Spotted in Rancho Santa Fe, CA

I recently had the opportunity to spend a few days with Debra Lee Baldwin, author of two excellent books about gardening with succulents, including a wonderful guide to using succulents in container gardens. Perhaps best of all, I got to spend the night in Debra’s guest bedroom, which looks out onto her gardens. I’m trying not to brag, but I also got to tour Debra’s gardens twice, once with Jean Ann Van Krevlen, and the second time with three talented landscapers in tow. Lucky for you, I took a lot of photos…

Of course a succulent aficionado like Debra fills even her window boxes with succulents. Whether she is looking to highlight the color or shape of a plant, or to frame a view, everything in Debra’s garden is done with intention. Here, she has combined three types of succulents, all with colors reminiscent of a sunset. It’s also a balanced composition in the sense that there are large, medium, and finely cut leaves, with the tallest plant (Firesticks – Euphorbia tirucalli ‘rosea’) in the center, flanked by Graptoveria ‘Fred Ives,’ and graptopetalum paraguayense ‘pinky’ spilling over the side.

Another thing I noticed in Debra’s garden was her affection for one of a kind pottery. She is slowly amassing a collection of hand thrown pots created by ceramic artists and sold at succulent and cactus shows. Debra feels that these pots reflect the natural habitat of succulents and better show off their innate beauty. I have to say, I agree. Also notice that Debra top dressed the soil of those container with small, rounded pebbles.

This is another unique pot. Debra drilled small holes in pieces of broken pottery and created a “necklace” by stringing them on a long piece of wire. There’s also another necklace with beads on it. What a great way to dress up a terra cotta pot!

I’ll finish my tour of Debra’s succulents with this interesting contrast. A water feature surrounded by drought tolerant plants. I hope the birds that use this bath enjoy the view of Debra’s garden as much as I did!

Unlike most of the country, some of the hottest days of the year are still yet to come for Southern California and the rest of the Southwest. Hot, dry winds are brutal on plants, but especially those growing in containers. They dry out plants faster than the plant can draw up water through its roots, so no amount of extra watering will help. That’s what got me thinking that colorful succulents could be a great, low-maintenance choice for Fall.

Read the rest of the article on Fiskars >>>

• Mike has a pretty neat idea to make about how to make a self-watering pot out of a soda bottle and t-shirt.
• Interested in vermicomposting (composting with worms)? Genevieve has got you covered.
• Take out your iPod and load it up with the latest Nest in Style podcast with hosts Jayme and Theresa chatting it up about lettuce and living walls. You’ll also enjoy the interview with succulent goddess Debra Lee Baldwin.
• Kerry is not a fan of upside down tomato planters. Find out why.
• I especially like the first of Jenny’s flower photos of a planter she created for a client’s deck railing.
• If you like succulents, check out Megan’s photos of her backyard. So many great ideas to take in!

Winner of the Botanical Interests Basil and Poppyseed Soap

There were a lot of great photos submitted to win a bar of Botanical Interests wonderful-smelling new soap, but only one person could win. I used Random.org to select a number, and it corresponded with Erin Neu’s photo. Erin, I will be sending you an email shortly to find out where the send your bar of soap and seed packets. Congrats!

If you’d like to look through the entries, you’ll find some pretty creating photo ideas:

Container Gardening In The News

• Lots of great container gardening ideas in this Chicago Sun Times article.
• Tomatoes, potatoes and rhubarb in the Pittsburgh Sun Times, oh my!
• According to the Edmonton Journal, you should view your containers as pots of gold. Sounds good to me.

Photos from this succulent container idea.

Lots of good news in my neck of the woods. For starters, I’m graduating from the Master Gardener training program this weekend, so on Saturday I will officially be a certified Master Gardener. I should be able to share more details about some other good news soon. This week was also good in that there were tons of great garden blog posts to share. You can really tell that Spring is getting into full swing!

Great Blog Reading

• Jayme over at aHa Modern Living has some creative ideas for gardening in small spaces.
• Kerry has an idea for creating a living flower arrangement for $10, sounds like a much better idea than dropping $40 this Sunday on a bouquet of flowers for mom.
• A talented container gardeners, Kimberly has some new pots to show off in shades of silver, red and orange.
• Garden designer Jenny Peterson interviewed the staff at her local nursery to find out their favorite plants.
• Adriana reviewed Womanswork gloves. Check out the video of her husband using the gloves, guess they’re tough enough for men too.
• Newly minted Angeleno, Mike is already hard at work planting up his balcony and making good use of self-watering containers. Smart move in a hot climate like ours.

Don’t Forget!

This month’s blog carnival topic is container gardens as wildlife habitats. This is such an important thing for us to consider, I hope to be flooded with great posts from you guys!

Also, Timber Press is giving away a garden center gift card and signed copies of Debra Lee Baldwin’s books on succulent gardens and succulent container gardens. Y’all know how highly I think of Debra’s books. To enter, simply upload a photo of a succulent container that you created and share the link in the comments of this Timber Press blog post.

Umzugsgesellschaft

Photo by Knoten-Susi

I admit that this photo first caught my attention in the LOTB Flickr group because of the really long German title. What is a Umzugsgesellschaft, I thought? Well, with the help of Google Translator, I think it means “moving company.” I wonder what a moving company has to do with these little seedlings? Any guesses?

Container Gardening News

• In unfortunate news, Scotts-Miracle Gro reported that it’s second quarter profits rose 53%
• Pretty thorough overview of growing fruits, vegetables and herbs in containers from Berks-Mont News.
• Check out this container idea published in the Lincoln Journal Star featuring a climbing nasturtium. Might have to thry this one out too.

Next to edible plants, succulents are probably one of the hottest topics in the gardening world. They’re sculptural, and modern looking, and are much easier to care for than vegetables. I know whenever I (re)read Debra Lee Baldwin’s book on succulent container gardening, I want to run outside and combine my succulents in new ways.

The other day, I went into a garden center during my lunch break looking for tomato stakes (I have a vegetable garden growing at my office). They were all out of stakes in the size I wanted, but while there I noticed that they had a bunch of succulents on sale for 15% off. Lemon, meet lemonade! I am sure I am a garden center owner’s dream customer. “Hi Fern, no, sorry, we don’t have the $3 worth of stakes you’d like to buy, but here, why don’t you spend $15 on some succulents!”

Anyway, I snatched up two of the plants they had on sale (A and B) and combined them with the Burro’s Tail sedum and a pot I already had.

• A – Aenoium ‘Plum Purdy’
• B – Echeveria ‘Doris Taylor’
• C – Sedum morganianum also called ‘Burro’s Tail’

Potting up succulents can be kind of tricky because it’s easy to accidentally knock off their fleshy leaves. But basically, I follow the same method I use for potting regular plants. I placed the aeonium first, because it was the flashiest part of the combo and I wanted to make sure I oriented it just right. Then I squeezed in the echeveria because it was the next largest plant. If a plant doesn’t quite fit in your pot, you can gently tease the roots and knock off some of the dirt to reduce the size of the rootball. Finally, I put the sedum in front. If anyone knows of a trick for potting those guys without squishing a ton of leaves or causing them to pop off left and right, I’m all ears.

Something I learned from Debra’s book is that a lot of succulents do better in part sun or filtered light. Since moving my other succulents into a spot with less direct sun, they’re looking even better than they did before. This pot will go near my front door that gets a bit of direct morning sun, then light filtered through a tree, and no direct afternoon sun. Hopefully it will be happy there. I’ve killed the last two plants to reside in that spot (I rarely go through the front door and I forget to water that pot).

Another thing you’ll notice is that I put gravel down to cover the exposed dirt. This is also something I picked up from Debra, she’s a big fan of top dressing. It does make the pot look finished, and has the added benefit of reducing the frequency of watering and gravel prevents soil from washing out of the pot during rain storms.

Related Posts

• Review of Succulent Container Gardens by Debra Lee Baldwin
• Plants for Windy, Scorching Hot Balconies
• Drought Tolerant Plants for Container Gardens

As you all know, I have been waiting for Debra Lee Baldwin’s latest book to come out for some time. And I am here to tell you that Succulent Container Gardens lives up to all of my hopes and expectations for the book. So many gardening books skimp of good quality color photographs. This book is overflowing with them. But the abundance of photos didn’t preclude Debra from including plenty of useful information as well.

My review copy of Succulent Container Gardens was delivered to my office, and once I saw that it was from Timber Press, I shredded the cardboard, I couldn’t get the packing off fast enough. A coworker and I giddily flipped the pages, practically drooling over all the inspiring ideas in the book. Honestly, it is an absolute steal at Amazon’s $19.77 price.

I don’t want to overemphasize the photos though, because there is plenty of text describing ideas for matching succulents to the right pot, different topdressings, and suggestions for creating miniature landscapes in each pot. There are ideas you’ve seen before, though done better or with an interesting twist. And then there are ideas that you probably haven’t, like placing colored balls on the tips of Aloe leaves (don’t knock it until you check out the photo on pages 190).

One thing I’ve been attracted to lately are landscapes and pots that pair succulents with other xeric plants, and Debra included page after page of possibile succulent companion plants. For example, I would have never thought to combine geraniums (pelargoniums) with succulents, but Debra points out that pelargoniums do best when crowded, which is how most people like to plant succulent pots. And once established, they can be pretty drought tolerant. The photo of aeoniums and geraniums spilling out of a low bowl certainly proves they look beautiful together.

Also useful is the section on growing and caring for succulents. It will certainly help beginners get started growing succulents, but it has enough depth to teach seasoned succulent aficionados a thing or two. Not that I am a succulent expert, but I was surprised to learn that most succulents prefer 3-4 hours of direct sun, max. I thought most liked much more sun than that. And I know that I will be referring again and again to the sections on repotting, grooming, pests, and propagating.

If you’d like to make your own succulent containers, as opposed to borrowing an idea directly from one in the book, Debra included useful lists in the back that recommend plants for height, fillers, cascaders, and succulents organized by color. I’m sure professional gardeners will particularly find that section useful.

To sum it all up, if you’re thinking that 2010 will be the year you give succulents a try, this book will help you create a unique and beautiful pot or two or ten. Not to mention give you enough information to keep your new plants alive for many years to come. And if you already have succulents on your balcony or patio, you will be inspired to try new things and find your passion for succulents renewed.

p.s. To give you an idea of the quality of photos in the book, all the photos I’ve included in this post were taken by Debra, but were among some 350 amazing succulent containers that did not make it into the book. So I’ll leave it to your imagination just how inspiring the photos are that made it into Succulent Container Gardens.