Five things to do in the garden this week:
Perennials. Tall slipper plant (Pedilanthus bracteatus) is a highly drought-tolerant selection from Mexica whose bracts are suggestive of Dorothy’s footwear in “The Wizard of Oz.” These bracts are produced without interruption from spring until fall and beyond. This species can grow up to six feet tall and — even in a collection of botanical curiosities — stands alone for its closely spaced stems, each bearing clusters of slippers. Note: The bracts of a distinct group of plants provide color nonstop. This list includes bougainvillea, crown of thorns (Euprhobia millii), peace lily (Spathiphyllum), and flamingo flower (Anthurium). These last two species is typically grown indoors but may be cultivated outdoors in frost-protected locations. Although not visible all year long, the bracts of the shrimp plant (Justicia brandegeana) are on display most of the time.
Plant a boysenberry bush. In the opinion of many fruit connoisseurs, boysenberry is the most flavorful of all bramble fruits. There is good reason for this since boysenberry’s progenitors include European blackberry, European raspberry, loganberry (a blackberry-raspberry hybrid), and dewberry, a kind of blackberry native to the central and southern United States. Boysenberry is highly suitable for growing in Southern California, as it was developed by Rudolf Boysen on his farm in Anaheim. Rumors of this special berry’s presence on Boysen’s farm, after it had been sold, aroused the curiosity of Walter Knott. Knott tracked down a couple of the struggling vines on Boysen’s by now weed-infested farm and propagated them on his own farm in Buena Park. When he began selling them in 1932 and was asked what they were called, he named them boysenberries in honor of their developer. Knott eventually planted 2,400 acres of boysenberries, which became the signature berry of what became Knott’s Berry Farm.
Vegetables. As ironic as it sounds, one of the most problematic aspects of growing vegetables is harvesting them in a timely manner so that the pleasure of eating them is not lost. Perhaps this is due to laziness or perhaps to pride: We are so pleased with what we’ve grown that we just want to look at our beautiful crops and resist removing them from the stem or stalk or soil. However, if you delay harvest once your vegetables are ready for picking, you will lose out on quality and sometimes lose them altogether. Delaying harvest may lead to sunburned bell peppers, split tomatoes, earworm-infested corn, woody or cracked carrots, pithy radishes, oversized and flavorless zucchini, hardened asparagus spears, and lettuce that becomes bitter when it bolts (sends up flower stalks). To get maximum flavor out of your vegetables, harvest them early in the morning since starch converts to sugar overnight. Vegetables are also crisper and juicier in the early morning due to moisture absorbed at night.
Melissa officinalis, commonly known as lemon balm, is an herb in the mint family that makes an enduring, self-sowing, water-thrifty ground cover for partial sun locations. In Greek, Melissa means honeybee and speaks to this insect’s powerful attraction to the eponymous herb. Lemon balm becomes prickly once established, so wear gloves when harvesting its leaves.
Powdery mildew is one of the most common fungal diseases. It affects both ornamentals, especially roses, and vegetable crops. It starts on the underside of leaves and, to be proactive, those leaves should immediately be removed with the first sign of fungal infection, which appears as a white powdery substance. You can prevent powdery mildew and other fungus diseases — and kill the spores of the fungi involved — with a solution made by mixing one tablespoon of food-grade potassium bicarbonate and a half teaspoon of Dr. Bronner’s Castile Soap in one gallon of water. Apply the solution through a sprayer and make sure you cover leaves completely, both on the surface and on the underside.