Town Mouse Year in Review: My Favorite CMouse Posts

Some time before Christmas I'd told Country Mouse that I might like to do a post about my 5 favorites among her posts this year. Little did I know that she would pick up on that idea and prepare a sweeping overview of most of my posts last year. Now, of course, I can't be left behind, and I must write about a little more than just 5 posts (let's do that one next year).

Here's what I've especially enjoyed:

Propagation Posts
My idea of propagation is to throw some seeds I've bought on the Internet into some pots and see what happens. A bit haphazard. Country Mouse, in contrast, has been more diligent and scientific. She's worked hard -- and with some success -- on propagation of local plants, both from cuttings and from seed she collected herself. I've seen here carefully labeled envelopes of seeds, her flats, and her cold frame. All very impressive. And then we had the posts: 

• Real Gardeners Propagate
  
• Garrya Elliptica or Bust
  
• Propagation: Tips from a Pro
  
• Garrya Elliptica. Dang! A Bust Again
  
• More Tips from a Pro: Transplanting Native Seedlings
  
• Propagation (and Pot Pourri)
  
• When to Plant Native Seeds
  
• Propagation from cuttings: Take two
  
• Seeds and cuttings and rhizomes and bulbs, Oh my!
  
• Confessions of an Incompetent Propagator
  
• Poopagation (and great inTentions) -- BTW, nothing much became of those seeds
  
• Propagation Tips from Another Pro
  
• Propagation Progress

Photo Posts
We've both participated in the Gardening Gone Wild Picture This Photo Contest several times, but only Country Mouse made it to 2nd runner up with her entry to the April Contest, Native Plants in a Garden Setting. It was an exciting and rewarding occasion. But other photos captured the eye and heart. For example, the Wordless Wednesday post, with the sun hiding behind the mists. And other photos of the views here.  Also a great post with birds here, and snakes and other wild critters in this post.


Poetic Prose
Some of the most enjoyable Country Mouse posts have been the book reviews. On such post, Three Ways of Seeing... Monterey Pines, tells not only what's in the book, but how the reviewer's relationship to the book changed over time. So we learn about the book itself, but also about the experience of reading and learning from a book. In the same way, the two posts about Lester Rowntree are much more than just book review posts, and really made me think about writing, about reading, and about times past and times present. 

Greenhouse
In the last month, the most exciting thing has been the dream of the greenhouse, and the move towards its fulfillment.  I'm sure we're all excited, and looking forward to the next post (no, it's not boring). 

• Gone with the wind: Groping toward a greenhouse
  
• Greenhouse glass - A blast from the past
  
• Short or tall - Update on the greenhouse
  

I, for one, can't believe how much fun it's been to have a blog and to have a co-blogger. Some other bloggers lament, at times: "Oh, I wish I'd look at my blog in the morning and a post were finished." Well, it happens to me all the time! And furthermore, it's really exciting to see what's going on up in the hills. I can't wait to see what spring will bring. 

With many thanks!
Town Mouse

Country Mouse Year In Review - Town Mouse Posts 2009

Here is my retrospective on Town Mouse posts of 2009. There are so many really excellent Town Mouse posts, I just clumped a few of my favorites under various headings.

Informative!
Tmouse provided many great informational posts, too many to list. Here are just a few...

• Is it time to water? Use your moisture meter! - Tip I most wish I had paid attention to: "Make holes with a stick to avoid breaking the meter."
• Native, Exotic, Invasive, Say what?
• Myth Buster: California Natives Don't Need Water
• Myth Buster: Get Natives Because: - IMO the most pervasive myth, resulting in a lot of scruffy gardens that give natives a bad name is: "Natives belong here so they won't need any care.")
• Native or Naturalized - Being a dialog between T and her imaginary friend Pet Rat.
• Lawn Reform - Including TMouse's before and after pictures of her back yard remodel
• Blog Action Day: Earth-Friendly Gardening Practices.
• Book Review: Designing California Native Gardens. Just one of many great reviews.

Inspiring!
My little water garden - I so admire how Town Mouse experiments with different habitats such as water plants and shade containers.

You can't miss TMouse's great five part series on the great front garden remodel. You'll learn a lot and be entertained too.

• The Great Front Garden Remodel: Before
• GFGR Part 2: Plan
• GFGR Part 3: Trees and Shrubs
• GFGR Part 4: salvias, buckwheats and a few odds and ends
• GFGR: Small Perennials and Friends
• GFGR Revisited.

I love how she shows the planting plan with colored dots on the plants she focuses on in each post.

Here's her great post about improving an ugly side yard area by adding some beautiful pots for shade plants - Before: scary. After: you decide. (We decided it was lovely!)

Town Mouse's beautiful native garden is a big hit on the Going Native garden tour. Here's her blog post on the event this year: Going Native Garden Tour: Mission Accomplished. Her garden is an inspiration to hundreds of visitors each year.


Touching!
And then there was Sal the Salamander, and how the fate of one poor damaged critter touched us all - Salamander Rescue Society and Salamander Rescue Society - Sad News (and a wonderful poem by Mary Oliver).


Travelling!
TMouse shares photos from her many expeditions to places where California natives abound.

• One of my favorites is of a place not too far from her home: Wildflowers of Russian Ridge. Carpets of wild flowers! And just a few miles off the 280 freeway!
• Then there was one on a wonderful wildflower trip us meese tood in May: Memories of a Grand Wildflower Day Out.
• Very touching is Tassajara fire, a year later - showing regeneration after one of our California wild fires that nearly razed the wonderful Buddhist monastery and hot springs.
• And don't miss Reminiscing, with amazing pictures of flowers from Yosemite. Tmouse and Mr Mouse sure get out and about more than us country folk.

There are many other wonderful trip reports besides these.

Entertaining!
All these posts are entertaining but I just loved this one. Assuming the voice of her garden, TMouse speaks out in MeMeMeme: The TMouse Garden Speaks. She was tagged as a favorite commenter and invited to participate in this activity, supposedly to talk about yourself - but she did it with a twist.

And Controversial!
One of the things I admire most about Town Mouse is that she holds strong opinions and voices them (whereas I tend to waffle a lot). Here's a post that hit a nerve with fellow bloggers: Hey Google, what's with the ads?

Another post on a controversial topic was To Photoshop or not to Photoshop?

Then there was the "book review review" - on the "low maintenance garden" topic, (Low) Maintenance. That promoted interesting discussion.


Other TMouse Posts I enjoyed

I enjoy town mouse's dialogs with M.r Mouse, as in The TMouse CMouse Excellent Adventure: SF Flower and Garden Show - we had a good time and both blogged about all we did and all we saw at the show.

Photography competitions - we've entered a few. I really liked TMouse's End of the Line photo of washing hanging on the line - promoting the ecosensible lifestyle, with wit.

In December TMouse had the idea we could do a shared post. We gave our differing perspectives on Toyon in Native plant of the month: Toyon.

That's a good way to end - a shared post on our shared blog. Thank you, Town Mouse, for all the great posts you wrote this year, promoting gardening with natives, wildlife gardening, and eco-sensibility. Here's to a productive and fun 2010!

Paper or plastic?

I've enjoyed getting a glimpse of some of the holiday decorations other bloggers have shared. And really, who can resist the plastic palm tree at Clay and Limestone?  Or the video of 64 garden-themed ornaments at May Dreams Gardens?

And of course, being gardeners, we'd all like to do the green thing tree-wise. Some bloggers come down on the side of plastic (reusable), others prefer a live tree (compostable, I guess), or a potted tree. I myself actually think I have the solution to the conundrum. Above is the tree that my uncle gave me at as a gift when I started college. It's about 3 feet high, holds a fair number of ornaments, looks beautiful with candles lit (look Ma, no electricity!) or not, and can be disassebled and stuck into a drawer.

I supplement the tree with the holiday ornament below, which I received as a gift from my sister at approximately the same time. There are singing angels on the second floor and a small nativity scene on the first. The while thing turns when you light the candles.

And finally, for the fragrance of trees, I have a vase with juniper, pine, and redwood branches. My neighbors just had their pine trees radically trimmed, and the other two are from my own garden. I've hung some straw stars and some angels on the branches.

Happy holidays to all my blogging and blog-reading friends. May the New Year be filled with joy, with rain at just the right time, and flowers all year.

A short - or tall - update on the greenhouse

I've been taking pictures of Rat working on the greenhouse project and thought you'd enjoy a peek at the progress. Also at the end of this post, I put a bit more info on some greenhouse specifics that I found on another useful Coop Extension document, this time from U. Alabama.

Rat first did an assessment of the doors. (We decided not to use the four sash windows we got along with the doors - will save them for a coldframe project.) The four glass doors that will form the south side wall of the greenhouse are in pretty good shape. We just have to figure out blanks to fill in the holes where we'll remove the doorknobs and locks.


The narrower decorative doors were OK in some places...

But not in others...

So Wood Rat did some repairs...

Then it was off to the hardware store for materials to build the foundation...

Total cost for foundation materials (plus a few things like nails): $180.59.
Rat quickly got to work.

He dug holes and filled them with builder's sand (that grey stuff) and bedded in the premade piers (He decided against pouring the concrete since piers are so much more convenient, and good enough for engineering purposes.)

See how nicely Rat put up the batterboards and strings to get the building good and square.

Metal plates make a neat join. The foundation is the only part that has the pressure treated preservative filled wood (there's a proper name for it). The rest of the wood is douglas fir (which grows here natively!).


Voila! --

Then before you can say Jack Sprat, the walls are framed:

Total cost for the wall and roof framing materials: $285.96.

The north wall (facing the pool) will be shingled and it will have the six windows recycled from the house's cupola. The roof on the north side will be shingled with roof shingles, with two roof vents in it. Thus it will match the pool shed on the other side of the pool, and inside I'll have work benches for potting along that wall.

BTW, FYI - here is yon cupola wherof I spake, with the rest of the house under it.

Meanwhile back at the greenhouse work site, I have just asked the question: "What is that damp patch below the electrical outlet there?"

Rat dug out around the outlet. Town Mouse has often opined that a water feature would be really lovely in our south garden. But I don't think this is what she had in mind...

The water comes from the swimming pool. The electricity is for a light in the pool. The pipe has corroded, and we are puzzled as to how to fix this. So we do what we always do when electricity puzzles us. We call on ---

The White Mouse! - aka my dad, and the household's chief electrician. I hope when I'm 94 I'll be helping someone solve a problem, too. Actually we agreed that it's a Big Problem and to just turn off the electricity for now. We'll have to drain down the pool, remove the light, and either replace the corroded pipe etc, or remove the light and seal it all up. We use the light maybe once a year. Still.

So the footings are in, and the walls are framed. What about the roof? What materials? Glass or Solexx? The greenhouse is already a mix of two styles - traditional greenhouse with white paint and glass on two sides (south and east), and more of a potting shed look, cedar shingled walls with windows on the other two sides (north-facing pool side, and west gable wall). So we decided adding Solexx would take it beyond eclectic and into chaotic. We're going to get 3/16" tempered glass cut to order, and do strips of it on the roof about 22" wide. Rat has it all figured out.

So what pitch should the roof be? Rat did some mockups so we could check the aesthetics. Here is a 5 pitch roof:

We looked at it from all angles:



Then he put up a 12 pitch mockup:

Oh dear!
Way too tall! But is 5 pitch steep enough? Today I got a great piece of objective info from a University of Alabama Cooperative Extension page, Hobby Greenhouse Construction:

Roof pitch for a glass greenhouse should be 6-inch rise per foot (27 degrees) to prevent inside condensation from dripping on plants. Plastic-covered greenhouses require a steeper pitch of 7- to 8-1/2-foot rise per foot to prevent drip.

We consulted Rat's Roof Framer's handbook and figured that a six and a half or seven pitch, just a bit higher than we had mocked up, would work fine, and would look good.

Extry Extry! - Just adding this in - this afternoon Rat mocked up a seven pitch roof and we like it! (He also framed the other gable end wall.)


Greenhouse Advice from U. Alabama
I'll just close with a few other nuggets I found useful, from the same Extension page I quoted above. They are about ventilation (we decided we have just enough) and benches (a topic of upcoming interest for sure!).

Ventilation
The purposes of ventilation are to exchange carbon dioxide and oxygen, to remove hot air, and to lower relative humidity. Hobby greenhouses can be vented by natural flow-through ventilation or by forced-air ventilation. Flow-through ventilation relies on side and top vents that pull cool outside air into the greenhouse through the side vent as warm air rises and exits through the top vent. The combined side and top vent area should equal about 20 percent of the roof area [my emphasis]. Vents can be manually controlled, but this requires frequent temperature checks and vent adjustment according to outside conditions. Using an electric motor and thermostat for automatic vent control is much easier. Simple automatic systems open or close the vents based on a setpoint temperature.

Benches:
If you plan carefully, 70 to 80 percent of the floor area can be devoted to growing plants. Make sure that the supports for benches are strong enough to hold the largest number of plants and the largest container size anticipated. Wood, metal pipe, or concrete block can be used as bench supports.

Also make sure the bench surface is strong enough to support plants without sagging but that it is open to allow water drainage and air movement. Spruce or redwood lath and 14-gauge welded wire fabric or expanded metal make a strong, long-lasting, open bench top.

Benches should be 2 to 3 feet wide with access from one side or 4 to 5 feet wide with access from both sides. If using solid-topped benches, set them back from the sidewall of the greenhouse by 6 inches to allow air movement. No setback is needed for open-top benches.

Benches should be 24 to 36 inches high; for individuals in wheelchairs, bench height should be 30 to 36 inches, with little or no surface lip. Place bench supports 6 to 12 inches back from the surface edge to provide knee room.

Here endeth the quotation. And the post.

A walk down my road

In August, Country Mouse delighted us all with a post about a walk down her bit of road, which you can read here. Country Mouse lives along a private road, with chaparral plants, and very little traffic. I live very close to 3 freeways: 237, 85, and 101. That does have its advantages, but it means I'm far away from nature and need to get in my car to go for a hike or toss my bike into my SUV to go for a bike ride.

Or do I? Well, actually, not really. First, I don't have an SUV. And second, I'm fortunate to live very close to the Steven's Creek Trail. This trail, which the City of Mountain View has been expanding each year, now reaches from close to the border to Sunnyvale to the baylands.


I actually live close enough to the trail to walk to it, but today I want to get all the way to the bay, so I'm taking my Trusted Steed (here in front of Mulenbergia rigens, Deer grass).


The first two blocks go through an area close to the freeway with schools, churches, and light industry. There are some nice oaks, but nothing too interesting otherwise.

Then I come to the overpass that crosses 85 (in the first photo of this post), and the trail actually goes right along the freeway. The trees you can see are the mature oaks and aspen (??) that line the creek.

After a short ride in the shade of oaks, I come to the first trail overpass, which crosses Caltrain and Middlefield Road.

The city has done a nice job planting flannel bush, ceanothus, and toyon in the areas along the trail. The trail is actually is a designated as a wildlife corridor, and the City of Mountain View trail site has information about the different habitats here. And here's a picture of the Toyon next to the overpass.

I huff and puff as I maneuver the Trusted Steed around the bend and up the incline, then I happily coast back down and enjoy a flat piece with oaks, redbud, and other trees, coffeberry, ribes, salvias, and native grasses. Soon I get to the second overpass, which was recently built to cross Moffett Boulevard.


Shortly after the overpass, the trail opens up, with high tech companies, an RV parking lot, and a tree farm on the left (in that order) and with the creek (and on the other side NASA Ames) on the right. From here, we also have water in the creek year round (higher up, it's still dry even now).


I'm not sure what the trees are, but I love the fall color.


I'm also glad to see how many people come here to enjoy the fresh air. Many bring their kids on small bikes with streamers, and I go slowly because they don't always understand that they'll be safer if they stay on the right side of the path.

The Toyon are amazing here as well, with lots of birds stopping by for a snack.


The trail changes again as we get to the marsh lands. Dogs are no longer allowed from here on. The views become wide and expansive.


And then, the Bay. Mountain View is at the southern end of the Bay, and open water so close by does influence the microclimate of my garden.


These areas are burrowing owl habitat. Migrating birds stop over or overwinter in the waters of the Bay. I'm not a birder, so I'll just call these birds ducks.


And then, to my delight, a hawk. Of course I have my camera in my bike pannier, and when I finally fumble it out, he's just in the wrong spot in front of a tree.


"What are these birds," asks a woman on a bike as I stop to take a photo. "I think they're vultures," I say. "Eeewhhh," is the response. I'm tempted to say "So, you eat your meat alive, like the noble hawk, not dead, like the vulture." But I don't.

And what's that bird? Oh, no bird. Here's the kite field.


And then, it's time to head home. The first part's tough. I always forget the headwind I'll have when riding home. Why didn't I turn around sooner? But then the wind comes from a more favorable angle, and it doesn't take too long to get home (after all, I'm no longer stopping for photos). At home, as I get ready to put the bike into the garage, I notice the fall color on Aristolochia Californica near the front entrance.


"I really have to prune that plant," I think. But then, as I take the photo, I notice the first blossom. Well, I'll have to prune it anyway, but how exciting to be welcomed by new blooms.

Guest Post: Solstice

Mr. Mouse here, doing a guest post for the solstice.

The Ohlone Indians, who used to live around here, had a legend about the solstice. It tells how the souls of all beings were brought from the ocean by Turtle. When the time came for all beings to come into the world, a beam of light from the sun cracked open Turtle's shell and the souls of all people and animals were set free.

In the Santa Cruz Mountains at the highest point of Long Ridge are two rocks. One rock is vertical and has a notch in the top, the other is rounded and low with a deep crack in it. At sunset of the winter solstice, a beam of light shines through the notch in the vertical rock and onto the rounded rock, which symbolizes Turtle's shell. The only day of the year when the sun sets far enough south to shine through the crack is December 21, the solstice. This place was a gathering place for all the shamans on the Bay side of the mountains, where they conducted sacred rituals on the winter solstice.

I've known about this legend for a couple years and have wanted to check out whether the sun did, in fact, shine onto the rounded rock as described and pay my respects to those old shamans. Unfortunately, the weather around here at this time of year is likely to be cloudy at best. At worst, it can be pouring rain, and that's what it was doing today when I went up to look at the spot:


It was near sundown and there was a small group of people waiting at the entrance to the trail holding umbrellas to protect them from the rain. At first, I ended up going in the wrong direction, where I found a group of rocks that weren't the right ones. After I got back to the car, I took another look at the map and realized that I had missed it, so I went out again. I had left the map in the car so it wouldn't get wet. By this time, it was getting dark and the wind was blowing the rain around.

On the way to the spot, I met the people who had been standing at the entrance coming back. The spot was easy to find, as you can see, there is a fence around the rocks:


And here is the rock with the vertical crack:



Maybe next year the sun will shine and I can check out the legend. Hope you all enjoyed the solstice.

Propagation Progress!

I am thrilled to report that the local Holodiscus discolor cuttings I put in pup tents back on October 30 have rooted! This is sensational news for me because it's the first time I've had any success at all with cuttings. I also noted down where the cuttings came from: tips, midsections, or heels. And the interesting result: the midsection cuttings did not root, but both tips and heels did. I'm leaving the midsection cuttings to see if they get roots, given time. I kept them fairly warm, and misted them daily or almost daily.

I've put them back in Rat's sunny office until the greenhouse is ready :-) He has finished putting in the footings and is now putting up walls. I'll post on that at a later point in these interesting developments.

Seedlings are coming along too. Here is a snapshot of what's growing.

Local Natives
First the local natives I'm propagating from seeds I gathered.

The below seedling is in the warty ceanothus tray. It's the only thing growing in that tray. I hope it's warty ceanothus! I'm not seeing the characteristic leaf pattern of ceanothus: "The leaves have three very prominent parallel veins extending from the leaf base to the outer margins of the leaf tips and the leaves are ovate in shape." (wikipedia) So I hae ma doots. It looks interesting whatever it turns out to be.


I was amazed and happily surprised to see shoots suddenly arising in the tray of native Douglas Iris. They have white flowers, and are really pretty. I hope that's what these are!

And here are the amazing little lupines. I planted so many lupines - big green ones, big silver ones, and tiny annuals - and only these tiny annuals are appearing. Next year I'll do better - this year was definitely a learning year.


Last but not least, the bee plant. I have to say, the bee plants that are sprouting all by themselves in the chaparral and also on the shady north slope are doing much better than the propagated ones. But still - I can put these where I want them.

(I'm being lazy about names this post. I don't have the names at my fingertips and am using whatever is in my head, which, as you can see, isn't much.)

CNPS Propagation Left-Overs
Volunteers at the Santa Cruz CNPS propagation group get perqs! Material that is supernumerary to requirements is eagerly snapped up. I have two trays of bulbs, one is alium unifolium and the other is Ithuriel's spear, and I have one with a mixture of both.


I don't know which is which yet - In due course I'll figure it out

One thing I learned for sure is this:

Don't use Sharpie permanent markers on plant labels: the ink bleaches out with light! Dark pencils work just fine.

This clump of native buttercup is burgeoning in a gallon pot. Don't you love that green? I see a stray clover leaf in there - have to do some weeding of the pots.


So I'm feeling very happy. Not a high success rate - lots of seed trays sitting doing nothing at all but sprout the odd weed -- but the thrill at seeing anything at all growing as a result of my efforts is inspiring beyond reason!