The Joy of Herbs

Santolina in June, © Barbara Radisavljevic

I love growing herbs in my garden. They feed the bees in winter when almost nothing else is blooming. In spring and summer they add color to my flower beds. In fall their dry flower stems add interesting shapes and textures. Here are some of my favorites. I took these photos at different times of the year. The santolina above adds a lovely gold to my flower beds.

Sages

I grow these sages mostly for their interesting foliage, though the clary sage does bloom in the summer, producing large flower spikes. 

I took the photo above in mid-October. On the left, is tricolor sage. To its right, clary sage. Below is some clary sage in bloom in June. It's surrounded by fading irises and the chard is reaching behind it as its seeds ripen and prepare to disperse.

Clary Sage in Bloom in June, © Barbara Radisavljevic

Wild Watermelon sage adds a bit more color to the garden than some of the other sages.

Wild Watermelon Sage in April, © Barbara Radisavljevic

Garden View of Wild Watermelon Sage in April

The black sage below has finished blooming. It's dry flower spikes are still striking.

Dry Black Sage, © Barbara Radisavljevic

Oregano

By October, my favorite herb, oregano, is almost through blooming, but you can still see plenty of its white flowers. This is the herb I use the most. I dry some every year. For kitchen use I pick it before before the buds form. but I always leave some to bloom. 

Oregano in Bloom, October, © Barbara Radisavljevic

Hyssop

Below the hyssop has almost stopped blooming, but you can still see a few purple flowers. At this time of year, October, most of the interest comes from the dry flower spikes that hold the seeds. Most of the seeds have dispersed by now. 

Hyssop in October, © Barbara Radisavljevic

The photo below was taken in mid-August and gives you a better look at the blooms and how they contrast with the dry spikes. 

Hyssop in Mid-August, © Barbara Radisavljevic

Rosemary

Rosemary is another of my favorite plants. It provides fragrant branches for winter decorating, and it usually blooms in winter and helps the bees. It's also very easy to root a twig of it in water. I have four large rosemary plants and I rooted all of them from slips from a plant in the backyard. 

Rosemary in December, © Barbara Radisavljevic

Happy Bee Enjoying Rosemary in March, © Barbara Radisavljevic

See some of my other photos of herbs from my garden on these Zazzle products.

 Seven-Spotted Ladybug on Borage Note Card Friendship card: Puzzle: Bee on French Lavender Jigsaw Puzzle Blank Card: Lavender with Santolina Lavender Uses, Otherwise Blank card:

My Neglected Templeton Garden in June

June 19, 2017

What Happens When a Garden Takes Care of Itself

The Butterfly Bush

This is the same butterfly bush that fell in 2014. See this post for contrast photos.

Recovered Butterfly Bush Growing Upright Again, © B. Radisavljevic

Butterfly Bush in Context of Rest of Herb Garden,  © B. Radisavljevic

In the left background is an Italian CyrpeCypress tree. In the foreground is a combination of black sage and rosemary.  The orchard is in the background on the right. This is quite a contrast from my original herb garden when I planted it a couple of decades ago. This is what this section looked like in April, 2007.

Expanding Herb Garden in April, 2007, © B. Radisavljevic

Apples

I was happy to see our remaining apple tree is producing this year. 

Young Apples, June 19, 2017, © B. Radisavljevic

Walnuts on the Tree

Walnut Tree with Immature Nuts, © B. Radisavljevic

June 20, 2017

Papa Quail 

Papa Quail Watches Over Family, Which Is Hidden in Brush,  © B. Radisavljevic

Papa Quail in Context. Quail Family is Hidden in Brush, © B. Radisavljevic

It was too hot to stand still and wait for the quail family to come out of hiding so I could get a photo, but I often see the mother with her chicks running for cover in the brush as I go by. They live on the section of our land that is near the entrance. That's our oak tree in the background.

The Herbs on the Slope

I planted my first herbs in Templeton on the slope close to the front door. For years they've grown wild, and I discovered when I took these photos that a coyote brush plant had sneaked in under the  rosemary on the back edge and grown large enough to smoother whatever is under it. Probably my oregano and tricolor sage. Rosemary is still growing strong in back. But I'd like to concentrate on the flowers here. 

The lavender was among the first plants I placed on the slope. I got it from the now gone Sycamore Farms herb farm. The sage below was planted at the same time and came from the same place. The santolina (golden) was planted later. It probably also came from there. 

Bee Foraging on Lavender, © B. Radisavljevic

Santolina and Lavender Close Up, © B. Radisavljevic

Common Sage in Bloom, © B. Radisavljevic, 

Thyme on the Slope, © B. Radisavljevic 

This last photo shows an overview of the slope. The taller yellow flowers are volunteer dusty miller plants that reseeded from some older transplants. The santolina and lavender are on its left. You see mostly rosemary and sage on the right, with thyme in the foreground. All these plants originally came from four-inch pots around 2006, so you can see how much they have grown. For the last three years they have had little attention. 

Overview of West Side of Slope, © B. Radisavljevic

I hope you've enjoyed seeing what can happen to a neglected garden. It's amazing so much of it survived the drought with almost no irrigation.

Do you grow herbs? What are your most memorable experiences with them? Which are your favorites to grow?

*****

What's Happening in my Garden in Early Spring?

There Are Lots of Garden Tasks to Be Done

We've had a lot of rain in the past two months, and the garden reflects that. The weeds are trying to take over, but I've been too busy going to and recovering from dentist appointments to do much about them. The grassy weeds are the worst.  Fortunately, my lamb's ears, which grow as fast as weeds, are helping to keep some of them at bay. Meanwhile, the bees are really enjoying the flowers that are appearing everywhere and the kale is bolting.

Grassy Weeds Trying to Take Over the Garden, Lamb's Ears Trying to Compete

Weeding and Thinning

In the photo above you can see some of the garden tasks I'm way behind on. Weeding is probably the most important. If I don't get the weeds out of the way, the reseeding plants may not get the light they need to sprout. Some of the lamb's ears, much as I love them, will also have to go. As you can see below, they are choking the emerging Sweet William seedlings from last year's seeds. I'll also have to cut back the star jasmine that surrounds and is starting to cover these plants. Looks like I will also have to reapply my non-toxic snail bait in this section. I usually use the cheapest brand, and it works.

Lamb's Ears Smothering Sweet William Seedling, while both Fight the Star Jasmine, © B. Radisavljevic 

With all this weeding to be done, it's time to check my gardening tools again. If you find yourself short, this Vremi 9-piece tool set has all one needs to tackle most weeding jobs.



Bees in the Holly

The holly is in bloom, and the bees love it. I took this photo a few days ago. I'm glad I did because the gardener trimmed some of the flowers off today. He said the bees were pretty angry with him as he worked and he had to be careful. I think there are still enough flowers to keep the bees busy. 

Bees Foraging in Holly Flowers in March, © B. Radisavljevic

The Bolting Kale

I currently have four kale plants growing in my flower beds. Three of them are volunteers that did not exactly grow where I would have placed them. All of them are bolting now. I will probably cut the flowering stems from the weakest plants, and let the others go to seed for next year's crop. I will also have to harvest and freeze a lot of the leaves that are left.

 My top photo showed my best kale plant. I understand now why it may not have had the aphid problems the other plants had. Its close neighbors are calendula and catmint, both of which help repel or trap these pests that bother my other plants. Also, that kale in my front flowerbed gets more regular water than the other plants, and better soil. It is the only kale plant with drip irrigation. 

The kale plant below gets less care than any of the others. It sprang up between my driveway and my neighbor's yard in the bed in the middle. There is a birch tree there and gazanias cover most of the ground. It is not irrigated unless I remember to pour some water on the kale plant. How it ever took root there I'll never know, but I have used many of its leaves. You can see from its flowers that it's bolting. So are the other plants, but the flowers are harder to see in their photos. 

Flowers of Bolting Kale, © B. Radisavljevic

This is actually a pair of kale plants below. I never thinned them. I sometimes use their leaves, but they are often plagued with aphids. They have poor soil and no companion plants but gazanias. They do not have regular irrigation. They grow in the corner of a bed of gazania and star jasmine beside the driveway. Like the plant above, they came from the mother plant you see at the top of this blog post. 

Twin Kale Plants by Driveway, © B. Radisavljevic

My Favorite Companion Planting Book

Great Garden Companions: A Companion-Planting System for a Beautiful, Chemical-Free Vegetable Garden

 I have used this book for years. It has provided inspiration on what to plant where and been just fun to read. There are lists of which plants discourage which pests, which plants attract which beneficial insects, and which plants help each other thrive. I love the garden design ideas, such as the wheel garden and the front yard salad garden. The information is organized in a user-friendly way so that it's easy to find what you want, and you will want to read more than what you came for. I highly recommend this to any gardener who wants to avoid chemicals.

Wordless Wednesday: Bees on Fruity Teucrium

How many can you find? Bees on Fruity Teucrium, © B. Radisavljevic

Small Visitors to my Garden in Early May

Visiting Insects in May

Although we schedule our visits on a calendar, it's not so neat in the insect world. They appear by season rather than by date. So although I can say that these insects were all garden visitors during the first two weeks of May, some had been hanging around since April, and some, like the bees,  visit me during the entire year. Let's look at them. My most welcome guests this month have been the ladybugs, who flew in to clean up my aphid problem.

Ladybugs Busy Mating and Eating Aphids, © B. Radisavljevic

They have been a great help to me. In the photo above you can see the one on top eating one of the aphids. The two on the bottom of the flower are mating. You can see how the unwelcome aphids are sucking the life out of the calendula plants. In the middle of April I had four heavily infested calendula flowers and one infested wormwood plant. It took the ladybug air force a month to finish the job, but as of yesterday there are no more aphids and most of the ladybugs have moved on. Below is another calendula plant they cleaned up. Do you see all the ladybugs visible on just this one plant? I counted nine.  How many can you count?

Ladybird Aphid Eating Crew on Calendula Plant, © B. Radisavljevic

There are still a few ladybugs lurking in the rosemary and on other plants. I found the one below in the crotch of this clary sage plant. I'm hoping it's not about to be a meal for the spider that lives there. We will see it later.

Ladybird Hiding on Clary Sage Plant, © B. Radisavljevic

 

Another insect currently in my garden is the spittlebug. Spittlebugs are small insects who cover their motionless nymphs, who hang out on the foliage of perennials, shrubs, annuals, and herbs, with this unsightly foam as they suck juices from the stems. According to Sunset, they do little damage and leave after about three weeks. If they really bother you, you can wash the foam off with a hose. They do make the plant look a bit ugly. Here they are "decorating" my rosemary.

Spittlebugs on Rosemary, © B. Radisavljevic

The last insect, the one who visits almost every day, is the hard-working bee. Below you see it on fruity teucrium, a ground cover, which is blooming now. The bees love it. I couldn't fit them all into this one photo, and they kept flitting off to new blossoms while I was focusing.

Bees on Fruity Teucrium, © B. Radisavljevic

Before we leave the insects, here's one more photo of a bee. This one is working on a lamb's ears flower. The lamb's ears started to bloom just a few days ago. This photo is just the right size to pin if you'd like to share it.

Busy Bee on Lamb's Ears, © B. Radisavljevic

The Inconspicuous Crab Spider in Early May

This spider has visited many of my plants. I have seen her (and what I assume is her mate) on the calendula plants with the ladybugs and aphids, on the juniper bushes, and on the rosemary.  It is very hard to see on this rosemary plant, even when I blow it up. It's not a large spider to start with, and it can take on the coloring of the plant it's on to blend in. Can you see it in the lower right corner below? I had to get into a very awkward position to get this photo at all.

Inconspicuous Crab Spider in Rosemary, © B. Radisavljevic

One of these spiders seems to be living on my clary sage. It's much easier to see and photograph there. It usually scrunches up like this while waiting for prey to appear. I do have a video of two of these spiders interacting on a calendula plant, and once they start moving, they are fast. I think one may have been chasing the other. The one below is a female. The male is smaller. I saw a male on this plant a couple of days earlier. I don't see it now. I wonder if the female had him for dinner. To see how this spider mates, check the last photo on this blog post.

Inconspicuous Crab Spider on Clary Sage Leaf, © B. Radisavljevic

 Spiders & Other Arachnids
I love being able to understand which insects and spiders are visiting me. Here are some books which have been a great help in identifying and understanding them. The two books on the bottom right will appeal to children and are small enough to carry into the backyard for field use. The books on the bottom left have a format designed for teens and adults. All are illustrated and will help you identify garden visitors with six or eight legs. The short video at left above shows you some common spiders in action up close. Prime members can watch it for free. Try Amazon Prime 30-Day Free Trial

& 

 A Field Guide to Insects: America North of Mexico National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Insects and Spiders (National Audubon Society Field Guides (Paperback)) Fandex Family Field Guides: Bugs Peterson First Guide to Insects of North America

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