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My husband and I are getting settled into our new house in Los Angeles, and we inherited a yard that we're not quite sure what to do with. Neither of us has had to do any yard work since we were kids living in the Midwest, and that just consisted of pushing and/or riding a mower, so we really don't have any knowledge of actual yard/plant care (I'm kicking myself for not paying more attention when my mom did all of the gardening and landscaping).
Do you know some good web resources for total yard/gardening newbies? We do have a few goals we'd like to work toward:
- Drought resistance: we feel guilty about trying to maintain a lawn when our region has such water issues, so we do want to eventually xeriscape at least the front (south-facing, full sun). Apparently, the City of LA will pay a certain amount per square foot of lawn that gets converted, so we're interested in that. Anyone have experience with doing this?
- Maintaining what we have: until we save up for the xeriscaping, we want to at least keep the stuff we have alive and looking respectable. Right now, the front has a lawn and some sizable beds right in front of the house with geraniums, some topiary-type things and maybe an allium(?), and the back has mostly lawn with some very overgrown beds against the back of the house (I recognize some calla lilies, but I don't know the others) and some trees/shrubs against the back stone wall. Can I post a couple of pictures and get some help IDing things? What are some of the best web resources for care instructions once I find out what we have?
- Square-foot garden: my husband wants to start a food-centric SFG; he bought the book but hasn't gotten started yet. I'll check out the SFG sticky here and see if there are any SoCal contributors.
if you can post some pictures of your plants probably you'll get somebody to help putting a name to the pictures. my guess is that resources for selecting drought tolerant plants for water saving gardens can be initially found by a web search with the words "drought tolerant garden plants southern California" for example. the arboretum of los angeles county (in Pasadena) has a number of gardens and plants wonderfully displayed that are adaptable to large or small gardens and is just a beautiful place to walk around in while learning and would likely have resources you could use or people to talk to that can give more details to what you see. you might also check your county extension agent or other botanical gardens and displays at UC riverside and fullerton, and UCLA. as for keeping what you have already alive, if you want to keep the grass green it probably going to have to watered several times a week (preferably evenings or early mornings to reduce evaporation loss due to heat and wind) for somewhere from about 45 min. to an hour and a half depending on how much lawn, what kind of grass and what kind of soil it's growing in. you want to strike a balance between thoroughly moistening the soil and causing run-off from too much which wastes expansive water FWIW, the "allium" may be agapanthus/lily of the nile very common in landscaping down there or "society garlic" (also common) or something else, LOL). in any case, if you have a good name for the plant, you can do more research on the plant by the computer, the folks here, or even reading the book. finally, a good resource may be very close to you---if your next door neighbor has a nice yard and garden, they may be willing to give you some guidance on how you can take care of your own----if only to keep the neighborhood looking nice and the property values up (again, LOL). hope this helps.
sorry, for some reason the pictures aren't showing up at my end---don't know if it's my lousy internet or something with how they are posted on the site???? that said and based solely on your words, you may want to do away with calla lilies (not necessarily because of their potential harm to pets---have seen them in a fair number of yards that likely had pets and just like the very poisonous oleander shrub even more widely planted in California losses to pets don't seem that common???) but because they are generally very water demanding plants and so probably don't fit into your plans on that point. any kind of topiary while interesting and attractive require lots of maintenance (just like a "formal" hedge) so you may want to find another home for the topiary (you might even be able to sell it to a landscaper) to save on-going time and effort on your part. until I can actually see pictures one way or the other, I won't be much help for i.d.'s for you---hopefully someone else will see the pictures to help out. FWIW, and speaking as a dog owner, depending on what kind of dog or dogs you get and whether they are indoors or outdoors types be aware that some dogs are diggers and your garden may be a truly "holy" horror thru normal doggie activities if you have a husky for example so you may want to factor that into what kind of garden and what kind of plants (and what kind of fencing) you may want to incorporate into your landscape plans. good luck. hope this is of some interest and help.
For the pics, try right-clicking and opening in a new tab - that seems to work for me (they're also not showing up in-thread on my end for some reason).
I didn't know that selling the topiaries were an option - that's great to know. I'd like to eventually get rid of them not only to eliminate the maintenance but also because there's a chance one might be the source of the roots getting into our sewer pipe (saw some intrusion on the cam inspection). Inspector thought they weren't from a current plant, but with the placement I'm not so sure.
pictures finally appeared, thanks. the back wall pictures shows a row of podocarpus "trees", the dark leaved plant in the last picture is an aeonium I think. maybe the aeonium arboreum cultivar "zwartkop" (fairly drought tolerant). not sure if the topiary (it's potential value if any for any sale is hard to say) is a cause for concern for your sewer---those kinds of plants generally have relatively shallow non aggressive roots compared to the usual suspects like eucalyptus, ficus, and cottonwoods. FWIW, looks that it might not be a tremendous lot or work to change up your garden as it's mostly lawn at this point except for the "foundation planting" around the base of the house. you might want to consider some kind of "xeric/drought tolerant rock garden" (potential search terms) or "succulent garden"----a planting of WELL placed "boulders" (not necessarily big rocks), and gravel mulch with aloes and ice plants for example might replace the front lawn rather nicely??? that said, pets may be a big concern in how the garden is planted and laid out. also, a big cost may be putting in a fence in the front if you want a safe secure spot out front for the dog.
pictures finally appeared, thanks. the back wall pictures shows a row of podocarpus "trees", the dark leaved plant in the last picture is an aeonium I think. maybe the aeonium arboreum cultivar "zwartkop" (fairly drought tolerant). not sure if the topiary (it's potential value if any for any sale is hard to say) is a cause for concern for your sewer---those kinds of plants generally have relatively shallow non aggressive roots compared to the usual suspects like eucalyptus, ficus, and cottonwoods. FWIW, looks that it might not be a tremendous lot or work to change up your garden as it's mostly lawn at this point except for the "foundation planting" around the base of the house. you might want to consider some kind of "xeric/drought tolerant rock garden" (potential search terms) or "succulent garden"----a planting of WELL placed "boulders" (not necessarily big rocks), and gravel mulch with aloes and ice plants for example might replace the front lawn rather nicely??? that said, pets may be a big concern in how the garden is planted and laid out. also, a big cost may be putting in a fence in the front if you want a safe secure spot out front for the dog.
Thanks so much for the IDs! Glad to hear the topiary roots might not be a big issue. What we may end up doing is keeping some lawn in back (back is already fenced in, so thinking about what would be good for potential future dogs/kids/gatherings back there) but getting rid of the lawn in front entirely. Even getting rid of just half our grass overall seems like it would save a ton of water.
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