Rain tomorrow?

I heard we might get rain tomorrow - I am aghast on one level (it's "SF summer" aka fall!) and delighted on another (the garden is parched) so we shall see. I expect an overcast day and a few scant drops for P Hill.

Today I went out determined to clear up the tool shed area, and clear it up I did. I potted up a number of succulents that had been languishing and rearranged, trimmed, primped and organized the plants there thoroughly.

Emily showed up as I was getting ready to leave and she worked on the weeding of the brights bed, which she has been assiduously doing for months now. One day she will taste victory against the evil sheep's sorrel!

Middle front bed plans

Aeonium nobile

Now that the big variegated Echium "Pride of Madeira" is gone (RIP) what shall we put in its place?

Well, I planted a Leonotus leonurus in the hole that developed in the middle a few months back, so that'll provide a nice tough filler with orange flowers in fall... hurry up and grow!

But that does leave is with some gaps around the sides, and looking at some of the plants there, well, they could use some rearranging.

For one, the Agave attenuatas are off: one huge one at the edge, the two smaller ones further back, with the Aeonium collection sort of impinging on them. Then there are Achilleas around the base of the big Agave americana variegata, buried and sad. Two Kniphofias that were hidden under the Echium came to light as well. And a good-sized but rangy Aloe striatula is now quite tall after it's hunt for light through the Echium branches. Lastly a stub of Echeveria secunda glauca that I'd planted at the base of the Aloe has grown and branched out a lot - and got covered by nearby plants.

Rearranging all this can mostly be done now, as the majority are plants that accept summer transplanting (Aloes, Agaves, Echeverias etc) but the Achilleas and Kniphofias may want to wait a month or two. Which gives me time to choose another Agave for that spot, and rebuild the twig border. I think this is a job for the next volunteer day!

Composters completed!

Today Matt built the final parts for the composters - the lids. He built them out of redwood, and screwed on the hinges, added handles on the tops and locks on the front (we're short one hasp so the last handle/hasp will go on tomorrow.)

Why locks? So that ONE bin is always open for "deposits" (i.e. your kitchen food scraps) and the other two are "cooking" new compost. Right now you can dump your kitchen scraps or compostable PG items (deadheaded bits, and so on) into bin number two - the middle one.

He also added the new sign, in case there's any confusion about what going in the bins (weeds and twigs can go on the heap).

Don't put weeds in the bins - we don't want to spread more weeds around the garden!

I emptied the worm bins into the new compost bins so they can get a head start, and we now have a worm bin and the old plastic composter available to anyone who wants them, in exchange for a donation to the garden, naturally! Email me if you're interested.

I also did a lot of weeding, and watered the left bed, middle back and middle front beds. It's the hottest, driest time of year and a lot of the plants are feeling parched.

GreenTrustSF hosts Coastal Cleanup Day at Warm Water Cove

This just in from our friend Janet - she puts on a very friendly volunteer day!

 

GreenTrustSF hosts Coastal Cleanup Day at Warm Water Cove

Sat. Sept.17, 9:30-noon.

24th Street at the Bay (2 blocks east of Third St.)

Use T-Line 23rd St. Station and free parking available at site. Walkers and bikes welcome too!

Join your neighbors, and bring a friend to help keep trash out of the Bay and the park. Approximately 80% of San Francisco's debris ends up in the eastern shoreline. For a low environmental impact— bring your own water in re-usable container, gloves and large bag or bucket to collect trash. We will have some for those who do not have!

Also watering of the flower beds to perk them up from the rainless summer. We should see some water birds and/or a harbor seal, hummingbirds, butterflies, dragon flies, late summer flowers,earth art and great views of the Bay.

Snacks, water dispenser and some "door prizes" provided by local businesses!

See more and register here: http://www.signuptocleanup.org/

Fill in "Warm Water Cove, San Francisco" for site. We would like you to register but can also just sign in on day.

 

We look forward to seeing you there. See more about GreenTrustSF on our website.

GreenTrustSF-Central Waterfront

1459 18th Street, Box 186

San Francisco, CA 94107

www.gtsfcw.org

info@gtsfcw.org

Pride of Madeira gets whacked

Today Matt and I went to the hardware store and bought the rest of the components for the composter lid. Redwood lumber, handles, hinges, hasps, screws and so on.

We got to the garden and Matt started assembling the lids. Well, tried too - a mismeasurement means we need to get more lumber tomorrow. It took quite a while to figure that out.

In the meantime I set up sprinklers to water the brights bed and dismantled the variegated Echium candicans "Pride of Madeira." Yep, also known as "Pride of Matt" this once stunning plant grew high on the hog, becoming so heavy-branched that sections of it would regularly split off and die. Well its swan song was today - almost all the branches had split and I was just sick of watching it die so I hacked it to death and got it over with. Took about 15 minutes to saw it all apart.

What took a lot longer was getting all the branches put away - there's not much room on the old compost heap so I cut down the branches and used them to edge part of the left bed. A couple hours later and the middle back bed is looking quite bare... I think this calls for some excellent Agaves, Aloes and so on!


In other news I deadheaded the Rudbeckias, Amaryllis belladonnas, Achilleas and a few other things.

Volunteer Workday

When you visit the dog area this week, be sure to give it a good look - I hope you'll notice that it is now almost 100% free of weeds! Jon, Sara, Jean, Jo, Carl and myself spent the better part of the workday moving like a wave of weeding fury across the dog area. The photos definitely tell the tale. While we were weeding, Carlin did some deadheading around the garden, keeping things looking nice and clean, before she headed off to Progress Park for their workday. What energy!
Jon watered, giving the Cordlyines by the arch a good drink along with new Phormiums Annie and Co. put in on Wednesday.
Ron has also been busy with the terracing project, and I've included an in progress photo to show how it's going, and also as a reminder NOT to go back there right now as it is under construction. We'll definitely let you know when it is ready!

Day of the Triffids

Yesterday I thought I'd go out and do some minor twiddling in the garden as my parents are here on a visit so not much time for serious gardening. First up I met with Ron and his dog Cassius. Ron is terracing the back slope - it's coming along!

I deadheaded the rest of the yarrows by the steps and also the Aloe nobilis hedge. As I went down the hedge I weeded the cactus wall too. The cactus wall always looks good - it's my favorite part of the garden. So xeric, so cool...

I met a woman sitting on the bench called Linda. I idly inquired whether she had a garden and she went on to reveal that not only does she have a garden, it's a San Francisco Street Park. And not only that, but it was partly inspired by Pennsylvania Garden! I was feeling so proud. Then my parents walked up and she eventually let them know that she helped write the book my dad was carrying - The Trees of San Francisco

And not only that but she is on the advisory committee of the Friends of the Urban Forest. I thought "wow - good job I didn't offer her some pearls of gardening wisdom!"

Later on Matt and I went to pick up some phormiums from Leah. She said they were big but that was an understatement. We couldn't fit them all in the back of the car and had to leave some. We slowly drove home with the leaves hanging out the back of the car, and thought "oh dear... now we have to plant them..."

I decided we really had excess and sent out an email to potentially interested parties. Bruce responded with lightning speed and we dropped off a portion of the phormiums with him right away. Phew!

Then Matt and I went to plant the rest. We'd decided on a good spot in the middle back bed only to discover a nest of yellow jackets next to it - don't want to get stung. We picked another spot in the brights bed, dug a good hole and started getting the phormium up there. First in the wheelbarrow. Then it fell out. Couldn't get it back in. Dragged it with ropes. It was too heavy. Cursed. Eventually got Gary to come help and had it in the hole in no time!

Job done. Time for a glass of wine!

Composter fiddling

Amaryllis belladonna

I went out to add a few L-brackets to the composter on Friday... and the cordless drill died on me. I did manage to get one bin finished, and filled it with the compost we'd saved from the plastic composter in the wheelbarrow and three tub trugs. I added a load of dry plant matter from the big heal and that bin is full already.

I charged the drill up thoroughly and went back on Saturday with Matt only to find Ron had been at work in the garden - he's started the terracing!

Matt and I finished screwing in the brackets for the composter. All we need now are another redwood board to complete the fronts, and a plan to make the lid. I designed a sign to attach to the front of the bin, outlining what should go in there. I'll buy some hasps and two locks: only one bin will be open for kitchen scraps at any one time, while the other two will be locked - busy cooking up new compost.

I'm considering emptying the worm bins into the new composter too. I think they'll be happier in a huge composter. The worm bin is a little small for such a big garden, realistically.

Matt and I also spent some time clearing the pathway to the composters and back area in general, so Ron and his workmen can access it easily.

The contents of the box

As we cut back branches from the trees I found a little black tupperware box that felt oddly heavy. I thought it might have drugs in it or something else someone had stashed... turns out it was a "letterboxing" treasure trove! This is a bit like geocaching (or not, if you read the website http://www.atlasquest.com) - you go to the site to get clues about the location of a box, and go out to look for it. When you find it, the box contains a little book that you stamp with your personal rubber stamp, and you sign and date it too. The box also holds a unique rubber stamp of it's own so you can stamp your personal book that you carry with you on letterboxing expeditions.

Clearly a few people have found and signed this trove's book! The most recent was October 2010 though - has it been forgotten and unloved? I hope not! It's nice to think of the garden having a little secret hidden away.

The inside of the box was a bit damp so we left the contents out in the sun to dry a bit, then carefully repacked them and hid them in the same area. I'm not giving away the location! You'll have to find it yourself ;)

All good things

Last week Pennsylvania Street Gardens was invited by Kathy of the Carmel Valley Village Improvement Committee (CVVIC) to lecture on how to create and maintain a public garden. Not only did I get to see the birth place of the Cal Academy's green roof (more on that later), meet many really nice people, but Kathy let Ryan and I stay in her gorgeous guest cottage for the weekend. You missed out Annie!

So first thing, I gave a lecture to CVVIC. They are really interested in creating more parks, so I tried to relay what we've learned at PSG about how write grants, get volunteers, and manage a public garden. There were a lot of good questions, and it was awesome to talk with people who were so motivated about helping out their community. Maggie, the nursery manager for Rana Creek came, and afterward invited Ryan and I for a tour of the nursery (wow).

Never heard of Rana Creek? I bet you've seen them - they did the green roof for the California Academy of Sciences, and they have done lots of spectacular green roofs and walls around the world. They also focus on habitat restoration and do projects for homeowners too. Their website is an amazing resource, definitely check it out. They are a distributor for Sempergreen sedum mats, which is literally a roll out mat of Sedums for doing green walls/roofs. It is a neat product, and I'd love to work with it in the future.
As for the nursery site, it is nestled in between rolling hills, oak trees, and it is absolutely beautiful. Maggie gave us a grand tour, and she refused to let us leave without taking a few plants for Pennsylvania Garden. How could I resist?

2 Aquilegia formosa -western columbine
2 Galvezia speciosa - bush snapdragon
7 Lavendula a. 'Munstead'
1 Eriogonum parvifolium (or Eriogonum fasciculatum I can't tell the difference)

If you ever get the chance I recommend taking a long weekend, exploring the Carmel Valley and stopping by Rana Creek to get some beautiful native plants!

If you (say they can) build it, they will come...

Sector clear! Start
your power tools.

Today Matt and I met Jim and Leigh at the garden, both of whom had come with their own power tools (impressive!) to build the composters we bought materials for yesterday (see previous blog post.)

Carrie came over too and weeded the area by the arch very meticulously, while we hauled all the wood we cut yesterday to the garden, and set about preparing the site. Oh dear - what a messy site.

Leigh gets stuck in.

We managed to remove all the debris and old compster and still save the compost in it. We'd got some gravel recently and we used that as a base for the composters - we hadn't planned to, but with nowhere to move it to it seemed like a good idea at the time. And it'll provide good drainage for the bins, so a win-win all around I think.

The site is overflowing with the massive compost heap, which as you can imagine is impossible to move, so we made the composter system so it can be nudged backwards, downhill, over time, when the massive heap diminishes and we put more stuff in our new bins.

Nudging the back
and right side into place.

We started screwing together all the parts for the three bay compost bin system I'd devised, starting with attaching the heavy 12" wide, 9' long lumber back panels to the two 4"x4" back posts. Next we added the two ends, also made of 12" lumber, to a height of 4 feet.

Anyone who was there will tell you my drawings, coded in multiple colors of pen, were models of exactitude! Well, maybe not, but we are building a compost bin, not an MRI machine, so tolerances of up to 1/2" were allowed.

The left side goes on.

We put a 9 foot long long strip of 2"x4" along the bottom front edge to stabilize it all, then started adding the two dividers made of 3/4" thick plywood in the middle to create the bays. These needed to be attached using metal L-brackets but we didn't have the right length screws - something to finish up later.

Later or we were joined by Nate who took over from Leigh in the operation of power tools, level, measuring tape and so on. Yes - it really takes at least three, and preferably four sets of hands on a job like this - doing it with just two people would have been quite tricky and would have taken a lot longer.

Nate is dangerously
close to that drill...

The front of the bin has redwood slats that slide into runners made of 1" x 1" wood - Jim and I cut those into lengths 3'10" long. We got all those screwed to the composter, and also the two 4'x4" posts that support the dividers at the front of the bin were attached firmly too.

Lastly we slotted in the redwood boards for the front of the bins - turns out we miscalculated and need another board to complete that part, as well as ripping a few inches off the top board so they fit flush with the lid. Oh yeah... the lid. We haven't finalized plans for that, so it's a task for another day too, though the composter will function fine without it for now.

Ta-dah!

After about 3 hours the end result is a really sturdy thing. The basic structure is done, and with just a few quick additions the new composter will be open for business!

Great job guys - thanks for all your hard work!

It's big! It's heavy! It's Log!

Today I put my foot down: that composter is going to be BUILT if it's the last thing I do! *gnash* I've been planning a three-bay compster for a while now, and as our main heap has reached outrageous proportions it's time to separate the good from the bad. The weeds we pull, pine cones, scrap wood etc can't be used as garden fertilizer, so they will be consigned to the heap.  The household scraps, garden trimmings and so on can be used, so they'll go in the 3 bin system to turn into lovely useful compost.

I dragged Matt out of bed at the crack of 10am and we went lumber shopping at Center Hardware. We got some supplies there, but needed to drop by Discount Builder's Supply for the rest. Shopping local.

We ended up loading a cart with a dozen pieces of heavy lumber, and got a sheet of 3/4" plywood cut to size there. We hauled it all home and Matt started cutting everything to size in our garage. Here are the pieces we ended up with, ready to build our composter which will look like 3 boxes stuck side by side:

6 pieces of lumber for the vertical parts measuring 4" x 4"x 4'
4 pieces of lumber for the back of the bins: 12' x 2" x 9'
8 pieces of lumber for the two ends of the bins: 12' x 2" x 41"
2 pieces of plywood for the dividers inside: 3' x 4' x 3/4"
2 pieces of lumber that brace the front, top and bottom: 2' x 4" x 9'
16 strips to brace the insides: 1" x 1" x 4'
16 metal brackets and a load of screws... I think we'll need more.

Tomorrow we start to screw it all together! Anyone want to come help?

Get this blog by email!

If you check in every few days looking for new posts and are sometimes disappointed because, let's face it, I have a full time job too, there's hope!

Scroll down and in the right column you'll see a new feature: "Get Blog Posts By Email" and if you type in your email and follow the simple instructions, you'll get an email each time I post on the blog. Neato.

Please note that this is different from signing up to be on our Google Groups email list (slightly lower in the right column) since that list only announces the monthly volunteer days or rare other events, and won't send an email each time a new blog post is written.