Gardening for the Senses

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Plants with textured foliage invite us to touch or pluck a leaf and stroke it, even caress our face!

Gardens can stimulate or relax us by how they influence the five senses. A relaxing ambiance can come from blending in with the existing natural environment. When we are alive to our senses, we are in the moment. The frargrance of a rose or the soft texture of a leaf slid across the face, contrasting colors in the garden, all influence us through our senses. A repetitive pattern has a soothing or harmonious influence.

Gardens that stimulate and bring the energy up often have bold colors and strong scents. Patterns that contrast and colors that contrast are powerful. Think magenta and orange flowers with combined with chartreuse foliage; ornamental grasses next to large-leaf shrubs like Fatsia; canna lily with ornamental onion, the list goes on! Whimsical garden features like colored globes or blown glass spikes and sculptures with mirrored surfaces all add to an energetic feel. Mahonia media and unusual hebes along with weeping dwarf conifers all add an element of excitement.

Sound

Most of us in Jefferson County are fortunate to live where it is quiet enough to hear natural sounds: wind through conifers, rain on roofs, treefrogs singing, and geese flying overhead. We can create or muffle sounds in the garden. A water feature outside our open window will bubble, gurgle and splash.

Birdsong is another feature we can add to our garden by offering habitat, water and food. Humans have evolved with birds—when they are singing, all is safe. The melodious calls of songbirds encourage us to relax.

Large ornamental grass like Miscanthus grouped together can whisper in the wind. Bamboo make a soft sound as the wind passes through.

Windchimes create different moods. Determine if high-pitch tinkling sounds or deeper, resonant bass notes bring you joy. Listen to different ones to choose. 

Science has shown how auditory input impacts us, based on variation of pitch and length of time the sound The rhythmic sound of water on the shore is similar to the sound of humans breathing thus it is often soothing. When we hear many sounds at once it can be discordant and confusing. We can create a peaceful soundscape by muffling unwanted sounds with hedges and berms.

Scent

Flowers come to mind first when we think of scent—roses and lavender. Other scents include volatile oils in foliage and resins in conifers. Ambient temperature affects how strong the scent is. A sunny day will bring out the aroma of ponderosa pine bark or the resin dripping from a spruce. Walkable groundcovers are prostrate plants that can be placed  in pathways or between stepping stones—in the shade Corsican mint and in sunny spots plant caraway thyme or pink ripple thyme. As you walk past fragrant plants along a pathway brush against them or let your hand glide over the surfaces. Better yet, pinch a bit and bring it to your nose, inhale deeply and set the bit in your pocket.

Scented plants along the path are easily pinched as we walk by, sniffed and placed in one’s pocket

Touch

Don’t forget the tactile dimension of the garden. Many gray foliage plants have textured surfaces of fine hairs to reduce water loss. Lambs ears, Stachys byzantina; giant silver Mullein, Verbascum bombyciferum; and the artemisia are ever so soft. Ferns have feathery foliage as does dwarf Japanese plume cedar, Cryptomeria japonica elegans. Moss is plush.

Taste

Edible flowers in the garden add an element for our tastebuds. The sweet-licorice flavor of anise hyssop, the peppery bite of nasturtium blooms, or the citrus notes of lemon thyme, all add to the multidimensions of the garden.

September Garden Chores

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The fall equinox is approaching quickly. The weather is changing. Autumn offers opportunities to plant and transplant; the soil retains warmth longer than the air can—a perfect combination for encouraging root growth. With cooler temperatures and short day length, plant growth slows. The roots have a chance to get established without the additional stress of transpiration or pumping water through plant and out the leaf surfaces.

Autumn is a great time to make compost piles with debris from the vegetable garden, perennial plants and deciduous leaves. Some people prefer to leave the dead foliage and seed heads for spring removal allowing insects and birds food and habitat overwinter. Try it, but note that adding garden clean-up to normal spring chores might overwhelm some gardeners.

Edibles

Fruit trees: Most tree fruits are ripe when they come off easily by lifting and twisting the fruit. Take care not to break off the short branch with buds known as a fruit spur. Cut open an apple —ripe seeds are brown. Pears are picked when they are still hard, before they are fully ripe. They soften from the inside out. Asparagus: Let the fronds remain and turn yellow. Cut them back to the ground after a hard frost. If you have an excess of produce, try making sauerkraut or kraut-chi.

Soil Fertility

Soil Samples: Every couple of years it is worthwhile to take a soil sample and get it tested. Although Jefferson Conservation District no longer handles soil testing, they do lend a tool for extracting clean samples and lab suggestions including A&L. I’ve had good luck with Peaceful Valley Farm Supply.

Compost: Build compost piles in bins or free-standing rectangles. All the autumn decaying foliage from the veggie garden, perennials, and deciduous leaves. Add a source of Nitrogen: manure; powdered fish or bloodmeal; or urine.

Mulch shrubs and garden beds for winter protection and weed suppression. The increased organic matter that will eventually feed the soil ecosystem.

Cover-cropping: After removing spent vegetables, rake the soil, add seeds of clover,  field peas, oats, rye, vetch, or fava beans. More information from WSU All seed available at Chimacum Corner.

Pests

Yellow jackets

Recognize yellow jackets and their underground nests. In the autumn listen for buzzing if there are more than two yellow jackets in a location, step back and search the ground for more. Yellow jackets can sting repeatedly. By contrast, bees avoid stinging because it is lethal, it rips out their stinger. Learn to distinguish them.

Spring Bulbs

Plant bulbs and corms now for spring bloom. The earliest bloomers are the small bulbs: snowdrops, crocus, chionodoxa, Siberian squill and winter aconite. Select bulbs that are firm with no signs of injury or mold. If one bulb is lightweight compared to  others, discard it. Plant with root side down and pointy end up. Plant at depth three time the length. Small bulbs often are earliest. See Royal Horticulture Society for more information.

Grain Amaranth

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Abundant Life Seed Foundation Gardens 1999

Tinker was involved with Abundant Life Seed Garden from its inception in the 1980’s until 2001. She and John Gilardi were garden managers in the latter years. In the above photo, Tinker and an apprentice named Nicole are stripping the flower heads of dried amaranth to remove the seeds. Next steps include winnowing and screening. Later amaranth was one of the crops Tinker experimented with in the dryland farm project.

 Amaranth’s importance is twofold—its super nutritious and easy to grow.

Unlike grains, the seeds of amaranth contain all the necessary amino acids. The protein content is 16 percent, more than rice or wheat. Like quinoa, this offers complete protein for vegans. Amaranth is considered a pseudograin (only plants in the grass or Poaceae family are considered true grains)

Grain Amaranth comes from one of three species. All are white-seeded whereas the leafy greens amaranth tend to have black seeds and may become weedy.

A. cruentus, Purple Amaranth: Day-length neutral and most widely adapted. Typically white-seeded from Mexico, this is made into “Alegria”, the popped seeds mixed with molasses pressed into a small cake or bar.

A. hypochondriacus, Prince’s-feather is day-length sensitive. I know little about this species.

A. caudatus , Love Lies Bleeding is native Peru. Sometimes called Inca wheat, it is an important staple in the Andes.

While young foliage can be confused with weedy amaranth, (A.hybridus, A. viridis, A. retroflexus. A. spinosus.) grain amaranth has apical panicles, or seed heads forming only at the top. Grain amaranth can withstand drought conditions because their roots can grow several feet deep.

Early strains of A. cruentus were cultivated as far back as the time of the first maize in Oaxaca. The Jardin Etnobotanico de Oaxaca includes a section of early cultivated food crops. I was lucky to volunteer in the garden during the winter of 2019 and had the privilege to work with Roberto Chavez Rendon. Here he is with an early strain of Amaranthus cruentus.

Open-pollinated grain amaranth species can be variable. Many selected strains have full heads laden with seeds. Seed breeders are selecting for shorter plants that don’t shatter. University breeders are developing F-1 hybrids for food production.

Although claims vary, Amaranthus cruentus and A. hypochondriacus were cultivated before 1,000 BC in Mexico. Grain amaranth was an important food source from the Aztecs until European missionaries put a stop to eating or using amaranth in ritual. It is again popular and is best known as “Algeria” , the popped seeds mixed with molasses and pressed into a small cake or bar. An NGO in the Etla Valley of Oaxaca, Puente a la Salud promotes food sovereignty with a focus on grain amaranth not only for cakes but to add as an ingredient in many dishes ground into flour; boiled and used as a thickener in soups; toasted and popped as a cereal. They encourage farmers to grow the crop and teach communities how to make appropriate tech ovens and poppers for cottage industries with amaranth.

Amaranthus cruenthus. Farmer demonstrating harvesting with sickle.

Amaranth has the potential to be an important crop as we move into greater climate change. It is drought-, heat- and pest-tolerant. The nutty flavor can add more nutrients to oatmeal or ground into gluten-fee flour. Try growing this beautiful plant in the edible landscape, or in rows for production. Available from Adaptive Seeds, Bountiful Gardens and Johnny’s selected Seeds.

Joe-Pye Weed: Pollinator-friendly Perennial

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My earliest memories of Joe-Pye-Weed are from the coastal town in MA where I grew up. In late summer the purple flowers towered over other plants growing wild in what we then called swamps. I would bicycle down the country lane and cut stems of the flowers to make dried flower arrangements. Joe-Pye-Weed was likely named for  Joseph Shauquethqueat, a Mohican medicine man who cured settlers.

Although the plants are found throughout the East Coast on moist sites, they can tolerate drought conditions. For this reason, they make a good addition to our landscapes. A myriad of hybrids is available for this popular genus. Formally known as part of the genus Eupatorium, botanists have recently reclassified this group into a distinct genus, Eutrochium.

One hybrid has been bred to grow only 3 feet tall. They can grow in part shade and look more robust with regular watering. If the intention is to encourage them to be drought-tolerant, plant them in lots of compost. After three years divide the plants. They will ocassionally reseed, mostly they spread slowly from the crown.

The 6 ft tall hybrid plants I have were divided from a friend’s clump. The hollow stems are a deep purple and after the perennial is finished for the season, these stems make excellent disposable tubes for Mason bee homes!

Landscape uses:

Consider this for outside the deer fence. Eupatorium works well with Miscanthus, perennial sunflower and cardoon for a dramatic late summer perennial display. After growing vigorously in spring and summer, they come into their own in August and September. Rain gardens need plants that can withstand inudated soils.

Other Uses

If you raise mason bees, see my earlier post, then the dried stems of this plant make great disposable nesting tubes for the mothers to lay their brood.The right photo shows the Joe-Pye stems on left and the purchased tubes on right.

Rabbits in the garden

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Eastern Cottontail photo from Wikimedia

The Eastern cotton-tail rabbit was introduced to Washington in the 1930’s as a game animal for hunters. These introduced rabbits thrive in close proximity to people. As habitat generalists, they adapt to different available plant food and benefit from brushy coverage. Although the state’s mapping shows the introduced rabbits widespread in Kitsap County and Whidby Island, Jefferson county rabbit population is not on the map! The population has recently boomed in Seattle.

The bunnies never bothered my vegetables while I had Black Labs. These dogs have a great sense of smell and can easily track the cottontails. My property is fenced with hog wire with openings large enough for rabbits but not their common predators such as coyotes and bobcats. However, the common garter snake that are abundant on my property probably consume baby rabbits in the nest and barred owls might catch young ones.

I became acutely aware of rabbits when a neighbor’s domestic bunny started living at my place and even chewed through the plastic deer fencing to get in the vegetable garden. As cute as it was I wanted to keep it out. I felt like the mean farmer in the Beatrix Potter stories. The neighbor and his children came over several times and were successful catching the wayward pet.

Rabbit damage is obvious, it looks like someone went through with garden clippers making sharp-angle cuts. The rabbits bite young stems, buds and flowers. By comparison, deer tear away stems, leaving a jagged edge because they don’t have upper front teeth.

Cottontails are most active dawn and dusk. In spring I noticed vegetable seedlings neatly nipped off. Lucky for me I always have a couple of red clover volunteers on the edge of beds and in the paths. While the rabbits certainly prefer clover to vegetables, I share enough of my garden with the voles and the birds, that I was determined to prevent another creature from entering. I bought some rabbit repellent called Liquid Fence that was effective but requires monthly applications.

After watching several YouTube videos, I decided rabbit fencing would protect the lower two feet of the deer fencing. So I hired someone to work with me and we installed the fencing where the rabbits were entering from the west. I also had already placed landscape fabric there to prevent grass and weeds from growing underneath the deer fence. One foot of chickenwire on the ground will prevent rabbits from burrowing under the fence. That was effective for several months and now I have noticed a rabbit in the garden at dawn. On to fortifying the deer fence on the north and south sides! For more information on fencing and general cottontail behavior, see the state Fish and Wildlife site

3 ft Chicken wire with 1 inch openings, 3 ft metal stakes, landscape pins and zip ties

August in the Garden

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By August the garden is often humming along on autopilot, although sometimes the garden (or more likely the gardener) feels tired by late summer. This year, July only got a bit of rain on the last day. The current forecast for the remainder of August is cooler than normal— great for the cool-season vegetable starts, but not so encouraging for the warm season crops that have just started to pump out vegetables like zucchini, beans and tomatoes.

This is a time to reflect on garden priorities. What thrives in your garden? Do you have an intention or a vision for it? Are you in a phase of expansion or contraction? This changes with how the garden matures and ages along with our own interests and energy levels. Walk around and make notes. Beth Benjamin, one of my favorite garden teachers from when I was an apprentice at Camp Joy, in the Santa Cruz Mountains, always said, “The garden is forgiving. Next year we can try again or change how we garden.”

Garden Chores

Shrubs and Trees: Don’t add any more fertilizer that is high in nitrogen to shrubs and trees. Plants need to harden off before the winter cold settles in. All-purpose natural fertilizer with fertilizer ratios in single digits are okay. Apply the last fertilizer to roses by mid-August. Aged compost is also okay.

Perennials: Continue deadheading, ease up on watering and fertilizing. Consider which large perennials could be divided and moved around to fill in gaps in the garden. Determine which plants are aligned with your watering regime. Plan to move or divide perennials in September or October.

Rockrose: They typical rock rose, Cistus hybridus tops out at 3 ft. But, here in Jefferson County can grow to 5 ft. and sprawl. Older shrubs can be completely renovated. Remove dead branches and then prune with a combination of thinning and heading cuts. Sometimes these plants can be pruned into artistic sculptural forms. Remove splayed and sprawling branches.

Wisteria: flowers better if pruned regularly. Prune the vine now after flowering and also when the vines are dormant in January/February. Now cut back new growth, leaving five or six leaves on a branch. This will encourage flower buds. In the winter cut back to three buds. These become spurs that will flower next year.

Wisteria was cut back about 2 weeks ago after prolific flowering earlier. Pruning encourages vines to grow flowering spurs

Raspberries: Summer bearing canes (floricanes) that have finished fruiting on the previous seasons wood. Cut these canes to the ground and remove. Any new growth thinner than a pencil should be prune to the ground. Then look at the canes that started this year—primocanes. Select 6-8 canes per plant spaced about  3-4 inches apart. When the plants go dormant in winter cut these canes back to just above top wire. These will produce lateral flowering and fruiting branches next summer.

Fruit Tree late summer pruning: Plum and cherry. Did your trees grow vigorously this summer? If so, prune back branches that pumped out two feet or more new growth. This can reduce next year’s vegetative vigor and encourage fruit buds. But if the tree grew moderately, then wait until winter or even after next year’s flowering before pruning. Poorly executed summer pruning can stunt a tree.

Apples: Sometimes apples get in a cycle of over-producing fruit one year and then the next one the tree is recuperating and has no fruit. Biennial fruit-bearing can happen for numerous reasons. If too many fruit form one year and are not thinned out then the tree doesn’t have the energy to form many flowers the next year. Some  apple varieties  like Honeycrisp and heirloom Brambley Seedling are naturally biennial fruiting. Other trees fall into this pattern through lack of nutrients, irregular watering, or one winter frost destroys the blooms. RHS always has good information. Thinning flowers (once you confirm they are pollinated) is more effective than thinning young fruit. Advanced gardeners can look at the Royal Horticulture Society’s post on summer pruning of apples and pears.

Hairy Manzanita

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Arctostaphylos columbiana

This native manzanita is uncommon on the Quimper Peninsula , but I have seen it growing wild on Cape George Road and close to Kala Point. The above photos are of a shrub that Willy Smothers grew at his place on Marrowstone Island. Recently Janet Welch pruned it to highlight the beautiful peeling bark.

The tiny ‘apple-like’ fruits are eaten by birds, small mammals and patient gardeners. It grows in the coastal scrub community and its range is from Sonoma County, California to Vancouver Island. Along with shore pines, manzanita can grow on and stabilize sand dunes. Native specimens can also be found in the understory of open coniferous forests in the Cascades. The critical factor is gravelly soil. The peeling bark is an attractive feature that it shares with its cousin Madrone. However, it is more closely related to our native groundcover kinnikinnick, Arctostaphylos uva-ursi. In fact a hybrid called Arctostaphylos x media is cross between the two.

Care for Manzanita

Manzanita rewards the patient gardener. Select a site with full sun and excellent drainage. It is best to start with plants in one-gallon containers. Water weekly until new growth appears and then taper off. One way to avoid crown rot is to plant it a little bit higher than the existing grade and mulch with woodchips. Don’t mulch with compost. Use drip irrigation because overhead water will encourage fungal disease. Keep it on the lean-side and avoid adding soil amendments. Once established it is completely drought tolerant.

Here is another manzanita, a hybrid, (probably Arctostaphylos x media) used in the landscape of Kathleen Turaski and Peter Hornsby This drought-tolerant garden includes Ceanothus and red hot poker, Kniphofia. They hope to remove the deer fencing once the plants are mature. But realistically, they may need to keep the fence in place—even if deer don’t browse a plant to death, they often step on and break branches of nearby plants.

Oregon State University, Horticulture Dept has many more photos, including pictures of the flowers and fruits. A great new native plant nursery opened in Kingston. Salish Trees Nursery carries hairy manzanita. Their knowledgeable staff will be a great help. Far Reaches Nursery has a superb variety of Arctostaphylos densiflora—Howard Mc Minn.

This hybrid Manzanita is an excellent drought tolerant choice
Manzanita flowering in April

Weeds and our perspective

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When I would help Tinker in her garden, often she dug up dandelion plants as if they were precious. The roasted roots made a delicious tea that she savored. Imagine if the plants we detested somehow changed in our mind to become useful resources. So much in life is how we frame something. If we look at a weed and notice a couple insect pollinators insects sipping the nectar, maybe the ‘weed’ isn’t so bad. That doesn’t mean we have to keep the plant. I have had weeds that I once hated and then learned to accept them, even as I removed them.

Dandelion, Taraxacum officinale

Gardeners who take the time to identify the plant can be more effective. Knowing a plant lets you determine the best way to control it. Sometimes a weed can be an indicator of environmental conditions: the soil is wet or heavy, or it is very acidic. Some tough weeds will die out if the roots don’t get nutrients from foliage. This requires diligence—regular weed-eating. Small, less-hardy weeds will die from deep mulch that smothers small plants and suppresses weed seeds. Proper ID is key to control.

Weed Identification

Botanical identification begins with a plant’s flower. We can’t rely on the foliage because weeds are by their nature adaptable and have a lot of variety. Vegetative characteristics are malleable. Here’s a short digression: years ago I managed the UCSC agroecology program greenhouse and was responsible for transplanting seedlings. In wood flats full of vegetables or flowers that required pricking out, there would be a number of weed seedlings from the compost. The young weeds could look almost identical to the some of the crops—so much so, that a number of the apprentices I supervised would pot up the weed seedlings! So identify your weed when it is flowering and then start to recognize the plant in all its stages, from young seedling to flowerings going to seed.

I’m old-school and like books. My favorite book for weed identification is Weeds of the West, University of Wyoming Press. Our cooperative Extension had it for sale decades ago. Now it can be downloaded for free from the website or used books can be found online. 900 color photos include the weed at young stages.

Online resources include Hortsense from Washington State University, with 90 fact sheets listed by alphabetical order. University of California, Davis has a useful online weed identification key

Weed Ecology

Many weeds are species that have adapted to colonize disturbed sites, such as landslides; after a wildfire has burned off vegetation; along roadsides; or at building sites where excavators have exposed mineral soil. Alan Chadwick, the famous gardener who developed the French-Intensive-Biodynamic method, always said nature abhors a vacuum. That’s why in my garden I sprinkle around borage, red clover, phacelia, or calendula. By regularly weeding out unwanted plants, I have mostly replaced the disturbed areas with annual flowers that are easy to pull and have many benefits. There’s not much room for weeds.

Borage, Borago officinalis

Weeding Techniques

Start weeding early spring, when the ground is still moist and the plants are young. Weed annual gardens regularly. Use lots of mulch around perennials and woody plants. Since weed seeds can remain dormant for decades, it’s important not to let weeds good to seed.

Certain perennial weeds can become one’s nemesis, for example horsetail, bindweed, Canada thistle . If you do nothing else, make sure to cut flower heads before they go to seed, bag them and send to the dump. The county noxious weed board doesn’t want what the state includes as noxious plants in our yard waste. If you cut the flower or seed heads and bag them, then the rest of the material is yard waste and can go to the compost facility. Thick mulch prevents seeds from sprouting. Everyday weeds can go into yard-waste. I have a big pile of plant debris that I will not use as compost, but will let it rot in place. In it I include weeds that have gone to seed but are not listed as noxious.

At one time I added woody plant material to this pile, but now wild roses, native blackberries and branches from hedges and ornamental shrubs go to yard waste. I don’t want excess fuel for potential wild fires.

If you are still using herbicide on weeds in pavement cracks or gravel, please consider a vinegar solution. Horticultural vinegar—at 35% strength is a lot stronger than kitchen vinegar—5% sold at grocery stores, so take more precautions! Wear gloves, glasses and long clothing. Although flame torches are used in agriculture to control weeds ( by boiling the sap, not turning foliage black), when I called our fire dept about using them for weeds in cracks I was informed that we had two wildfires in the county start that way!

For woody plants or deep-rooted perennials, such as Scotch broom, Himalayan blackberry, and poison hemlock, a weed wrench can be used to yank out the entire plant. The county weed board has wrenches they loan out.

A lot of weeds are my friends. I make flower bouquets, or add them to salads. Others are a haven for pollinators. Some are good sources of carbon for my compost piles.

Tinker Cavallaro—tribute to a dear friend

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Tinker had a generosity of spirit that seemed nearly boundless. She always had time for people no matter how busy she was. People frequently dropped by and she took the time to enjoy them. If someone needed help, they were never let down.

Tinker had an abundance of energy and was able to do so much. Her gardens were vibrant and well-kept. She took delight in potting up little volunteer plants and have them on a bench in the garden. She watered and kept them alive and gifted them to gardening friends and acquaintances. I look around my garden and see the angelica, lovage, fig tree, Italian dandelion greens and so many other plants.

I copied so many skillful things she did or had and she never complained that I was a copycat. I so admired one of her marvelously-designed garden gates, that now I have three like it. Over the years I enjoyed helping in her garden (sometimes as a trade for taking her yoga classes.) Although I had made compost piles for decades before working in her garden, I found her free-standing compost windrows to be the most practical for converting large quantities of plant material and manure into compost. She was so deliberate in the construction. Working on shaping the rectangle piles of compost became a meditation or art form. I value that and do it in my garden.

Tinker mentored many young farmers and new market gardeners, advising them on the climate, vegetable varieties and local pests. With her broad scientific knowledge and decades of experience growing a variety of plants, she could clearly communicate what she had learned.

When I think of the ten years I took her Vinyasa yoga class, often twice a week, she never ceased to amaze and inspire me. She would arrive—all smiles—at 7 am after bicycling in the rain. She was a true yogi, with deep respect for the spiritual basis of yoga. We started each class with pranayama breathing and ended with a chant. Each class was different, based on the current need or request of students. She created a supportive, warm community of students.

Knowing Tinker Cavallaro has shaped my life immeasurably for the better!

Matilija Poppy

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Romneya coulteri

This beautiful grey-grey foliage plant with fragrant large white poppies does best where it has room to spread. It is both drought tolerant and—knock on wood—deer resistant.

Matilija grows well on the loose soil of landslides. I planted some on a mound about 20 years ago and rarely weed it. After a time, the Nootka rose spread across the mound pushing out the poppy. Not much can hold its own against Nootka rose. (That’s why I only suggest it for creating wildlife hedges where it will be kept in check by mowing or weedeating lawns and fields.) Matilija poppy migrated over to a pile of soil and rotting sod. Last year I had a dump truck load of horse manure delivered near the Matilija planting. Some of the plants were buried in the manure. Instead of suffering, the plant spread throughout what was left of the manure after I moved most of it.

Description

  • Perennial flower growing 3 to 6 feet tall
  • Gray-green foliage
  • 4”-8”  fragrant flowers. Described as fried-egg flower

Growing requirements and care:

  • Full sun
  • Drought-tolerant once established
  • Soil: flexible, needs good drainage
  • Cut back to the ground in late fall

Matilija Poppy spread to adjacent aged-manure pile. Wild mustard’s yellow blossoms in the middle of plants.

The Chumash, an indigenous tribe of central -southern coastal California, values the antimicrobial properties. In fact the name Matilija comes from a Chumash tribal leader. The plant’s alkaloids and other secondary substances make it useful for sensitive gums and preventing plaque. Herbalist Micheal Moore describes Matilija as a good first aid plant: the foliage makes a good external wash for sunburn, and inflammation from allergic reactions. At one time this plant was seriously considered as the state flower of California.

In the landscape, plant this majestic plant with other tall drought-tolerant ornamentals like Miscanthus and cardoon. In the foreground use Russian sage, and red hot poker. Once established these are all deer-resistant.