color changes there are under UV light.
Dandelion 
Vinca minor 
Vinca minor under UV 
Norsk mure (Potentilla norvegica) 
Norsk mure under UV 
Primrose 
Crocus 
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Of Monarchs and Milkweeds
Monarch (photo: Miranda Kennedy) The migration of the monarch butterfly covers an astounding 2500 miles. Instead of dying off in the cold of winter, these flimsy, light-as-air insects fly from parts of the US to groves of Oyamel fir trees in Mexico. They are the only insect to cover such territory. They are particular little beasties, for they rest only in the Oyamel firs and look for milkweed plants on which to lay their eggs. Milkweed exudes a sap toxic to animals which the Monarch caterpillars eat, obviously immune, making them toxic in turn. The caterpiller’s bright coloration is a warning.
Snazzy stripes mean 'eat at your own risk' (photo: M. Kennedy In fact, the Viceroy butterfly, which is very tasty to predators, mimics the Monarch’s coloration to keep from being dinner.
Deforestation, insects, climate change and pollution have cut a huge swath through the Oyamel fir tree population, and the Monarchs are struggling to survive. They also combat the decrease in milkweed as human populations spread and plant lawns instead of weeds and wildflowers.
At the beginning of this year, in my efforts to change my property into habitat, I was determined to help the Monarchs. Every year I see maybe one or two of the majestic butterfly pass through my yard, and I’ve been sorry that I can’t offer he or she anything except nectar.
What I had been calling milkweed actually is sow thistle Sonchus oleraceus, which is an edible kitchen herb brought over from Europe with the settlers as food. It also has a milky sap in it’s hollow stem, thus the erroneous name of milkweed. There are over 100 varieties of real milkweed. So, I purchased two Balloon Plants, or Asclepias physocarpa (Asclepias is the botanical name for the milkweed family). They grew quite well, developing the balloon-shaped seed pods which, when ripe, burst open spreading small seeds with feathery wings attached that carry them everywhere.
Seeds burst and fly To my great excitement my daughter spotted very tiny Monarch caterpillars on the leaves!
Tiny Monarch caterpillers (photo: M. Kennedy) The caterpillars have been eating voraciously and growing big and fat.
Monarch caterpiller and milkweed (Photo: M. Kennedy) We’ve seen Monarchs in the yard many more times than in the past. We are monitoring the caterpillars closely, waiting for them to metamorphosize. I’ll help the plants distribute seeds throughout my yard, and I’ll plant the native narrow-leafed milkweed as well. I’m so excited that within months this goal was achieved and that these wonderful creatures have one more place to find refuge.
Good links:Monarch Watch http://shop.monarchwatch.org/ , Monarch Migration http://www.monarchbutterflyusa.com/Migration.htm.
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Stinkhorn!
What is that? There was a surprise in our garden this afternoon. We were weeding and planting a flower seed mixture around the back of the house, and suddenly my daughter excitedly shouted, “Stinkhorn!” I didn’t take offence. I was excited, too. What she was referring to was a reddish, odd-looking fungus that had emerged from the ground next to a rose bush. This fungus makes a rather unpleasant odor, which attracts flies who then carry off the spores. A pretty tricky plant. We had our first and only stinkhorn emerge last year in a different part of our yard, and I was afraid that with all the walking and weeding done in that area, that it wouldn’t be back. Silly me. The fungus was traveling!
Flies enjoying the stink and spreading the spores Then shortly after this discovery and only a few feet from it, I was digging up weeds and found what I thought was a reptile egg. We thought that maybe it was an egg from Mrs. Sabatini, the Western pond turtle that we found on our property and released into our upper pond, never to be seen again. Or perhaps a snake egg.
Not a reptile egg When I felt it, however, it was firm and had a little give to it, like it was made of soft rubber. My daughter figured it out. She had read where the stinkhorn spores grow into an egg-shaped, um, thingy, which breaks open underground revealing the slimy gooey part which then pushes up through the ground and begins stinking. The slimy part has the spores on it.
The shiny green interior will thrust out of the ground Fungus is incredible and wonderful. The threads of fungus hold together the soil, feed us, medicate us and yet we know so little about them. An incredible book to read is Mycelium Running: how mushrooms can help save the world, by Paul Stamets. Although most people wouldn’t welcome a stinkhorn into their perennial border, we think it is very cool, as long as there aren’t too many of them!
- Gardening adventures, Other Insects, Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures, Rain Catching, Vegan, Vegetables
Beginning an Edible Forest Garden
Pumpkins by the chickens An edible forest garden is a mode of growing that mimicks the relationships between plants in a forest, while substituting food producing plants for humans. To achieve this, you have to examine what plants grow in forests near you. Here in San Diego County, we have chapparal communities, along with some pine and oak forests in the mountains. I cannot replicate a forest such as found in, say, Olympia, because we have completely different climates, soils, and plant interrelationships. Even for people who live in deserts, you can examine what once was there before the area was a desert, or what plants are in a nearby oasis if you have one. I’d substitute plants for more desirable ones, such as lemonade berry for its cousin poison oak. Plants should provide canopy, groundcover, mulch, nitrogen-fixing, and insect attracting. After these plant guilds mature they will provide fertilizer and moisture for themselves.
However, most of us are far away from this type of gardening, or just don’t want to go that far. Integrating your ornamentals with food plants, though, is not radical anymore and entirely practical. Any nook in your yard can be a place for food producing plants. Too many squash or tomatoes? Take them to a local food pantry.
Melons by a dead lime tree trellis 
A single Cinderella pumpkin vine under an apricot 
Zucchinis make lush bushes 
Watermelons suppressing weeds Tomatoes are a vining plant which will use any upright structure on which to climb.
Can you see the tomato plant? (Its up the palm trunk) Is your produce sprouting in the house? Try planting it instead of composting. Onions make particularly pretty plants with flowers that attract pollinators and hummingbirds. You may collect the seed from them as well. If the produce doesn’t survive, its okay: you’ve just buried compost.
Plant sprouting produce for ornamentals and to gather seed Sweet potatoes are perennial plants that produce swollen rhyzomes rather than swollen roots as other potatoes do. Plant them where you can dig up some of the roots but leave the main plant to thrive for years, depending on your climate. Their leaves are beautiful, and the plants are often sold as ornamentals.
Sweet potatoes have beautiful leaves Herbs in the shrubs, strawberries in the flowers, and melon and squash under the trees all make for a beautiful edible landscape that will provide food, compost, mulch and habitat while you study up for your edible forest garden.
Strawberries with yarrow 
Apple mint attracts pollinators and is good on fruit 
Passionvines are a host plant for Gulf Fritillary butterflies 
Hops are vigorous, tall vines for brewing and sleep pillows 
Grapes will hide a chain link fence