danger garden

Wednesday, April 23, 2025

The Desert Garden at Balboa Park

I was surprised to discover I'd missed writing about the Desert Garden at Balboa Park, since I'd previously covered the Kate O. Sessions Cactus Garden and Palm Canyon, and the Botanical Building (aka the lath house), all of which we visited in mid-January of this year.

You reach the desert garden by walking across a pedestrian bridge at the far east side of the park.

As we descended down into the garden I could see that the plants were suffering from the same lack of attention, care, and water that I saw elsewhere in the park.

Someone had a little fun with a dead barrel cactus.

The plants that were still looking good stood as a testament to the resilience of succulents.

Towering Euphorbia sp.

I don't know palms enough to venture a serious guess as to the ID of this beauty. I mean if you made me throw out a name I'd say Bismarckia nobilis.

Puya sp?

It's crazy to think there were aloes blooming during our visit in mid-January and still many blooming when I was in the Bay area at the end of March. You gotta love a plant that blooms for that long.

I love this yucca class photo. Or maybe it's a family reunion?

The large trunk of their Brachychiton rupestris (Queensland bottle tree) has broken open.

Wow.

This opuntia looks like it's melting.

Cochineal

Ah yes, there is nothing more stately than a Dracaena draco..

So dry...

These agaves (sorry, can't venture a guess on the species) were all colored up with drought stress.

The Wiliwili tree (Erythrina sandwicensis) was blooming!

This tree in the pea family is native to the Hawaiian Islands. The colorful flowers were a stark contrast to the bare brown branches.

The blooms pictured above were way up over my head, but there were a few that had fallen to the ground.

Look at that adorable little baby cactus! Grown from a dropped seed? Planted by someone who is watching over it?

This one is not so lucky, it's at the end of its life.

It's still a visual anchor for this vignette within the garden, and no doubt providing shelter to small creatures.

As it breaks down I hope it will be allowed to stay in place and do so completely. What an interesting process to watch.

That's a healthy Agave victoriae-reginae at its base...

A parting view. I still have a handful of San Diego gardens to share!

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Monday, April 21, 2025

April garden views

I find myself confused about where exactly the plants in my garden should be in mid April (when I took these photos). We've had a sunny warmish stretch and I think I've mentally jumped ahead to May, I'm trying to tamp down my expectations and just enjoy what's happening out there, which is a lot!

There are so many blooms on the Citrus trifoliata, if they all set fruit it will be a bumper crop.

The Rhododendron stenopetalum ‘Linearifolium’ is also covered in blooms.

Continuing the walk around the front garden, my small Erica arborea var. alpina is covered in flowers and can no longer be called small. Wow. When did this plant get this big? (maybe the explosion of white just makes it seem larger?)

Also, how did I never notice the blooms are fragrant?

One of my Yucca nana is fixing to bloom!

Tiny flowers on the Pittosporum anomalum.

Entering the back garden now where the Impatiens omeiana are up and looking flawless.

The fact the Blechnum penna-marina (Austroblechnum penna-marina) is moving into and mingling with the back mondo makes me very happy.

The shady bed along the side of the garage is all fluffy with new Adiantum venustum fronds and other fern species.

I'm thrilled to see Pyrrosia sp. SEH#1511 is putting out several new "fronds"...

Paris quadrifolia has been dissed on social media lately. Someone commented on my Instagram post with a "Meh" and someone else said on their own Facebook post "I remember when I thought they were special" (their photo showed an area where the plant had spread). I still think they're special!

Rodgersia (the brown leaves), sadly I've forgotten which species this is (likely R. podophylla, thanks to a commenter for ID).

New growth on Rhododendron cardiobasis.

And blooms opening on the Magnolia laevifolia

Arisaema ringens, such a cool flower, it's hard to believe it's real (not fabricated).

Disporum longistylum ‘Night Heron’

Walking down on to the patio the new growth on these two mahonia are hard to miss.

Mahonia eurybracteata 'Indianola Silver' backed by M. x media 'Marvel'.

It's wonderful to enjoy Stachyurus salicifolius in bloom with leaves still on its branches. This is one of the plants that was hit hard the last few winters.

Not this year!

I did a little paint touch-up around the edge of the stock tank table planting, after a couple of years the orange was wearing thin and the ugly blue underneath was showing. I must say the planting itself just keeps getting better and better.

I added only two plants this spring, an Asplenium trichomanes and the Cassiope 'Askival' I brought home from the Rhododendron Species Botanical Garden.

This Athyrium otophorum 'Okanum' likes life in the table planting.

And the fertile fronds of Blechnum spicant (aka Struthiopteris spicant) are extra stunning when they're raised up closer to eye-level.

Backed up for an over all shot of the area.

This is the best the Loropetalum chinense 'Sizzling Pink' has ever looked. It was pruned back hard after the destruction of winter 2024 and it's made a great rebound.

Daphniphyllum macropodum 'Ki Midori Nakafu'

New foliage of Quercus dentata 'Pinnatifida’.

And to wrap things up, a new frond on Blechnum brasiliense, the Brazilian tree fern. My tiny plant is anything but tree-sized, but what it lacks in height it makes up for with that color.

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