This week we are sharing a section of our Test Garden in Lafayette, Ca with you all via video. Hope you enjoy!
Hi everyone, it's Stef from Homestead. I'm here with Christian and Rosalind, and we are sharing another part of our test garden. So this area was just planted last fall and you can see how large and full it is. It is a low water, pollinator attracting, cut flower garden. Chris, what have we got? And be careful there's a bee right there.
Well, that's good because the bees are declining and they're very happy here. As you can see, everything is mostly in full bloom. This is Dwarf Greek Oregano, the Nana Compacta. I know … it's a mouthful! It's an edible oregano. Yeah, it is. And it's just starting to come into bloom right here.
We've got the dwarf curry. This is Helichrysum Italicum Anom, it stays a lot tidier than the typical curry plant. Now this isn't the kind of curry that you cook with. It's just smells like it when you rub the foliage and smell your hands. It's incredible! And it's a new favorite from Rose at Morning Sun Herb Farm. We're still kind of testing this out. This seems to stay a lot tidier though than the other one, which makes it a great gardening plant and an understory for the Phenomenal lavender.
We've been planting Phenomenal lavender in lieu of the more common Provence lavender. It just seems to handle the heat waves a little bit better than the Provenance does and handles humidity well, too. So if you're on the east coast, this is a good one to plant.
And then what was this? This is Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz, ornamental, oregano. This is a new one for us. We're not really sure what this is gonna do, but, it looks pretty exciting, very pretty, its beautiful and tough as nails. Yeah, all of these plants are really tough. They all got planted in the crazy heat wave last summer and pretty much everything survived.
As is typical, we love to interplant all these Mediterranean and native plants with some really fun things in the Protea family. Like, look at this. The beautiful color on this Leucadendron ‘Safari Sunset’. Very easy, very hearty. It loves this same kind of, microclimate (as the California & Mediterranean natives).
Then we've got the King Protia here - a little finicky in the landscape. It really likes to be grown on a slope, as it is. Then this. Oh, beautiful. I love this plant. This beautiful thing just started coming into its own. This (plant) is called ‘Celestial Blue’ Sage. This is a hybrid of the Cleveland Sage and the Mojave Sage. Mojave Sage is a beautiful plant that's very, very difficult to grow in the garden. And this seems to take on the best qualities of both parents as you've got like the different colored coxes with the flower and a shrub that is hardier and more garden friendly. So then, this entire planting strip is really super low water, super harvestable. Obviously supporting the pollinators as we're getting whizzed by.
We've got Apiana sage, Grevellia … we've got a whole wide variety of Proteas … all great plants for harvesting and Buckwheat! Buckwheat's a great midsummer pollinator plant for bees and butterflies. Then let's show them this Hakea right behind you, too. This guy right here. This guy has gone gangbusters. Just look at the cool foliage. It also gets these like really awesome sea urchin shaped flowers, which I don't remember when it actually bloomed. I think it was the early fall. Is it fall? Yeah. I don't know either. Even when it's not in flower. The foliage is just super cool. It's great for arrangements too.
And this plant is extremely vigorous too. This thing is tripled in size since we planted it. Last summer and then we’ve got our good Verbena ‘De La Mina’, which is a (California) native from the islands off of Baja. This plant Blooms 24/7. It's been in bloom since January. Yeah, it looks like it might be due for a cutback at some point. You can see the flowers are kind of getting to the end of their rope here, but that's okay. It'll just grow back and start blooming again.
And then this is another favorite from Baja. This is Lepechinia hasta. And this one actually starts blooming in summer and goes through the fall. So it'll kind of take over when a lot of these other California natives start to kind of peter out and it's a favorite hummingbird plant. Bees love it. And the foliage smells like Seven-Up. Yeah. It's a great fragrant flower. Tough as nails.
Alright, so we just wanted to share with you this really fun planting we did last fall. And what's amazing is that all of these plants besides the proteas were planted in either four inch or one quart size. And look how large and full this planting is. All right, have a great day everyone!
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