Design trends

Bare Root Edibles

Bartlett pears can live for over 50 years in your garden with good care.

A visit to any of our local nurseries at this time of year is like a visit to the candy store for a gardener. There are so many exciting edibles available now and this is the time to get yours. How lucky am I that I get to recommend some to new property owners looking to create an edible landscape. Here are some that caught my eye at Mountain Feed & Farm Supply in Ben Lomond.

If you have limited space there are multi-graft trees that combine compatible pear, peach, apple, plum and nectarine. There’s even a “fruit cocktail tree” that combines totally different stone fruits.
For really small spaces maybe a Garden Delight Miniature Nectarine would be perfect. This tree is a heavy producer of sweet, freestone delicious fruit that ripens in August on a tree that’s only 5-6 feet tall. The beautiful pink flowers in the spring are spectacular.

Besides classics like Elberta Peach and royal Rainier Cherry, what about planting a Candy Heart Pluerry, a cross between plum and sweet cherry? Or how about a Cot-n-Candy Aprium, an apricot-plum hybrid with incredible flavor? Or maybe a Flavor Grenade Pluot with its explosive flavor? This taste test winner produces fruit that hangs on the tree for 4-6 weeks which is a real plus. If it’s a new cherry tree you have in mind, consider Craig’s Crimson. This taste test winner produces dark red, to nearly black, medium to large size fruit with a wonderful spicy flavor. And if you get overwhelmed with everything ripening at the same time in the summer, maybe a Carnival Peach which ripens late September to early October would be a welcome treat.

And I haven’t even started on all the blueberries, grapes, goji berries, gooseberries, boysenberries, raspberries, strawberries and not to be forgotten-the delicious fruiting mulberry all available now in bare root form.

Planting a bare root tree is easy. In most soils, even sand or clay, bare root trees are best planted in your native soil. Less is more when it comes to amending your soil. You want your tree’s roots to reach far into the surrounding soil, and if you have added too much amendment, the roots will tend to grow only in the richest soil right around the tree. You can add a starter fertilizer like Dr. Earth Root Zone or E.B.Stone Sure Start with mycorrhizae organisms and micronutrients, otherwise wait to fertilize your new tree after a year.

Don’t plant in heavy saturated soil. If your soil drains poorly it’s best to place your tree at an angle in a trench and cover with soil or place it in a can. Wait to plant until the soil is crumbly and friable. Digging in waterlogged soil is one of the worst things you can do for your soil’s health. Do a drain test by filling the hole with water. If the spot you’ve chosen doesn’t drain in 3-4 hours, then plant in another spot or on a raised mound.

What fruit trees can you grow here in the mountains? Well, almost everything. Most of us get 700 hours of winter chilling or more where the temperature is below 45 degrees. Even with climate change the chill hours add up. And we can still grow fruit like a Fuji apple that doesn’t require this much chill.

What if you don’t get full sun where you’d like to grow fruit trees? Apples, pluots and plums are good choices for an area that gets at least 5 hours of sun a day during the growing season. The ideal is full sun but these trees will still set and ripen some fruit in partially shaded conditions. With peaches, nectarines or apricots it’s a different story. These fruits need hot sun to develop sweet, tasty fruit. Too little sun and they will not deliver anything close to what you have in mind.

With a little planning you can have fresh fruit 7 months of the year. By growing your own fruit you’re not at the mercy of mechanical harvesters and shipping practices. You can grow fruit and harvest it when the time is right. Homegrown fruit is a world apart from agribusiness and much less expensive than the Farmer’s Market.

Design trends

Good Houseplants for You and Your Home

Prayer Plants aka Maranta are safe for pets

I look out my sliding glass doors and see tall redwoods and stately oaks but on the inside I enjoy the green and sometimes flowers of houseplants. I learned long ago to group them where they get enough light to do well. Last year I lost my cat, Archer who never nibbled on plants. I have couple of doggie friends that come over. I make sure tharen’t interested in any toxic houseplants. Here is some information about those houseplants and the benefits of houseplants in your indoor environment.

It’s been known for a long time the beneficial effects of indoor plants. In addition to providing a natural, soothing environment, houseplants clean the air in your home of pollutants. Toxins such as benzene, formaldehyde and trichloroethylene can be released from furniture upholstery, carpets, cleaning products, paint, plastics and rubber. Carbon monoxide from the incomplete burning of wood and nitrogen oxides from cigarette smoke, vehicle exhaust and smog can also be present in indoor air. With people spending more than 80 per cent of the day indoors, air quality is a priority. Since COVID-19 improving environmental quality has become a global issue and a top priority for scientists today. The average concentration of pollutants indoors is 5 to 10 time higher than outdoors.

A recent study published in Scientific Reports on the ability of indoor plants to purify the air gave the highest rating of effectiveness to one of the easiest plants to grow- Spathiphyllum or Peace Lily. The highest purification per unit of leaf area award went to Sansevieria or Snake Plant and Aloe arborescens, a close relative of aloe vera, was one of the strongest absorbers and purifiers. But it’s not just the leaves of our indoor plants that clean the air. Plants absorb indoor chemical pollutants into their bodies through stomata on their leaves and lenticels on their branches. These pollutants are then neutralized into non-toxic substances by the plant. So either exited through the root system or accumulated and stored in organs, the process is an effective means of cleaning our indoor air.

Some of the easiest houseplants to grow are some of the best to have in your home. Any of the plants listed above would fit the bill. If you have a cat or dog that nibbles, however, it’s best to stick with spider plants, palms and orchids, African violets, aluminum plant, bromeliads, peperomia, cast iron plants, Christmas cactus, chenille plant, creeping Charlie, false aralia, tradescantia, piggy back plant, maranta and succulents like donkey’s tail and echeveria.

houseplants toxic for dogs and cats according to the ASPCA are asparagus fern, lilies, cyclamen, jade plant, aloe vera, azalea, begonia, ivy, mums, coleus, sago palm, kalanchoe and rubber plant. Keep your pets safe by keeping toxic plants out of reach.

With a little planning you can clean the air in your home while keeping the pets safe.

Design trends

Gardening Trends for 2026

Embrace bold, vibrant colors and textured layered plantings.

I like to keep up with new garden research as well as the new trends. We humans started growing food about 12,000 years ago when we shifted from nomadic hunter gatherer lifestyles to settled farming. This happened independently in places like the Fertile Crescent, China and Central America driven by climate shifts and population pressures. We’ve been at this gardening thing a long time. So is there really anything new? Consider the following ideas this year for your garden. Maybe nothing new but worth revisiting.

One trend I like is called Lemonading and Intention. Find joy, using your garden for quiet thought and plant with a purpose for pollinators and the planet.

Adapt to the challenges of a changing world by finding harmony in a less tidy garden. Yes, you read that right. By adopting a more relaxed and organic gardening style, nature is encouraged to thrive. The birds, insects and other critters will thank you when you don’t rush to tidy up fading perennials, remove seed heads or rake up every leaf in the garden.

Fire resistant gardening can play a big role in creating defensible space around your home. Focus on creating a garden that is not only beautiful and friendly to the environments but more resilient in the face of a wildfire. This doesn’t have to mean gravel for 30 feet out from the house either. There are many ways to protect your home.

Add more native plants and ’nativars’, which are cultivated native plants specifically designed to thrive and fit into residential gardens. While native plants are typically defined as growing in nature without human intervention, ‘nativars’ are created by selecting and crossing native plant seedlings to produce traits such as compact size or brighter flowers. In many cases they provide food and habitat to pollinators and wildlife while adapting to the home garden.

If you want a low-water landscape but aren’t into only succulents you can have it all by choosing plants with leafy foliage and vibrant blooms. Create your own version of a cottage garden by planting shrubs like grevillea and blue hibiscus and perennials like yarrow, catmint and kangaroo paw. You can still use water responsibly and have a beautiful garden, too.

Container gardening never goes out of style. Bring nature onto your deck, entry, windowsill, patio- wherever you can enjoy edibles, fragrant flowers, lush foliage or any combination you choose. Expand your living space outdoors with container gardens, fragrant climbers and areas for relaxing and entertaining.

Borrowing from past trends- embrace the smaller garden. You can create an instant meditation garden that encourages you to stop and sit for a couple minutes by placing a small bench where you can view something interesting in your garden. Small gardens are not only compact they are easier to care for. Containers on the patio or deck allow you to grow plants for food as well as for the birds and the bees. There are more new dwarf vegetable, herb and flower varieties being introduced every year.

Combine ornamental plants with edibles. Your veggies don’t have to be in a special raised bed or plot but can be planted throughout the garden. Think tomatoes, pole beans and other vining veggies trained on a metal obelisk within a perennial bed. Or compact versions of beans, eggplant, chard, hot peppers, tomatoes or edible flowers like nasturtiums planted among your other plants or along path borders.

It all comes down to enjoying your garden anyway that works for you. Nothing is as personal.

The Mountain Gardener's Weblog