Saving Water in Pleasanton

Pleasanton gardener Kathryn McClelland has been a Bay-Friendly tour host gardener, workshop participant and volunteer at local nurseries. She recently shared with us that her garden is featured on the Save Our Water website. Kathryn shared some of her learnings from overhauling her “blah cookie-cutter landscape” with gray, green and purple hues of Mediterranean climate plants.

You can read her profile below and visit the Save Our Water site for more photos and a short video from Kathryn’s garden.  

One More Reason to Cover Up Your Lawn: Chemical Toxicity

A couple weeks ago I heard keynote speaker Paul Tukey of SafeLawns.org at the 2012 EcoLandscape California Conference. Tukey is on a mission. He likes lawns, and would like to see more of them! To boot, water conservation is NOT his issue. He doesn’t even sound particularly aware of California’s struggles over water. And yet, his message is compelling.

Bay-Friendly Plant Pick - Dodonaea sinuolata

Georgia Madden is a Bay-Friendly Qualified Professional who has had several gardens on past Bay-Friendly Tours. I've always enjoyed the plant pallete she works with, so I asked her to share some of her favorites. Dodonaea sinuolata is her first pick. -Ben Duggan, Alameda County Tour Organizer

Here’s the skinny on DODONAEA sinuolata:

Pruning Young Fruit Trees

If you don’t know how to do it, pruning fruit trees can be intimidating since it requires making some bold cuts. However, it’s such an important part of growing fruit that it is definitely worth learning a few basic techniques. Pruning a tree is actually fairly easy to do and does not take very much time. Even the worst dawdler out there should be able to prune a young tree in less than 15 minutes once they get the hang of it.