As the weather warms up in the Santa Clarita Valley it’s not too early to think about your garden and now is the time to check on your lawn, your bushes and shrubs. In the mild Southern California climate there’s never a bad time to tend to your yard. In addition to planting, watering and fertilizing you can add to your garden’s beauty with landscape and lawn ornamentation. There are many ways to personalize and beautify your outdoor environment.

Lament the Dead, Reclaim the Living

One of the biggest garden issues this past winter was the frost, which Richard Green, of Green’s Landscape Nursery in Saugus, has said was actually a blessing in disguise for many shocked homeowners new to the SCV. Though many residents may have lost very expensive vegetation in the frost, said Green, it’s important for newcomers to realize what kind of weather this valley is capable of getting.

“We used to have this kind of weather much more regularly,” he said, noting that the low temperatures recorded by the National Weather Service probably underestimated how cold it really got this past winter.

“They said we made it into the 20s, but I think areas of the SCV dropped into the teens,” he said. “This is a tough climate – hot and dry in the summer and sometimes really cold in the winter.”

If your plants did get “burned” from the cold, he doesn’t recommend cutting them back unless you’re sure they’re dead. Geraniums, bougainvillea, hibiscus, ficus and birds of paradise, though, he said are definitely goners.

On the other hand, calla lilies, canna lilies and asparagus ferns will come back if left alone, as will sego palms. In fact, Green suggests waiting up to another four weeks before cutting back the dead material, because it acts as a protective cover.

“It shields the tender underparts of the plant or tree that are still alive,” said Green. “Basically it acts like a scab.”

For the plants that are dead, wait until mid-April to pull out and replace them with spring flowers (and vegetables if you keep a garden). This is because this current bout of very warm weather could be a “false spring.”

Fertilize Now

According Green, now is the time to fertilize everything, including your lawn. For everything but your lawn, he recommends E.B. Stone Organics GreenAll line of fertilizers. Stone’s All Purpose Plant Food is organic and includes micronutrients. Its composition is 5-5-5 which refers to its ratio of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium (known in the business as NPK ratio). They also have a synthetic version (NPK of 16-16-16), which releases at all temperatures – organics need heat.

“It has a lot additives other ones don’t have. It’s like feeding your plants a full-course meal instead of a hamburger,” said Green.

For fertilizing lawns, Green suggests Best Nitraking Fertilizer which comes in 50 pound bags for less than $20. This brand has an NPK ratio of 21-4-4, and that 50 pound bag will cover six thousand feet. That’s enough to last you through the season and beyond.

“You can fertilize in March, April, May and in the summer, and as long as you have a cool dry place to store it you can use it the following year, too,” said Green.

Adding a Decorative Touch

Green’s is well-stocked with lawn ornaments and other kinds of yard art to help you dress up your front or backyard garden.

“We have lots of birdbaths,” said Green. “And they’re very popular. They’re not just good for birds – squirrels love them too.”

Green’s has all kinds of birdbaths, from plain concrete to porcelain and enamel, Talavera Mexican and even engraved.

“Some of them have quite ornate painting,” he said.

Of course, they also have animal figurines (bunnies and frogs are big sellers), angels, and the quintessential lawn ornament, the gnome.

Birdbaths, Fountains or Waterscapes

Green is solidly anti-fountain, having had some bad experiences with them.

“We’ve been in business for 30 years, and we haven’t carried fountains for the last 20 of those years. We know better,” Green said.

Apparently, there were enough irate customers unhappy with the high maintenance involved in fountains to make Green swear off the item, and he can understand why.

“We have hard water here. Hard water leaves chemical rings on colored concrete fountains, and if you try to scrape the residue off, you end up scraping off the surface of the fountain,” he said. “If you go with a glazed surface, the water takes off the glazing.”

Another problem the hard water presents for fountain enthusiasts is the debris it contains tends to burn out the impeller, (a rotor that makes the water flow through the pump) which breaks, freezes up or dries up. In order to fix it, you have to disassemble the whole fountain to get to the pump. Heavy debris that can simply fall into the inside of the fountain also burns out pumps easily and frequently.

“Birdbaths are a nice easy alternative,” said Green.

What Price Beauty?

Jane Gates of Gates and Croft Horticultural Design is a landscape designer and horticultural artist. She agrees that gardens that incorporate waterfalls and other ornamental water decor are high maintenance, but feels that they are worth it for the beauty and relaxation they provide.

“I do it all,” she said. “Fountains, waterfalls, ponds and watergardens. They’re very popular now, but if you want a low maintenance garden, watergardens are not for you.”

With so many going in these days, Gates notes that some ponds, for instance, may be not up to code. For instance, if your pond is very deep, or very large, say, 18 inches deep, the city considers it like a swimming pool, meaning you need a fence that conforms to certain specifications of size and design. Also, you can’t have rain water wash into your pond.

Gates agrees that hard water can cause problems – but still loves the look water elements provide.

“There’s an upside and downside to everything,” she said. “For instance, if you create a fountain using boulders, calcification (hard water staining) doesn’t matter.”

She has had problems with impellers, too, and fountains that burn out pumps due to water evaporating in the dry climate of the SCV. But some pumps are easy to replace and not too expensive.

“We live in hot dry environment,” she said. “You can’t expect it to be maintenance free. But definitely don’t enter into the process with the illusion that a watergarden is going to be low maintenance.”

In fact, said Gates, there are newer, lower-maintenance fountains on the market now, ones that come in pieces and can be incorporated into a landscape. Still, she said, homeowners will have to clean them out at least once or twice a year.

“There are very natural ones,” she said, “where it looks like the water is just bubbling up out of the ground, or where it gives the illusion of an actual stream.”

Dry or wet, natural or ornamented, your garden can be whatever you want it to be – and beautiful, too.

Gates and Croft Horticultural Design 15004 Daffodil Ave., Santa Clarita, CA 91387 (661) 299-5383 www.gardengates.info. Green Landscape Nursery 26191 Bouquet Canyon Road, Santa Clarita, 91350 (661) 255-8838.

source : www.the-signal.com