Last Day Farewell

Beth, David, Bob, Drew, Noelia, John, and Sarah came out on my last day as Nursery Manager. They were nice enough to put together a little party with drink and food (we should have done this more often!). Park staff also dropped by to say farewell: Laura, Rick and Molly.
Drew has stepped forward and will be continue to head up the Nursery. I wish him well; he brings a lot of energy and experience.
At this point, this blog is now “closed”, and will stay as a history of all the great help I’ve had along the way. (Click any pic to enlarge)

All Around Work Day

Beth, David, Bob, Drew, Bob and Sarah. Beth and David took care of moving around plants within Nursery so as to move all plants out from under polyfilm roof for this weather. Then they did cut backs on Toyon in median to encourage new growth that we might use for vegetative propagation in Jan/Feb.
Drew and Sarah put together tree/shrub cuttings for walnut (across the street), sycamore, mule fat and false indigo (hiked up Laurel). The weather is cool and wet, perfect for growing these plants.
David helped me straighten out the supply area. Thankless but needed. David then planted with Bob another 15 trees to provide screening along potty trail for new structure (if we actually do this). (Click any pic to enlarge)

"Non work day"

Beth, Noelia and David came by to work today on non-work day. Beth and Noelia trimmed the 4" pot stock inside and outside the nursery... about 1,000 pots. Also they trimmed the purple needlegrass. David took care of outside irrigation. We really have issue with lines being chewed up.
Pictured is Juncus Acutus, seed from along the Lorel trail. This plant gets to be about 1 meter high and wide (at least in the park). The plant does not droop, and retails itself erect, however without spines that hurt. Very showy.
Weather has been nice. We had about 1 inch of rain a few days ago (Ha! You La Nina folks!). (Click any pic to enlarge)

Bumping Up #6

Beth, David, Bob, Drew, John and Noelia came out to help today. Drew brought in 2 walnut trees he started from seed at home, pictured, which were collected Crystal Cove State Park (with permission). Very nice. Beth and Noelia trimmed current plants, repaired pots and then spared all potted plants with neem-oil based spray for fungal gnats and fungus.
David repaired our outside irrigation lines that had been gnawed on, the ¼” pipe that had not been covered. The running premise it is the rabbits, but we don’t know this for sure.
Bob and Drew bumped up the white monkey flower and the prostrate buckwheat into 1 gallon pots. They also cleaned up the area, as when Betty came by for a visit she nearly fell over “junk” twice.
The Argentine ants are out in force now that the weather has warmed up. The cool summer has even delayed the ant behavior to late summer, rather than early summer. We are using low-tech, environment friendly technique to encourage them to move from Nursery: we’re watering where they are nesting. You can see them moving their larva to higher ground and away from Nursery.
The weather was hot and dry, as it has been for the week and is forecast for the most of next week. Drew said he’d seen the hot weather coming in Fall, and Ranger Barbara has called off restoration with seed because of forecasted low rainfall (La Niňa). (Click any pic to enlarge)

Bumping Up #5

Beth, David, Sarah, John and Noelia came out to help today (yes, …. again!). We spent they day undoing all the preparations for hot summer weather (when is summer anyway?!) and the effects of the cool weather. Beth, Sarah and Noelia trimmed the potted plants, while John did the tree/shrubs. Fungal gnats are a real problem as irrigation was set for hotter weather and we had put up shade-cloth siding , which cut the air flow. So we sprayed them with neem oil for gnats, larvae and fungus. We then took those plants that failed, and saved potting soil mix to re-use; and finally separated pots to provide better aeration.
I lowered the times on misting table and potting irrigation table by about half. The weather forecast looks to warm up this coming weekend, but not that much. What we need to be careful for is hot dry winds The weather today was 64F when we started and partially overcast… perfect gardening weather.
David continued putting out plants and maintaining our outside irrigation. It really looks nice. Extending this area will be our next project.
The vegetative propagation went very well this year. Some important lessons learned were: 1) collect plant material same day, 2) do flats by single species, 3) bump up when that flat is ready. So our next set will be in the Feb 2011 time frame. We’ll break plant days into 2 sections: collection and flat preparation. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Bumping Up #4

Beth, David, Sarah, John and Noelia came out to help today. Noelia cared for the outside plants: trimming grass down and trimming and spraying rose. Beth cared for the plants inside the Nursery: trimming and spraying. The cool weather this summer seems to bring on fungal gnats and powdery mildew.
Sarah and John bumped up Juncus and Dudleya. John was official potting soil mixer. The new large cart, pictured, can hold a full bag of TOLN potting soil for mixing and easily moved up to potting area: total weight about 160 lbs.
I moved the irrigation for the outside Nursery plants to their own valve. David connected up the outside irrigation lines, and we can drain and test this week, after the valve changes sit for 24 hours for the glue to dry.
All in all it was a pretty morning. We have gone weeks without deer mice getting into our storage chests, which saves on damaged goods and general health. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Bumping Up #3

Beth, David, Drew, John, Noelia and Bob all came out and helped today. We finished bumping up of all of the herbaceous plant cuttings into 4” pots. There are still two flats of woodier cuttings, that will take longer. Today our total is around 700. Outside we have another 400. And over 100 tree/shrubs in 5 gallon containers.
Beth organized the folks to bump up the remaining monkey flower and bush sunflower. Then they bumped up lemonade berry to 5 gallon pots. And lastly they bumped up a few walnut and a sycamore tree to 5 gallon also.
Noelia worked on the temporary storage area irrigation by adding more sprinklers. David put together the framework irrigation to the outside plantings. Drew put up the shade cloth panel on the back side to cut the summer heat.
All in all it was a pretty day. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Bumping Up #2

Beth, Sarah, Drew, Bob and David all helped today. Beth coordinated the bumping up of the cuttings with Bob and Sarah. Many of our flats we had a 100% success rate, and others much less.
David, still not over this bug, worked more on the outside plants, which look great. We’ve noodle out a plan, and OKed today by Ranger Barbara, to clear are around Nursery, have a Juvy crew put out mulch, then lay irrigation out, and plant. We’ll have a path through area to make working there easier.
Drew and I worked again on getting the mix right for a bag of TOLN potting soil (which is actually about 21 liquid gallons): 6 gallons water, 1/3 bag of 1oz mycorrhizae mix, and 1.5 cups Osmocote fertilizer. The new mixing wheel-barrel works really well.
Drew and I also expanded the pathway from 32” to a little over 40” to accommodate the new wheel-barrel. This is a more appropriate size for many Nursery carts.
It was a pleasantly overcast day. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Bumping Up #1

Beth, Sarah, Drew, Bob and for a while David all helped out today. Beth organized and worked with Sarah and Drew to bump up our first batch of cuttings we started in 4 months ago. Our original flats from training, with mixed species, were nothing to compare with our later flats in overall quality of cutting… we’re learning. Key was to get the various training flats with mixed species back into same-plant flats.
Bob helped me use the new wheeled cart which allows us to mix a full 30 gallon bag of TOLN potting soil and then wheel it over to the potting work area… cutting down people traffic. Also the cart allows us to mix 3 times the amount as before. Key is to get the right mix of water and potting soil… about 8 gallons.
Bob also helped me repair the temporary plant fenced area, which Beth reported full of rabbits last week. Find out a critter had chewed a hole on the back side of the plastic fence. The fence is now metal. A good thing we only tested with 1 flat (18 plants). Last week Noelia put together and installed a drip line irrigation for this area… very nice.
David was sick, but still was able to come by and tend to the plants on the outside of the Nursery. We’ll be putting irrigation lines on these plants. All the materials arrived in the past few days. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Clean Up Day #3

David, Beth, Noelia, John, Sarah, Drew and new-comer Bob (none pictured) all came to help out today. Noelia put the finishing touches on the irrigation for the “temporary” storage of plant flats, which she put together last week. This turned out very well and taps into one of our existing lines. We’re using micro-sprinklers in a test mode. Drew leveled “temporary” storage area and put in first stakes. Bob, John and Noelia wrapped up the staking the fencing. Bob moved 20 plus bags of TOLN potting soil, each weighing 75 pounds, over to the new storage area. He then cut and bent fencing stakes… a hard working guy.
Beth and Sarah fixed the tree/shrub structure fixings and put up south facing side for upcoming warm weather. In the same spirit they hung shade cloth siding on main structure. They then arm-wrestled the irrigation timer and checked all the micro-sprinklers in tree/shrub area. We then negotiated a plan for the upcoming plant bumping up.
John assembled the new tree pot cart and the new wheel-barrel for mixing potting soil. Neither fit on path to main structure, so this will need to be widened.
David tended to the ever-growing plants newly planted around the Nursery. We reviewed the irrigation setup for the outside watering too.

Clean Up Day #2

David, Beth, Noelia, John and new-comer Bob are pictured in new storage area. Noelia and Beth both got all the assorted pots into containers, which keeps them critter free, cleaner and easier to manage. John and David worked on clearing the 10x10yard area for planting and irrigation. Robert and Bob cleared new storage area and laid cloth.
We reviewed the number of new Nursery initiatives: new storage area, 10x10 yard area/year to irrigate/restore, an dpotting bench and hopper. We reviewed how we’d bump up new cuttings to size of pot and how to get this into a 1 gallon pot. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Clean Up Day #1

David and Beth helped do major clean up at Nursery today. Beth cleared back the foliage around the Nursery perimeter so that we can get around on all sides and we now have a full work area. David fixed the little red wagons, weeded and took care of new plantings around Nursery. I cleared area for supplies and weeded also. We were all exhausted at the end.
We seem to have made some real progress with the deer-mice, as we have not had any in the chests for 3 weeks now. David brought in the final prevention: a sign he and granddaughter made. We concur that Betty’s suggestion of steel-wool in the open spaces did the trick.
By the way… David is helping me with another automated irrigation scheme to water the plants we have started outside the Nursery and an overflow area (to be determined). (Click any pic to enlarge)

An update, lookin' good

We already have 460 restoration plants: purple needle grass (280), Juncus acutus (144), and rose (36). These are almost ready to go.
Our vegetative plants are doing very well. See following pictures of samples that are about 2 ½ months old. So far the results look very positive. See root growth in pictures of black sage and buckwheat.
We’re testing walnut, Juglans californica, and sycamore. The walnut came from Crystal Cover (but I think we have some outside of Willow gate). The tree planting by Willow gate will need another mulch put down… unsure if we’ll do it or park staff.
If you haven’t seen planting at Willow Ranger trailer, take note. Very pretty white monkey flower and mustang mint in picture.
Before our “official” plant day, in early July, we’ll have a few clean up and get ready work days. In June we’ll be open for new volunteers to start, no reason to leave them out of pot scrubbing, cabinet cleaning, weeding and other duties as required!
Deer mice continue to be a problem with our cabinets. They chew up everything and pee-poop-birth on everything; damaging supplies and making all unsanitary. We’re working on keeping them out, and going to try repellants too.
(Click any pic to enlarge)

End of 2009/10 Plant Year

Beth, Nanci, Sarah and David helped wrap up the end of the 2009/2010 plant year. All seed flats were bumped up and all tree/shrubs pots were bumped up to 5 gallon pots. The tree inventory is back up to about 60%.
Beth brought in her flat used for her training at TPF, and finished potting them up. These were about 5.5 months, and many of the plants woodier than ours. These plants give us a good idea of what we should expect. Also I’m running tests on sycamore, walnut and willow cuttings.
The weather was slightly overcast with a cool breeze; rain is forecast for tomorrow. Deer mice continue to get into the Nursery containers over the past 3 weeks. We’re taking Beth’s suggestion of plugging the lock hole and the hinges. Stay tuned as whatever drives them to do this is strong. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Plant Propagation: Vegetative #4

Beth, Noelia and Kristen helped prepare 5 cutting flats: BRI CAL, RHU LAU, MIM LON, ERI FAS and ENC CAL. That’s a total of 320 more cuttings, bringing our total to 1,204… we’ll see what that turns into actual plants. As important, most of the Nursery volunteers have gotten 1-3 training sessions with vegetative propagation, and this last group showed they are getting the knack.
The day was warm, and rain is expected next week for 2 days. The water to the Nursery had been turned off, and Ranger Steve made sure it was working again.
(Click any pic to enlarge)

Vegetative Propagation Steps

These are the steps we've used for vegetative plant propagation. Most of these were adapted from trainging at Theodore Payne Foundation Nursery. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Plant Propagation: Vegetative #3

John, David, Nanci, Beth, Noelia came out one more time to work on vegetative propagation: buckwheat, toyon, sagebrush. The group is getting the routine down: cutting, prep and seating, which will help much as we include this technique more and more. Beth brought her flat from TPN training, which has been a big help in show-and-tell. We’re working making things go smoothly with setup: using wraps, not rubber bands and switching to spray bottle for rooting hormone (we can re-use it then).
We bumped up much of existing plants: elderberry to 5 gallon, rose, juncus, monkey flower. Also the usual mundane of a Nursery: weeding, cleaning, caring for potted plants. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Plant Propagation: Vegetative #2

Sarah, John, Beth, Drew came out for more at vegetative propagation: buckwheat, monkey flower, brickle brush, and black sage.
The usual mundane of a Nursery: weeding, cleaning, caring for potted plants. (Click any pic to enlarge)

Plant Propagation: Vegetative #1

Sarah, John, David, Beth, Kristen, Noelia, Nanci all came out after our 1st day was cancelled due to rain. This was our first go at vegetative propagation: rose, buckwheat, bush sunflower and black sage.
Our medium is 80% perlite, 20% coconut coir. DipNGrow rooting hormone, auxin. Disinfectant cuttings with diluted hydrogen peroxide. 8x8 cuttings/flat.
Overcast day. The rain collection barrels have been full for over a month: 400 gallons. It is also tick season… did not check while getting cuttings, and got one on my leg. (Click any pic to enlarge)