Garden

My husband says it’s like being married to Pigpen, the notoriously dirty character in Peanuts.

I might be cleaned up and ready to go out for the evening, but then notice a plant that needs water or run into the garden to check something. The next thing I know, my shirt is wet and smudged, my fingernails are grungy and there is debris in my hair. There have been occasions when I have had to wash up and change clothes twice before we finally pull out of the driveway.

I simply can’t stay clean.

You can’t just plant and forget a landscape tree. Even if you’ve carefully planted it in the best possible spot, your job isn’t done. According to Pamela Sanchez of the Sacramento Tree Foundation, you need to make a commitment to properly train and maintain your new tree for at least eight years. Just as you must instill good behavioral habits in a child or puppy, establish good growth habits in a young tree.

Trees grow in the wild without any human intervention. Our standards are higher for a tree that is growing in our yard. Attending to a tree’s structure improves its health, safety and aesthetics. Just as a stitch in time saves nine, a snip (or several) will save you time and money over the many years of a tree’s life.

My two yards are like a mullet: business in the front and party in the back. I’ve never gotten around to converting my scruffy front lawn to a more interesting water-efficient landscape, but my husband and I have created our personal paradise in the back.

I didn’t mean to keep it a secret, but only a small circle of family and friends usually see it. Our garden was designed for my obsession with plants and my husband’s addiction to tomatoes, not for garden tours or large-scale entertaining.

I began seeing espaliered plants long before I knew the word “espalier,” and certainly before I knew how to pronounce it (either es-pal-YAY or es-pal-YER is correct). However you say it, the practice of training woody plants, such as fruit trees or ornamental shrubs, flat against a wall or support can be decorative and interesting, produce more and better flowers and fruit, and allow you to grow otherwise too-large plants in a limited space.

It’s still summer, but it’s time to plant winter (cool-season) vegetables.

If you get them in the ground while the days are still relatively long, you can harvest this winter. If you wait too long, peas will pause and broccoli will balk. Dormancy sets in when there are less than 10 hours of daylight. You need to give winter crops a head start before plant growth slows down or stops altogether.