Hello fellow Californians....let's introduce ourselves!

Welcome, Grace. You're in the right place. I have also exploded eggs I was trying to hard boil because I got preoccupied in the garden. I was also on-line once for six hours because I forgot I had been on the computer when I went out to the garden. It's a good thing they don't charge by the minute anymore.

San Leandro has perfect gardening weather. I loved gardening in the East Bay when I lived there.

This is my first time in this forum and couldnt resist to say hello from Northridge, CA..
a half hour depending on traffic from Los Angeles....
Smile to a few of the friendly names here....
Stop in and say hello.

Welcome, Sheran. I'm sure we all know where Northridge is, even if only because of the terrible earthquake news some years ago. You'll like this forum. Everyone here is as friendly as we all expect our California neighbors to be.

Hi Sheran...welcome to the new forum...I was to Northridge once before the earthquake. My daughters husbands family lived there. After their house was condemed after the earthquake, they moved to LV!

Hi! *wiggling under the fence*....Since I have met some of you in person I think that qualifies me to enter.....

I'm Jo, 70 years young...widowed ...and don't have the energy to really garden....but I sure can talk a good game after reading so much good info on DG!! I love meeting new people and have met over 120 DG's in person...I hope to meet each of you before long!! Hi Daisy, so-cal, George and strever...where's spin? Oh...gone to China, huh?

Jo ...just off I-10 in south east Arizona...

I head for Taiwan early Sunday morning. Staying a week.

We're so lucky! I didn't know that this was in the works.

I grew up in Southern California enjoying my grandmother's ferns and fuschias and having snail races in my spare time. Now I live on the Stanford University Campus, next to Palo Alto and about 45 minutes south of San Francisco. I've been working on my garden for 30 years, but because of bad paving, crumbling retaining walls, the need for new sprinklers and necessary new drainage, basically pulled it all up and started over again. Well, not all over again. I still have the beautiful trees and some shrubs. I know that many of you have already seen it but you can find my garden photos at

http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/482325/

I am particularly excited about bearded iris, clematis and dahlias right now. Other than that I'm still filling up holes in the garden where things didn't quite work out or I felt needed a change. You know, gardening.

I'm glad to be here.

Oh, Doss. What a beautiful garden and pool. And such splendid doggies!

Thanks Zuzu - you're so kind commenting on everyone's gardens. I'm looking at the incredible experience and enthusiasm of the group of people in this forum. I'm feeling lucky to be here. Thanks all.

Greet from Inland Impire, I live in Fontana near San Bernardino about 8 miles and new 210 freeway 2 miles.
Rusty (SnowElk)

Doss, what a beautiful garden you have, thanks for letting us peek into your world. Are the pups King Charles spaniels? When Zuzu mentioned "doggies" I thought I was going to see dogwood trees -- shows where my brain is this morning!

I'm down south near San Diego -- glad to meet you. And the same to all the other folks who have introduced themselves -- I forgot to push the 'watch thread' button AGAIN!

I was born and raised in So. CA, so lots of the places are familiar, plus I have family in Mariposa, near Yosemite. Hi Janet -- spent some hot summer days in Fresno when I was a younger!

Kathleen

Hi All, My name is Mimi and I am a fanatical flower gardener. Once spring hits I cant stay away from Nurserys. I have a hard time concentrating on anything else. My new passion is the Clematis vines. I just bought an incredible blue "Rhapsody" on E-bay. What a pass time. Shopping for the exact plant that you want and having to out- bid for it. I love all your pics of the beautiful plants. Keep them coming.

Great new forum!

I've recently moved to Davis from Sacramento and I'm loving it. It seems like everyone plants drought tolerant species here and I'm now even closer to Lemuria Nursery (fabulous prices!) and the Davis Arboretum sales which both good and bad. Right now my project involves removing a ton of english ivy before installing a xeriscaped front yard with herbs containerized.

Thanks for starting the thread >; )

I'm sorry Rusty, I thought I responded to your post. Guess it didn't happen.

I have been really enjoying the garden. Thanks for coming and sharing it.

And you are right. My dogs are Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. (big name, little dog) Good guess. They're just a different color from most of them. Everybody is used to seeing the red and white ones. The solid reds and black and tans are genetically recessive. Just trivia.

I had to give up on Dogwood trees. I had three and none of them were thriving. I'd given them quite a bit of time and then I decided I had to replace them. I love Yosemite in the spring when all the Dogwoods are blooming. It should be about now. After you've seen that, dogwoods grown in yards just fade by comparison. With folks in Mariposa I'm sure you know what I mean. Although my neighbor does have a pink one that is very lovely.

doss,

Did you try CA native dogwoods? There are several varieties that would seem to fit in your zone. Too dry here, I think, except for the 'brown twig' which I will definitely try in an area that gets afternoon shade.

There is a place up in our neck of the woods that sells the pacific dogwood... I was going nuts trying to find them last year. I agree that they are just stunning. They are my favorite tree.

I did plant a dogwood (cornus florida, Cherokee Chief) in my yard at my old house and I thought it would never make it. This spring it bloomed and came back with a vengence.

Try these folks for a native: http://www.wildwoodmaples.com/pages/dogwoods.html. They also carry the Rutgers hybrids.

Thanks. Sadly, we have a disease locally that is wrecking native Dogwood, so Cornus Kousa is about all we can grow. But at this point my yard is so full of big structure plants, I have to focus on a few problem areas. And of course, find places for my Dahlias, Clematis, and Iris. Good thing that Clematis don't take up too much room. Right now I'm putting in daylilies, ginger and hellebores and I've just finished Dahlias.

Hi Rusty,
I'm your neighbor here in Rancho Cucamonga!!!

Hello there!!! Weegy!

Rusty (SnowElk)

Hello everyone! Awesome thread growing here.

I'm Annapet, originally from San Diego, but moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1995. My husband, son, and I live in Corte Madera, a small town 12 miles north of the Golden Gate Bridge, near Sausalito.

This is my first season gardening.

You live in a wonderful area. Stuff grows like crazy. You should have lots of fun with your garden. Good luck! One nice thing about gardening, mistakes can disappear very quickly and it is like it never happened.

Hi All

I am new to Dave's garden and really happy to be here. i live in Santa Cruz, and would love to meet up with local avid gardeners in my area or the bay area.

i have just started my first big garden project, creating my garden from scratch, it is about 1/2 an acre of grasses at the moment, but i have many great plans and it should take about 2 years to really see results.

So if anyone out there has good tips, or cuttings to trade who are local let me know.

PS i have many gabanzo beans plants that need homes for anyone local to this area. They are about 4 inches in height and going very well, also some rooted cuttings of dragon claw curly willow, about 2 - 3 feet in height.

Thanks for this really fun forum

Diane

Hey, I'm checking in late here, just found this. I'm in Los Angeles, I'm in my third year now with my garden, which was a hillside of weeds when I moved in, and after a year of having it under black plastic (lovely!) to try to kill the weeds, I'm finally getting it going. I've planted about 12 antique roses amongst other dozens of other things, and I can't wait until next year when I can post pics of my paradise!

Hi Margu, we're in a similar boat here. We moved in a year ago, so we're just starting to see a little growth. Not having your patience -- and having over an acre of weeds -- we're killing ours a little at a time and planting natives. Good luck and post those pictures when you have them.

Welcome Diane and Moonglow!

Kathleen

thank you for the warm welcome.

=)

Hi Kathleen (and all), where is Bonsall? And it wasn't patience, it was negligence.....I let the weeds get totally out of hand the first year, and the only way I could deal with it was to cover them with black plastic. Actually, it worked out well, because I might have had some serious trouble with all the rains this year. When I pulled up the plastic, I had the most lovely moist clean soil.........and of course within a couple of weeks the weeds were sprouting again. Ha! Little devils. But this time I'm on the job with my trusted hori hori knife!

Bonsall is in North San Diego County, between Oceanside and Fallbrook -- or between the 5 and the 15 freeways. We are on a slope in a river valley so we get ocean breezes except when there's a Santa Ana condition. Our place was completely covered in weeds also, except where they graded for the house. With the rains, the weeds got so high we had to have them sprayed a few weeks ago. They added a pre-emergent, though, which should give us a chance to get a handle on them. With regular applications of the pre-emergent, the natives will have a chance to come back, and we will add what we can when we can.

There's a thread here http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/460283/ about a So. Calif roundup if you're interested.

Getting the weeds roundupped or pulled and then mulching heavily will help. Preemergents help, but they also keep down any volunteer seedlings you might want. But the ultimate key is planting heavily so there are no bare spots and then watering only the plants you want to keep. I spent about six hours weeding and cutting things back today. Still have a long way to go, but with drip, most of the weeds are just about toast till it rains again. It is drying out pretty fast now. Just about time to do the annual weed wacking. You have to wait till the grasses head out or they continuing growing for a while.

Welcome all of you new and not-so-new garden folk.

As to weeds, Sunset magazine recommends newspaper. Don't cover it with plastic though because it will cause mold to grow that is not good for your plants. They use newspaper to kill lawn when they are changing it into a planting bed. Wet it after you put it down and it won't fly away. Evidently good for the soil too.

Half and acre of newspaper though. You'd have to read a lot of Sunday papers. :-)

And Diane, you should start a thread about your garden with photos and thoughts about what you'd like to do with it. Then people can give you their thoughts. (or without photos). Now that we have the California Forum, you've got a place to do it. If you don't know how to create a link to your new thread, just email me.

Just let us know where we can jump in.

This message was edited Apr 20, 2005 9:07 AM

Hi all, I'm Annie, We moved from CarbonCanyon, San Bernadino County, Ca almost 3 years ago, where We lived for 16 years, my DH got a position at UCB, I love it here, and would never move back, Castro Valley is kinda of a small town, and great people, so here We are! Next to San Lorenzo, San Leandro and Hayward, 20 minutes to Berkeley and San Fransisco, 7 miles to Pleasanton! I spent my Teen years in Anaheim in the 60's, prior to that I grew up in Brussels, Belgium, and speak French.
I love my 250 something Cactus & Succulents, anything strange and grand, quite an ecclectic garden to say the least, A ton of flowers, Citrus and Cherry tree for now, I'm a planting fool, love a lot of color in my yard and love the compliments I get by passerbyes! I'm looking forward to a roundup, and meeting many of you!!! Annie

Hi Annie! Welcome to DG. I'm a relatively new member myself and really enjoy the people and info available, as I'm sure you will. I'm in the 'other' part of the state, near San Diego -- similar zone, though.

Kathleen

I love San Diego, We use to go there a lot on outings! It's a beautiful place, nice for a Sunday out, Annie

We used to come here on outings, too! That's why we moved here. :-) Little did we know we were part of an invasion! The county has changed so much since we moved here it's incredible. Still a lovely place to be, though.

HEY! Any of you close enough to Mission Bay....Frogrus is having a "gathering" on June 25th...I plan to be there...how about you??

Now, not to capture this thread, go to the Round Up Forum and check it out!! Jo

you are all making me miss my hometown (san diego) even more!

Jo, you read my mind. Here's the link http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/460283/

Kathleen

WOW...Kathleen...you have a mind? And I can READ? Yippee...we make a swell team...I have no mind left. heheheh Jo

Well, part of it was working this morning, but read fast, it will be gone soon! :-)

LOL Kathleen...I meant to post that the reason I had no mind left was because as I got older and older I kept giving other people a piece of my mind....drat....sure wish I had saved some for myslef!! Jo

Jo -- you were just pruning, dear, to make room for more wisdom. ;-)

k