A Place All Our Own : Lives Entwined in a Desert Garden [1 ed.] 9780816599394, 9780816512829

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a place all our own

A Place All Our Own Lives Entwined in a Desert Garden

Mary Irish Photo Art by Gary Irish

tucson

© 2012 The Arizona Board of Regents; photographs © 2012 Gary Irish All rights reserved www.uapress.arizona.edu Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Irish, Mary, 1949– A place all our own : lives entwined in a desert garden / Mary Irish ; photo art by Gary Irish. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 978-0-8165-1282-9 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Desert gardening—Arizona— Anecdotes. I. Title. II. Title: Living and learning in a desert garden. SB427.5I752 2012 635.9’525—dc23 2012014459

Manufactured in the United States of America on acid-free, archival-quality paper containing a minimum of 30% post-consumer waste and processed chlorine free. 17 16 15 14 13 12  6 5 4 3 2 1

For Ginny, Joe, and Lisa—the Great Neighbors

Contents

Introduction  1 The Beginning  5 Weather  13 The Back  27 Birds  59 The Front  87 Animals  113 The Outback  135 Bugs  143 The Patios  165 People  179 In the End   205 Index of Plants   207

a place all our own

Introduction

building a garden is no different than building a life; often the pieces and parts come together without much conscious effort, creating a recognizable pattern only when you look back on it. A garden in which you live for a long time, just like a life of almost any length, develops around choices little and big, conscious or not: the placement of a path, or a wall, or a plant, sometimes selected with a particular result in mind but just as often a stumbling response to changing circumstances. After a while all the choices you make in a garden run together and a pattern emerges; one day you look around and are stunned to see that the garden has a well-defined look, an ambience that marks it as your own. This is a story about how that happened for me and my husband, Gary, in a garden in the desert city of Scottsdale, Arizona. We did not set out to make such a garden. We simply grow plants the way some people bake cookies—we just gotta do it. But this garden, in this place, taught us a lot, not only about the desert and how it works but also about ways to garden in such a unique and frequently daunting place. It is also a tale about shared lives, human and otherwise, and the inestimable value of living as close to all the other lives as you can. This book is not intended as a manual for designing a garden or growing desert plants. It is a chronicle, a personal recollection of what it took to get this garden this far. While it is an idiosyncratic and personal story, I hope that our experiences and trials prove helpful. Whether what we did works for you or not, we wish all gardeners the best garden they can create. 1

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People who tend a piece of land, whether expansive like a farm or minute like a patio home, are forced to deal relentlessly with other living things and with the immense variety of twists and turns resulting from their march through the garden. More often than not other lives, invited or not, become the agent of choice and change in the garden. Choosing one style of fencing may be dictated by the need to keep marauders out of the plants, which then leads to the rearrangement of an entire section of the garden. Or an adjustment made to accommodate pets or the preferred nest sites of well-loved birds nearly always runs counter to our own interest in pruning, allowing a plant to grow larger or more prominent than we first intended. Good design principles and their application can help launch a garden. We find such dictums handy for ordering our thoughts and controlling some of our most ridiculous desires—but for us, good design alone won’t make a comfortable garden. Over the years we have come to a humble acknowledgment that a lot, if not most, of the life of the garden is well outside our control, and that it will be best if we let it evolve out of the life we and others live in it. It is our firm belief that a garden allowed to form its own pattern from our whimsical choices and heartfelt desires, so that it gets its true pulse from all the lives that enter and live in it together, is the best garden there is. A truly comfortable garden is one where all the lives with whom we share it become intertwined, a place where most lives are tolerated, indeed welcome, and where a moderate live-and-let-live approach is enough to settle our differences. Every gardener knows that you don’t build a garden all by yourself, just as you don’t build a life or a career or a skill all by yourself. You bring a lot of yourself to it—your experience, talents, interests, and imagination—but numerous teachers, friends, stolen ideas, and captured images lurk in the corners of every life and garden. All of these other lives embed themselves in our daily activities and become integral to our gardens and, like a lot of family members, some of these other lives present great challenges. Some companions offer more than you give in return, while others are greedy and take away too much. But in the end, we cannot escape the knowledge that they all had a part in creating the garden we have and the life we cherish. This garden has been our laboratory and our refuge, our greatest accomplishment and our most exhaustive endeavor, one that we have shared with a vast array of others, all of whom have intertwined themselves into our garden and our hearts. It has consoled us in troubled times, allowed us to

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wallow in self-congratulation when things have gone well, provided us with the opportunity to lazily watch cactus wrens attend to their daily chores, allowed us to marvel at the flowers of oxblood lily (Rhodophiala bifida) as they rise up like sparklers each fall, and soothed us with the elegant grace of a palo blanco (Acacia willardiana) during the brutal summer heat. All of these lives bring us joy and delight; joy in the bounty of a garden and its connection to a wide range of desert lives, and delight in having done something well, in having accomplished something—even if it is just getting the watering done.

The Beginning

we came to arizona more or less on a whim. We were driving from one parent’s house to another on a Christmas visit through an ice storm’s residue, knowing that the same storm had hit our home in New Orleans with a record freeze for the second time in as many years. Pipes were broken and leaking. Mercifully, a kindly neighbor had shut off the water. We knew our plants were devastated; this freeze had been worse that the one two years before, and we could imagine the damage to our subtropical garden. We looked out over the bleakness of hay fields and winter pastures and wondered, Where is it warm? I had a newspaper, and while Gary drove us through the miserable weather and dreary landscapes toward his parents’ home, I consulted the weather page, looking for some locale that had not frozen in the previous day or two. There were three choices: Los Angeles—not likely, a bit bigger and smoggier than we preferred; Miami—no way, we had been there and the congestion and humidity and yet another hurricane coast did not attract us; Phoenix—hmm, I had never been there and wondered what it was like. The mention of Phoenix sprouted a memory from Gary. His family had lived there in the 1960s when his father was stationed at Williams Air Force Base. He remembered liking it, but what do kids know? We agreed to check it out. The following May we did just that, traveling in and around Phoenix and camping throughout southern Arizona. We were smitten and recognized that we both loved the West with its big skies, open vistas, and sharp air. 5

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How could it be this dry? We moved to the Phoenix area the following June. It proved to be a great adventure, one that launched us both into a new way of looking at plants, gardens, and the natural world. We took our time coming out to Arizona, dropping off plants in East Texas and dogs in Amarillo, camping in the mountains above Santa Fe until finally diving down into the desert in mid-June. As we came over Gonzales Pass and looked out over the breadth of the immense Salt River Valley, waves of heat rose up from the desert’s floor, crushing our small, poorly airconditioned car under the full weight of 107-degree heat. We could hardly believe it. We had both grown up where it was hot, plenty hot, and in my case without the benefit of air-conditioning, but this was altogether different. It was our first introduction to the Big Heat of a low-desert summer, with its astounding combination of blistering heat and extraordinarily low relative humidity. For both of us, it heralded a new yardstick of what it meant to have hot weather, in ways that would become more and more evident the longer we lived here. The drive into town also introduced us to the expansive beauty of the Sonoran desert east of town. Sturdy saguaros (Carnegiea gigantea) punctuated the flat ground as far as we could see. Ocotillo (Fouquieria splendens) spread their spiny fingers up and down the hillsides. Glowing chain-fruit cholla (Cylindropuntia fulgida), lacy blue palo verde (Parkinsonia florida), and foothills palo verde (Parkinsonia microphylla) formed a blanket on the land. We were enthralled by so many new plants. Gary, a man who never met a hill he could resist going to the top of, was nearly delirious thinking of all those crests and ridges and hills. The heat was intense but so was the excitement, and it has hardly dulled since that first day. We rented a small house to get our bearings and figure out where we wanted to live. Somehow plants began to show up in the backyard almost immediately. We kept them all in pots, because we knew this house was merely a way station, but by the end of the first summer there were over thirty pots out there already. We were giddy with the new-found wonders of this place and with all those exciting new plants. But we had a lot to learn about the growing conditions in our new home. The air conditioner broke in August, and we were forced to sleep outside on the porch with a fan while we waited for it to be repaired. The repairman turned out to be a fellow plant nut. This man, Lou Steichman, was a dedicated member of the local cactus society, and we would later meet him and his wife through that organization. But on that hot August day he

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was anonymous, and when he called to me from the roof after noticing all the plants, I was surprised. He knew most of them, and while he worked we compared notes and chatted about care and cultivation. How could I not love a place where the air conditioner repairman was so knowledgeable about plants? He also commented to me about how humid it was that day. I responded that we had never known humidity this low in our previous home; but over time as I have become accustomed to the weather of the desert, I no longer think of 40 percent relative humidity as low. We began looking for a house to buy that fall and were shown a pretty ordinary place with an pretty ordinary front yard marked by a decrepit lawn and some sad-looking Texas rangers (Leucophyllum frutescens) and perky feathery cassias (Senna artmesioides). The backyard was small, but we noticed that one corner was slightly raised above the lawn and lined with an array of rocks. That corner was devoted to succulents, and standing on one edge was a 3-foot tall boojum (Fouquieria columnaris). Once we confirmed that the plants came with the place, we were sold—we had to have that boojum. We put a palo brea (Parkinsonia praecox) in the front garden with a cow horn agave (Agave bovicornuta) for company. I am sure we put in other plants out there, but they have faded from my memory, and I kept lousy notes on that yard. But I do vividly recall my unrelenting and, ultimately, barely successful, war on the Bermuda grass (Cynodon dactylon). I took a gardening class at the Desert Botanical Garden taught by the admirable Ron Dinchak. One of the lessons was on techniques for getting rid of Bermuda grass using Roundup or its equivalents. I loathe almost all chemical treatments, so I decided that if I were just persistent enough I could pull, rake, yank, and force it out of the yard. As stubborn and dedicated as I was, I had to eventually relent and admit that I was licked. After a season or two of constant effort, I gave in and began to spray carefully with Roundup. Just as Dinchak had promised, it worked, and I learned very quickly that vigilance pays where Bermuda grass is concerned, even when using strong chemicals. Along the concrete driveway it found a refuge (as he warned it would), so I got out my little bottle of Roundup and sprayed it to oblivion. Undaunted, this tenacious African pasture grass found the tree well an ideal new home, and there I used an old technique taught to me by a rose-growing friend—I saturated a sponge and painted the chemical mix on the individual blades. Certain of victory, I was stunned when I found it on the corner of the driveway, wandering into the street through a crack

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in the asphalt. I knew this was a more formidable grass than I could have imagined, but I kept at it every year until we left that house. I never saw the last blade of Bermuda grass but I did knock it back to a mere shadow of its former self—probably the best you can hope for where Bermuda grass is concerned. Despite the yard’s small size, we planted quite a lot in the backyard of that house, including a drift of aloes and a red orchid bush (Bauhinia galpinii) under the immense Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis) that dominated the space. The aloes loved growing under that pine, but the red orchid bush was less thrilled and finally died after a long, slow decline. Along the back fence we inherited a Texas Hill Country native, Texas mountain laurel (Sophora secundiflora), which at the time was an unexpected treat from the region where we were raised. Every spring it smothered the garden with its sweet aroma that reminds me of grape soda. In a back corner we found a mature white-fruited grapefruit, which we came to know later was a ‘Marsh.’ We were skeptical at first. While it was sensational to live where citrus would grow—Gary confessed repeatedly it was a long-held dream of his—we were not familiar with white-fleshed grapefruit and wondered if it would be very tasty. We had been spoiled by the luscious pink ones that came up from the lowlands of the Mississippi Delta, almost all of which were ‘Ruby Red.’ But we tried it anyway; not only was it delectable, but we quickly learned that the longer you leave it on the tree the better it tastes, and that grapefruit keeps best on the tree, not in the house. I began to go a little nuts about succulents, buying countless types; I was for some reason particularly taken with stapeliads. They were just irresistible to me in those days, and I particularly adored Edithcolea grandis—possibly because of the name. In the end I found them cranky, demanding, and difficult, and few of them survived over a year or two. It became clear that while some people were outstanding at providing the intense attention needed to keep odd plants with fussy cultural needs growing in containers for decades or longer, I wasn’t one of them. I needed those that could live in the ground, sturdy souls that would take a missed watering without declining, and that could be abandoned for a bit while life got in the way and not sulk. It took me much longer to learn this lesson than it probably should have, and who knows how many hapless succulents died in the learning, but that is how it often goes in gardening. In death and destruction do we learn best. Two survivors of that crowd are planted in the ground in our current house and have given us immense pleasure ever since. They demand very

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little and look splendid all the time. Although my ardor for the stapeliads has cooled and my tastes have moved on, I revere these remnants of a long gone, quick passion. They are like odd china pieces from beloved older relatives, or pages from a forgotten diary, forming a sweet reminder of a time now gone. To my chagrin Gary began to speak of looking for a more perfect location almost as soon as we settled in. I found this irritating at first; we had just got here, we had small trees and other new plantings. Would we not be here to see them grow up? Why was I spending time on the blasted Bermuda grass and the delightful triangular vegetable bed if we were only to be leaving soon? He was entirely unmoved—he insisted that we needed to consider another place. He had dreams of an even greater horticultural empire, one with more space, one that would offer us more options to learn about making a desert garden. On that I could agree; we were clearly going to fill this one up in a year or so, and then what would we do? So we signed up with a realtor who could not understand our plea—largest possible yard with smallest possible house and no pool and, after the fiasco with the miserable Bermuda grass, absolutely no lawn. She must have thought we were naive; she never once showed us a house that met our criteria. So we began to take walks and bike rides around the perimeter of where we lived. And that is how we found our neighborhood and our home. It is a small development in southern Scottsdale built around 1960 by a man named Castleberry. He took the desert into account in this development, celebrating its distinctive features rather than demolishing them. It is a beautiful treasure and, because the lots in one section were large, we began to look for a house there in earnest. When we found this house, during one of our almost daily tours of the neighborhood, we asked the realtor to get us in to look at it. It was love at first sight. The house had a big kitchen with a nice view that impressed us, but we were out in the yard before she could begin to describe the number of bedrooms and so forth. She found us out there, staring; we couldn’t believe how huge it was. We found out later that it is six-tenths of an acre, and it felt all of that on that first day. We were pleased to see how few plants there were, unless you counted the creosote (Larrea tridentata) that were everywhere and so numerous that you had to bushwhack through them. We made an offer then and there. Later when friends and family asked about our new house, neither of us could call up more than a minimal description of the house—but we knew all the plants on the property by heart.

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We moved in on a March weekend in 1991 with the help of friends and their pickup trucks, and assisted by my sister and her husband, who thought they had come for a visit. It was a chaotic and unruly move, jammed in during a plant sale weekend. But without doubt, the most daunting and important part of the move was getting the boojum over to its new home. Cesar Mazier and I worked together at the Desert Botanical Garden at that time, and he took the approach that no plant was too difficult to move if you truly wanted it. The three of us set about moving what was now a 5-foot boojum to its new home by the small wash in the back. We were careful and it went well; he and I had already lugged around a lot of large succulents and a few boojum during our work at the Desert Botanical Garden. It looked wonderful in the back by the wash, announcing this as our new desert home. We put the Aloe marlothii, nearly as large, near it and preened with glee over both of them. A graceful, mature blue palo verde was near enough to shelter them from cold, if necessary, and offered needed shade to the aloe. But all of those plants were destined to break our hearts before too many years had passed. I am frequently asked what to do first with a new garden. What is the beginning, how to start? I say it depends a lot on what you find there and what you see in the future. But it is most important to get a handle right away on the locations and types of trees. As we looked around at our new place, we saw in the back a mimosa (Albizzia julibrissin) smack dab in the middle of the ground as you walked out the back door. Just beyond it was a jumbled, gray, thorny plant that I quickly realized was a graythorn (Zizyphus obtusifolia). Over to the right of the porch was a huge Mexican palo verde (Parkinsonia aculeata) that offered a great deal of shade from the morning sun. Beyond it and next to the wall along our property line was an African sumac (Rhus lancea) that could just as easily have been planted by birds for all the care it had received. Over to the left was the biggest creosote I have ever seen and beyond it the previously mentioned blue palo verde along a small wash that ran from the house to the alley. Only half the back garden was fenced; the area outside the fence was a mess, but a small foothills palo verde had found a home in the wedge of the alleys at the farthest edge of the garden. In the alley was another graythorn and a pathetic native mesquite (Prosopis velutina,) both of which had undoubtedly been put there by birds. A terribly desiccated saguaro, only about 5 feet tall, sat in pitiful isolation on a rocky slope. A larger wash came down the driveway and flowed through this outer area, ending in the

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alley and a large culvert. A small foothills palo verde was at its beginning and three large native mesquites grew along its course. The front was pretty spare but for the ubiquitous creosote, with a small and struggling Texas ebony (Ebanopsis ebano) and a small native mesquite. There were two big ocotillos that looked as if they had just had the ropes taken off them the day before and a nice spear-shaped saguaro. Scattered about were a few golden barrel cactus (Echinocactus grusonii), a couple of purple prickly pear (Opuntia santa-rita), one cane cholla (Cylindropuntia spinosior), and two pencil cholla (Cylindropuntia aciculata). It was a start, and almost from the first weekend we were there we began its transformation into our vision of a desert garden. It has been a long and exciting journey that is far from done. But then what garden ever is?

Weather

while weather is not technically alive, it might as well be for all the effect it has on a garden. I learned early on that no matter where you live, weather vacillates from being a congenial, satisfying partner to a merciless bully, and learning to join the vagaries of your climate with your choice of plants is the surest path to a calm, restorative garden. When I first moved to the desert I remarked continuously on the stability and sameness of the weather. I had grown up in Central Texas and had just arrived from New Orleans. Both are places where weather is a fierce and changeable thing that can turn on you in a matter of hours or days. Weather in each of these locales, particularly in the winter and spring, ranges from balmy sweet days, with highs in the 80s and a gentle breeze, to relentless days of below-freezing temperatures that devastate years of growth. In Central Texas, long-term records look like there is plenty of rain, when in fact there can be weeks on end with buckets of rain or a prolonged spell of no rain at all. In New Orleans, a dry year might have only 50 inches of rain. Both places were often in the thrall of sensational frontal storms that tore down from the polar ice caps at breakneck speed, crashing into the warm air of the Gulf of Mexico and sending up walls of purple clouds that spewed out ghastly amounts of hail/sleet/rain as calling cards. Such storms fill creeks, tear down trees, eliminate bare soil, and rearrange everything. And in New Orleans the looming threat of hurricanes, coupled with living below sea level, punctuated every single summer. 13

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I find not having to face devastating Arctic blasts, hurricanes, and funnel clouds with their deep green, unsettling clouds, to be calming and a great relief. Nothing disturbs the peaceful roll of the desert seasons from mild and inviting to warm to hot. Clouds are welcome; we need the rain too much to ever complain, even if it shows up with maddening irregularity. We even welcome the spectacular crashing thunderstorms that have torn out parts of the garden, or ruined a peaceful day out on the hiking trail; rain is too sparse to get picky about how it is delivered. Naturally, as I lived here longer I began to understand the nuances and rhythms that make up the weather of the low desert. It quickly became clear that, while most of the disturbing weather events with which I was so familiar are less common or missing entirely from this place, there are still plenty of meteorological subtleties to denote the passing of time and the seasons. The first difference is that I don’t think of four seasons most of the time; I think of the low desert as having two seasons—the warm season and the cool season. The cool season begins sometime in October and ends anytime after mid-April. It encompasses the traditional designation of winter as well as most of spring and a good deal of fall. It is a time characterized by exquisite weather without great drama. During the coldest parts, the afternoons are resplendent, and the possibility of a long, slow rain that soaks deeply into the ground is ever present. At both ends of the season the mornings and evenings are the loveliest time of the day, and outdoor living, open windows, and fresh air are abundant. The early part of the cool season is an active planting time for almost everything: winter vegetable gardens and annuals for spring flowering; most perennials but especially the natives like globemallow (Sphaeralcea ambigua), brittlebush (Encelia farinosa), and penstemons; spring flowering bulbs and trees and shrubs; in short, almost everything except the most cold-tender perennials or shrubs. To me this season marks the real beginning of the year, announcing a time when all things garden-wise seem possible and likely. It is the desert analog of what temperate gardeners feel for spring. Gardens and their caregivers are released from the intense burden of summer, and long-dormant plants start to emerge from their deep summer sleep. It creates an optimistic frame of mind, and no one is more blindingly optimistic than a gardener.

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Late December and most of January is when it will get cold, at least by our standards, if it gets cold at all. Most plants do not grow a lot during these few weeks, and even the emerging annuals stand still for a bit, waiting for just a touch more warmth to resume growth and start flowering. It is a good time for a breather; the holidays are over, and the garden is in a lull because few plants enjoy being transplanted or moved when soil temperatures are so cool. It is a time when you cannot get enough of the outside, when the short days encourage you to keep looking and thinking about plants for the spring, or about the scope and scale of building projects that never seem so difficult when the high is only 75 degrees. I deeply appreciate January in this garden—it is the time when I think, when I look and see and understand the garden the best. It is not the showiest time; only a few aloes can be counted on to have flowers. If it gets quite cold, leaves of brazilwood (Haematoxylon brasiletto) and the Mexican bauhinia (Bauhinia divaricata) turn brown and fall off. It is the time when the garden looks clearest to me, when its intentions and possibilities are most vivid. Perhaps it is because there isn’t a great deal to do but harvest the bounty from the vegetable garden, or eat lunch out on the main patio, that I get this reflective time out in the garden. It is when we make plans, it is when we develop the concepts for new beds, it is our thinking time for this garden. You might imagine that planning would take place during the long summer, also a time of diminished chores, but during that time the weather is so extreme you just want to get through it and hope everything makes it intact. It is unimaginable that you want to spend more time than absolutely necessary outside. In January though, it is pleasant to be outside, you feel like you can begin work almost immediately on your plans—it is like the time right before a big party, or a long anticipated event, when you just know that it is all ready and you are going to have a great time. The great bane of winter in all our previous gardens was a deep freeze. The worst were in New Orleans, a generally subtropical place, where two great freezing events in the mid-1980s shooed us right out of town. The first winter we lived in the desert, the overnight temperature at our first house fell to the high 20s, and we were certain we had made a critical error—it was cold here after all. But that winter taught us a vital lesson about freezing in the desert and about how different such events are from those of our former home. When the Arctic systems, so typical in our previous locales, rain down cold on the land, they come like banshees, blowing mightily, and often with

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rain that leaves a coating of cold that can last for days on end. During such events, it is not at all uncommon for the temperatures to rise above freezing, if at all, for only a few hours. Thus, the duration of freezing temperatures can be long and ultimately deeply devastating. But in the desert it is much different. Cold air arrives stealthily, like a soft blanket. It is rarely windy and almost always extremely clear when it is coldest. Consequently, the freeze is a radiant freeze, where the heat of the day, locked into the concrete, the soil, and even the plants, rises to the upper reaches of the atmosphere quickly once the sun goes down and the temperatures begin to fall. This is why we love covering things so much, and are devotees of the frost blanket, the old sheet, and the plastic on the shade house. All we really need to do, for the most part, is cover something up before the sun goes down and the resulting radiant heat will be locked in just enough to prevent serious damage. In addition, what cold there is, even on the edges of town where freezing temperatures are still an annual event, usually is of extremely short duration. That short duration is why we had no damage that first year—and we were both amazed and delighted. As the years have gone by, in the deep urban core where we live, even these light or short freezes are increasingly uncommon, as the complicated equation of increasing amounts of concrete, asphalt, and buildings, coupled with a shift in the climate to a warmer phase, has made many parts of the interior metropolitan area frost free. Or so we all imagined until a devastating event in January 2007 blasted us all out of our frost-free lethargy. Temperatures in this garden stood at 24 and 26 degrees on two successive nights, lasting long enough to cause significant and meaningful damage. The first night of this now infamous freeze crept up on us, and we covered a few things late in the game. The next night we were better prepared, but still those temperatures took a dramatic toll on this garden and on our psyches. The lovely Furcraea selloa that so beautifully anchored the small wash in the back melted before our eyes. The first morning, as the sun rose, the tips were already brown, the leaves lax and pale. These are vivid signs of cold damage in most rosette-forming succulents, and we were not pleased to see it. On the morning after the second night the entire plant was mushy and soft, with only the base more or less intact. It was a total loss, and we sadly removed it to the compost pile. A large Cape honeysuckle (Tecoma capensis) secured the western corner of the house in the raised beds. It came with the house and had grown

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happily, flowering extravagantly each fall and winter for over sixteen years. After those two freezing nights it was devastated, even though it was on the highest point in the yard and under the eaves of the house. In the spring, once it began to show some growth, I pruned out all the dead, which was sadly most of the plant. It never recovered completely, and by the second year it had made only a pathetic recovery. We were certain it would never look as vigorous and beautiful as it had before the freeze, but after three years of growth it was full and lush again, replete with its brilliant orange flowers. In the area we call the Outback, the variegated Agave sisalana looked ragged, with brown, drooping leaves instead of its typical sturdy upright white and green ones. To our amazement, this plant recovered better than we would have expected, and while the damage to the oldest leaves can still be counted, it has quickly regrown a new rank or two of vigorous leaves and generally looks fantastic in its fountain bed on the monsoon patio. Without a doubt, however, the most dramatic effect of that freeze was to the Chinese lantern tree (Dichrostachys cinerea). Chinese lantern tree is a multi-trunked species with lacy, intricately compound leaves that give it the appearance of a shaggy fern tree (Lysiloma watsoni). The lanterns of its name (it isn’t Chinese at all) are the bizarre flowers that smother the plant every spring and early summer. Each flower is a long cluster (catkin) of tiny flowers, with those at the end composed only of zig-zags of yellow stamens and those toward the top of straight, congested bright pink stamens. Because the color is formed by the stamens, rather than petals, it lasts only a day before the entire thing hangs down dejectedly as a dried, tan relic. Pistils are buried deep and are nearly invisible. Pods form quickly and they, too, are extraordinary. Each pod is twisted tightly and clustered together into a ball with all the other pods formed by the catkin. At first the pods are light green but mature to dark brown and look like an orgy of fossil worms shellacked together. We had planted this marvelous oddity in the eastern perennial bed to replace the Chihuahuan orchid tree (Bauhinia macranthera) that had lived there for years but finally succumbed to old age. Although we knew Chinese lantern tree was a bit tender to cold, we didn’t think it was cold here any longer and in it went. It had been in the ground a little over two years and was already over 10 feet tall when the freeze hit. Within a week after the freeze it was invisible; all of the above-ground parts of the plant were dead, and nothing appeared to be coming up from the ground or the nodes

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around the base. I cut all of the dead stems down to the ground just so we didn’t have to look at them. Perhaps out of sentiment, or because I was tired of removing so many damaged plants, or possibly just the vagaries of time, I left this tree alone following that initial pruning until the final round of spring cleanup. By the time I got around to dealing with it, the Chinese lantern tree had shot out four or five branches, which was encouraging—but they were growing flat on the ground. This presented a conundrum, one that all gardeners face at one time or another; the present growth form was entirely unacceptable and would never do, but what in the world was the right thing to do about it? Give up a beloved plant? Hope that it would get over it and grow more naturally? Wait it out and see what happened? This plant was in such a prominent spot in the garden I was undecided, but a combination of hope and lethargy beat out every other feeling. I left it alone to see what happened. I reasoned that if it didn’t do something I could live with by the end of the summer, I would remove it. Like many gardeners, I am entirely convinced plants hear you when you cough up ultimatums like this. We had a stunning yellowbells (Tecoma stans) in the bed near the stairs that refused to bloom for years until, exasperated, I said in its hearing, “This is it—no flowers this summer, no more yellowbells.” It set an extravagant bloom that same summer and every summer after that until the Great Freeze killed it. We have had much the same experience with other reluctant plants, so perhaps the Chinese lantern tree fell into this pattern. Or perhaps it just had plenty of mojo left deep under the bed. Whatever the reason, by the end of the summer, the flat branches had straightened up and were nearly 5 feet tall and full of smaller branches and countless leaves. It was so vigorous I felt secure in removing all but three of the branches to improve its form. I was deeply relieved to see that it had taken matters into its own hands and regrown itself in a different but highly congenial form. That fall it failed to bloom at all; normally it would send out at least a few flowers in the fall. Throughout the next spring and summer, no flowers at all—but the plant was vigorous and growing well, and we trusted it to recover completely. Then in the second spring following that freeze, it had the most extravagant bloom it has ever shown—perhaps ever will. Dozens upon dozens of

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those tiny pink lanterns adorned every tip of the tree, and it stayed in bloom for months. I think of it as the tree’s version of a celebration of recovery, a recovery we had little to do with but for patience, and one for which we will remain grateful for many years to come. The final segment of the cool season is the speedy extravagance of a desert spring. It seems to me that, suddenly, right around the beginning of February the entire garden, and indeed the hills around us in a wet year, just wake up and begin to grow and flower at breakneck speed, hardly stopping until the heat of the summer starts to poke around the corner. While January can be something of a gentle torpor, beginning in February the garden and all of us who live in it are infused with a manic surge. It is hard to keep up; everything is flowering, sometimes all at once. Annuals, most native perennials, the bulbs, a few of the shrubs, and the aloes that weren’t already flowering are in full bloom now, and all the birds are in a lather to find mates, build nests, and raise a family. Spring is short, but it is a sweet and lovely time. Everything is in a rush to get all the work done before the summer. Like an airport or a train station during the holidays, the entire garden is on the move, rushing to meet strict deadlines, with every living thing intent on its own purpose despite the crush of others around them. It is an exhilarating and often exhausting time, staying ahead of chores is hard, and taking time to savor and enjoy it all takes planning. But the memories of spring are delicious and keep your spirits up for months. Every year, almost before I know it, the cacti in the front start to bloom. Hedgehog cactus (Echinocereus engelmannii) erupt in their brief extravaganza of purple and mauve flowers, the chollas are transformed with clusters of yellow, purple, maroon, and copper-colored flowers at their tips. The prickly pears are lined with brilliant yellow flowers along their pads, and the barrel cactus each present a yellow or orange crown at their tip. These are signs that the cool season is wandering toward the warm season and that soon the rising afternoon temperatures of April and May will expand into the heat of the summer. Just as the low light and increasing chill of fall in temperate climates signals the rigors of winter to come, these long, balmy days of the late spring, with their increasing daylight and flowering cacti, are reminders that all the frantic work of the spring was to prepare us to meet the summer. Somewhere near the end of May the warm season takes firm control of the weather, and the season swings into full action by June. The days are

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longer as the equinox approaches and the nights begin to heat up. This increase in nighttime temperatures, the urban “heat island” phenomenon noticed throughout the world, has caused the greatest interruption in the pattern of summer for us and for our plants. Our warm season has two distinct aspects: the first summer, which is marked by days with humidity at less than 10 percent and temperatures that can cruise well over 108 degrees, with virtually no possibility of rain; and the second summer, when the days and nights glow with a noticeable rise in humidity, temperatures that are still ridiculously high, and days that are punctuated by a continual tease of immense clouds on the eastern and southern horizon that may, but generally do not, choose your place to unload their rain. The first summer, with its ever-increasing temperatures and astonishingly low humidity, creates the greatest challenge for gardeners in the desert. It is the single best argument for loading up your garden with local natives and other well-adapted plants. Temperatures that high, coupled with humidity that low, cause plants to lose moisture with breathtaking speed and result in irreversible damage quickly if you are not vigilant, or if your plants are not well suited to endure it. Vegetables wilt in a matter of three or four hours without strict attention to mulching and consistent watering. Lovely spring-flowering perennials turn crisp in the withering heat, shrubs pale and may lose some leaves, fruit dries out quickly without attention, and even cacti, agaves, and other succulents can lose more water than they can replenish without intermittent supplemental water. Some species, of course, just bail out of the entire thing, as do many residents of the area. Most spring-flowering perennials of desert origin employ this strategy; they simply reduce to the lowest possible size and wait it out. Species like brittlebush, globemallow, foldwing (Dicliptera resupinta), desert penstemon (Penstemon parryi), and firecracker penstemon (Penstemon eatonii) follow this route. Many woody species like wolfberry (Lycium spp.) and fairyduster (Calliandra eriophylla) lose their leaves to wait out the season. Some of the most dramatic succulents in the garden, like the boojum and the elephant tree (Pachycormis discolor), also shed their leaves as the weather warms and the soils dry out. Before the Phoenix metropolitan area became so large, the nights used to cool off, at least to the low 80s and more routinely into the 70s, even as midafternoon temperatures soared. Long-time residents of the area remember

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this clearly, and it is what made the use of swamp coolers so common and so helpful. But the twin demons of too much concrete and asphalt and a clearly warmer climate are creating a few days, or even a couple of weeks, of nearly unbearable weather each year, with highs over 110 degrees for days on end and nights with lows in the mid-90s, a terrible combination that can make an unprepared or unwary gardener despair. It is during this time that you wonder how plants survive. Even rugged agaves and yuccas, native shrubs, and extremely drought-tolerant plants can be lost during this time without extraordinary vigilance. Pale leaves show up often on these plants. It is heat stress, and no amount of water is going to correct it. Brittlebush on the edges of the garden where there is minimal water die, and cactus shrink to a few pale stems; only the native mesquites in the wash look fit. Even creosote lose so many of their leaves that they are more wood than leaf. Many plants simply cannot endure it; we have lost numerous experiments sent to us or gathered by us from all over the arid regions of the world during these times. This season is the crucible where good plants emerge and the also-rans turn up their roots and give out. It takes a lot of shoulder shrugging to get through it all. I have to take the stance that if they can’t take it during this time even with our best efforts at shade, watering, and other coddling, then they just don’t belong in this garden. For most of my gardening life, when I would think about whether or not a new species would work into the garden, its tolerance to cold was among the first questions. How low can it go was a continuous part of the discussion, and I still have excellent gardening friends here who remain locked into this question. But in this place, and certainly in this garden, January ’07 notwithstanding, that is no longer my first concern. Now, I evaluate an existing plant and look for new members based on the ability to endure the relentless and unsparing heat of a low-desert summer. While cold might occur from time to time and is decidedly annoying when it does, heat is permanent, increasing, and becoming a tougher and tougher burden on the garden and the city. It still amazes me, even after so many summers, how many of the plants in this garden do well, even thrive, during the onslaught of five, eight, ten, or more days of highs over 110 degrees and nights that often fail to fall below 90 degrees. It is also truly wonderful how many of our plants not only endure these conditions but come back year after year to look their best when the weather is less ferocious. These are the heroes, the ones to

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celebrate, and they are the ones I love to talk about and give away—the ones I am delighted to live among. They have found their place, just as Gary and I have, in this desert garden, accepting its conditions and accommodating its whims. Just about the time it seems that the first summer will never end—and there have been a couple of years when I honestly thought it never would— the clouds rise up and start to peek over the horizon and you know that the second summer is just about to start. Usually I see the clouds rise high over the mountains to the east for weeks before the humidity really ramps up. Then there might be a dust storm or two clouding the sky with a brown haze that makes it impossible to see the butte that is across the street. Reports filter in of rain south of us. For a few nights lightning punctuates the sky, not particularly close but impressive nevertheless. Finally the vigil is rewarded and the clouds thicken, the thunder rattles the shelves, and rain falls on the garden. The day after the first great slug of humidity and the release of the garden from the Big Heat, I can watch the plants respond. I swear they sigh with relief—they made it once again—and their color and attitude changes overnight. A little more perk in the stem, and a little sturdier leaf with more green to it. I feel like I should start some sort of ritual or dance to celebrate it all. There is no question that hot and humid is more uncomfortable for people, but it is such a relief to the garden that I look forward to it, revel in it, count the days until it comes and, let us be frank, count the days until it is over. During this second summer, the season of thunderstorms known locally as the monsoon, the mornings are dim, full of the leftovers from the storms the night before. The milky sky creates a blanket over the area, soft and warm as if the garden had just stepped out of the bath. By mid-morning the clouds separate into puffy formations, following their own whims, and by noon the sun is out and the sky appears cloudless. It is a lie, because in the late afternoon, the clouds are back, flowing up from the south, or falling down from the mountains to the east. Every hour they are bigger, closer, more demanding. Some rise up, creating the anvil heads so distinctive to desert thunderstorms. If you can see all of it, they are far away and are less likely to be your rain god that day. Walls of purple sometimes come in from the south, and those are more serious. They are full of thunder; massive bolts of lightning claim the ground, and the rain is heavy and dangerous. Whatever form the clouds

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take, they continue through the afternoon, and are at their best around sunset, sometimes creating a magnificent sunset—all color and rays and glory. But unseen are the clouds that have rained over the mountains of the eastern edge of the valley. They are caught in a slide down the hills and descend into the valley in the night. Mostly you see the wink of their lightning near bedtime. These storms make the air restless, uneasy, and too still for comfort. One evening during this part of the summer, I opened the front door and met a mist that seemed to form a valance over the sky. If I looked straight out, I could see the houses and street and creosote and so forth, but it was fuzzy, hazy, like a dark London street scene in a nineteenth-century painting. Shapes were visible, but none were clear. When I looked up, just to my head level, the mist was touchable as it hung on the air. Everything was surrounded by it. The air was perfectly still, not one frond of the palms moved; neither did the tiny leaves of the mesquite or the fine leaflets of the fern tree. The sky was lightened by the moon so hidden by the clouds that it was only a nightlight, not the beacon that turns the night sky into a silver room. The moonlight appeared to float from the top of the clouds in an even and understated way. There was no sound at all—just that soft, diffuse light, the hazy cover of the clouds, and the warm air covering everything like a shawl. I saw lightning far away and knew this air meant that the clouds from faraway mountains were coming down. These clouds are fickle and, more often than not, do not produce any rain for us, but when they do it is a rigid downpour lasting about half an hour. I think all gardeners are closet weather wonks, or quickly become so. It is such a vivid and important part of all gardens that you have to pay attention. Gary has always been a weather watcher, long before his gardening days. It was his first big hit with my mother. They can both stare at the Weather Channel for hours: endless repetition and iterations are wonderful, and the more disastrous or difficult the weather the better. I have known my mother to avoid traveling away from home in May, a stormy month where she lives, or to wonder months in advance how the weather will be during an upcoming, important event. I have watched Gary regularly record in his weather journal the times and durations of freezes. Happily, that journal is gathering dust out here, yet I think of it as something that will be found by archaeologists in future years, like old garden catalogs that will offer a picture of how life was “way back then.”

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I fall into a less intense category of weather watcher but still can’t resist talking about it, especially in the summer. Gardeners have always talked of the weather, I suppose, and where I live the first question is always about rain. Did it rain at your place? How much rain did you get? Because rain does not fall evenly in the desert, it is an important consideration. I do, however, like the associations that weather can produce. In our neighborhood there are small and large washes (also known as gullies, draws, bayous, or rivulets depending on where you live) between our lots. They are dry swales of rock and dirt most of the year, but they cross the roads and make the neighborhood streets rise and fall in a gentle roller coaster. These washes are the remnants of a complex braid of channels coming off the rounded, rocky buttes that are themselves the leftovers of the mountains that used to define the place south of the neighborhood. Water slides off their southern face, passing through our neighborhood as it heads directly for a much larger, older wash that is now a major street. In a good storm, water collects, covering the road for a moment before racing through the alleys and yards to quickly disperse. In a larger storm, the moving water sets up a current dashing down the slope, leaving little bits of debris in the roads as it disperses. But in a really fine storm, the washes are transformed into torrential giants of muddy, swirling water. This water rises to the tops of banks, spreads out through the neighborhood alleys, cascades in waterfalls over the streets and into the channels. This water leaves rocks, leaves, limbs, and all kinds of debris over the roads as it slows and releases its hold on its cargo. These are the events that draw the neighbors out to watch the washes rise and fall. It rarely takes more than an hour from start to finish. When the great crest of water is over and has moved on, there is little left but a muddy print. The running of these washes is when neighbors come out, trapped on their side of the wash for a short time, gazing in awe at the power, force, and sheer quantity of water that arises so quickly. When it is over we find ourselves milling around in the street, filling each other in on the small details of life that have been accumulating since our last visit. I know of few other places where a simple rainstorm is a bonding event and treasure the effect that this weather has on us all. Watering plants in the summer, particularly the ones that are completely or partially dormant, gets tricky. Even the ones that are still holding on, like the agaves, the cacti, the Texas rangers, the red fairyduster (Calliandra californica), hopbush (Dodonaea viscosa), and jojoba (Simmondsia chinensis)

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need some supplemental watering if they are to last. One of the greatest lessons this weather, and these plants, have taught me is that how they go into the summer absolutely determines how they survive it. Therefore, whether it is cacti, agaves, shrubs, or desert perennials, I try to make sure that they are well watered and in prime condition before the Big Heat begins. It is the best defense they have. Watering when it is 110 degrees or worse is only palliative. Almost nothing grows when it is that hot, and while such watering may prevent outright death, it does little to stave off the ravages of heat stress. I am just trying to avoid disaster, but it is the plant’s own reserves that are really going to make the greatest difference, and those reserves are built up in the months before these temperatures, not the day before.

The Back

like many gardeners, we consider our back garden a haven, a place to retire from the world and its demands, an intensely private world where we can be soothed by the first blooms of the oxblood lily, where summer nights are punctuated by the gentle, white flowers of sacred datura (Datura wrightii) and four o’clock (Mirabilis jalapa) as they offer their nectar to the swirling hawk moths. The porch and its adjacent patio are now an extension of the living room, and serve as our dining room for much of the year. This is where we have morning coffee while the lesser goldfinch breakfast on the bounty of the bee bush (Aloysia wrightii), where we consider the next garden challenge, where we lay out the varieties of tomato seed that will be tried in the coming spring, or where we chat over the week, all the while staring down the path to the blazing red bird of paradise (Caesalpinia pulcherrima) and the white oleander (Nerium oleander)‘St. Agnes.’ The main patio has hosted numerous friends and associates, parties and soirees, but its most treasured time is when we simply sit, just the two of us, watching the first nighthawk of the year as it swoops close enough to hear its normally silent wings, or stay out long enough chatting and nursing our wine until the bats and the stars tell us that the night has truly begun. Every garden needs a place like this, a spot where just sitting is the best idea, where all the other lives that share the garden show up—maybe just once, like the elf owl; or from time to time, like the small gray squirrel that peers at us as it passes by, inquisitive and uncertain; or continuously, like the cactus wrens and thrashers, the Abert’s towhee family, and the generations 27

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of hummingbirds, all of which race from side to side, tree to tree, flower to flower. It is all here, the life of this garden, out in the open, and we are charmed and grateful to be part of the action with this most personal patio as our garden’s lodestar. But the back garden was not always like this—in fact it was a deserted and desolate place when we bought the house despite the fact that it was the principle reason we fell in love with the place. What we saw was room—lots of it—with not much in the way of any future plans for the garden, save the creosote. The freedom of having next to nothing left over from a previous garden was so attractive that in the beginning we were overwhelmed with ideas and dreams for the place. Initially, the backyard was in two parts. Roughly half of it was fenced in by a block wall that had no opening or union with the other half. This left the western part of the back entirely open to the alleys that bound it, and for a number of years we left it like that, partly because we could not figure out what to do with the large area “outback,” and partly for lack of money to fix it. But almost immediately we set to work with vigor on the interior part. In retrospect I think this was wise, and I enjoin all new gardeners or those with a new place to consider this approach, which was basically to start at the house and work out. After all, this is where you will spend a lot of your time; this is what you will see the most and probably where you will allow your friends to visit. Taking on an entire garden all at once, especially if it is large, is a daunting task and, even with unlimited funds to hire legions of people to help you out, it can overwhelm anyone. So start small; start at the doorway to the house and work out from there. In this garden, the view from the back porch was secured by a large mimosa that dominated the center of the area directly outside the door. Although we had no definite plans for this large open area, we agreed that a mimosa would never have a place in our plans. I am always amazed by the timidity of some gardeners when it comes to removing a plant, particularly a tree, that has either passed its prime, has become more of a problem than a help, or is just in the wrong place. I have seen this refusal to face up to the difficulty and its obvious solution over and over again, both in public and private plantings. Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t think you just fire good trees willy-nilly, but there can be good and sufficient reason to do so. Few trees are truly sacred in my view—those that are isolated examples of their kind, those that came from beloved friends and have a wealth of memory attached to them, or those that are invaluable

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scientific specimens qualify—but simply being there isn’t necessarily enough to spare them. So, the pretty, but wildly in the way, mimosa was sent off to the shredder almost immediately, and we have never regretted it. Once that was settled and we looked around, it wasn’t altogether a promising scene. In a jumble behind the mimosa was the biggest creosote I had ever seen, and a large and particularly unruly graythorn. Over toward the eastern edge was a massive African sumac that had been so infrequently pruned of its rambunctious suckers that we could hardly figure it out. Directly to the other side was a beautiful tree, however unlikely. A Mexican palo verde that, despite its well deserved reputation for messiness, contrariness, and a singular ability to take over, was beautiful in this spot. This tree is a pest in most of the region, easily taking root in natural places like Camelback Mountain or the McDowell Mountains to the east, where houses and gardens are in direct union with the natural area. It is wisely considered forbidden in those areas, but this one was deeply imbedded in the urban core, and it was a beauty. It had a straight, sturdy green trunk with well-placed branches that soared high above the porch, providing light, comfortable shade for that entire side of the garden. The long leaves with their persistent rachis gave the tree a graceful swaying look that added the only bit of charm that this garden enjoyed at the time. After we removed the mimosa, we began to noodle around the idea that the big space left from its removal would be a patio, and the spectacular Mexican palo verde would anchor one side of it. We began to think of perennial beds along both sides of this imaginary patio and quickly began to install a few perennials, mainly to attract hummingbirds, as a start. But then, as is often the case, something came along that changed everything and caused a complete rethinking of all our schemes. It turned out that the septic tank needed reworking, and the tank was directly beneath the Mexican palo verde, with leach fields reaching out toward the African sumac and the immense creosote. This, of course, explained their great size and vivid growth. Working on the tank would involve digging down to the tank, which we knew would be disruptive and difficult; but when we were informed it would involve getting a large bulldozer into the yard, up near the house, with at least some room to work, concern shifted to alarm. This was clearly going to cause a phenomenal amount of damage to our merely two-year-old garden. I had already built wooden raised beds for the vegetables down near the only entry from the alley into the yard. At the time, the tomatoes were

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setting a lot of fruit but regardless, the entire bed—soil, frames, and all— had to be moved before work could begin. In addition, a new leach field was needed, but this time it was to be a pit and was to be directly beneath the emerging main patio. We had been over our plant concerns with the contractor many times, and had reiterated that if he told us how much room he needed for his work and his equipment and gave us a little notice of their arrival, we would get anything we valued out of his way. He was all sympathy and understanding, but he wasn’t the guy on the bulldozer. Although we had moved and shifted what we understood we needed to, we were stunned when the bulldozer showed up hours early outside the alley gate. We tried to get him to tell us what he needed out of the way, except for the vegetable beds which were already gone, but he only knew three things—he was here, he was on a dozer, and he was going to dig a hole. He clearly was no gardener, and he just as clearly had not heard or listened to one word that was spoken between us and the contractor with whom we had planned the work. It was abundantly clear that he considered that the size of his equipment gave him license over all of the land anywhere in his sight. We had other ideas. After a feeble attempt to speak to him, we began to run in front of his approach, trying to anticipate what might be in his path. This served to increase his speed; he was only held up by the rise of the land and the tightness of the situation. He almost took out some of the wall, and that got his attention, so he slowed up a bit. While I was running hither and thither with a shovel, he began to try to take a different route than the one we had laid out with the contractor. Here were plants that we had not thought we needed to move, and one of them was the boojum, so lovingly moved from the previous house. He wasn’t in the mood to listen and began to wheel and turn the machine in a reckless and ill-considered way—retching it around in areas that had no proximity to where the work was to be done. When he missed the boojum by inches, suddenly Gary had enough. A man I had only seen angry once, who rarely raised his voice even under the most trying circumstances, leaped on the running board of the growling dozer, shoved his face immediately in front of the operator’s, and announced that if one leaf was disturbed on that priceless specimen (I think the sum of $5000 was shouted out) he would hold he-of-the-big-machine personally responsible. Of course the plant was dear to us, but hardly worth anything like that amount of money. But Gary

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was so incensed by this yahoo’s cavalier disregard for all our planning and our concerns, it worked to get the man’s attention. The dozer operator relented on the boojum, now turning toward the area where I was frantically moving a few small but well loved plants out of his way. He saw me, but he kept on going. I stood up, I put my shovel on the ground, and I stood there. He came a bit closer and gunned the engine. How could he know that this was far from the first bulldozer I had ever been around, and that I was not the least bit concerned that he would run me down? I was pretty sure even this dolt wouldn’t murder me in my own yard, but I emphatically meant to slow him down enough to move those plants. I was really angry and he probably was too, so we just stared at each other like that for a few minutes while I finished moving the two plants. I then moved out of his way and remained in house, seething and nervous, while he finished his work. However, his meeting with two wild-eyed plant nuts—one facing him down and the other screaming in his face—must have gotten the message through to him. From that moment on he calmly and quietly went about his work, gently nudging that huge machine into place, taking out enough soil to fix the tank and dig a 17-foot deep pit. He even took the time to inquire where we would like the immense pile of soil to be placed. When he left and the plumbing was happy again, we were faced with a huge dilemma. We now had the remains of that pit piled over on the side of the main patio area and had no clear idea what to do with it. As is typical of any of our planning exercises, it took a while to figure it out and involved a lot of talking and hand waving, but the scheme we came up with turned out to be a grand solution. A pit that size yields a lot of soil, actually a huge amount of soil, so this was no tiny problem that distributing a few wheelbarrow loads around the yard would solve. This was a mountain, and we did not particularly need or want a mountain right there. But we quickly lit on the idea that it would be handy to raise the level of the patio area to that of the house. Before the dozer man left us this pile, there was a nearly 3-foot drop from the porch to the ground, and we had long known we would have to do something about it before some catastrophe involving ankles took place. Such a huge amount of soil would help solve that problem, and that is where we started. We lugged the soil around until the ground leveled out, and then Gary built two steps to make the exit from the porch less difficult and dangerous.

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Naturally this meant that now the patio was much higher than the ground beyond it, going out toward the alley. So we put some of the soil there to make a gentler slope and again he built stairs—three this time—to create a more graceful descent from the patio to the walkway. But there was still a lot of soil left in the pile. We turned our attention to the area west of the patio, going toward the gate where the dozer had entered, which was now virtually barren ground. We created two long, terraced beds stretching out like aprons at a theater to form a transition from the upper garden to the vegetable garden. For some reason, we did not build stairs there right away, but waited until Gary fell down the slope one morning on his way to get tomatoes for breakfast and broke his ankle. Now there are four stairs. In the end, even before the final stairs, we had a lovely set-up—beds, stairs, and areas that more or less defined this portion of the garden. That lemon had turned into delicious lemonade by the end of the year. The other problem that the septic work left us with was not obvious at first. Despite his snarling ways, the dozer operator had had no choice but to dig through the bed where the beautiful Mexican palo verde lived. He had also had no choice but to sever a lot of roots, although not all of them. We were naively pleased when, in the months that followed the work, the tree looked good and seemed not to have suffered unduly from the rude treatment, until one August night a few months after the work was completed. There was a fierce thunderstorm full of wind and lighting that evening. The wind was high, and we watched as all the plants in the garden swayed during the onslaught. Just as the rain finished, we heard what sounded like a sigh, like the gentle release of a small jet of air. Gary looked out and called me over; the Mexican palo verde was laying across all the patio furniture, into the bed beyond, entirely concealing the immense creosote on the other side. It had fallen over and had made almost no sound while doing it. Once on the ground with its roots in the air, it was clear what had happened. The tree had not had sufficient time to grow roots to compensate for its one-sided system, and the wind and rain had done the rest. We rescued the smaller perennials under it, especially those that would be rudely shocked by the sudden onset of full sun, and set to work to get rid of the remains of the tree. Now we had a new patio area, a working septic tank, two new sets of stairs, nice terraced beds that faced west, re-installed vegetable beds, and a huge blank in the east perennial bed.

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The other result of the work on the septic tank and the redirection of the leach field was the shock it inflicted on the huge creosote and the African sumac, plants we had not guessed relied on the septic system so completely. Once the septic work was done, and the new pit in operation, it became clear that both of these plants had lived for years on the leach fields that formerly radiated from the tank. The new configuration had changed their lives dramatically, and both went into a quick sulk about it. The creosote, of course, got over it quickly and, thankfully, more or less ceased growing, maintaining its extraordinary size. It is still a singular presence on that side of the patio. The African sumac, however, took it hard. At first it looked merely peaked, with a general loss of good color and a few leaves. But summer was underway by that time and we gave its condition little thought, certain it was only the heat and dryness. We were new to the place, and new to this plant as well. Slowly, it began to look really rough, with more curled leaves and a general slowing of all growth. After an entire season like this, and some concern on our part about its overall health, it dawned on us that it must have relied on the old septic system for its water. We could not imagine how to water such a large tree—the roots had to be all over the place and into our neighbors’ yard and beyond all hope of hand watering. So, we left it to find its own way in these new circumstances. It took about three seasons for the tree to reach a new equilibrium with the reduced water, particularly in the summer. Now it looks fine throughout the entire cool season, in good years blooming heavily, which is definitely a mixed blessing, and in leaner times starting to reduce its leaves as early as May. I assume it relies on the overall watering of the entire garden around it, not to mention some thievery from our neighbors’ trees across the fence. But it looks good and grows in much the same pattern as a Sonoran native. It was our first clue that this is a much more drought-tolerant plant than is generally assumed. It is clearly built for the long haul and can take good care of itself on a modest watering regimen. I doubt that we would have planted an African sumac in the spot where it lives, but it has turned out to be a welcome part of the garden. When we arrived, and before the catastrophe of the septic tank, it had a forest of small limbs shooting up from the main branches like hair on the back of a dog. It was a mess, and Gary set out to try and fix it. Pruning an old, overgrown, and neglected African sumac is not easy, not just because it is a lot of work, but because it is easy to take out all the

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wrong bits and ruin the entire thing. But he did a good job, leaving the graceful, spreading, main branches, releasing their form from the tyranny of all those tiny branches, and creating an open structure. Over the years, we have continued to keep it free of as many of those sprightly, suckering branches as possible, worrying less about the higher realms but keeping the look and feel of the elegant branches down low intact. It has worked out well because this tree is a prominent visual part of the main patio, making it worth the trouble. It has also allowed us to make a reliable succulent garden underneath it. During our earliest years here, Gary fell in love with aloes in a big way. He is still a fan, but without quite the acquisitive verve he had in those years. Consequently, we have acquired a lot of aloes over the years, and when we first moved in they were almost entirely in pots. Everything about the area under the African sumac, the western sun protection, the overhead shade, and the prominence at the east end of the patio, convinced us this was a splendid place to put the aloes in the ground. One of the first to go in under the welcoming arms of the African sumac was Aloe vaombe. This is a tall aloe with long, smooth leaves that in mild winters fade to a burnished red-brown but in colder temperatures change to a fierce, demanding red. The brilliant red waxy flowers are held high over the plant in a candelabra-shaped inflorescence. When the plant was young, and only about 3 feet tall, this flowering was prominent in the late winter and early spring, and the hummingbirds went completely mad over it. It was the scene of innumerable hummingbird wars and hours of our time were spent admiring it and watching the birds’ antics. But as is always the case, problems began to show up in later years. For reasons we still do not understand the main stem began to die slowly, clearly without hope of rescue. Just about that time, we noticed that a smaller plant had arisen from the base. It has never been entirely clear if it is a pup or a seedling. As we watched over the declining larger specimen, the little one continued to grow, and when we finally cut off the main stalk we left the small one in place. We had already put another Aloe vaombe on the other side of the tree in one of our bursts of symmetry and were glad to see that it was doing well. So, if worse came to worst, we would still have one, just not the pair we had envisioned. It is good news to us that they both live to this day, although the older one is much taller than the younger and is now threading its way through the branches of the African sumac. It is delightful see those flowers seeming

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to erupt from the tree on a February evening. Although the flowers are now less prominent in one way, and the symmetry is yet to be achieved, we don’t care; it is enough to have those luscious blooms, elegant leaves, and commanding presence even if one crawls into the tree while the other hovers nearer the ground. Once the African sumac looked presentable, we tried to gild it a bit by planting both a vining aloe (Aloe ciliaris) that would wind among its boughs and a grape ivy (Cissus trifoliata) to serve as a green drape in the summer. Both grew well, particularly at first, but over the years, the aloe suffered. I presumed for a while that its decline was from a combination of increasing heat and less water in that bed than it prefers. But after cleaning up the dead parts, I found that on the backside of the tree, in the deep litter at its base, the aloe was growing with abandon. It appears that sun was the culprit and so, to help it along, I set it up on a trellis behind the African sumac where it now lives happily. It is such a charming accent to the winter garden that if it will forgive me for my negligence, I will promise to take better care of it. The grape ivy, however, went nuts, as grape ivy will do, but it reserved most of its vigor for the canopy of the African sumac. This is a neglected ornamental vine with deep green, thick leaves lined by irregular margins. In ample sun, the leaves are dense and thick on the plant, but I have known this plant to grow in deep shade, making it a desert equivalent of English ivy (Hedera helix). The flowers aren’t much, too small and white to be noticed, and the small, purplish fruit is usually ravaged by birds before I notice it. Ours took to the skies, and while it is not growing in anything like full sun, it does love the upper reaches rather than the lower. Considering that the grape ivy is happiest and in best color in the summer when the African sumac has shed a good number of its leaves, and is winter dormant, losing all or most of its leaves when the sumac is full of its light green leaves, it makes a nice association. These two lives have both literally and figuratively intertwined, and the result is entirely satisfactory. Five agaves, which we considered sun delicate, have lived under the African sumac for a long time—Agave celsii, A. desmettiana, A. filifera, A. guiengola, and A. margaritae. All have thrived in the shade, but each has had a different response to living in the bed and offered a different perspective on the care of agaves. The Agave celsii was originally put in behind the aloes and the African sumac because we were certain it would like consistent shade. I think we misjudged, at least for this individual. It has struggled a lot with the shade,

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the lack of consistent watering, and the ants. The shade we adjusted by moving it to a sunnier part of the same bed, the watering we adjusted by adding it to the overall system in the back, but the ants are beyond us all. Agave celsii is a variable species about leaf color—ours is a light celadon green—but the leaves of all forms are brittle, much less fibrous that many other agaves, and they feel soft in your hand. At first I noticed that the smooth surface of the leaves was being marked by dark gouges, as if something had taken a bite and moved on. This was baffling; agaves are renowned for their acrid, even revolting taste, and at the time I knew there was not a rabbit in the back. Besides, this didn’t look like a rabbit’s work, and I had seen plenty of examples of that over the years. I determined to find out and camped out near the agave for a few days. I was stunned to find that it was ants, crawling all over it and munching away from time to time. I cannot imagine why this happens, or what the ants find so appealing, or why they took years to initiate this assault on our beautiful agave, but for two summers they nearly took it away from us. As they crawled along, gnawing their way through the leaves, they left a trail of large wide holes. I checked around and found that while there were other reports of ants eating agave leaves, both in gardens and in nature, this was not a particularly common occurrence. We felt helpless in the face of the ants, as we have often felt with ants—they are just so much wilier than we are. I won’t use the dreadful poisons on the market that claim to kill them, and all our other remedies seemed futile. Finally, the ants moved on, or their tastes changed, and they have not disturbed the serene beauty of our agave again, demonstrating once again that sometimes just waiting a problem out is the best solution. As the agave began to recover and started to look healthy and vigorous once again, it bloomed. Ah well, that is life with agaves, I felt. But this one looked odd, even for an agave, and if I had not known the plant from which these flowers came, I would have thought it was a manfreda. Its maroon flowers with their long extruded stamens looked so much like a manfreda that I tried a number of cross-pollinations, but none of them took. The single rosette that bloomed died, but the plant subsequently went into a heavy phase of setting more rosettes along the stem. This species clusters its rosettes densely around the small stem and if you aren’t attentive, you might imagine that it did not die after flowering. Around this time, Carl Schoenfeld and Wade Roesch of Yucca Do Nursery made us aware of their plant Manfreda ‘Macho Mocha,’ which they

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were confident was a natural hybrid between Agave celsii and a manfreda. It was easy to see how that could be the case, so closely did the flowers of this agave resemble the manfredas in my garden. ‘Macho Mocha’ lives close by the agave under the African sumac, but I am positive that each would prefer to live where the climate was not so dry, or so terrifically hot, and where the soils were richer and deeper. But it is impossible to give them up; these are the best spots we have for them, so they shall just have to continue this way until they give up or we do. The Agave desmettiana turned out to be not anywhere near as sundelicate as we thought; in fact numerous specimens grow along the roadsides and in front gardens throughout the area now. The one I grow comes from a selection I sold many years ago at the Desert Botanical Garden and is an upright, urn-shaped plant with deep, dusky green leaves that are entirely devoid of teeth. It looked perfect just to the right of the stairs. It lived companionably with a flurry of smaller succulents around it and a Jerusalem sage (Phlomis fruticosa), with its dusky gray leaves and buttery yellow flowers, behind it. But agaves are just loaners in the garden; they have the sad habit of dying after they bloom. This lovely plant was the first of our innumerable agaves to bloom in the garden, and we thoroughly enjoyed the entire spectacle. And we were not alone. Before the first flower opened, the birds of the garden began to come regularly to keep track of the progress of the bloom. How they know is beyond my understanding, but all the birds are anxious and curious about every agave stalk that comes up, hovering like nursemaids on daily rounds for the first open flower. Curve-billed thrashers checked on it often, cactus wrens stopped by on their way to their nests, doves sat on the top as if waiting for a signal. Eventually, the flowers began to open at the bottom of the stalk and then the birds really took things in hand, visiting daily, slurping nectar from those sturdy, yellow flowers. By this time they were joined by both Costa’s and black-chinned hummingbirds, house finches, and that most comic bird of the garden, the Gila woodpecker. Woodpeckers are not well built for gathering nectar from a flowering stalk, even one as sturdy as an agave. I have seen them try to land on aloes that cannot hold their weight, but they cling to the swaying branch nevertheless and with startling acrobatic twists manage to catch some of the sugary juice almost on the fly. On the agave stalk, they can at least walk up to the flower, but it isn’t easy for them. The upright umbels full of the luscious treat are dense and, from

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the woodpecker’s perspective, just slightly over their bill’s reach. They make it work, dipping and diving into the flowers, and while far from graceful, it is completely successful. Later, bees, wasps, and other flying insects came by for their fill. I never kept track, but every time we sat on the patio we saw at least half a dozen or more species of birds and insects feeding avidly on the flower’s nectar. Verdin came by, and both they and the small house finch take the same approach—pecking a hole in the back and slurping out the nectar from the base. A verdin is so tiny that I can imagine it getting caught inside the flower if it wasn’t careful. The Agave filifera was a later introduction into the bed and lives on the far end more or less at the bottom of the stairs. It, too, bloomed out a couple of years ago, leaving us with a couple of pups, but no seed and no bulbils. In this instance, we put one of its pups right back in its place. It is just a perfect location for this small, tidy, elegant agave, and we couldn’t see losing it. A. filifera is well named, its deep green leaves are lined with delicate, white filaments that in some individuals are numerous enough to virtually hide the leaf. Ours is more refined, with dark green leaves smeared with regular white markings on the surface and just a light accent of filaments. After the Agave desmettiana died, we were undecided about whether to simply replace it with one of its own pups or bulbils (those little plants on the flowering stalk), or put in another species. The new-species idea won the debate and now there is a stunning A. margaritae there. This agave has a completely different form—more spreading, with long, well-armed teeth, not to mention it is well over three times the size of its predecessor. While it consumes a good portion of the bed, making maintenance behind it more of a challenge than we expected, its dark green leaves provide a stunning and important anchor to the area. But when it goes, as it will someday, it will probably be replaced with one that is not quite so large. The Agave guiengola is entirely another matter. It loves its spot at the base of the African sumac, front and center as you view the bed from the patio. It has spread its wide, gray-green leaves over the base of the tree and appears contented with its location. This extraordinary agave sets only a few leaves, less than a dozen generally, but it goes all out with them. They are light blue-gray to green, wide at the base, tapering gracefully to a point. While there are small teeth and a suggestion of a terminal spine, this is an easy agave to work around. Ours has made just enough pups to give a few away and form a stunning foundation around the base of the African sumac.

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The ants took after it that same summer we found them on the Agave celsii, but they never had the same disastrous effect on this agave. Every so often someone comes to the garden and wants one and we are happy to oblige; they are easy to remove and are always in great condition there in the ground. We used to take pups of many of our agaves and put them up in pots for future use, by ourselves or others, but in recent years I have nearly quit taking up pups into pots to hold them in reserve. The plants simply love to grow in the ground and are so much healthier there than in any pot. We have been on a long and difficult journey with our ever-expanding agave collection. Even in a place this large, I can’t find just the right spot for every one of them. What has become clear, however, is that an agave will only tolerate a 1-gallon black plastic pot for about two or three years and then it begins to die. Being agaves, they don’t up and die quickly, but first look sad, then get lousy lower leaves, then turn pale, then you repot them, then they fail to perk up, and finally, when they turn brown or worse, they die. But I have noticed that this progression is not the same in clay pots, and I rarely lose agaves in such pots unless I am careless about watering. So the entire immense collection is being moved into clay—if only we could ever get to the end of it all, they would be so happy. Now, when we consider that the Agave guiengola, or any of the others, is getting too crowded, we look for a home in our garden, or some else’s, for the excess, and have tried hard to resist the urge to just put that little extra plant in a pot, unless a good clay one is at hand. The experiments with various Kalanchoe species in the bed under the African sumac have been some of the most rewarding in this area of the garden. In the early days, we had a few in pots, especially the lovely Kalanchoe synsepetala, naively assuming they preferred pots to being in the ground. But some of those potted plants succumbed to the summer heat as do so many members of the Crassula family here in the low desert. I had watched various species of Aeonium at the Desert Botanical Garden sink into near oblivion every summer, and my own large jade plant (Crassula argentea) had literally melted before my eyes the first summer I grew it here. I began to wonder if there might be some members of this family, however, that could take our conditions and over the years have kept alert for those that not only looked great in the cool season—which was no trick—but withstood the summer as well. The hunt continues to this day, with some startling and exciting results.

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The first success, unsurprisingly, was with Dudleya saxosa subsp. collomae, which is native to the Mohave desert of southern California as well as parts of western Arizona. I collected seed of this plant in western Maricopa County and grew it successfully for many years, offering it for sale at the Desert Botanical Garden. It is the most reliable dudleya I know for this area; my own has been living beside the toolshed in deep shade for over ten years. It is only watered when we think of it and clearly prefers it that way. I have seen it grow in much more sun, but I love it where it is. Since it blooms extravagantly each year without fail, why bother to move it? The flowers are held on upright, succulent stalks and range from yellow to apricot with almost any combination or shade possible. My own are more yellow than orange, but I have seen them on every point of the spectrum. It is a stunning sight as you leave the garden by the back gate, usually to take out the trash, to see this cheerful little bouquet hovering by the shed, out of the way and out of mind, making its own way so successfully without any more intervention on our part than to have put it there in the first place. I have tried any number of other species of Dudleya, as well as forms from southern California and Baja, and while some of them live for a while, they never have the sturdy resilience of this one for me. Another of the great successes, mother of thousands (Kalanchoe daigremontiana), came to me from one of my volunteers while working at the Desert Botanical Garden. She had grown it for years in her garden in Buckeye, a city west of Phoenix, and while I had always thought it incredibly cold tender, her experience proved me, and my references, wrong. It is possible this one is a hybrid, with K. tubiflora, but it is a vigorous, almost delirious, member of the succulent beds under the African sumac. Kalanchoes as a general rule are ludicrously easy to grow and propagate; in fact they can be a bit too generous with propagules. Unlike most plants, kalanchoes have meristematic tissue along the edges of their leaves and the result is that, in many species, small plantlets form on the edge of the leaf in great numbers. This makes an arresting display—it is so unusual and so unlike most other plants—but it is wise to remember that every single one of those darling little plantlets have nearly invisible roots, and the second they hit soil, they will begin to grow. It is undoubtedly the source of the weird common name, mother of thousands (or millions) given to many members of the genus. As I began to grow this kalanchoe and the dudleya for sale, other volunteers began to bring in species with which they had success. Kalanchoe

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orgyalis, native to Madagascar, showed up with its big, rough, brown leaves. The South African species, K. beharensis, came along after I saw a plant growing in the ground at a friend’s nursery where it was almost a tree, replete with its long, thick, felty celadon green leaves splotched with odd knobs and cones on the back. There have been others, including the irrepressible K. tubiflora with its small, green and maroon dotted leaves, with each side rolled over so that it does indeed look like a tube, as well as a pale green, big-leaved, sturdy plant of uncertain parentage that has meandered around at the foot of the stairs for years. Kalanchoes flower in the cool season in our garden, beginning any time after Christmas and continuing through the end of March. They live as a low rosette, until the late fall when growth resumes. Sometime around Christmas the flowering stalks begin to form, sending up large, winding stalks that carry thin versions of their principle leaves. These blooming stalks are up to 4 feet tall, forming at the top of the stalk a much-branched inflorescence that holds numerous, tubular, draping pink flowers. The entire thing looks like a Victorian sleeping cap on the tip of the pale stalk. When seated on the patio, you cannot tell where these large, flowering heads come from—they appear to float over the bed out of nowhere. From another angle, they look like a forest of pink-topped trees. Either way the flowers are outstanding in the area, and take the same level of care that it takes to have dust in the house. Put them out, leave them alone, shoot them some water from time to time, provide good shade, and wait for the happy results. The smaller green one has the same easy habits, but it has wide, green leaves that are ruffled along the edges, often with some little plants along the leaf edge, and happily keeps its handsome foliage all year long. This one is at the base of the stairs, and its tall thin stalks are full of light pink flowers like lanterns lighting the way to the alley. These two kalanchoe, along with many of the aloes in this bed, make a big color splash around the patio in the time between winter and spring when few other plants we grow are blooming well. The Crassula family is large, almost entirely succulent, and most grow best in the dry but cool conditions of the Mediterranean, South Africa, and coastal California. Many are from high, dry mountainous regions where the ground is rocky and rainfall is unreliable, but where there is either fog or snow for moisture and temperatures are cold. This helps explain why so many are so difficult here in the low desert, but I try never to give up on

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plants. They are outstanding at fooling all my preconceived notions about them, and these modest successes keep me in a state of expectant alert about their varied kin. Consider the aeonium. Here in the desert, most aeoniums are exquisite in the winter, full of leaves, with the stunning symmetry for which they are renowned, but look absolutely horrendous in the summer—reduced to shadows of their former selves, barely hanging on—and unless you are very careful, or very lucky, unlikely to survive to the next winter. At least that was my impression until I met the one I currently have. This lovely aeonium of uncertain origin was given to me by a woman living on the slopes of Camelback Mountain who once asked me to come over and look at some plants she had that were not thriving. We talked about her problem, I offered some solutions, but what really caught my eye was this plant. It was absolutely everywhere, in the full sun, in the shade, along the paths, in a derelict fountain now turned planter, in the house, around the house, and in most of the pots scattered around her large patio. She couldn’t remember where she got it, didn’t believe she ever knew its name, but most kindly gave me a couple of pieces. I grow them in some shade in a pot and resist the urge to water them more than intermittently in the summer. They are exquisite, with a flat, pale green rosette of leaves that have a tiny fringe along the edge. I am terrified to put them in the ground until there are more of them, but I think I am being too cautious out of sentiment. Hers were vigorous and growing in such a wide array of conditions, I should be brave. The area beneath the African sumac is also home to an array of smaller succulents, a few South African winter flowering bulbs and, along the edge by the stairs, a false agave (Hechtia texensis). Early on we planted another plant in this area, one that has turned into a star in the garden, a glorious Yucca grandiflora. This beauty has also been a lesson on the need to be aware of the ultimate size of your choices. For some of the time that I ran the plant sales at the Desert Botanical Garden, Ron Gass and Greg Starr were raising a truly impressive number of species of yuccas, dasylirions, and nolinas. As is too often true of this type of growing, only two or three dozen of us really wanted or valued those plants at the time, and Greg and Ron were forced to cut back to the ones that people actually bought. But Gary and I sucked up their selections like a vacuum during those years, and one of them was a small Yucca grandiflora. We planted it in front of the African sumac, on the edge of the patio,

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thinking that a yucca would be a fine complement to the agaves and other succulents that we had already set in there. By the time we had realized our spacing error, it was too late to move the yucca and none were available anywhere again. So we left it to grow. At first, as it got bigger and the leaves extended into the patio, we were chagrined. This yucca does not have spines, but the tip of the leaf is sturdy and sharp and the deep green leaves are stiff, so that a fall into it is painful. For a long time, it was impossible to get beneath it to pull out the dead leaves of the dormant Freesia alba, or the flowering stalks of the desert penstemon. Still we waited; it was too valuable to us, too rare in cultivation, and becoming much too lovely to mess with. Now it has turned a corner and has risen tall enough on its sturdy trunk, as these arborescent yuccas will do, to clean out old, dead leaves and other detritus beneath it. It has also shifted just a bit over the years, making it less intrusive than it used to be. It is incredibly stunning, one of the most commanding plants in the entire garden. We are simply overcome by it when we walk onto the patio. In Mexico these fellas can be over 30 feet tall, maybe more, and I have no idea how tall ours will ultimately be here. The one thing I do know is that it is never going anywhere as long as we are the tenders of this garden. I had to learn the same lesson about spacing with the Agave sisalana. I planted it near the wall at the base of the stairs, where its large size and full set of straight, regular leaves created a gorgeous focal point as you headed down the stairs. But it also swallowed up everything that grew in its vicinity. Being sentimental agave nuts, we decided to just wait until it bloomed, when removal would be inevitable and something less enormous could replace it. The bloom was sensational, over 25 feet tall, full of bright yellow flowers and a festival of birds, bats, and insects during its time. But finally, all good things end, and it became time to remove it. Pulling out a large, even dead, agave is not for the faint of heart, but it is good to remember it is dead so you can hack it up at will. I began with hedge pruners and cut the leaves down to size, which meant that I would not have to deal with the daunting terminal spine. Gary wrestled with the main body of the plant, but we seriously underestimated how many pups there were and how big they had grown over the years. We also underestimated how tenacious a half-dead agave’s roots could be. In the end, the remaining hole looked like a bomb had gone off, but it was out of the ground. It took both of us to haul the heart into the alley. You might want to wait until the plant is further down

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death’s path, after the roots have completely died off, when it would be easier to pull it out of the ground. My impatience to get rid of it, and the prominent and visible place it held in the garden, drove us to remove it when it was considerably more work than it needed to be. That agave became so large over the years and so crowded next to the Senegal date palm (Phoenix reclinata) next to it that, while I thought there were two or three pups, we found two or more dozen during the excavation. They were big, many over 3 feet tall and, for reasons that not only are lost in the mists of time but also will never be listened to again, we thought we had to save them all. Honestly, what price love? After it was all over and the blood on our arms and hands was staunched and bandaged, we had learned a few things. First, pay attention to large agaves and put them where their size is useful. Second, when removing large agaves, cut them up into manageable pieces (the only thing we did right in this entire escapade) to make them easier to deal with. Third, throw out any revulsion at how ugly it is and wait until it is well and truly dead before you start on its removal. Fourth, forget about the pups and treat them just like the mother plant, with the possible exception of one or two that are less than 4 inches tall. And finally, when dealing with agaves that pup a lot, figure out whether you want them to form a massive set (sometimes a great idea) or if you want a more solitary or manageable scene. If the latter idea suits your garden better, take out the pups regularly when they are small. It is activities like this that build experience and knowledge about plants, but it comes at a hard price. While I am certain I am a slow learner and hideously sentimental about all the wrong plants in the garden, I have tried ever since to use this experience with the Agave sisalana as a hopeful lesson in the enjoyment and placement of agaves in the garden. The rest of the interior backyard took shape in various ways over the years as we moved through phases of planting frenzy. The terraced beds formed from the remains of the septic work were initially filled with Mediterranean plants: rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis), lavender (Lavandula dentata), conehead thyme (Thymus capitatum), giant mugwort (Artemisia arborescens), and both green santolina (Santolina rosmarinifolia) and its gray-leaved relative, lavender cotton (S. chamaecyparissus). The lavender and the santolinas lasted a number of years but finally succumbed after reaching the limit of their endurance for the fierce heat of the summer in a hot, full-sun bed. The lavender was happy enough with the spot to leave behind a free seedling, just beneath the jacaranda

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(Jacaranda mimosifolia) but we relocated it to the then-emerging herb bed. We had gradually relaxed the entire thematic approach to the bed, and when those three went, the Mediterranean concept was entirely abandoned as a conceit or theme, although we both still call them the Med beds. What has emerged now is a tribute to the ever-shifting interests of two avid plant fanatics and the conditions of the site. These beds, flanking four graceful stairs, face west, and only one side of them has a connection with the feeble irrigation system in the back garden. In addition, we have done next to nothing to amend the soils, leaving them as we found them—rocky and dry. But areas like this are invaluable in my garden; they allow me to test perennials, shrubs, bulbs, and some succulents for their endurance to the heat and aridity of this place. Plants that do well here are plants that will probably grow nearly anywhere in the low desert region. And so it has proved. During one of the two or three renovations of these beds, we planted a pair of tenaza (Havardia pallens) at the bottom of the stairs with the quaint idea that they would form an arch at the base of the stairs, creating a doorway to the lower beds. Tenaza is a smallish tree related to the much more familiar Texas ebony. It has a more open form than Texas ebony and its flowers emit an intoxicating, sweet fragrance throughout the summer. It all sounded so romantic, a fragrant arch gently shading the stairs, but sadly, someone forgot to give the plants the memo, and one of them failed miserably and lasted only about three years. This, of course, was the one with the most intense fragrance, although its surviving partner is a luxurious grower and reliable bloomer. After a bit of cogitation and regret that the arch was never meant to be, Gary dug out the pitiful one, replacing it with arroyo sweetwood (Myrospermum sousanum). It also became clear that the thin bark of tenaza did not easily stand up to the full blast of the western sun, and it began to blister and peel. We quit pruning the remaining tree so that its natural tendency to form low branches would protect the main trunk from the sun. It is always nice to feel that you are doing something good for your plant, and the tenaza has rewarded us for this small effort by growing and flowering summer after summer at the base of the stairs. We also use this as an area to try out various bulbs, particularly those that books tell us want a dry dormancy in the summer. When our neighbors Howard and Marie Gentry moved away, he kindly gave us a set of his prized red squill (Urginea maritima); they went into one of these beds. These are

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remarkable plants, with a bulb that grows to the size of a football or larger, sending up a bouquet of deep green, strappy leaves every November without fail. Bloom, however, is erratic, and ours have only flowered two or three times, but it’s worth the wait. The huge flowering stalks begin before the leaves in the early fall and ultimately hold hundreds of light blue, starshaped flowers. These beds are also the home of the arilbred iris, with their exotic mottled blooms; one of the forms of Ferraria crispa with its ruffled, five-pointed, greenish brown flowers; and the pale orange flowering species of Homeria; as well as the brilliant yellow-flowered Sternbergia lutea. They all thrive in this dry, rarely irrigated bed and become a stunning display during their flowering. Once we put in some saffron crocus (Crocus sativus) in these beds and they seemed to like it just fine, but the manic thrasher loved them even more and destroyed them. Even after we caged them, that bird tried everything to get rid of them, and now only a relic of their former glory remains at the top of the bed. But not everything loved it there. This is the place that, early on, we tried the ill-fated Queen of the Nile (Agapanthus orientalis), figuring out too late that it hated the heat and dry soils of the desert no matter how much water we gave it. This is also where a much-beloved Amaryllis papilio and the lovely Amaryllis belladonna were originally planted. While they both grew abundant leaves, they never flowered until we took pity on them and moved them into a pot in the shade house. An orange-flowered form of Chasmanthe floribunda lived happily for years there and then inexplicably failed to return one year. We are considering bringing it back; it is so beautiful in the spring with its tall sprays of bright orange flowers. Last summer, we went on yet another rampage of renewal in that bed, adding a guajillo (Acacia berlandieri) to the mix so that over time it will provide the bed some relief from the intense sun. It has become much hotter for a longer and longer amount of time over the years, and it seems to me that light shade will give us even more options in our Med beds. One of the last relics of the original Mediterranean planting is the giant mugwort that is planted in front of a large creosote. I cannot think why this plant isn’t used more in the desert—it is exemplary. True to the nature of these beds, it grows in native, unamended rocky soil on whatever water we think it would like. Because it is more or less dormant in the summer, we try not to overdo the summer watering, although one year we almost lost it

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by being a little too lean with water when the temperatures rose to extreme levels and the monsoon was recalcitrant. I bowed down in shame and now make sure it gets watered about once a month when the temperatures are high. It makes a perfect backdrop, and in the cool season when fully leafed out in its feathery, silver leaves, it glows like a gossamer wave. An Agave ‘Sharkskin’ and a tiny A. toumeyana subsp. bella, poke out from the understory. At the bottom of the stairs a Leucophyllum ‘Mountain Cloud’ protects the Aloe hereroensis from the sun. Behind the creosote we set in the surviving stapeliads, another false agave, and an A. shawii. All of them are so happy over there I just love walking by this little bed on the way back from the shade house. Success is so fleeting sometimes, I just have to admire it. There are still holes on the upper edges of these beds, yet without spaces like that where would we be? I am sure they will fill in over time. A stunning Bismarck palm (Bismarckia nobilis), which was payment from a nursery friend for giving a talk, takes center stage in one of the beds, sharing its place with a bell-flowered hesperaloe (Hesperaloe campanulata), whose springtime sprays of pink flowers are so revered by the hummingbirds. The now immense red bird of paradise owns the summer, with its brilliant orange flower display that makes sitting on the porch worthwhile no matter what the weather. On the southern edge of the Med beds is a jacaranda that we inherited with the house and have never had the heart to remove. It has never seemed to fit into our desert garden, but it was not in the way of any other ideas, more or less shaded the western window of the guest room, and bloomed exquisitely in May. None of those seemed to be a good enough reason to get rid of it. It lives on a slight hill in a drier location than you typically find jacaranda, and while it doesn’t seem to mind, it has never been much over 20 feet tall. In the aftermath of the freeze of January ’07 we thought we had lost it entirely. I almost wish we had. Its recovery has been erratic and difficult. At first, we were certain it was gone for good; all the branches were dead high on the tree and even the main trunk looked bad. Slowly a few of the lower limbs began to show signs of life and, because we didn’t have a good candidate for its spot at the moment, we let it be. Probably more to the point, it would have been a huge amount of work to remove it, so we let it go its own way and waited to see what would happen. It is an immense task to take on the removal of any standing tree that is over 10 feet tall, but it does mean I get to use my chain saw, which I find

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exciting. Limbs must be removed and cut to the dimensions preferred by the city workers who haul it away. And finally, you have to deal with the stump and the growth underground. Rarely are stumps an attractive garden feature, and although it may sound lovely to sand and use it as a table or plant presentation piece, that has never worked out for us. Our disinterest in removing the jacaranda also taught us a couple of things about this lovely tree. It is considerably more tolerant of rocky, dry soils and desert-appropriate watering than we would have ever imagined. It has also grown back well from a terrible freeze, although differently than we might prefer, more huge multi-trunked shrub than tree. Down the small wash in the backyard, on the other side of the Med beds, a blue palo verde that came with the place spread its wide, graceful arms over a third of the back garden. It, like most large trees, defined the garden in that area, and we were enamored of that plant from the day we moved in. In the spring it was coated with bright yellow flowers and every bee within flight range was there sucking down the luscious nectar it so generously provided. The tree hummed during that time—you could hear it from the house—and it was exhilarating to see how one great tree could support so many hundreds, even thousands, of minute insects. One day in the summer, after a week of winds and some rain, we were walking through the garden and, as we turned toward the great tree, it seemed that the limbs were terribly low to the ground. This tree had always presented a challenge to the adjacent path. We attempted to prune it only enough to avoid head knocking, but it grew wildly every monsoon season, often with limbs much too close to the ground. At first we thought that was what had happened. But our minds were simply denying what our eyes were seeing; our blue palo verde was down and on the ground. It was a horrific loss, much worse than the Mexican palo verde up the hill. We were in love with that tree pure and simple, and so were the bees and the birds. It had come with the place, and we were pretty sure no one had planted it, although actually we will never know. It was in an absolutely perfect location, and although we had noticed some decline in the previous two years, we had no idea it was at death’s door. Later I learned from the esteemed Warren Jones that this species routinely has a life span of about forty years, at least in a garden situation. That would have been just about right. Our house was built in 1960 and here we were, over forty-five years later, with the remains of our beloved tree.

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You often hear that troubles come in threes, and the loss of that palo verde marked the final chapter in a three-part loss of much-loved plants. The first to go was the exquisite boojum we had brought with us. We planted it the first year in the garden at the edge of the little wash just beyond the limbs of the blue palo verde. But it found that place no good, and within a year or two we began to notice a big black hole forming at the base. Drastic measures were taken but to no avail. We had to remove it and quietly held services for the plant. A year or two later, the large Aloe marlothii decided against life in the garden and simply collapsed in the late summer. We have since found that a lot of the arborescent aloes will do this—just give it up in the late summer. But in those early years, we were devastated and, once again, services were held. But without a doubt, the final loss, the blue palo verde, was the most dramatic, both to our sensibilities and to the garden. Suddenly the entire area was open, cleared, bright, and very hot. Like the Mexican palo verde, it went down in the summer, and the plants underneath it were not happy about the extreme increase in sunlight. Some could be moved and were, but others, like the Agave ovatifolia and a Puya laxa, as well as an exquisite cactus in the genus Harrisia, were too big and had to tough it out. They were not pleased and turned pale, yellow, and generally sulked. But by the next summer all were fine and ready to move on to their new life as full-sun plants. After a time we decided that the loss could be considered an opportunity, as often happens in a garden, and we began to rustle through the plants in the shade house to find a replacement that would suit. We selected the splendid Baja native Lysiloma candida, but the freeze of January ’07 killed it. Next we put in an Acacia caven that had been lurking around for ages in a pot. This South American acacia strongly reminds me of sweet acacia (A. farnesiana), a species that was such a sad choice in the front. So far, it grows well without regular irrigation, although like its predecessor, it taps into the small wash. Plants are wily though, and no sooner had the acacia begun to look well settled in the spot and started to grow steadily than a seedling blue palo verde emerged in almost the exact location of the original and much too close to the acacia. One will have to go, and that is a tough choice, one I have been putting off for a bit too long. I still don’t know what will happen, but it needs to happen soon. Both are growing well, but eventually one will have to go and one will get to stay. It is a solomonic decision, and I can’t say either of us is looking forward to it.

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For some time after the stairs were built, they led to the reestablished vegetable garden that had been so rudely interrupted by the septic work. But later we had a block wall built to enclose the Outback. As a result, the vegetable garden was relocated and the blank space that was left presented us with a quandary. What in the world to do with it? We weren’t entirely sure, but it was such a prominent spot, and fairly large to boot, that we thought something important must be done. We landed on the entirely unoriginal idea of an herb garden. At first we thought of it as squares, in an old and time-honored crossshaped scheme. But when Gary set out to lay out the paths, using brick this time, the area wouldn’t cooperate, and it is now composed of four uneven beds connected by roughly cross-shaped brick paths. This area has been a trial and is still undergoing extensive redoes as I write. We first planted a number of herbs, including the relocated Mexican oregano (Lippia graveolens); moved one of the conehead thymes from a perennial bed; and installed a pair of vetiver (Vetiver zizanioides) that were hanging around in pots to flank the entry into the vegetable garden. In the opposite corner to the vegetable beds we put in a stunning desert cotton (Gossypium thurberi), a bit of garlic chive (Allium tuberosum) from one of the perennial beds, and a couple of artichokes (Cynara scolymus) we grew from seed. We spread seed exuberantly, both herbs and annual flowers, and we set about to enjoy our bountiful new bed. Sadly, it was not to be. Most of the annuals failed in a dry winter; only a few were able to make it through. One of two rosemary died for inexplicable reasons, but the other was alarming as it tried to cross the brick and move to the other side. It all became erratic and spotty, hardly the full, filled-out bed we had in mind. Then the irrigation began to fail. The layout makes the irrigation system a big challenge: lines have to go under the bricks to get to two of the beds, and maintaining pressure makes certain types of systems awkward or difficult. Over time we have tried risers, but the beds are too small for them to be effective. There was water everywhere, and if you turned it down enough to get only the bed, the water came out like a dribble rather than a spray. We tried point emitters but found they did not conform well to the plants we had in mind; in the end we ripped it all out. We then tried soaker hoses, but these seemingly excellent watering tools were a miserable failure after a few years. Here is the thing with this hose style and this place: it works great for two or three years, but then the salts in

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the water begin to collect inside the pipe, cutting down flow and ultimately poisoning the plants. In all drip systems, it is wise to open up the end once a year or so and let water flow out freely to remove accumulated salts. But with the soaker hoses, it became clear (later of course) that the salt crystals became more or less imbedded and interwoven in the very fabric of the pipe. At first we didn’t notice what was happening; we had soakers both here and in the vegetable beds. Seeds began to germinate poorly, small plants would come up and then stop as if a great hand held them back, and some things simply failed to thrive so thoroughly they died a premature death. This decline was slow and subtle, and it took a good while to figure it out. I wonder if we ever would have figured it out if it hadn’t been for a chance meeting with a former colleague from the Desert Botanical Garden in a parking lot. As we swapped gardening tales, it came out that he had noticed much the same thing in his garden but, being a scientist, he had set out to find out why. Soil analysis revealed salt buildup. He then began a program in his garden to soak the entire area toward the end of the summer as if it had received an inch of rain or so. This would send the salts back into solution, moving them far down the soil column and allowing the soil to grow plants well again. We went home and almost immediately ripped out those soaker hoses, noticing that they were stiff, crusted with white (salts), and that water was barely flowing through them. So, in addition to the salts clogging the pipes, and the pitiful amount of water the plants were actually receiving, it was clear that these pipes were serving as a reservoir of the salts, and the water that flowed through was gathering up and concentrating salt as it went. The plants were growing in brine. What a mess. All this mucking around with irrigation meant that almost nothing lived in the brick beds for long, and no matter how elaborate our planting scheme was, when the irrigation failed to measure up, the plants declined. In addition, we found that it was a pretty hot spot, with full sun in the summer added to the reflected heat of the block wall that backs it up. The amount of conversation, revision, and conjuring that has gone into this one small area could probably have built the entire garden. It has been one of our greatest challenges in this garden. But two things changed recently, pointing the way to a new lease on life for this pitiful area. The first change was a final resolution to the irrigation that seems to be the best solution so far. Naturally, as is our tradition, we talked about it for

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a season or so before we came up with a plan of action. In the end we put in a system that still runs off a battery-operated timer at the hose bib (the only good idea we had originally), with variable emitters at points along the line. But this time, instead of trying to anticipate where things would grow and putting in all the emitters at once, we only put in emitters when we plant something. This ludicrously simple idea is working out beautifully and, like the blithering optimists we are, we feel certain that this will be the trick that sends this bed into success. But without a doubt the second change was even better—Art’s spectacular palapas. When it became obvious that some summer shade was needed to improve things, the conversation turned to what kind and how. Somehow I hit on the idea of umbrellas, one in each bed. They would be metal, and I would cover them with something like palm fronds to mimic the palapas found everywhere near water in Mexico. Our friend Art was working with a metal artist at the time, and he came over to see about my idea. Among my many shortcomings is a complete inability to draw; I consider it an achievement to write my name legibly. So Art and his wife Judy, and Gary and I, went out to the area, and I began to wave my arms around. Luckily not only can Art and Judy draw, they can do it to scale, so a little sketch began to emerge. To settle dimensions, we used bamboo poles to find out how high they needed to be, and Art set off to see what he could do. About the same time, Naté and his men were building the wall out front, and I contracted with them to dig the holes for the poles and pour concrete to hold the metal sleeves that Art wanted to set in the uprights. This naturally caused massive disruption in the bed, leaving it once again barren and pitiful, but I felt we were on the way to a great reward nevertheless. Finally, the poles and tops were done. Art had secured some leftover pieces from another job, and he formed the tops from rebar and what I would call baling wire. The pole fits in the sleeve, the top fits on the pole, and voila! An umbrella of metal rises over each bed. They were perfect, but they needed a top. The palm fronds weren’t going to work out so I turned to burlap, which I thought would yield the same casual organic look. I bought a roll, but the long rectangle of burlap had to be cut into gores, then sewn together on the frame with sisal twine. It took two or three weekends to get it all done. This all took place under the big native mesquite by the shade house. I felt like a woman from two or three centuries back, working with the fibers by hand in a crude but effective way.

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The burlap tops looked spectacular, earthy and raw, and fit right in with the orange wall, the brick paths, and the plants that remained. The plants were ecstatic and did better than ever. But it was quickly obvious that the burlap had only a season or two in it. Monsoon winds and the rains that often come with them shredded it to the point where it all eventually resembled a haunted house more than a beach palapa. After their second season, we knew we had to come up with something else, and I couldn’t see my way to doing all that cutting and sewing every year. So we turned to tan shade cloth, which worked fine and looked pathetically boring and odd up there on the splendid palapas. Then Gary had a brainstorm and took three cans of paint in yellow, red, and orange and sprayed each tan shade cloth generously with each color in no pattern at all. It is a tie-dye worthy of our youth, and despite how outrageous it sounds, it is absolutely gorgeous up there on the metal umbrellas against the orange wall. Wow, with the colorful umbrellas and a functional watering system, finally our sweet brick beds are coming to life, holding an array of perennial edible plants—no longer simply restricted to herbs—and we can finally turn our attention to some other part of the garden. Color, particularly on walls or other features of the garden, is often handled a little too delicately it seems to me. Deserts are not subtle places, sunsets are intense, light is almost too bright, rocks are red, black, with tones of lavender and pink threaded through them—so why take such a timid approach to color in a desert garden? One of Gary’s first chores at our then-new house was to relieve it of its mundane gray color, replacing it with a soft pink/brown that is nearly the color of the ground. The neighbors vacillated between horror and interest—although none have followed suit. But the color settles the house into the garden in a way that gray, or white, or beige never would. He continued the effort by painting the hideous gray block wall that surrounded the back garden the same color. When the new block wall around the Outback was built, he repeated the color scheme, but the portion enclosing the new vegetable garden needed a bit more dash. Those walls are yellow with red pilasters and, in the spirit of it all, he painted the concrete block of our raised beds red as well. Then it became obvious, to us at least, that we could not possibly leave the wall at the back of the brick beds plain pink. It was a struggle to come up with a complementary color—my first choice, a rich, deep purple, was terrible—but ultimately we found a bright, deep-toned orange that did the trick and that is the color that remains to this day. That wall can be glimpsed from the back porch, beckoning you down the trail to see

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whatever is just out of sight. The tie-dye umbrellas are even more enticing; you cannot imagine what you are seeing from the porch. It looks like a cloud formed by erratic sunsets, and you’ll just have to go down there to find out. When the main patio was first completed, we stepped out onto it for a superb view of the towering power pole in the alley directly outside the gate. Shielding the patio view from that array of useful but hideous wires, transformers, gray boxes, and a big pole was an early intention, and we chose a South American mesquite species to fix the problem. These are big trees, cousins of our native mesquite that, unlike the native, grow easily to over 50 feet at maturity. That is what we wanted, and that is what we got—over 40 now pushing 50 feet of exquisite mesquite. The one we have is likely Argentine mesquite (Prosopis alba), although most purchased South American mesquites are hybrids, so it is foolish to get too worried about their nomenclature. But this one has the fine, thin leaflets and huge thorns of that species. It grew to these extraordinary dimensions in about ten years, and we quit watering it on purpose after about five. It now towers over that part of the garden like a guardian, entirely obscures the pole and everything behind it, and forms the background for nearly a third of the back garden. It is also more or less upright, with wide spreading branches that the doves and peach-faced lovebirds find irresistible. It is deciduous, providing a delicate rain of leaves that we scoop up and send off to the herb, perennial, and vegetable beds annually. But for all the trouble these leaves may cause, in the summer this tree transforms the area from one of blazing sun to a gentle, almost forested, place. It is one of the darkest parts of the garden in the summer, and over the years we have had to adjust a lot of plantings to account for that. To my astonishment, one of my favorite plants of all time, the winter flowering Baja senna (Senna purpusii) grows happily near its base. After the tree grew so large and the shade became so deep, I worried that this plant from the deserts of Baja would suffer, but it has maintained the same dense dusky green foliage, edged in purple, and tight form of those grown in the full sun. And to my everlasting delight it continues to bloom extravagantly, virtually coating the plant with its bright yellow flowers every winter as well. The Australian native, noble acacia (Acacia notabilis), as well as a variety of agaves, aloes, and manfredas thrive beneath its shade. A now huge, variegated, simple leaf chaste tree (Vitex trifolia), an ever-increasing number of the delicate butterfly lily (Moraea polystachya), the summer flowering

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Habranthus robusta, and a splendid beaked yucca (Yucca rostrata) round out the plantings beneath its boughs. But it is the immense dark green opuntia, whose name is unclear, that commands the area, giving the whole space a wild, jungle feel. A few plants did not care for the deepening shade. The charming Burroughsia fastigiata that made the trip from Santa Barbara on my lap reaches pathetically for the sun, hoping every spring that we will find a sunnier spot for it. The crinum we received from an old friend quit sending up its deep pink flowers altogether once the shade became too much, and I moved it to one of the perennial beds up near the house. This is a common problem in older gardens, especially those with large trees that started out as little fellas in 5-gallon pots. As the tree grows, the shade increases—it is the reverse of the problem presented by the falling over of the Mexican and blue palo verdes. Some plants don’t care, or even do better, while others fade or fail. It is all part of the shifting shape of any long-held garden—these are, after all, living things, making up a living, breathing space we call a garden. As change is inevitable, it is best to absorb change’s whims and dictates. The shifting parade of plants in a garden is not just a mark of life in general; it is what makes our garden more than just a staged photograph, rather a life shared and intertwined with numerous others. Shrubs are an important and long-lived part of any garden; they define the character and style of the garden as well as form its backbone. Yet too often they are treated as a step-child to the power of the trees and the charm of the flowering perennials. I have used numerous shrubs throughout the garden over the years, both for effect, such as at the monsoon patio, or for screening, as around the main patio; and sometimes just to enjoy them. Very few, save the eternal creosote, came with the place, but one of those is still a great favorite. It is a white-flowered oleander. This oleander grows in the area that was initially beyond the wall and beyond most of our attention. It was large already when we arrived, and poked up over the wall behind what became the brick beds. I am positive we have never watered it on purpose, and over the years it has made a good living between the large wash just at its edge and the watering in the brick beds. It is a big round thing, and I am nearly positive it is the old white ‘St. Agnes.’ I have written many times of my admiration and enjoyment of oleander and this one is close to the top of my list. When its pure white flowers rise over the dark orange wall on a summer morning, it soothes my irritation

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at the intense heat. I feel that way about most summer-flowering shrubs that have white flowers, and almost without realizing it, we have packed the garden with a bunch of them. It is probably one of those subliminal things, like loving chocolate or hating watermelon, a preference of which you are hardly aware until you begin to take stock. Beside the brick beds, hiding a small lonesome area that we have never figured out what to do with, is the enormous Chisos rosewood (Vauquelinia corymbosa). A stately plant, it is as much tree as shrub, now over 15 feet tall and almost that big around. It masks the lost area so well, we would probably like it just for that, but in May it overwhelms us with its white flowers. The flowers are minute, but there are incredible numbers of them in a big, rounded head. They aren’t vividly fragrant, although if you get up close you notice a clean, spicy fragrance. But they are pure, clear white and a feast for the bees of the area. In summer, the tree hums with the noise of the bees, busy and intent and so immersed in feeding on the delicious nectar that forms at the base of each tiny flower that you could nearly handle them. In an area beyond the big Argentine mesquite and along the alley wall is another white flowering favorite, a shrub that has entirely stolen out hearts. It was sold to me as Vallesia baileyana, but it might be V. glabra. This plant was offered as part of a program I ran introducing new ornamentals while working at the Desert Botanical Garden. I got the original from the ArizonaSonora Desert Museum, and although I sent out quite a few, I know of only two left from that effort—mine and an equally large one in a garden in Paradise Valley. The deep green leaves of this evergreen shrub make a secure backdrop for any planting, but it is the small clusters of white flowers that capture my interest. It blooms off and on through the summer, undoubtedly in response to good watering. The flowers send out a fragrance that reminds me of jasmine with a tiny note of gardenia—a sweet summer smell that is so reminiscent of the Deep South. It shares space with the purple-flowered Texas mountain laurel and a gray-leaved shrub we first thought was a variety of quail bush (Atriplex lentiformis) but turned out to be a species of Rhagodia. Nearby is the kidneywood (Eysenhardtia orthocarpa), with its cones of white flowers that emit their sweet vanilla note throughout the summer. Across the way, protected by the big mesquite, is the fall-flowering white boneset (Eupatorium havanense), a much too uncommon shrub that sends out a cloud of pure white flowers just when the butterflies are coming around to enjoy it.

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Climbing the small hill to the top of the garden, you are met by the white and intensely fragrant flowers of the bee bush, now intermingled with an equally overwhelming little-leaf cordia (Cordia parviflora). Both bloom prolifically, but the cordia is showier with its clusters of paper thin, white flowers that are guaranteed in the hottest part of the summer. The little-leaf cordia was another relocation; we found it in the front when we moved in and thought we would enjoy it more in the back. It and the bee bush have joined to form a wall behind the main patio, separating the patio from the side path down the small wash, and from the western sun. Continuing up to the porch, our obvious preference for white flowers smacks you in the face once again with the Arabian jasmine (Jasminum sambac) that hugs one of the porch pillars. The sturdy, long branches full of dark green leaves climb the pillar with a bit of judicious assistance, but it is the waxy white flowers that make me swoon with their robust, sweet scent upon opening the door in the warm mornings of early summer. It is right where I hang out clothes, and I never tire of its luscious, exotic aroma. I have heard it said that scent is the most permanent and evocative memory, capable of pulling you back decades into past places or to activities that you thought were long forgotten. I can be sent directly back to my grade school if I smell the cleaner that was used on the floors, and I know that if I ever leave this garden the fragrance of all those white shrubs, the lingering sweet notes of the jasmine and the vallesia, the crisp, vanilla accents of the bee bush and the kidneywood, will bring me right back into this desert garden.

Birds

owing to a lifetime of bird watching, birds always grab my attention. Sometimes it is embarrassing. I might stop in mid-sentence (mine or someone else’s) to snatch a quick look, or turn my head (and my attention) at an unfamiliar sound or flash of wings. Anyone who spends time around birders gets used to it, but others react with an uncomfortable stare, or manage a thin smile and an uneasy glance, trying to reassure themselves that everything is perfectly normal and they are not in the company of a lunatic. Actually, they probably are, but as a rule birders are harmless. Birding offers the thrill of a hunt without the mess. Stalking birds in nature is like a playground dare; you move in carefully to see how close you can get, or how much you can see of the little bits of their lives before they fly off. It is titillating and difficult. But in a garden watching birds is different. There we and the birds live together in close quarters, and like all intimate partnerships we learn to tolerate each other’s foibles and bend to each other’s needs gracefully over time. It is not the thrilling chase, but the careful unveiling of habits and preferences formed by countless small moments spent together. I have found that the birds that come to share our garden with us are even more important to me than the ones I still joyously seek out in the wild to tick off my life list. When I look around it is amazing how many plants we have put in just to offer a food source or a home for various birds, and how many we left where they came up for the sake of the birds. It seems that the birds that live 59

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here all the time, or come to visit on a regular basis, have done as much to define and shape this garden as we have. They have become inseparable from the garden itself, contributing their currency as part of the wealth of a successful garden. During the earliest days of the garden, we decided to plant a pair of red fairydusters (Calliandra californica) directly in front of the two front windows. One window is over the kitchen sink, a place we were guaranteed to spend a lot of time, while the other is next to the dining table and provides a clear view of the dimpled buttes across the street. At the time, red fairyduster was fairly new on the horticulture plate; the oldest one I knew was at the Desert Botanical Garden and was well over ten years old when I got there. It still grows happily to this day near Webster Auditorium in full, unrelieved sun and blooms almost all the time. We were sure it was the perfect plant for our spot, which also has full, unrelieved sun. As an added bonus, we expected those flowers to attract hummingbirds like crazy, and endure, perhaps even thrive, on the minimal watering scheme we established for the front. Rarely do things in a garden work out so perfectly, meeting all your criteria and expectations, but so it has happened with these beloved plants. Even when the plants were small and their bloom was sparse, hummingbirds began to set up ownership of the brilliant red stamen clusters that form the flowers. A male Costa’s hummingbird was one of the first visitors, and one has lived near them ever since. How birds find new plants, or those that have just come into bloom, among all the plants that are within their realm, I cannot imagine. I think of them as little reconnaissance flyers, swirling around the neighborhood, gazing at the lay of the land, watching carefully just in case a bargain hits them in the beak. Once one hummingbird has found your yard, others are not far behind. Some scientists believe that vultures hunt this way; one bird finds the dead critter—whether the finder is a vulture or not appears to be irrelevant—and the others home in on the presence of one, or better yet a crowd, milling around on the ground. Might hummingbirds do something similar as they seek out flowering plants? I suppose they could, but if so they haven’t let on about it. As the red fairydusters grew and their bloom became more prolific and reliable, the number of hummingbirds also increased. Because here these plants are only out of bloom for a brief period in the summer or during an

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especially cold snap in the winter, it is now virtually impossible to look out of either of these windows and fail to see at least one hummingbird. As the years went by, black-chinned hummingbirds became regular residents of the garden. This species arrives in the summer to raise their young, and they quickly find the fairydusters and try to feed on them regularly. The Costa’s hummingbird male, however, does not share well, and these two species fight a lot over the flowers. Neither gives up much ground, and we see them both throughout the summer, continuously dueling over the fairyduster feast. Oddly enough, in all the years I have lived here I have seen an Anna’s hummingbird on these red fairydusters no more than half a dozen times. I say odd, because Anna’s is hands down the most common hummingbird in the low desert where I live, as well as in the neighborhood. Who can ever know what birds are thinking, but this stunning bird with its magenta throat and smacking, kissy song is only seen in our garden in the back, and even then only at odd and erratic times. Yet if you take a walk around the neighborhood, you are rarely out of range of at least one pair, and often more. In our garden, we are much more apt to see young males than either adult females or the exquisite adult male. When adults do venture into the back, they don’t stay long. As a rule, they are enticed by the bloom of the red justicia (Justicia candicans) or the scarlet sage (Salvia coccinea) and seem to swoon over the late winter flowers of the Aloe vaombe. Once sated, the bird preens a bit, keeps careful watch for the cranky Costa’s that often runs their kind off, releases its odd, scolding song, and then whisks out over the lime tree to the neighbor’s blue palo verdes. I often find myself watching hummingbirds from the dining room window, because it is possible to watch them go about their daily business at very close range. They either can’t see me for the glare, or they don’t care. Regardless, I am less than four feet away, close enough to marvel at their tiny feet, curled like a sleeping baby’s fist, as their wings—that beat too fast to see—keep them afloat. Between sips birds often perch on the red fairyduster, and when I am really lucky I get to spy on their bathing ritual. A hummingbird’s wing is specially adapted to their unique flying style; a portion of their wing is extra long compared with other birds. This, combined with a beak that is so long, requires them to take a different approach to the vital business of preening and smoothing their feathers. To begin they lift their tiny feet over the back of their wing and scratch the area of their head where their ears are. This is done with blinding speed; you can’t .

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quite see the foot, but you sure can see the feathers raise and flop around. A quick shake of the head and the feathers are smooth and coifed once again. The long bill is used to attack whatever foreign matter might be found on the underbelly and along the back of the bird. It makes a good tool for smoothing the tail feathers. The tricky part is working on their wings and here I am amazed at their technique. The bird holds one wing out, spreading the feathers as a geisha would a fan, and lets its long bill and tongue caress one tiny feather at a time. Toward the tip of the wing this becomes awkward, but they get through it somehow. There is finally a lot of raising of the body feathers, turning the bird briefly into an erect little pincushion and then, with a shudder, all the feathers fall back into perfect position. Voyeur that I am, I never tire of this Lilliputian toilet. When the garden was young, and we were deciding on the size and shape of the main patio in the back, we planned to rim it with plants that serve as food for hummingbirds. Even though at that point the patio was not much more than a dream and was defined by edges of rope and paved with swept earth, we began to put in plants following this basic idea. On the eastern side under the Mexican palo verde we set out autumn sage (Salvia greggii), red justicia, and the irrepressible scarlet sage. On the western side we used California fuchsia (Epilobium canum) to round out the corner, and a couple of Mexican oregano (Poliomintha maderensis), backed up by some Rodney’s aster (Symphotrichum praealtum), and Mt. Lemmon marigold (Tagetes palmeri) for the rest. It was a good beginning, but the plants were so small and paltry, with only intermittent flowers, that I put up a sugar-water feeder on the back porch. I do not feed birds as a rule, at least not in the traditional meaning of the word, and we kept this feeder for only a year or two until the plants were well established and have never had it back. I like to nurture and encourage birds by planting what they like and trying to provide what they consider irresistible. Having birds in to dine is like any good party; success hinges on having enough variety to tempt all appetites and enough quantity to sate them. Sometimes I yearn for that feeder because of the visits of Mr. O, the name we coined for a male hooded oriole who appears every April in the neighborhood. This species of oriole is not a permanent resident of the Phoenix area. It arrives in the spring and early summer to raise a brood before quickly returning to Mexico. Its spring return is so faithful I could mark the calendar by it. Like all orioles, there is nothing subtle about the plumage—it is basically a flaming orange bird with a long smear of black

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over its head and down its throat. The wings are black and show white flashes when it flies. The female is a dull, indefinite yellow green, and she is a shy thing; we see her much less often around the garden. We have been visited by a male hooded oriole almost since the beginning of this garden, but I cannot imagine it is the same individual. It may be a succession of Mr. O’s coming back time and again, possibly (and most probably) the young who are raised in their lofty nests, returning to the scene of their first memories. Or perhaps it is a new pair, who waited patiently for an opening in the neighborhood and then dashed in to lay a claim when the prior pair died. How would I know? After all, to us they all look just alike. Although I have yet to see their nest, I am certain that it cannot be far away. Hooded orioles are known to prefer to build their woven, pendulous nest in tall trees, and nothing attracts them like California fan palm (Washingtonia filifera). During the past hundred years or so, the extensive ornamental use of this palm throughout the Southwest has contributed to the northward march of this oriole from its historic home in southern Arizona, northern Mexico, and Baja California, into central and northern Arizona as well as northern California. Urbanization and the plants we bring with us to cities have had this effect on lots of species of birds; it just goes to show that for every dip our ecological impact may cause there might be a rise as well. We notice the oriole first by sound. Hooded orioles have a distinct, raspy call note that has been described as a sharp, metallic chip. It sounds like no other bird in the usual array, but very much like other orioles. In April the house is open, and over the years we have become accustomed to this call. One note, sounded as we linger over Saturday morning coffee, or as we putter around in the afternoon, and we are assured that the oriole family is back. Once we hear the call, we drop everything, head out to the patio, and start looking around. First, we check the palo verdes in our neighbor’s yard; if he isn’t there we search around the back side of the African sumac. If that is not successful we carefully stalk the citrus trees at the far east side of the house. Orioles feed on flowers, insects, and nectar and, despite their gaudy plumage, easily disappear in a dense shrub. Wildly shaking leaves and that sharp call are the only clues to a bird’s location. Finally, the oriole braves an open branch or the very tip of one of the mesquites, palo verdes, the African sumac, or the citrus, and proudly begins to sing with gusto. He never stays long, spending just enough time to pick

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up a morning snack before flinging himself off the tree and disappearing into the maze of palm fronds across the street. During the time we had sugar-water feeders up, a friend was sitting with us on the porch in the late afternoon having a beer and gazing at the garden, then so young and vaguely formed, when we heard the tell-tale chip. We alerted our friend to look for an oriole. We told him what it looked like, where it usually flitted around, and that it would stay very briefly. We were all poised for his coming like vestals at the altar. But that afternoon Mr. O was in a particularly ostentatious mood, and he flew directly to the hummingbird feeder hanging less than six feet from our chairs. It was breathtaking. We each froze, hardly daring to breathe lest we frighten this spectacular visitor away. Our friend was mesmerized. He had never looked closely at an oriole, and now this bird was close enough to measure each feather. An oriole on a hummingbird feeder is a marvel of acrobatics, determination, and plain greed. First, he turned upside down, floating around the feeder on flashing black and white wings until he finally managed one small, aerial slurp. That seemed to satisfy him, because he burped a mighty chip and flew away. It lasted only moments, but like most fine things, it wasn’t how long it lasted, but the wonder we felt in seeing it all. Orioles use the same acrobatic skills with plants that do not remain still as they feed. One year the pair of orioles showed up on the hybrid Tecoma ‘Orange Jubilee’ planted beside the front door. This tecoma has an abundance of tubular orange flowers that hang off the ends of its long, arching branches. This arrangement made it tough for the orioles to get a good position to feed, and just as that long-ago male had done with the feeder, this male first began flying in and taking sips from the air. Not content with that approach, the bird, now joined by his mate, selected a branch and held on firmly to the bouncing limb, feeding deliberately as its perch swayed in the breeze. With what I thought was an especially clever move, one of the orioles simply walked along the adjacent wall, feeding on the lowest hanging flowers that were draped along the top of the wall. With an actor’s instinct for a good audience, the orioles put on this one-time feeding display while my in-laws were visiting. Everyone was by turns amused and awed by the birds’ determination to get every drop that tecoma had to offer. We count on this oriole to mark the end of spring and the leading edge of summer. Life is so tenuous, held together by such tiny threads of custom, hope, and imaginary surety, it is easy and comforting to fall into the certainty that the return of the oriole provides. But whether or not he returns next year, and we certainly hope he will, we are contented that he was here

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once, lifting the garden and our spring hopes high above the mesquite on his ebony wings. The choice of a Mexican oregano as part of our hummingbird planting around the patio satisfied both our interest in attracting hummingbirds in to feed and our desire for a change of color. This charming perennial blooms late, in May in our garden and, in marked contrast to the array of reds, corals, and pinks around the patio, blooms in dense sprays of light lavender flowers that fade to white as they age. The late flowering is a happy accident of planting for the birds, because this is the season when there are large numbers of young hummingbirds around, finding their way in the world and learning what makes for a good meal. We have chairs adjacent to this plant, where the spicy aroma of oregano fills the warm spring evening. The stems are floppy, weighted down by the profuse flowering, and fall like spent party wands near the chairs and over the edge of the patio, brushing my back as I sit down. But even with the flowers that close to me, hummingbirds flock to the plant. They are so close that I feel the wind from their wings as a tiny caress on my cheek, and if I remain completely still, I see their small black eyes and watch their magical tongues dart in and out of the purple flower, pulling in the nectar drop by drop. The plantings around this patio have changed time and again over the years. The California fuchsia gave up after about six years and is now replaced by a splendid Sonoran water willow (Justicia sonorae) and a pot of coral-flowering Barleria repens. The red justicia finally exhausted itself after over twelve years of virtually non-stop blooming and was replaced by a vivid scarlet-flowered selection of cherry sage (Salvia microphylla) called ‘Red Storm.’ The Mexican oregano continues to flower, but not as prolifically with the increasing shade of the large plants to the west. The Mt. Lemmon marigold had the same problem, but resented our efforts to move it to another spot. There is no way to get rid of all of the scarlet sage, there are still as many as we will ever want over on the eastern edge of the patio. But the aloes along the edge have grown steadily, and all of this is still enough to keep the hummingbirds bravely feeding right next to my ear. Around the back edge of the patio we planted an array of succulents, chiefly aloes to take advantage of the shade and overhead protection of the African sumac. The coral aloe (Aloe striata) that took three years to get used to the sun now supports entire generations of hummingbirds in the spring. The Aloe vaombe, chosen for its erect stature and reddish leaves in the winter, turns out to be a reliable winter bloomer whose scarlet flowers

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are a banquet for the tiny birds. This aloe also provides a perch of just the proper height and location from which a male Costa’s hummingbird carefully monitors any interlopers into his patch. These plantings have worked out just as planned, giving the patio a generous, often gaudy, colored border with a blizzard of hummingbirds to boot. Their daily comings and goings, family life, and brutal territorial disputes mesh into the story of the garden. Plants they like or use consistently are planted and managed with careful consideration of how the birds will be affected. Countless times I have delayed necessary pruning to keep scarlet sage flowers intact for Costa’s hummingbirds during their winter courting season. I am certain the garden would look more tidy if the old stalks of the aloes were pruned rather than kept in order to provide a perch for hummingbirds and house finches. Countless times, some unruly perennial or wayward shrub has just about gone under the knife, only to be spared while nesting finishes. Our first, and perhaps best, lesson on this point came from the lesser goldfinch and our bee bush. Lesser goldfinch are almost unbearably lovely. The feathers of the tiny males are a clear perfect yellow on the lower half of their body and jet black on the upper half. As is usual in the bird world, females are a dull yellowish green. They have a tiny squeaky call that is more or less the background noise around the back porch all spring long. For a number of years, I had a habit of pruning back the bee bush to keep this unruly and intricately branched shrub tidy and somewhat in place beside the small wash in the back. But one spring I got to the chore later than normal and, with pruners practically in hand, I noticed that the bush was full of lesser goldfinch. As I carefully made my way down the porch to get a better look, I saw that dozens of them were in the bush, each of them pecking and pulling diligently at the base of the old flowering stalks. It did not take long to figure out that they were devouring the seeds, seeds so tiny that they look like dust in my hand but were obviously a sensational treat to them. I slunk back to my end of the porch, put away the pruners, and we have never touched that plant again. You can see the bush, and therefore its congregation of devoted lesser goldfinch from the table on the porch. It is a particular treat to be out there having breakfast, or a tea break, and watch the industrious attentions of those tiny birds to the fruit of that plant. Later we found that they have the same intense interest in the seed of the scarlet sage. So there went another clean-up opportunity, left long undone because the birds made us do it.

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Most of the garden birds belong in our garden even more than we do. The cactus wrens, thrashers, quail, and verdin lived in the desert before we made it into gardens. It is huge comfort to us to have them in the garden; we consider it a compliment. It means that the garden is a good enough reminder of the desert that envelops us that these birds feel at home. When birds live with you as garden roommates, you learn a lot about their daily lives. You find that birds are full of antics, and some might even be playful. It is this pure, untainted joy for life that marks all the comings and goings of the irrepressible cactus wren, endearing them to us and enshrining them as the most revered members of our extended bird family. We used to feed the dogs outside on the porch, thinking that if insects, especially roaches, were attracted to dog food in the laundry room it might present a problem. We soon learned that any possible problem with insects inside was dwarfed by the assault on the dog food outside. First I noticed that the dogs were begging food all the time. This was unusual and caused me to be more observant. I noticed that their food was disappearing rapidly. Finally, I set up surveillance and found the culprit, a prancing, dancing cactus wren that was brazenly making off with every bit of the dogs’ food. During this time there was a male Costa’s hummingbird who took a fancy to sitting on a cable, strung from beam to beam on the porch, that held hanging baskets. The remarkable thing about this tiny visitor was that he sat facing the house, as if the sight of all that growth and flowering food was too much for him and he needed a small respite from so much glory. He and I watched in amazement as the wren raced from the glare of the patio into the cool gloom of the porch, stopped quickly, looked around a bit, then hip-hopped over to the dog dishes. Like a wary pickpocket, and with just as much speed and skill, it popped one little kibble into its mouth and ate it right off. It nipped another, wolfing it down in a flash. This continued, one small morsel at a time, until the entire bowl was empty. All this thievery took place in full view of me and the hummingbird. I relented and moved the dog dishes, but the cactus wren continued to come every day for a month looking for more food. It was during the building of the first cactus wren nest in the back garden that we learned just how maliciously playful and artfully wicked these charming birds can be. There was a cactus wren who learned to play with one of the dogs, in a form of catch-me-if-you-can. It began when Cassia, the Australian cattle dog, then ten months old, noticed that the cactus wren had built a nest only eight feet off the ground

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in the Texas ebony. Texas ebony is a splendid nesting site for these birds; thorny enough to provide the necessary security, large enough to accommodate the four or five nests that seem to be required, and tall enough to assure that the bird will notice any earthbound predator who tries to make it up the tree. The dog stared intently while the bird came and went, in and out of the tree daily. She watched it bring in each scrawny twig, weaving them one by one into the rough ball shape of the nest. She kept a close and careful watch on all of these proceedings. Although two adult birds were involved in bringing in material for the nest, one seemed to be around most of the time, and this one began to take offense at the dog’s determined attention to their nest building. Initially, the bird scolded the dog for its rude staring behavior but generally kept on about the business of building the nest. Cassia began to get more curious, until one day she leapt up toward the nest. We were never sure whether she wanted to grab the nest, nab the bird, or just get a better look, but the bird took great offense, and the scolding got more severe. This silly dance evolved into a ritual that transpired between them every evening for months. It went like this. The bird began the performance by flying into the far side of the garden just before sundown, sitting on the fence scolding and hollering, setting up a great fuss. This alerted the dog that the bird was ready, and no matter where she was or what she was doing, she stopped and tore out to the Texas ebony, responding more quickly to that bird’s signal than any command we ever taught her. Braking from her top-speed flight, Cassia sat down at the base of the tree and waited for the bird’s arrival. Once the bird seemed assured that the dog was in place, it moved steadily toward the tree and the nest, hopping from one bush to another in an oblique entry to the nest. We learned over the years that this is how they always approach the nest, never using a straight, dead-on path. Finally, in the last light of the day, the wren plunged into the nest. This was the signal for which the dog waited. She leapt straight into the air, landed, leapt again, and continued these gymnastics until she had the bird’s full attention. The wren then stuck its head out of the nest and gazed in amusement, pleased that once again it had forced the dog into this ridiculous leaping. They continued this drama for months, each repeating its part with precision and verve; neither changed a single move during the entire run of the play. The next year the bird was back, concerned enough about the leaping dog, perhaps, to build a new nest two feet higher than the last one, but in

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the same tree. They continued the same performance, night after night, but this time the bird was spared the dog breath at the entrance of its bedroom. Perhaps the bird died, perhaps it got bored and moved on to another fun animal, but eventually it quit coming to the nest. But Cassia, being a dog, never gave up, and camped out at the base of the tree for an entire season waiting for the bird to return. For years, when the mood hit her, she would run up to the tree and leap up a few times. Until she died, whenever she heard a cactus wren in the yard, she would stop and listen for a minute. Often she ran from wherever she was to the tree, taking up her position and waiting for the wren to cue up the performance. The dog’s behavior reminded me of one of those terrible little obsessions that highly neurotic people develop, like licking, or arranging cans or something. But in my heart, I saw the dog’s determination as a tribute to the fun they had together and as a wish that some future cactus wren would pick up the call. You do not need to plant much in the way of inducement to have cactus wrens in the garden. They hop and dash around looking for insects in the soil, stray bits of flower or fruit on the limbs of bushes and trees, and filter through any kind of litter looking for suitable items for a nest. Their nests are messy rounded things with a small opening on a protected, shaded side. But if you want them to try building nests, it helps to put in the style of plant they prefer. Chollas, especially the larger ones like cane cholla, chainfruit cholla, or staghorn cholla (Cylindropuntia versicolor) are among their favorite nest sites. However, large thorny bushes or trees can be an equally alluring nest site for cactus wrens. Plants such as graythorn and Texas ebony are apparently just fine because we have had over half a dozen nests built in each of them in the garden. Oddly enough, cactus wrens rarely use palo verdes, mesquites, or other tall trees for their nests; they appear to like a nice 8- to 10-foot bush over such large trees. I have also known cactus wrens to build nests in the frames of shade structures and other similar buildings when the structure is open or strutted and of the right height. They also appear to appreciate a suitable bush or tree that is positioned so that they have a clear shot when coming and going, and plenty of vegetation around to provide the jungle-gym approach to entering that they seem to like. Cactus wren nests are full of the odd detritus that we all leave around— candy wrappers, twine (plastic or otherwise), metal can tabs, shiny pieces of flagging or other construction debris, and loads of fluffy material that looks remarkably like the lint that comes out of a dryer. In fact, I suspect that if I put that lint out on the table, they would scoop it up, but even I

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haven’t gotten quite that depraved—yet. It could be taking recycling just a bit too far—or is it? Despite their catholic tastes in building materials, cactus wrens are very particular about the exact size and location of the nest that will ultimately house their brood. Cactus wrens are notorious for building numerous nests—not just one for the kiddies, but one in which to sleep and rest, and a couple of extras, presumably as decoys. Sites they prefer begin to look like a leftover Christmas tree after a while. But I wouldn’t trade the hours of fascination with these clownish visitors for all the tidy trees in the world. They are the optimists of the garden, never daunted—earnest workers and dedicated parents who know how to have a bit of fun on the side. One spring, we got to watch one of the finest of all family events in our garden birds’ lives—cactus wrens teaching their young to fly. We had not noticed that the youngsters had already left the nest until one evening we were resting on the patio and heard a huge commotion over the fence behind the African sumac. There were six cactus wrens hollering and shrieking at each other nonstop, and we could not at first figure out what was going on. Then one of them, clearly an adult, flew to the mass of trees behind us and landed just to the side of the Texas ebony that held their nest. This bird was calling continuously and finally one of them, obviously a young one, walked out onto the patio. This set up a new level of cacophony from the adult—clearly junior had not done the right thing. The little one stood around calling, looking up, and generally appearing either bewildered or anxious. At last, it launched itself up into the brazilwood. It wasn’t too good at this maneuver yet and began to spin around the branch, hanging on and flapping frantically until it could make itself stay upright. Regardless of the shrieking by its parent, it was not going anywhere and acted like it was glued to that branch, panting and silent, with a wild look in its eyes. Eventually, each of the other three youngsters made it from one side of the patio to the other, with the adults calling, cackling, occasionally nudging (literally) them until all were in the vicinity of the Texas ebony. No one tried again to walk over—clearly the first one had settled that idea—but they each hopped or soared, scrambling awkwardly, never flying more than two or three feet if they could help it. Once in the Texas ebony, the adult took serious charge and began to almost lift them into the nest. They were not hard to convince; I figure they were asleep before the last one got settled in. It had clearly been a hallmark day for them, and we were delighted to be there for it.

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Since then, we have watched as countless adult cactus wrens have tried to indicate, show, cajole, wrestle, and fuss their young into understanding where and how to feed, how to fly from branch to branch, and how to get back to the nest. It is extremely noisy, and you would swear they were all being murdered, but it must be effective—the number of cactus wrens has steadily increased in the garden over the years. My study faces the back garden just at the edge of the lime tree. The window is shaded by the backside of the Jatropha integrimma and just beyond this is a large creosote and beyond that the blue palo verdes that mark the eastern boundary of the place. All this vegetation makes the region just outside my window a haven for birds. During the long clement spring and fall, when I have the windows open, I can hear them out there while I work. Abert’s towhees have a fondness for rooting around on the ground looking for the bugs that find shelter in the cool, dank soil beneath the four o’clocks that are plentiful under my window. Even one bird can sound like a troop of baboons at work, and no matter how many times I have heard them, I always jump up and look to see what monster is foraging out there. Towhees are a lazy gardener’s best friend: they delight in the incomplete raking, the plant that should have been pruned but that you just couldn’t get around to this season, or the wildly overgrown shrub that really should have been brought under better control. They like to hide and forage under cover of the deep detritus that every plant leaves beneath its limbs. They give me good cause to consider that continued raking is just a fool’s errand and much more work than is necessary. Towhees are also a great deal of fun to watch, making them a perfect companion when you need only the tiniest excuse to quit work, sit on the porch, and just stare at the life of the garden. They fly awkwardly but run with elan. Sitting very still you find that they run quickly over exposed areas, stop abruptly in a good spot, and leap upon a pile of leaves that looks promising. They forage in two ways. One resembles a kind of gymnastic stunt, wherein the bird leaps onto an area of leaves, scoots them away from its landing spot with both feet and, as it drops back down, grabs the bug. The whole thing looks like a version of those acrobatic Russian folk dances where dancers squat and leap and fling their legs out but never leave the spot. The other method involves only their bill. Using this technique, the bird inserts its bill under the leaves and flings its head violently back and forth, then side to side, causing leaves to fly around as if caught by a wild

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typhoon. Once again bugs are leapt upon once exposed, or occasionally as they fly up out of the maelstrom. It all makes for great theater. Towhees are settled birds. They mate for life, an endearing but not altogether common bird habit. A mated pair settles into a small, tightly proscribed territory that they defend rigorously and monitor regularly. Our birds use the block wall on the eastern edge of the yard to check for interlopers, to gauge the proximity of the cats, and to move freely when the dogs are out. These are urban birds, and while they can be found along the drainages, washes, and rivers of southern Arizona, they are most common in yards that are full of the dense, low-slung shrubbery that they prefer. Some years ago, I found that the towhees had graced us with a nest. I would never have found it if the bird had not flown out of it, scaring me and her in equal parts. It was about six feet off the ground in the middle of the densest part of the lime tree. It was hard to find even after I knew where it was. One chick came out of that nest, which I understand is typical. I see young every year, but that is the one and only time I ever came upon their nest. The other bird that I hear regularly from my window is the verdin. Their early spring song is a sweet, lilting rhapsody, but most of the time I hear their monotonous, insistent, descending, peep-peep call. I don’t know what they are saying to each other, but someone isn’t listening properly because they have to repeat it hundreds and hundreds of times. When I was a kid, birding in Texas, I remember going on a little pilgrimage to find a verdin that had shown up against all odds. I recall that it was an event—it apparently had no business being there. Birds out of range are always exciting; you cannot help wondering how in the world they got there, particularly if they are alone. Are they brave pioneers or colonizers (probably the case with those early verdin, which are now common in the area) or are they vagabonds who are desperately in need of getting lost, preferring anywhere without others of their kind? Whatever the cause or reason for that long-ago verdin, for many years I continued to think of verdin as something foreign and highly prized. Years spent on the Gulf Coast of Texas and Louisiana, where they are extremely rare, did nothing to change my mind. Then I moved to Arizona, and suddenly verdin are a daily part of my life. It was practically the same as having a whooping crane in the yard at first, and even though I am now accustomed to them, I still marvel as they flit through the garden.

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Verdin are tiny, busy birds. I have never seen one resting on a branch or taking a bath. Even hummingbirds with all their frenetic activity and enormous bursts of energy sit around a good bit, hanging out on old blooming stalks or on a branch, watching, waiting, and sizing up the area. But not verdin. I watch verdin and think of the industrious, or the thrifty, or the Amish. They seem to be birds who do things in an old-fashioned, hand-made sort of way, and all the time they are awake, they are working. Presumably they brood their young, which does require sitting still, but that takes place in the closed football-shaped nest, entirely in private. All bird nests are rather unbelievable; they do after all make the entire thing with what amounts to chopsticks held in their mouth. Imagine having no hands, but a long, mobile pair of sticks in your mouth with which to build your house, or drive your car, not to mention feed yourself and discipline the youngsters. It is mind boggling, but in a verdin I am triply amazed because their bill is only about a quarter of an inch long, and the nest they build is ultimately about eight or more inches wide. Just goes to show what can be done if you only apply a little industry and imagination to it. They are encouraging birds that way. Unlike cactus wrens, who poke around their nests, often gazing out from the opening, a verdin nest always appears abandoned and unused until you walk under it or accidentally get too close and the bird flings itself out of the nest at top speed, like a little brown bullet. The bird is out and gone so quickly that, without experience, you are never sure just what kind of bird it is. One year, a verdin began building a nest in the creosote outside the study window. The male builds the nest, while the female does the testing and approves it for the crucial business of raising the young. He may build more than one before she is satisfied. One thing I learned about living with birds in the garden is that they can grab your attention with something so ordinary to them as nest building, and you can spend a great deal of time watching them do these household chores at the expense of your own. This is, however, one of the greatest delights of a garden; the nearly hypnotic ability it has to make you slow down, consider things about life more carefully, wrangle over difficulties with care and imagination rather than anger and ferocity. Taking in the daily lives of birds is a vital part of the magic—and watching something as small as a verdin build his nest is captivating. The nest begins as a platform and, over the two weeks or so it takes to complete, each new piece is woven in to form the rounded sides. Slowly the

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sides become denser and the top begins to appear until you can no longer see through it and only its bristly, outer shell is in view. While building the nest, the verdin establishes and maintains an opening that will be the only way in and out of the completed nest. To find the right size they do field measurements, with the female hopping in and out of the hole many times, wiggling and nudging from the inside, adjusting all the little bits and pieces of the walls until the entire inside and the hole are verdin approved and perfect. Like cactus wrens, verdin build nests for many purposes. There is one nest in a blue palo verde in the garden that has been in continuous use for years, but as far as we can tell has never been used to raise young. Rejected nests become cozy quarters for the male to roost overnight. Many times, the male has a somewhat smaller nest nearby where he sleeps while his mate is brooding eggs or protecting the young. Later, the nests may house one or even many verdin as safe havens for the night. Verdin in the garden encourage you to keep trying no matter how small you feel next to the task at hand. They are wild for nectar in any form and, although their tiny bill is not built for reaching down a long flower for nectar, this little titan goes in the back way, piercing a hole at the base of flowers or plucking them off entirely. Watching them roust out nectar is a reminder that solutions may come from looking at things from the back end; you might just need some perseverance and old-fashioned verdin sense to get to the resolution. Despite my deep interest in birds, I have to admit there is a destructive side to having birds in your life. They eat things you wish they wouldn’t, they make messes in places that are unsuitable, and they can be annoyingly noisy at all the wrong times. And although I try to be tolerant, the most difficult bird partner in the garden is the curve-billed thrasher. While I find it hard to be angry with them for long, with their bouncy, optimistic step, exuberant voice and general enthusiasm, they are murderous little marauders at heart. They have taught me forbearance—a sadly neglected virtue in most of our lives. The first house we had in Arizona had almost no desert plants in it when we moved in. Early in our time there, we began to consider it a temporary place—useful until we found the place that would become our true desert home and garden. But I had to have a vegetable bed, and so we built an odd triangular bed in one corner of the backyard. I planted squash and was astounded when they not only failed to germinate but appeared to have been excavated. I planted again and watched a little bit more carefully.

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Although I had not seen or heard one anywhere in the neighborhood before I planted the squash, I spied a curve-billed thrasher gleefully yanking each and every one of the barely germinated seeds right out of the ground within days of my replanting. This joyful destruction of seedlings is part of the price you pay for living with thrashers and has continued at our present home. I cannot understand how they find a seed that is still underground with only a tiny radical and a broken shell. Do germinating seeds make a sound perceptible only to thrashers? Do they have a smell that only thrashers can detect? Does the ground quiver ever so slightly or do these birds have delicate seismic readers cleverly encased in their bills to echolocate my seedlings? However they do it, it is amazing, impressive, and very destructive. Thrashers have wreaked the same havoc on a variety of bulbs in the garden as well. One thrasher pranced right up on the porch and destroyed a pot of assorted rare bulbous oxalis only days after I received and planted them. This same bold porch marcher has uprooted cactus, removed agave bulbils as they tried to root, and rained astounding brutality on lithops. Bulbs planted in the ground fare no better. The emerging stand of butterfly iris remained only a spare plant or two for years under the Argentine mesquite because their corms are obviously thrasher candy. Every spring, before I have seen a sign of the tiny shoots, the thrasher comes and flings them out of the ground. Although I am sure that some are eaten, most are just left lying on the ground with a tiny shoot reaching for the sun. One year I replanted the same corm four times until the bulb gave up and disappeared until the following spring. My proud stand of saffron crocus never had a chance. In the fall just as they should have been blooming, I found that the ground around where the bulbs had been planted looked plowed. Wise to the ways of thrashers by this time, I put rocks and other impediments over and around the area. It saved most of the bulbs, but nearly half of them were ravaged by my golden-eyed nemeses. After all this, thrashers have sunk lower than pigeons on the all-time garden bird pest list. I know pigeons are supposed to be awful, and messy, and generally a nuisance, but no pigeon has ever taken such a wrecking ball to my garden. Yet, as with a charming but mischievous teenager, I end up liking thrashers after all. Their loud clarion call note, two notes that to my ear sounds like “wheaty wheat,” is bold, and their energetic style is irresistible. They are absolutely fearless and take no notice of the dogs, very little notice of

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us, and barely even pass the time of day with the cats. Even urban thrashers prefer to nest in cholla and other spiny shrubs and will roam around the neighborhood looking for good ones. Their nest is a huge, untidy mess of sticks, twigs, bits of trash, and old material from prior nests. In our garden they have nested for many years in the graythorn at the end of the patio and in the tall, spiny prickly pear at the eastern edge of the house in the front. Although I have not watched them build this messy home, I have been delighted to notice all the activity inherent in raising their young. The nest, which is revamped and reused year after year, is just above my eye level. One spring as I walked out to the alley, I heard a riot of peeping and trilling coming from the nest. When I looked up, four yellow beaks with a wide eye below each one stood at attention. I had caught these little thrasher babies off guard—they were screaming for their parents to come and feed them, but I wasn’t a parent and, in good baby bird fashion, they froze. I held their gaze for a while but didn’t want to cause undue alarm, so I moved on. When I returned, one of the parents was on the nest and the little youngsters were invisible beneath its chest. A thrasher’s overall attitude is impressive, clearly stating that they own the garden, we are only here on sufferance, and if we behave we will be allowed to stay. The glint in their golden eye harbors mischief and cunning; they are the bird embodiment of the bad boys we all secretly loved when we were too young to know that, while they loudly proclaimed their majesty, they would soon destroy everything they cast their gorgeous eyes upon. Considering their hefty sickle of a bill and their cocksure attitude, it is merciful that thrashers are not larger and do not have talons, for then we would all have to be afraid of them. When I was a child a woodpecker took up residence on the side of our house for a while one spring. The house was wooden, but there was some kind of metal flashing near the roofline and that bird took to it, attacking it with a vigorous and relentless pounding. He was clearly delighted with the sound and repeated it almost endlessly for a time. It was all terrifically noisy and showed that bird to be determined, if not wise. Nothing could induce either of my parents to do anything about it—he was just a harmless, if misguided, woodpecker, and he would tire of it soon. That wacky behavior came to mind when one morning I heard that same kind of metallic pounding. A quick look around confirmed that it was the resident Gila woodpecker, pounding away, madly driving his bill

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into some metal part of our neighbor’s garage. By now my bird lore was more advanced, and I knew that woodpeckers in general set up this sort of relentless sound as part of a mating and territory establishment ritual. The metal, or sometimes timbers, of a house give out such a loud noise that they cannot resist; it is probably the woodpecker equivalent of roaring mufflers and squealing tires. Gila woodpeckers are everyday birds in this garden, as they are throughout the city, and show once again that many birds quickly and readily adjust to our cities and to an urban habitat. But it comes with a price. In the natural desert, there aren’t many good woodpecker trees that offer the requisite height for their solitary, interior nest. Over the millennia, however, Gila woodpeckers have adapted to using the saguaro as a suitable nest site, and the association is benign and harmless to the plant. The birds drill out the nest in the soft, expendable tissue that forms outside the ribs, composed of water storage cells. The plant quietly seals over the damage with layer upon layer of hard tissue. The plant is unfazed and the birds have a cozy, hidden nest surrounded by the water-soaked tissue of the saguaro that cools the interior where the little babies live. The bird behaves itself by cutting only into the water storage tissue between the skin and the ribs, never defiling the precious inner sanctum where the life-giving xylem and phloem of the plant reside. The final result is a container within the plant that has a neck and bulbous base. These are regularly found intact in dead saguaros, and we call them “boots.” The number of woodpeckers and saguaros is in rough balance over the miles and miles of Sonoran desert. But we love to have saguaros around us and, as the numbers of saguaros has increased, so have the number of woodpeckers. This has shifted the ratio of woodpeckers to saguaros, resulting in many saguaros around the city being riddled with holes from repeated use by woodpeckers. Where a saguaro might once have supported a family or two or three over its life, now it may be twice that in some areas. Over the years I have heard of numerous attempts by well-meaning saguaro owners to rid their plants of birds. Some might work but are hideous, like aluminum foil plugs and shrouds of netting. Others are destructive, like moth balls or other products shoved down the holes. So what is a person to do? I say, live with it, and trust your plant. Holes might not be what you want, but it certainly is what the woodpecker wants and needs. And despite the fact that you may think there are far too many holes, healthy saguaros can heal them over and stay healthy.

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Over the time I have lived in this house, Gila woodpeckers have worked their magic twice on the big saguaro in the front. Their first hole got by me completely; I had no idea it was there until I began to hear the babies shrieking each time a parent came by with a snack. I was lucky the second time, however, and watched the excavation of the new hole from beginning to end. It is a marvel of bird engineering. I first saw the head of the woodpecker peering out of the hole—sadly I missed the initial drilling—spitting out black goo with each appearance. This took place over many days—I could not count how many spits it took to get the hole just right. The woodpeckers raised their brood, and I watched carefully one day as the youngsters felt their way out of the womb of the saguaro and into the daylight of the desert spring. They took the journey more or less in one gulp, looking and peering and chirping, until finally launching themselves out, landing awkwardly on the adjacent ocotillo and creosotes. This was the last hole the woodpeckers dug in the saguaro, but starlings and house sparrows and house finches have made themselves at home in those holes every spring since. The situation is not as rosy for saguaros, however, when it comes to the woodpeckers’ larger cousin, the common flicker. These large, noisy woodpeckers also enjoy the delights of urban life and will nest in a wide array of plants, provided they are tall enough. Unfortunately, this array includes saguaros—but these birds don’t have a long history with saguaros and too often pound out a hole that is too near the tender, new tissue at the tip. Or they drill too deeply into the plant, penetrating behind the ribs into the vital tissue that moves nutrients around the plant. All in all, a flicker on a saguaro can be a big problem for the plant, and in many cases nesting flickers have caused serious damage. It is a conundrum, probably with no good solution. Luckily flickers will also take to telephone poles, trees, palms, and almost anything else that is tall enough, and Gila woodpeckers are becoming more and more adept at choosing alternate sites, at least in our neighborhood. Over time, I hope they all find a way to live together congenially. I am deeply fond of both of these woodpeckers and find watching their feeding antics as much fun as watching them nest. Woodpeckers are built to fly and hold on vertically to a branch or pole. Therefore, when they are on the ground they can look absurd. Woodpeckers’ legs are extremely short for their bodies, and they tend to hop around rather than truly walk. Regardless,

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we find them milling around anytime we throw out crumbs from the cracker jar, or when the fruit from the saguaro is on the ground. We also find them poking and prodding in the ground, presumably for insects. But it is when they try for nectar that they become clowns in the garden. Gila woodpeckers are especially fond of the aloe flowers and head straight for the Aloe cryptopoda when its flowers begin to open. The branched stalk of this aloe is three or four feet tall and the shiny red flowers are up to two inches long. This is not very large when compared to the size of the bird, but someone forgot to tell the woodpecker. The bird first tries to land on the stalk. As its weight bends the stalk, it hangs on to it, floating and bouncing, refusing to give it up. Undaunted, the woodpecker keeps jabbing at the flowers, like a toddler with a fork, stabbing randomly, hoping for success by perseverance. By this time upside down, or over on its side, or practically on the ground, the bird reels out its fine tongue and takes a long sip. Aloe nectar must be spectacular to go to so much trouble, and we are delighted by the show. Of all the birds that have visited the garden I was most fond of the Say’s phoebe, who for a number of years came daily to the firebush (Hamelia patens). Firebush finishes off its long and remarkable hot weather blooming season with small, round, black berries. It is a prolific and continuous bloomer, so there is a lot of fruit. When the Say’s phoebe first showed up, I couldn’t figure out what it was. The quick flash of wing and tail visible from the living room was gone by the time I got onto the porch. I kept watch, struggling to get a good look. Then one day the bird flew directly onto the back of one of the patio chairs, letting its tail rise and fall in that lazy tail display typical of the tribe, and I knew who my visitor was. I was delighted; the old bird counter in me noted that this was the first Say’s phoebe we had seen in our yard. It came every day, feeding steadily on the fruit. It remained in the garden until there was no more fruit and continued to come each fall for three or four years. I began to think of it as a marker bird—the cool weather was here to stay when it arrived, and it would be nearly winter when it left. Once familiar with its habits, I could watch and enjoy it for long stretches. The bird did not mind me as long as I was still and not too noisy. It never seemed to notice the dogs. I discovered that Say’s phoebes have a tiny chip call, barely discernable above the city noises unless your ear is ready for it. I came to understand that the soft pinks and browns of their plumage are just the colors you would want in a good suit, and that they have dark,

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piercing eyes. I’ll never know why that Say’s phoebe finally didn’t return, but it was great while it lasted and I miss that bird still. I do know that if we had not chanced to plant that firebush right by the patio, I would never have enjoyed such a long and luxurious visit. Many birds have come and gone in this garden, passing through on their migration, but I never wanted any of them to stay around as much as I did that Say’s phoebe. Gary and I have a lot of disagreements over the practice of raking. Gary likes to rake and keep most of the garden pretty clear and clean. I have no objection to raking along the paths; in fact I, too, take on this chore with pleasure. But in the front garden, where we grow only tough desert plants and care for them minimally, I would leave every leaf, twig, spent flower, and creosote seed wherever it found a place on the ground. I think the slow accumulation of mulch is good for the plants, that it increases the permeability of the soil, and that over a long, long time it will help hold just a tiny bit more moisture and nutrients for the plants. He counters that if there is too much of it, it moves from soothing naturalistic scene to back-alley trashy. This is a gnarly problem and solutions have eluded us for years. In the front, the current compromise goes like this. Large twigs and sticks are swept up and removed to either the dump or the compost pile depending on their size. Winter weeds, particularly dead grasses, are cut down and the remains are thrown into tree wells and raised beds. I watch out that the rake does not invade the underside of the creosotes. I love the piles of seeds, leaves, and vegetable debris that collects under there. But one of the best benefits, which I point out with what I’m sure is annoying regularity, is that the Gambel’s quail also love all this clutter. Gary reluctantly acquiesces to these raking restrictions solely in favor of his beloved quail. Gambel’s quail come into the yard quietly and with great caution. One male begins the parade, chest out, walking in a straight line, presumably looking around but you can’t see their eyes well, so who knows. He talks incessantly in that low quail chortle. He takes a few tentative pecks; gradually the pecks become more constant. Finally, he keeps his head down and feeds steadily. It is the signal that the females and youngsters behind him are free to follow him into the yard. They, too, start out carefully, taking just a peck or two at the ground, tasting, exploring, clearly nervous. Quail speak to each other incessantly while they walk around in loose groups between the creosotes, behind the saguaro, under the ocotillos. But finally, if they have remained undisturbed

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during all the preliminaries, they relax and feed in earnest. Feeding quail rarely raise their heads, but they do not go far from one another, and the interminable quail chatter continues. With the slightest disturbance, the entire group will walk off quickly in a long line—the way we were trained to do in school fire drills. Then the chatter is on a different pitch, higher and more frantic. If there are youngsters in the group, the adults herd them into the middle of the line and, within seconds, the entire group has elegantly faded away. If the disturbance is sudden, they fly off in an explosive burst. But flying quail look silly, and I think they know it, so this undignified exit is reserved only for desperate times. Quail do not share well. They push, persuade, or intimidate other birds away from a feeding area. It isn’t anything as undignified as a fight, more like a bully’s shove, but it firmly establishes their intrinsic right to first peck. I have seen them muscle thrashers, bowl over sparrows, and push cactus wrens out of the way with their quiet persistence. They save the fighting for duels between themselves. Quail belong to a family of birds wherein breeding rights are established by one male who can then go on to mate with a group of females. This right of mating is established by a ritualized fight between males that can be intense and is clearly serious. However, Gambel’s quail and their close cousin, California quail, while maintaining the ritualized male fighting, do establish pairs to mate. The jousting bouts are spectacular to see, although perhaps you have to be a quail to understand the nuances. It all begins with a group of quail, both male and female, arranging themselves into a loose circle. Females hover around the edges looking bored and uninterested, while males gather toward the middle of the group. Male Gambel’s quail, like a lot of their close relatives, have a large, round, black spot of feathers in the center of their chest. During this ritual it serves as a target. Each pair of males first walk a few steps away from each other, then turn like duelists, facing each other dead on. With a quail-style battle cry, each bird flings himself at the other, propelling its chest mark toward the chest mark of the other. They hit each other with astounding speed and enough force to lift each of them off the ground. The two males repeat this until one or the other moves along. Sometimes, young males perform this ritualized feat with each other, probably for practice as there is nothing to be gained. Females select the males they favor; the youngest are rarely in the running.

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I have seen this ritual a number of times since living in Arizona. Once I came upon it as I walked along a path at the Desert Botanical Garden. I stopped quickly only a few feet away, but the birds never noticed me. I was so close I could hear the thud of their chests and the wheeze of their lungs. Not one quail moved or noticed me, and I was less than four feet from the action. It is clearly an absorbing ritual for quail, and I felt privileged to be allowed in. I usually see the quail from the kitchen window or the front door as they parade by. It is like seeing ghosts; they come in so quickly, and are gone so fast, you aren’t sure it happened at all. When they are guarding and escorting their young I cannot help myself; I stop whatever I am doing to watch them pass through. What could be more of an honor than bringing their young into the garden? Quail nest on the ground and prefer a place that offers them enough camouflage to entirely hide the brooding female. In the front garden, this is often at the base of one of the huge purple prickly pears. In the back garden, however, it can be a pile of pots, an overturned forgotten wheelbarrow, the bottom of a large tomato plant, or to my great annoyance, a pot with enough overhanging foliage to hide the female until she erupts like a bomb when I get too close or try to water. Pots that hold a clutch of quail eggs and their mother are a problem. I feel torn: water the plant and soak the female and her eggs, or don’t water the plant and watch it languish. Some watering doesn’t seem to faze her or the eggs, and since it is all going on in the spring, we can usually manage some kind of compromise. What is harder is to get used to the explosion of bird that is inevitable if I get too close. It scares me every time, even though I know just where she is. Quail young are precocious; they are ready to feed and run only hours after hatching. At first, they are so tiny they look like whispers of fluff held up by threads. Coming up on a group unexpectedly, the ground appears to suddenly rise up and take off as they scurry frantically wherever their parents direct them. They are astonishingly fast and clearly no one wants to be left behind. As the parents bring them in to feed, the male finds a spot that gives him a wide view. Sometimes I see him on the front wall, sometimes on a rock, but always he is up high enough to see around the area. This behavior is so recognizable, a single male atop the wall or rock, that I begin to look around for the family group right away as soon as I notice him. They are never far away.

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The female stays with the young, and the two adults chirp and talk back and forth the entire time. The little ones are only interested in feeding; they rummage and scratch avidly as they slowly make their way from one side of the garden to the other. Leaving the group is discouraged, and the female will chirp sharply to any that wander. If the pack moves on and one is left behind, there is a lot of squawking and talking about it, but neither adult goes to round up the stray. It is obviously expected to keep up. If the family is startled or feels cornered in any way, even the tiniest of quail will attempt to fly. I have seen tiny downy youngsters leap up and over the 6-foot wall if I came out the back door when they did not notice, or if the dogs got too close to a resting group. Within a week the ranks are thinned by coyotes, hawks, and snakes. Quickly the little birds begin to form feathers and look more like young quail than dustballs on legs. We keep a running count, and their losses are extraordinary. Clutches start with a dozen or more youngsters, and by the time they are half grown their numbers are reduced by at least half. By the time they look like small, pale versions of their parents there are rarely more than four. At that stage, we call them teenagers and they have many of the same attributes—pushy, recalcitrant, disobedient, fearless, and foolish. The final few (usually two) that make it to young adulthood remain as a family unit with their parents until the following spring, feeding, growing, and learning how to take their place in the life of quail. Red-winged blackbirds are common in our neighborhood in the winter, and I wait for the sound to mark the true beginning of the cool season. I think our neighbor’s feeders down the street are the equivalent of the fields and meadows on which these blackbirds would normally spend their winter feeding season. Although I think of them as pond birds, hanging daintily from grass stems and wafting in large flocks over golden, riparian sunsets, they are now common every winter in our garden and our neighborhood. On the Texas and Louisiana coasts, red-winged blackbirds sound like a bad door hinge on an old barn. Their calls are too high-pitched to be pleasant, and the odd gurgles and buzzes that punctuate their songs are loud, persistent, and generally fussy. Here in the desert, I find their voice a little softer, and although every crystalline, fluting note is still wrapped up with buzzes, gurgles, pops, and cracks, it all sounds more like a song and less like a terrible accident. When the small flock gathers in the African sumac or in the highest branches of the Argentine mesquite, or fills up the native mesquites in the Outback, I have to stop everything and come out onto the porch to listen.

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It reminds me of coming upon a great choir at rehearsal; if you are lucky enough to be passing by you cannot resist dropping in to hear what they are singing. A mere dozen birds sounds like hundreds, and every note resonates in the clear, cool air of late winter. Such community song fests are common any time of the day, but seem to get especially loud and glorious in the hour or so before sunset. I have tried to find out what they are doing, but it appears that are just gathered up to sing, and I am thrilled to just sit and listen in the waning light of day. Probably we sell them short. Birds might just as easily have activities that are pleasant, done merely for the sociability of it all, or to release creative impulses even they do not understand. This singing sounds like that to me. It is exuberant, it doesn’t seem to have a steady, identifiable purpose—it sounds like an entire village woke up and decided to sing an opera. I remember the awful days following the attacks of September 11, 2001. Planes were forbidden to fly and the skies were bare. We live near enough to Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport to see and hear planes fairly regularly. But in those days, it was as if the silence shouted that something was terribly amiss. I believe that is what it would feel like without the birds of the garden—not just quiet but scary and ominous; not just something missing, but something terribly amiss. Birds tilt my world toward the lovely, the adventurous, the delightful, and the bountiful. Some perform real work in the garden, pollinating plants or eating insect pests. Others simply use what they find, whether it is a suitable nesting site, a floral cafeteria, or a nice bathing spot. Some pass through quickly, others linger for days, or weeks, or their entire life. Yet despite the frustrations of pecked fruit and ruined plantings, the weariness of shooing them from bad nest sites, and the cleaning up of their assorted messes, I cannot imagine my garden or my life without them.

The Front

there are a number of reasons to love our neighborhood, but one of the most obvious is the way the front yards meet the street. There are no sidewalks and there are no streetlights, save the small ones that mark each home’s entry walk. The streets are not straight, but wander and slide, up and down, from wash to wash, side to side, from one curve to another. These features make it all informal, accessible, as if one front yard sways gently into the next. Houses sit at varying distances from the street, and ours has a generous dose of garden in the front as well as the back. From the beginning we employed two general principles to guide our planting in the front: use only North American desert species, and have no overall irrigation system. This scheme has provided us with a splendid testing ground for discovering which of the wide array of species available to us could take whatever the weather had to offer. It is just shy of an LD-50 experiment (those lab tests where at least 50 percent of the population dies from the lethal dose) but it has taught us a great deal about how little care and water some species need to thrive. Learning how often to provide supplemental water for this large and most public part of the garden is a continuing process. We know that not having an irrigation system doesn’t mean no water at all, but I have to say that this crowd does grow on a scanty and erratic watering schedule. In the summer, or when spring turns hot too fast, or during those years when the winter has been exceptionally dry, I water by hand around the garden about once a month. In the early days I used an oscillator at night 87

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to cover a lot of ground for the monthly soak. But I quickly tired of its cantankerous nature and moved on to a metal spray head that fits on the hose with a sturdy metal spike to hold it in the ground. In tight spots I also rely on the clever noodlehead sprayer. We are firm in our conviction that any watering that involves sprays or sprinklers shooting water into the air must be done after dark, or at least after the sun quits shining on the plants. In cool weather, watering in the front is a matter of judgment; good rains might mean no watering for a long time, months perhaps, or watering only those that appear to need it. We have found that this approach works well for our front garden choices, and the variety of plants that have thrived on this stark regimen is astounding. Naturally we expected that cactus out in the front would be fine with the plan and that a wide variety would grow there. For the most part that has indeed been the case. But cacti are not all the same; some definitely prefer shade in our area, and a few demand much more water than this scheme permits. But it is impossible to consider a garden based on North American desert plants without them, and we have found them to be a vital part of the garden. The house came with three golden barrel cactus scattered around in various places. We lifted them all and relocated them under one of the creosotes in the front. In time we acquired two more, and they joined up with the group under the creosote. All five golden barrel cacti have grown admirably over the years and now form what looks like a family group, sheltered by that creosote. The two largest are the size of beach balls, while the others range from the size of a basketball down to a soccer ball. There is no telling how big they might get. There are old ones at the Desert Botanical Garden that can hide a small child. But they are clearly happy, and we hope they continue to find this a congenial home as long as we are all here together. Many years after we set these golden barrel cacti in place, we built a small wall to define a front patio and, ultimately, rearranged the front walk. By sheer accident these golden barrel cacti are now perfectly lined up with the front door and framed by the cut in the wall. It is an exquisite sight when we step onto the front porch to greet guests, walk to the mailbox, or enjoy the front garden. This small scene stops you right in your tracks, and I can’t help but smile at the symmetry and balance those cacti provide. It just goes to show that good accidents are just as worthwhile as good ideas where garden design is concerned.

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The sole saguaro growing in the front when we arrived has fared well. It was an 8-foot spear, off to the west side of the walkway, when we got here. To our eternal delight, even this moderate watering regime has allowed it to grow wonderfully. I often wonder if it was planted by some long-ago resident of the house, or if it was carefully left in place when the neighborhood was developed and the house was built. Clearly, when the house was built some care was taken not to destroy every living thing, because there are innumerable creosote, a few mesquites, and some palo verdes that have all the hallmarks of growing naturally. I want to believe that it was a true native of the spot, and since I will never know for certain, I have just declared it so. In January 2002, eleven years after we arrived, I noticed that this saguaro appeared to have sprung a shaggy baseball high on one side; it was in fact the beginning of its first arm. It was a thrill to watch closely, daily if we cared to, the progression that transforms these mighty icons of the Sonoran desert from their immature, solitary, upright state to the characteristic profile with arms. It has five arms as I write; the oldest is about 3 feet long, with the entire plant somewhere north of 20 feet tall. It stands as a symbol of how congenial an urban garden can be to the desert plants that learned to live here first. It is also the greatest offering we have for all the birds of the front garden. The blooming of a saguaro is a poignant event for us and the garden. Although the flowers are gorgeous, big and white, surrounding the crown of the plant like an Easter chapeau, they bloom late. They signal that spring is gone and summer is underway. Like many white flowers, they open at night and, in the case of saguaros, for only one night. Bats feast on them, but we mainly see the bees and other insects that crowd around the flowers early in the day, sucking out all the nectar they can. Later, when the fruit ripens, birds jam the upper regions of the saguaro. Early in the morning during this time, when I go to get the paper, there are at least one or two white-winged doves feeding on the fruit. By the end of the day, almost all the birds of the garden—thrashers, wrens, finches, and woodpeckers—have visited and sampled the sweet fruit. Fruit that falls is jumped on by the quail, and since it is often gone the next day, I know that the underground rodents have been at work on it also. A dozen or more years ago, a woman I knew at the time was building a house out in north Scottsdale. While the development was desert oriented, any house is going to destroy whatever is within its footprint, and she invited us to accompany her there to evaluate what was in the way and to assist her

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in removing anything she wanted to keep. For our efforts she offered us two tiny saguaros, each small enough to be cupped in my palm. I planted one on the east side of the front beneath a brittlebush and the other on the opposite side of the front beneath a creosote. Gary shot them extra water from time to time when they were small, but for the most part they had to handle things on their own. I have read many times that saguaros in the wild grow only an inch or so a year when they are young. I have no idea how accurate that measure is, but these two surpassed it magnificently even on our regimen of benign neglect. Like most desert plants, while they are built for the rigors of living in a dry, even parched, land, when they get even a minute increase in water they grow quickly. Their success is gratifying as well as exciting. Both of them are now nearly 3 feet tall, hefty and good looking. The one under the creosote is having a battle with some of the branches, and I am strongly inclined to prune them away to give it some room. Of course, it could make its own way through the tangle, and would if I weren’t here, but it just seems like it could use the help. The other has already outlived its brittlebush nursery and faces the rising sun all on its own. The front also came with two huge, sprawling purple prickly pear cactus. They were gorgeous for years, with their incredible combination of gray pads fading to purple along the edge and bouquets of clear yellow flowers in the spring. But in the last few years they have begun to decline. This is a common happening with old prickly pear. As the base gets woodier and dies off, various forms of insect life take hold and the entire plant begins to collapse, falling farther and farther away from the center. As this collapse increases, it resembles a prickly meteor scar, with an ugly, desiccated center and a rim of healthy pads. There is only one remedy—to yank out the entire mess and replant a few of the large, healthy pads. You can put these vigorous pads directly in the ground again if you like, or take them away to a sand bed or pot of sand and root them before replanting. We haven’t started this chore yet, because it is a big job and there hasn’t been much time, but it is the only thing that will improve the look of these poor old cacti. One of their progeny was set out many years ago from a section that fell off. It looks terrific on the caliche ledge at the eastern edge of the front garden, so we won’t be without their stunning beauty for long. We also counted ourselves lucky to have a sturdy anchor near the street, provided by a splendid cane cholla and, closer to the house and driveway,

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a couple of large pencil cholla. I fell in love with cholla early in my desert life even though, on my first hike in the South Mountains, I sat on one. A savvy companion had a comb handy, which I gamely applied to remove my attacker. But later, as I hiked through an entire forest of jumping cholla (Cylindropuntia fulgida) along the Salt River and the Superstition Mountains and marveled at the cascade of teddy bear cholla (Cylindropuntia bigelovii) falling over the desolate hills west of town, I became mesmerized by these erratically branched cacti. They look more like shrubs than most cacti and I consistently recommend them to new desert gardeners as tough shrub equivalents. Chollas can litter the ground with their progeny and are the veritable Johnny Appleseed of cacti. Their detachable pads, which will each make a new plant if the rains are kind to them, are often so thick in these cholla forests that walking is an obstacle course between the plants and the litter. It was no surprise, then, that I was thrilled to find these two already well established in the garden. Cane cholla has the happy habit of holding its bright yellow fruit in long hanging clusters, with each year’s supply growing directly from the previous year’s fruit. The deep, royal purple flowers spring up for a short time in April, but these long yellow and green fruit clusters make it colorful throughout the year. Pencil cholla looks less formidable than most of its cousins, with thin, celadon to gray-green stems that have important looking spines at wide intervals on the stem. But this plant makes up for its spare spines with an intricate, intertwined branching pattern. It is impossible to put your hand between any two branches and, like most members of its clan, getting close to it will leave you with a gift of a short stem in your hand, shirt, or foot. One of the pencil cholla is situated near what became the low wall in the front, and the builders were understandably careful around its edges. But it had become incredibly large by that time, and a good pruning not only did not hurt it but gave it a lift and encouragement to set an array of beautiful new stems. This cholla has oddly colored flowers—sometimes you think they are yellow or chartreuse—but in another light they are closer to tan with copper undertones. The fruit are small and stick around for a long time, but once they fall they are whisked away in a minute by all the rodents that live outside our sight. One of these rodents, possibly a pack rat, took up residence under the big pencil cholla by the wall for many years. We would find wrappers,

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leaves, fruit, pieces of fur, odds and ends of what looked like yarn or string, and all kinds of other messy things just outside and around the pile of dirt at the base of the plant. We never fooled with it and, after countless tries, gave up our attempts to see the little critter itself. It eventually gave up the place—perhaps a coyote got it, maybe it died of old age and no one wanted the old place—who will ever know? But I still snatch a look now and again under that cholla, just in case another one of these secretive animals has chosen our garden for his home. Soon after we moved in, we decided that a teddy bear cholla would look great along the caliche ledge on the east end of the front. We bought a couple, putting one there and the other over on the west end of the front, tucked between some creosote. Both have thrived with practically no intervention from us. Once in a while, we are moved to clean up in the front, removing old limbs, dead plants, and all the general detritus that seems to accumulate in any large garden. However, I strongly resist Gary’s effort to rake up the emerging colonies of detached pads around each of these chollas. I find it charming that they leave a trail of themselves running down the ledge or around their base, as if insisting on the kind of permanence we only fantasize about. It seems the least we can do is to leave them alone, considering what a stunning contribution they have made to the front with virtually no help from us at all. Cactus wrens that nest in the back prefer the Texas ebony as their nest site. But the birds that nest in the front choose only the cane cholla or teddy bear cholla for their nests. Because teddy bear cholla are not terribly large, only about 3 to 4 feet tall and less than half that width, the nest takes up a lot of the cholla. The birds and cholla seemed to have worked it out between them, and they settled in to a comfortable companionship during the nesting season. Over time we noticed that one of our neighbors had a gorgeous cholla with copper flowers—undoubtedly one of the countless color forms of staghorn cholla. We swapped them a piece of our cane cholla for a beginning of this one and planted this neighborly gift along the drive. Now every spring as I careen into the driveway I marvel again at that amazing color. It is a rich, brown-red—so unlike most cholla flowers I have seen. This cholla makes a lot of flowers and if we ever got adventurous enough, or hungry enough, would supply us with a big supply of cholla buds for roasting. But for now, I leave the buds alone so that there are plenty of flowers for me to enjoy. We have planted a number of other cactus around—a Myrtillocactus geometrizans that is well on its way to becoming a great tree some day; a

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nearly invisible Peniocereus marianus (named by our long ago neighbor Howard Gentry) that surprises us every March with its bright white flowers; a big tree-like, pink-flowered prickly pear whose name is lost to me. This beautiful plant, with its fine, white bristles along the pads, is almost too large for its spot, but we love it as the anchor for the east end of the house. It is the clear fan-favorite of a host of nesting birds and is never without some bird’s home in its pads. We also established the striking totem pole cactus (Lophocereus schottii var. monstrosa) halfway down the walk, backed up by a desert prickly pear (Opuntia phaecantha) plus a wide array of small round pincushion cacti in the genera Coryphantha and Mammillaria. Most of the cacti are back notes in the garden until April, when the entire area erupts into a symphony of cactus bloom, one after another after another. The pristine satiny yellow of the bishop’s cap (Astrophytum myriostigma) unites with the gaudy scream of the magenta hedgehog, while the sweet pink-flowered pincushions beckon us to come over for a closer look at their delicate beauty. The flowers of cacti are so unlikely and so brief—we feel lucky to enjoy such a dramatic treat. In a flurry of design mania, Gary decided the front walk needed a barrel cactus accompaniment to bring it into the spirit of the front garden. I agreed it was a great idea as long as they weren’t planted in rows like soldiers, and he readily concurred. These barrels are now about two years old, and while one of them couldn’t take the sun, it was quickly relocated and another placed in its spot. They range from the bright red-spined fire barrel (Ferocactus gracilis) to the more subtle Ferocactus emoryi and the purple-flowered, flatspined F. latispinus. It is our intention and our hope that they will continue to expand, forming a welcoming committee enroute to the front door. The only cactus that has proven to be a trial in the front is the large Indian fig prickly pear (Opuntia ficus-indica). In our ignorance, we imagined that all cacti should be able to take the dry conditions and the minimal care we planned for the front. This is a tropical species that, while immune to all heat, needs considerably more consistent and abundant water than the front garden scheme provides. What did we know? I suppose we should move it someday to a better location, as soon as one presents itself. So when it droops pathetically during long, dry spells it gets a little more water than the rest. It is, after all, a lovely plant with big, orange flowers and is our source for the tender, edible young pads known as nopales or nopalitos in the early spring. Maybe someday a place will show up for it in the back, near where we grow all the rest of the food plants, but for now it tries its best at the end of the drive near the native mesquite.

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There were no agaves in the yard when we moved in, but we already had an emerging collection in pots. They clearly needed a home right away, and over the years agaves, yuccas, and their kin have multiplied in this garden, both in pots and the ground, beyond all imagining. Most have thrived, a few have baffled us with their cantankerous refusal to do well, all have instructed us daily in their preferences, and we have learned a lot from them. I doubt we will ever get them all in the ground; they seem to arrive much more quickly than we plant, but neither of us can resist them and hope they understand that we try our best. The planting of agaves and their relatives in the front garden has been a story of mixed blessings. It is in general a harsh and difficult location for most of them, and we have never even thought of putting any of the manfredas or furcraeas out there. But hesperaloe love it. The giant hesperaloe (Hesperaloe funifera) is one of the stars of the front and is the commander of one entire side of the garden. Its towering late-spring flowering stalks are full of white flowers with tepals that look peeled back. We take out the old stalks infrequently, usually only when they fall over, because they are the only place we ever see ladder-backed woodpeckers in this yard. There must be something especially wonderful about this hesperaloe’s flowering stalks for these woodpeckers. One or two come every year to peck and work away on it, perch on it, fly exuberantly back and forth to it. They leave it entirely alone until the flowering stalk is dry and dead, and then flock to it like Mecca. On the opposite side of the walk is a hybrid between giant hesperaloe and red hesperaloe (Hesperaloe parviflora) given to us years ago by a fine nurseryman here in the Phoenix area. I don’t know whether he made this hybrid on purpose or not, but it is gorgeous, and I have told him so before. It is as large as the giant hesperaloe, with a flowering stalk that is more or less in the style of that species, but the flowers are a deep coral on the outside and pale cream on the inside, more like red hesperaloe. It blooms extravagantly, and while we leave its stalks as perches for hummingbirds, wrens, and verdin, the ladder-backed woodpecker is immune to its charms. We aren’t, and because both of these plants are visible from the new patio, when we sit out there in the late spring we can spy all the action on its tall flowering stalks. Thinking a large agave would enhance the west side of the garden, we put in a fine, gray-leaved clone of Agave weberi that we had in the shade house. It never truly thrived—it never seemed to have enough water and I was unwilling to change the entire watering regimen for it—and ultimately

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it succumbed to the agave snout weevil, or something similar. It was just as well because, after we built the wall and patio, it was also too close to what became a side path to the garage, a gauntlet wherein we were either impaled by the agave or raked by the elephant tree. When the largest rosette collapsed, we knew its time was up, and we removed a couple of pups. One of them we replanted in the front, a little farther south from where the original one stood. This time, however, we were wiser and built a basin around the plant so that providing the extra water that this species clearly needed in the summer would be both easier and more effective. Basins are a long-standing tradition in this area for watering citrus. Their equivalents are found in the few remaining orchards on the east side of town, and I have found that it is the best method for watering a host of different types of plants. All the fruit trees are surrounded by them, but we have also taken up the technique for the agaves in the front; most of the trees and shrubs, at least when they are young; and even the dasylirions and nolinas planted in the Outback have a personal basin. Basins are quick to install, water-thrifty, and permit water to flow right where the plant wants it—at the root system. It is such a simple idea when you consider it. Basins are built up, not dug out, by raking up a bit of soil to form a dike in a complete circle about 4 inches high, more or less at the drip line or edge of the plant. For trees and woody plants, it is important to increase its diameter as the plant grows; in agaves and the like you can pretty much anticipate their ultimate size right away and build it to that dimension initially. There are two ways to provide the water the plants crave when using a basin. The plants don’t care which method you use, so pick the one that you prefer. One way is to fill up the basin quickly with water, right to the top and walk way until it soaks in completely. Lazy gardeners like me love this method. Large plants may need this to be repeated two or three times. The other method is equally clever but requires a bit more vigilance. Here you fill up the basin right to the top and then turn down the hose so that it flows just enough to keep the water level at the top of the basin, but not overtopping it. Eventually water will run over the dam, a sign that the entire root zone is now thoroughly soaked and you can turn off the hose. Simplicity is such a great thing—you have to wonder why we’d ever turn away from it. Along the south face of the house there are raised beds that came with the place—one under the bedroom window and one along the garage wall. The garage wall bed is intensely hot, a fact I did not fully grasp when I

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planted a treasured Agave bracteosa at the end of the bed nearest the house. This plant was given to me long ago by a friend at the Desert Botanical Garden, and came from a set she had collected with Rodney Engard decades ago. She and I do not see each other often, but when we do the first thing we ask is How are your agaves? and Have they bloomed yet? The answer is still They are growing well, but they haven’t bloomed. I look forward to the flowering of this agave with great anticipation, because this is one of the few agaves (perhaps the only one?) to bloom white. I have seen it in bloom in California—the luscious white spike looks like spun cotton candy on top of this unarmed and delicate agave. It is in my dreams for this garden. Over the years the Agave bracteosa grew well and multiplied freely, but as the summer temperatures grew hotter and were too often accompanied by a negligible monsoon season, it began to decline. It took me a while to wake up to this, but finally I did and moved one rosette of this charming, small agave to a shadier place within the walled seating area in the front, tucked behind a small creosote, where it shares space with one of the Agave victoriae-reginae and a foldwing. The remaining ones now live in the shade house. There are, of course, agaves out in the front that need no special care and continue to thrive in the front garden. As you might expect they are chiefly the locals: Agave schottii, with its delicately fragrant, yellow flowers meeting you halfway to the front door; A. delamateri, tucked beneath a creosote; various and sometimes unnamed species from the Tonto Basin, gifts from the dedicated agave botanists at the Desert Botanical Garden; as well as A. deserti, which occurs in some of the driest parts of North America. There was an Agave arizonica out there, but it bloomed out long ago. After we completed the front patio, we installed another one within that area that I hope will be as contented as the first one was. One of the most pleasant surprises is how well the A. macroacantha that lives just outside the front door has thrived. It is nestled into a perfect combination with a large rock, both of which are backed up by a rambling desert ruellia (Ruellia peninsularis). When I worked at the Desert Botanical Garden, I was a shameless promoter of a number of smaller agaves that I think are vastly underused and that can be used in any size garden. I grew what I could out of the collection and sold them relentlessly. This group includes the tidy, gray-leaved Agave pygmae (now considered a form of A. seemaniana), A. bracteosa, and A. macroacantha. I have no idea how much difference my endless cajoling and constant admonishments made, but A. bracteosa is now grown by the

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thousands and shows up everywhere; the other two are still looking for their place in the commercial sun. My own Agave macroacantha in the front came from those I sold out of the collection at the Desert Botanical Garden. It has thin gray-blue leaves that are rimmed with intensely purple, almost black, regularly spaced teeth and a terminal spine. The color contrast is exquisite, and because it is small and sets only a few pups, it makes a perfect little picture next to that big rock. Some years later, at the Huntington Botanical Gardens, I found another form, one whose leaves were greener, a bit thinner, but with the same deeply colored teeth and spine. That form lives in the back near the main patio, but my heart belongs to the gray one out front, resting comfortably next to its rock. It looks more at home than almost any of the other agaves we grow, and I consider it one of the treasures of this garden, despite its modest size. Many years ago, Agave victoriae-reginae was added to the mix of plants nearest the house, and they have been extremely happy with the intense sun and intermittent watering that characterizes this part of the garden. These plants were part of a set of small seedlings that I bought over twenty years ago from a local grower who was giving up on growing agaves at the time. I sold many of those little plants but bought about six or so and planted them around the garden. They are all over the place; I planted them in a wide array of locations, but the ones in the front are the handsomest, with the tight rosette and deep green leaves that is the glory of the species. So far only one has bloomed, but you never can tell with agaves—the rest could wait for decades or they might all decide to give up the ghost next year. There were two ocotillos in the front, one on each side of the walkway, when we moved in. Both looked pitiful, and I suspect they were planted shortly before we moved in. Although the ropes that held them tight were gone, they still had a rigid, bundled look, falling over in the middle as if in the throes of a tummy ache. Each was entirely leafless. As the months went by and there still wasn’t a leaf in sight, much less a change in posture despite additional watering, I went up close to check on them. Just where the thorn emerges from the stem, I saw that there was a tan-colored sheath and beneath that, it was green. I figured that was a good sign that the plant still had some juice left in it; I continued to water and worry over them for the two years it took them to finally grow leaves. I have since learned much more about ocotillos. When ocotillos are dug out of the ground for sale—a much too common practice I am afraid—little to none of the root mass accompanies them. This causes the plant to dry

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out quickly and extensively, and it takes determined effort and a long time for it to recover. This I can guarantee—spraying the tops with water will do nothing to help them along on their recovery even if it makes you feel like you are doing something useful. I am continually amazed at all sorts of folklore that finds its way into our garden lore. Most plants—and ocotillo are plants—take up water, with its dissolved minerals and nutrients, only through their roots. I would repeat this if I thought it would help. There are rare exceptions, but ocotillo are not among them. Therefore, the calming practice of spraying the wands may be soothing to the gardener, may even offer a micron of humidity for a minute or two to whatever leaves may still be on the plant, but it does nothing to help it establish a root system. And without a root system, the plant lives a short, unhappy life and withers where you planted it. Take it from me and many other devotees of the ocotillo: when you plant a bare root plant, give it ample water in a well-drained location for a long, long time—up to two years—to allow it to regrow the root system that was so brutally torn from it before you knew it. It will reward you well, live a long time, and you can rest easy in the knowledge that you saved one of the finest of all desert plants from certain death. Even better is to exercise the patience for which gardeners wish they were renowned, and buy plants that are grown from seed. They are easy to recognize—they are in a container, they are green and hydrated and healthy looking, they have stems of various and odd sizes, and most are less than 4 feet tall in a 5-gallon pot. In Arizona, there are numerous growers who raise ocotillo from seed and offer them for sale. Take advantage of this noble effort and spend your money on these plants, even if they aren’t 12 feet tall. You and the plants will be better for it. Two years ago, one of the ocotillos up and died and we still don’t quite know why. The other one remains sulky, with the sad evidence of its bondage still obvious all these years later. It refuses to allow its canes to spread but holds them closely, as if the rope had been a security blanket it misses. While it leafs out abundantly in a good rain or with a long and deep soaking and blooms vigorously in the spring, I still worry about it. It seems damaged somehow and reminds me of a rescue dog that got off to a miserable start and, although it now lives a good life, can’t forget the scars of its early years. We have tried other ocotillo relatives but most have not enjoyed the front garden. The incredibly gorgeous palo adan (Fouquieria macdougalii) with its shrubby habit and sprays of bright red flowers never took off after being transplanted. Perhaps we did not water it enough in the early days, perhaps

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it simply took against the spot. But I look forward to trying it again; it is too beautiful to give up on after only one try. In a fit of excitement, we recently spiffed up the raised bed by the garage wall. A stunning guayacan (Guaiacum coulteri) has lived there for years, partnered with a Jatropha cordata that has grown tall and impressive. Lots of things have been tried there, and now it is home to one of my favorite ocotillo relatives, Fouquieria fasciculata. In Arizona this extraordinary plant remains a smaller, shrubbier version of the ocotillo, although it can get quite large at home in Baja. Its most remarkable feature to me is that it blooms white, an uncommon trait in this tiny family. It is small now, just out of a 1-gallon pot, but if its relatives are any guide, a minor amount of extra water for a year or two, coupled with careful observance of its summer dormancy, should result in great success. We have now rechristened this plot the Baja bed as our meager tribute to that most extraordinary region. Trees have proven more difficult in the front garden. The place came with three: a sweet acacia, a Texas ebony, and a native mesquite. The sweet acacia never looked happy, and its sad performance in our garden was an early clue about the needs of this species in the low desert. This charming, golden-flowered tree does best in deep soils, none of which are found in our garden, or indeed in most of our neighborhood. Sweet acacia does not seem to have a problem with the heat, and will endure quite a lot of drought in deep soils, but the rocky, dry soils that are the norm in our garden ultimately do them in. We removed it after a few years; it was a mercy killing. The Texas ebony was less than 5 feet tall at the time of our arrival and never seemed to fit in where we found it, growing much too close to the street. After mulling it over a bit, we decided to move it to the back. So one fall morning not long after we moved in, we dug it up and moved it, placing it along a walkway opposite the small wash. It has rewarded us for that favor by growing to over 15 feet tall. Who knows what combination of soil and watering made it so successful, but we had clearly given it a perfect spot in the garden. Texas ebony is one of the few evergreen trees of modest size that does well in this area. It is a handsome choice for a smaller garden or even a patio. In the spring it is smothered with white, powder-puff flowers that are gently fragrant. These are followed by large, curled brown pods. The pods are so sturdy they seem to last forever, whether on the tree or on the ground, and are a fine choice for dried arrangements or other plant-based art. If they were just a little bigger they would make a great serving tray for nuts or other small condiments but, as floral arrangement is not my gift, I just admire them out in the garden.

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Our relocation exercises point out the happy side of one of the hard lessons of living with so many other living things; each of them needs to nestle into a place that is their own version of perfect, and that place may or may not coincide with our own desires. In the case of the Texas ebony, we were both pleased, but such things can go awry just as quickly. It is my job to try to guess what makes that perfect place, occasionally nudging a reluctant place into a more congenial one; or, when there is not a good fit, searching for another; or as a last resort calling it quits. Some call all this searching for a proper fit “gardening in the place,” and some call it “using well-adapted plants.” But I think of it as paying attention to what the plant needs to grow and thrive and be as happy and healthy as it can be, looking for all the world like it is inevitable that it grows in just that one, particular spot. Plants give out a ton of clues about their preferences and needs; the great trick and ultimately the greatest joy of gardening is learning to hear what they are saying. This is why when something dies in the garden, especially after a number of tries, we just give it up. I have a friend who maintains that he knows nothing about a plant until he has killed it three times, and I think much the same is true in our garden. Anything we try that continues to fail, no matter where we put it or how much we want it, will never be happy at our place, and what is the point of trying to force it to be so. It is like plant prison at that point. Much better, and certainly much easier, is to let go and continue to nurture the ones that fit in well, like the Texas ebony, having no fear of moving them around a bit if necessary. This tree isn’t the only creature that is thrilled with its relocation—it is now home to cactus wren nests, numerous dove nests, and once a towhee’s tidy nest. The cactus wrens come year after year, renewing, rebuilding, and setting up over a dozen, new, used, and decrepit nests in its complex and thorny stems. On the other hand, the native mesquite we inherited in the front lives at the edge of the drive, to all appearances content with its location, never growing much despite living on the edge of the wash. I strongly suspect that a firm caliche layer has stopped its root system in some way. It is not much taller than it was when we moved in, around 15 feet or so, but it is healthy and seems vigorous. It makes a good punctuation for that end of the garden, the quail find it a welcome place to watch over the area, and doves roost in it regularly, so I leave it to its own devices. It is amazing how little you can know at first about a new place. I look back on some of my most naive, or most ignorant, mistakes and wonder what I could have been thinking. But the truth is I just didn’t know. In the

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world of gardening you often learn best by messing it up royally—and so it was with the ironwood (Olneya tesota). Over the fence in the backyard, growing in the large wash that separates our house from Lisa, our eastern neighbor, is a huge and extremely handsome ironwood. It is so impressive that we decided to plant another one, on the east side of the house, outside an east-facing bedroom window, to provide some shade. What I failed to notice, although you have to wonder how, was that this entire side of the house is a ledge of pure caliche, rising up like a stone wall from the wash. So while Gary was able to pound out a hole for the plant, and it drained adequately enough to give us encouragement, we did not pay near enough attention to what an ironwood truly requires. Ironwood is a tough desert native to be sure, but if you look carefully you notice that it always grows in the small washes and rivulets of the desert plain. Our spot was on a high, rocky embankment. A good observer would also have noticed that there are deep, often sandy, soils in those washes. Our site was a caliche bucket for all practical purposes, although water did drain out of the hole slowly. For five years, that ironwood sat there and did not grow one single new branch. Neither did it decline, nor otherwise look stressed. For the next few years, thinking that water might be the issue, we began to increase the frequency of its watering. During this time, the valve to which the hose was attached did not close properly, so the hose was always seeping a tiny amount of water. We began to use this as our watering method, in lieu of all others, while it lasted. It took days for the leak to water the palo brea or the ironwood or the saguaro, but it was easier than many of our other methods. In the case of the ironwood it made some difference. Long, slow, deep soaks are what desert trees, especially legumes, favor above all other watering schemes. It also began to dawn on us that we had probably just picked a lousy spot for that ironwood and were going to have to try to make the best of it. By now, over fifteen years and counting, some new branches have emerged and the plant is larger than when we planted it. While one or two branches are over my head, it is much more a shrub than a tree. It will take a century, and significant climate change, before it ever shades anything as tall as the bedroom window. The other bedroom window faces south into the front garden and desperately needed something to cover it up as well. Interior shutters were attractive and helpful, but a tree or large shrub would round out the twin needs

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for privacy and sun protection. At the time this discussion was taking place, a new member of a familiar genus, palo colorado (Caesalpinia platyloba), showed up in horticulture in our area. This lovely relative of red bird of paradise was just the ticket for our spot, and we couldn’t resist trying it out. It grew quickly, and has by now surpassed our most optimistic yearnings for a tree that combines drought and heat tolerance with the privacy and sun protection we require. Like a lot of woody legumes, it favors multiple trunks when young until one, usually in the middle, grows taller than the rest. The short, smooth limbs of palo colorado hold light green leaves, which are broken into a dozen or so large, rounded leaflets. I have read that the wood is highly prized by woodworkers for its durability and beauty. The flowers are yellow with a bright dot of orange at the throat and are held in small clusters. Overall it is less spectacular than most of its kindred, with flowers so small that, from a distance, it can be hard to recognize whether it is in bloom. Nevertheless, palo colorado rises gracefully almost to the pitched eave, covering the window enough to block most of the summer sun, but still open enough to feel you have a view of the front garden. Birds, especially house finches and cactus wrens, find shelter in it during the day, allowing me to spy on them through the window. It is one of those plants that makes a gardener feel undeserving—we put out so little effort for such great reward. We count it as one of our great favorites and big successes. Yet it has given us a number of scares over the years, and greatly tested my inherent wait-and-see, live-and-let-live approach to the insects that enmesh themselves in this, or any, garden. One April, over ten years ago, the leaves abruptly turned pathetic shades of yellow and brown and began to fall off. Close inspection revealed that each was completely coated with small white and yellow dots, some of which moved around. Even closer inspection revealed that these were insects, their small nymphs, and an array of their various droppings. I brought out my trusty hand-held water nozzle, affectionately known as the water commander, and set it at stun. I diligently started to blast these unwelcome newcomers off the tree. While this more or less worked, it only affected the ones I contacted; the reserves higher up, on the backside, or underneath each leaf were simply holding out until I walked off. It became immediately obvious that I was barely making a dent in the horde even with my twice-a-day campaign. Within two weeks the tree lost every one of its leaves. It was a distressing time. What would become of this lovely tree, and what could we find to replace it that worked as well?

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But as we all know, sloth and procrastination yield many happy results, both in life and in the garden. Taking the time to give things a chance to work themselves out before racing out to secure some horrendous poison has worked for us almost every time. Sure enough, within another couple of weeks, the tree had renewed all its leaves, and they remained vigorous and green throughout the entire rest of the year with no further sign of those pesky little insects. I later learned that these pests are psillids, small sucking insects related to and similar in appearance to whiteflies. They are on the move at that time of the year, feeding, hatching, and mating for the next generation. I also learned that palo colorado is a tree from the tropical deciduous forests of Mexico and South America and sheds its leaves routinely during the annual dry season. So the loss of leaves acted as drought would to the tree; it was merely giving up its leaves to the psillids instead of to the drying soil. The psillids, as they will always do, moved on once all the leaves were gone, and the tree promptly resumed a vigorous regrowth. I now try to remember to give this tree a deep watering once the damage is over; it helps give it a boost as it sets out its new leaves. It all worked out fine between me, the psillids, and the palo colorado. It was a huge relief to retain our beautiful tree, and the episode also formed another cog in the learning wheel that makes up the intertwined lives of this garden. Keeping ahead of massive infestations like psillids is nearly impossible. But those little pests confirmed for us that patience, coupled with a healthy plant—especially one equipped with an inherent trait that aids in its recovery—is by far the best pest control strategy. Weather, of course, is quite another matter, yet it offered much the same lesson and another big scare with this same tree. In January of 2007 we had the hardest freeze of our time in this garden, with temperatures for two nights in a row well below freezing, down to a menacing 24 and 26 degrees, respectively. Those nights hit the palo colorado hard; the main stem died and had to be pruned out. We were very anxious and worried about our tree, but once again it was equipped for recovery. Usually, with most woody legumes, there are two or three other stems growing near the base, waiting for the biggest stem to kick off so they can quickly take over. That was the case, and they did, and they have kept up the good work of this lovely tree ever since. Years ago I acquired a potted palo brea that probably should have been thrown out. It was a pitiful thing, with a crooked main stem, far too many small stubby branchlets and, I strongly suspected, girdled roots. It sat around

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for quite some time before we finally took mercy on the poor thing and planted it in the front. We put it outside the same window as the palo colorado, but farther away from the house. The idea was that over the years, as it grew, it would provide even more shade to that window and wall of the house. And should the well-loved palo colorado ever die, this one would be large enough to take over the job. It sat like a statue for two or three years, never looking bad, hardly growing at all. I watered it regularly and deeply during this time, knowing that young trees need ample water to get going and build the root system that will sustain them over their long lives. Our scheme for both shade and the ultimate replacement of the palo colorado looked like a fantasy. Then, after at least three years (possibly more—my notes are hazy) it began to send out some new growth. It was around this time that the brokenvalve watering scheme began, and we put this plant on the rotation. Apparently that was its signal, and it took off, shooting out new branches and other signs of life until finally it bloomed. Palo brea, even one as young as this one, flower extravagantly in April. In this area, palo verdes bloom in a progression, beginning with the pale, buttery color of foothills palo verde, followed by the bright, clear yellow of the blue palo verde, and finishing their floral symphony with the blazing, pulsing yellow of the palo brea. I was relieved that this tree was on its way to a long and happy life. Once the palo brea got the hang of growing, it never looked back. What started out as a weird angled main trunk is now transforming into a gracefully arched central stem that widens every year. One of the most seductive features of this tree is the widely spaced limbs coated with smooth green bark that looks as if it is painted on. It now looks like this poor little straggler, saved from the boneyard, is set to emerge from its confinement and become a truly handsome tree. What were once bizarre stubs of branches have now elongated into wide, welcoming secondary branches that are moving toward the formation of the distinctive canopy of this elegant tree. During all this time of establishment and worry, I refused to prune it; not even a stray branch was removed—and there were plenty of candidates. Now that I am convinced it is firmly established and on its way to a long and happy life, it is time for a bit of pruning to rogue out a few of the less successful branches, those that cross over each other as well as those that cannot resist hanging toward the ground. Both the tree and I are ready to do it. I have always resisted pruning young trees; I am certain that they need all the photosynthetic pop they can get for the first few years. This is especially clear when you see that they are often aggressively pruned in the nursery

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for reasons that make sense on a growing yard, but not in the garden. Why there is such a rush to prune trees is beyond my understanding. They are long lived in the garden and you have more than enough time to fix unruly growth or train them to a desired shape. This palo brea is one of the numerous testaments to the role of patience in the garden and of not giving up on young trees too quickly, or getting itchy fingers to “fix” them too fast. I am certain that without all that mass, no matter how unattractive it was for a while, it would never have had the strength to recover and grow up enough to let me nibble at it now with my saw. This ugly duckling of a palo brea has confirmed all my convictions, as it now transforms into the swan that it was meant to be. One of the other great trees of the front did not have nearly such a difficult time. Outside the front door we planted a tiny palo blanco. This one immediately started out well and has never looked back. It is almost a textbook example of how a tree should grow and form. It confirms one of my other mantras of growing trees, and that is the futility of most staking. This tree was so small when we planted it that the main stem was barely a finger wide, and I could see over the top of the entire tree. Soon after planting it began to droop, and its main stem curled toward the ground. At a certain point, the tip of the tree was only a whisper from the soil. Gary was in favor of staking it, if just for a time. I resisted strongly, certain it would straighten out on it own, if we just gave it some time. And sure enough, a year later it was erect and firm and has never let that main stem go near the ground again. Trees form bark partly in response to stresses, including the daily beating by the wind and the pummeling of sunlight stronger than they prefer. Just as it is said that adversity builds character, tough conditions build bark and a sturdy trunk in a tree. This palo blanco is exquisite testament to that fact. It is now taller than the eave of the house, and the drape of its branches and the phyllodes along them create a sweeping wave, like a royal hand, in the softest of breezes. Phyllodes are petioles (that little stem that runs from the branch to the leaf) that are never shed. They are a common feature of Australian acacias; it is what gives them their appearance of being evergreen. This is the only species of acacia that has made the same adaptation outside of Australia, an adaptation that accounts for its elegant draping form. The actual leaves are tiny, in a pair at the end of the phyllode. They only show up intermittently, when water is abundant. They look like little green commas on the ends of the phyllodes and quickly disappear if the soil becomes too dry, or the weather turns hot.

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The palo blanco has become large enough now to shed bark, as palo blancos do, and we find those little pale shreds all over the front patio. They look like lost notes from a long-ago past—only the writing is invisible and the message no longer knowable. The white stem, the pale shedding bark, and the floating cascade of green, like a mist, gives this tree a delicacy that is entirely at odds with its rugged nature. Its singular beauty seems removed and remote from the harsh conditions of the desert, both here in our garden and in its Baja home. On the opposite side of the patio, just beyond the wall and in front of the raised bed, is another remarkable tree from the Baja peninsula, the elephant tree. But where the palo blanco appears to rise above the desert conditions, elephant tree assumes a head-on, aggressive stance, like a fierce competitor with the weather. It is clearly not going to let the weather win. This tree, related to cashew, also has pale, thin bark that sheds away exposing a light white to tan trunk. But instead of a slim graceful rise, the stem widens as it ages, forming a sturdy, fattened base that over time becomes a great boulder of a trunk. Young branches are short, more or less the same size up the entire main trunk. But again, as it ages, they become large, spreading out in a wide fan of stout, white limbs. The abundant leaves are a dark, intense green, in stark contrast with the whitish stems and trunk. They emerge late, usually not until November, and remain on the plant through the winter. But once the weather begins to shift from the gentle cool season to the rigors of summer, the leaves turn golden yellow and the tree becomes a fiery beacon on the western edge of the front patio, backlit by the waning light of spring sunsets. This autumnal color in reverse is one of the many glories of this remarkable plant. Out by the driveway we have tried a number of different trees in one particular hole. The one we really wanted was a twisted acacia (Acacia schaffneri) but it rebelled against the spot, never thrived, and finally a rabbit caused so much damage we got rid of it. We then tried another acacia, the charming black brush (Acacia rigidula) of South Texas. Once again the rabbits found it delectable, and even after we installed a shroud of chicken wire, it died. We have now declared this spot a death zone, although there is a seedling native mesquite in the middle of the still-standing chicken wire. Good luck to it. Don Fultz was a dedicated amateur grower whom I knew well during my time at the Desert Botanical Garden. He loved red bird of paradise and claimed to have introduced it to the Phoenix area. He was interested in a lot of plants, and one year he showed up with a small tree as a gift. He called it

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a palo verde hybrid, and I am sure that it is, but he did not know precisely who the parents were. Looking at it I suspect it is similar to lots of hybrids around now that may contain some of all the species of Parkinsonia that are routinely grown here. We put it in a hole where a Texas ranger had failed and increased the basin around it so we could water it well in its first years. Like the ironwood and the palo brea, it started slowly. However, after over a decade in the ground it has barely grown beyond the dimensions of its first year, although it does have a number of lovely branches. It is a miniature tree, perfectly formed, but dwarf. Because it grows down near the native mesquite at the turn of the drive, I suspect caliche is again the culprit. I can’t think of getting rid of this little tree; Don was too fine a fellow and much too good a grower to just discard one of his plants with abandon. So it lives on, probably in a highly unsuitable place; if we ever find a better spot I will move it, but for now it is just Don’s little hybrid out by the drive. Success with shrubs has also been up and down out in the front yard. A Leucophyllum langmaniae, put in to close off a view of the road, never liked the regimen out there and finally kicked off for good last year. The long stretches of temperatures over 110 degrees were the last straw. The place now occupied by Don’s little hybrid was originally the home of a Texas ranger ‘White Cloud’ that also could not cut it. Closer to the road, a transplanted jojoba took absolutely forever to get settled but now looks pretty good. Jojoba is generally described as having a deliberate growth rate, some even call it slow, but it responds well to increased or steady watering. We have four in the back, around the monsoon patio, that received abundant water during their formative years, and their growth rate was triple that of the one in the front on our lean watering scheme. Of course, like most of the property, the front is almost overrun with creosote. They continue along as if we weren’t there, growing, blooming, and providing the entire front garden with a lush beauty that we do absolutely nothing to deserve. They were here before us and they make it clear every day that they will be here after us; we are only a minor blip in their desert life. We get along splendidly with them as a result. They are a lazy desert gardener’s best friend, and every garden should be as overrun with them as we are. Verdin cannot get enough of the flowers and fruit of the creosote bush. Hummingbirds use them as a preferred perch. Quail bring their entire clan in to feed on the flowers and fruit that fall to the ground, forming a delicate

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and clearly delicious detritus under their boughs. Countless insects feed, rest, mate, and just hang out on their leaves and stems. Creosote are resplendent in the cool season, forming a green cloud over the entire garden. In the warm season they shift to a spare, lean beauty that shows off their erratic branching. They smell great after a rain, filling the entire garden with the pungent fragrance that is the source of their unlikely common name. The bright yellow flowers smother the plants in spring, followed by equally profuse fruit, each of which is a nub of downy white fuzz. When lit from behind by the rising sun, these fruit sparkle in the early morning with a light coating of dew. To top it all off, creosote consider the extremely modest watering scheme we have in the front to be nirvana; it is hard to imagine a more perfect companion in a desert garden. The wolfberry (Lycium exsertum) has much the same attitude as the creosote—loving its life in our cozy desert garden. This native shrub is fully leafed out only in the winter, although deep soaks at other times of year cause a brief flurry of leaves. The bright red berries of the name are tiny and taste a lot like tomatoes—not surprising, as they are in the same family. There are a number of species in this genus native to the low- and mid-elevation deserts of Arizona; some of them produce slightly larger fruit, some flower white rather than purple, and some have larger or longer or thinner leaves than ours—in general making them a horror to tell one from another. I love to munch on the fruit, and if you look around during the fruiting season, you will notice that you can find individual plants with fruit that is sweeter or tarter than average, and some that is comparatively immense. We have a long-held idea that careful selection and crossbreeding of all these types would yield a tasty desert fruit big enough to be useful to people, but I doubt we will ever find the time or the will to make it happen. Although the fruit on ours is tiny, too small for us to consider as more than an occasional snack, birds don’t see it that way. For them it is a feast, and when the berries are ripe, the plant hosts a continuous parade of verdin, wrens, thrashers, and finches that strip it in a matter of days. Any fruit that falls to the ground is quickly taken off by the various rodents that live quietly underground. The flowers on our wolfberry are dark purple and show up from late December to March. These flowers are hugely attractive to hummingbirds, and a male Costa’s hummingbird thinks he owns this plant—woe to any others who try to come near it. Even when it is out of flower or entirely leafless, the male perches proprietarily on it, daring any intruders who get near. Both the plant and the bird—whether the same bird

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or a series of Costa’s look-alikes, we’ll never know—have been together in our garden for a long time now. That continuity, and the careful intersection of lives, forms a bond that I would miss greatly if any of the threads were to break. We had long envisioned a small wall in the front to complement the house, one that would define a small seating area, and give us a background for future plantings. Finally it was time, and Naté and his crew arrived to begin work, but I was deeply concerned about the wolfberry. I envisioned it rising over the wall so I could watch the birds feed and perch as I sat on our new patio. I felt it was integral to the entire scheme. But it was close to the proposed wall, and the footing needed some of its space. Naté was sympathetic and assured me that the footing could be fitted in although the patio would be a bit narrower as a result. However, some pruning was unavoidable. It went well; the plant was much reduced but not devastated. In no time at all, it grew back to be large enough to come over the wall just as I had imagined, and the Costa’s hummingbird never seemed to notice. As is typical of all our building projects, design became final just as they all set to work. Gary had an idea that the block wall would be interrupted with pieces of cut flagstone inserted to reflect the flagstone fascia on the house. Naté looked it over, declared it a lovely idea although he had never done it before and, in the way of all good craftsmen, guaranteed that he could do it. And then he and another man whose name I never knew got to work. Each attacked Gary’s design in a different way. One built the entire wall first, leaving a gap in the wall as he laid the block that was later filled in with the flagstone. The other laid the flagstone along with the block as the courses of the wall came up. The first method was delicate and careful and took a long time, while the other went more quickly, but in the end you can hardly tell the difference, and the wall is utterly charming. We painted it the same pinkish tan color of the house and the walls, using the dark tan shade of the eaves for the pilasters. In the end, we and the builders were extremely pleased. I think pictures were taken, and I suspect that design will show up again in some of their future projects. The wall was so lovely, it forced us to take on the work of reestablishing the sidewalk. When we moved into the house, the usual runway of gray concrete ran from the streetside mailbox to the front door. We longed to remove it and do something else, but it was a big job, and we weren’t sure what to do. A couple of years before the wall construction, Scott and his crew were working on the eaves, and we decided to ask them to take out

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the concrete as well. It was a matter of half a day’s work as two men busted the concrete up and piled the remains on the east side of the house. At the time, we figured we would reuse it somewhere, we just didn’t know where. Almost immediately, conversation about the “new” front walk began. I favored no pavement at all, just a wandering track of soil that would pack down easily, meandering to the house. Gary favored using that old concrete, painted or dyed to match the soil, lined with cut stone. I loathed the lining idea, too formal, too regular, too strict. Naturally, we each adhered firmly to our idea for years before a solution was finally reached. The rubble had, by this time, been on the side of the house for so long that generations of animals and reptiles had come and gone in it, and we worried that soon plants would begin to grow in it if we weren’t careful. With only the merest of hint of agreement on the final design, but with a burst of energy and enthusiasm one fall day, Gary began to dig what would be the outline of the walkway. We had always agreed that it would not be straight, and after a little field modification, we had a layout that was just the ticket: first turning through the two creosote that formed an arbor at the entrance from the street, then winding along, and finally merging with the front patio and the front door. Gary dug out the path about four inches deep to accommodate the concrete. Then he began to set it out, moving and shifting all the pieces by hand until it looked the way he liked. He had found a way around his need for a border (and my insistence against it) by placing the pieces that had formed the outside of the sidewalk at the edge of the new path, forming an informal line but not really a border. I was impressed with the layout—the walk looked great so far. But as it turned out, life got in the way, and we had to leave it for months as irregular blocks of busted concrete set in a 4-inch trench. At Halloween I set a decorative barrier on the street to prevent little ones from walking on it and turning ankles or worse in the dark and placed their treats on a table in the street. In the spring, when the mail carrier needed to deliver packages, you could hear the fussing as she picked her way along the stones, avoiding the unfilled interspaces. People who came regularly knew which stones were most stable, and even the dogs picked their way across it delicately. When it looked like another Halloween would come and go and it wasn’t done yet, we knew we had to get to work. Soil filled the spaces, water and brooms settled it in and firmed it up, and Gary painted it all in a swirl of desert colors. The color didn’t make it past

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the first rain, but another application with a different type of paint solved that problem. It is now easy to walk on, and it looks terrific. Front gardens aren’t much in vogue these days, but I’m hoping for a comeback. There is more to the front than just keeping it tidy and trim and hoping the neighbors don’t complain. It is an announcement of intention, the first clue about who lives there and what kind of relationship they have with their plants and with the area. In our neighborhood, as in many old and settled ones, it is a confirmation of the original intent of the developer to create a gracious urban space, honoring and reflecting the desert from which it sprang. Some try to coerce their front gardens into something different, far from that original intent, but for us, having a front garden that mingles with our neighbors both literally and visually is appealing and inviting. It helps us feel connected to the activity and lives of the entire neighborhood, giving us the best of both the natural and the urban world. What more could you ask of your garden or of your plants?

Animals

i have lived in close quarters with animals all my life. I grew up with a minor zoo of dogs, cats, cows, sheep, pigs, ducks, chickens, and turkeys. Most were working animals, well tended, reasonably tame, and there to provide food for the family. Some crossed over to become pets, and a few were very dear. There was a storeroom off the barn that held an assortment of animal feeds, as well as salt licks, potions, milk cans, and the other motley stuff that rural storerooms collect. For my entire childhood, a group of semi-wild, working cats and all their progeny lived within its walls. It was a crude woodfloored room with a tin roof; the only light came from the cracks in the poorly fitting wooden walls. It smelled of grain and earth and old things and was always warm; a very cozy kind of place. It suited those cats admirably, and they were allowed to run their lives there chiefly unto themselves. We didn’t see them often, they didn’t have names, and I am not sure that any of them became a house pet. They ate whatever they could catch and kept mice and rats to a minimum, a duty that they freely accepted and that was helpful to the tomatoes and other fruit, not to mention the grain and feed. They taught me a lot about what a cat really is and about how to deal with half-wild, half-domesticated animals. Over the years, we have enjoyed the company of a number of pet cats, and I have never found them to be a problem in the garden, although I know there are those who feel differently. These days they are mostly ornamental, and I find myself imploring them to be more like those barnyard cats of old, 113

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getting on with the work of culling out rodents and other pests. The truth is that most of the animals we keep are nothing like those old barn cats; they are not actually helpful in a garden but are tolerated because we love them. While a few of our cats have been pretty good hunters despite their charmed and spoiled lives, hunting appeared to be more of a hobby than a calling. Tugger, a swaggering tabby, was particularly adept at nabbing young Inca doves and house sparrows, and considering how overburdened the world already is with house sparrows at least, I could live with it. He never took enough rabbits to suit me, however, which is probably more a result of the much easier food I provided in the kitchen and less a disparagement of his inherent hunting instincts. All cats go their own way, and all of ours have thrived on ignoring everything in the garden or the house that did not cater to their needs. Their most eager participation has been to dust bathe in the paths or lurk among the globemallow, black dalea (Dalea frutescens), and foldwing, pretending to stalk birds. These are definitely not the cats of the storeroom. But I do love the way they look, draped over the wall on a hot day in the shade of the African sumac, sleeping with only one eye open. Or how they use the limbs of the trees as a playground, chasing and racing one another. While they seem to enjoy the diversion and interest that the garden provides, they are delighted to have nothing to do with its upkeep. Royalty never does. We have never had to move a path, rescue a plant, or make any particular concession in design, care, or planting because of our cats. They sit lightly on the garden, serving as a charming detail, adding to the general ambience and peace of the place. But the dogs are quite another story. None of our dogs have failed to leave a mark on the garden—they are as much a part of the story of the place as the plants. The thing that dogs do most clearly in a garden is tell you where to set up the paths. There is little point in fighting them on this; it is hard, often futile, work to keep them running along only the paths you select. If there is a direct path from the back door to the back gate—a location ours consider extremely important for keeping abreast of all the activity in the alley—they will lay it out for you. If there is a place where they can find out what is going on in the neighborhood, they will make a beeline to it and be there every day. They will tell you that it’s unfair to plant directly adjacent to the fences, especially ones that front on an alley. The run the dogs created there served as a maintenance path and made an excellent place to run hoses or allow for painting the fence.

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Once in a while, my sense of where a path or a garden bed should be had to be imposed on them. While dogs can be trained to run along the paths you have set up and that you strongly prefer they use, it takes patience and diligence and a few tricks. Every once in a while, training the dogs resulted in a nice design touch, or an area in the garden I might not have thought of without them. Training dogs to your paths, rather than theirs, is more difficult if they love to chase things. I am convinced that dogs that love to fetch lose their little minds when something is thrown in front of them—they no longer know their name, who you are, or where they are. They simply cannon themselves in the straightest possible line to the ball. If your perennials are in the way, well, tough. If your annual flowers or bulbs look particularly fine today but are in the path of the comet, destruction is inevitable. We have seen entire limbs of the Chisos rosewood torn off in search of a ball, and once, one of the dogs cannoned into a young tree, felling it in one swoop. Over time we have established a definite path system; we want to keep it that way. It became a vexing problem when we acquired a new pair of dogs, and wanted to teach them where we wanted them to go when they first arrived. We finally solved it with barricades. I do not personally think chicken wire is an attractive addition to any garden, and while it sometimes holds back rabbits, it has no meaning to a dog, especially a dog at play. The next ugliest addition to a garden, among the most maddening pieces of hardware ever invented, are those wraparound wire borders. I can’t begin to imagine what fiend came up with those things. They wrap most successfully around themselves, and despite those cute little curved pieces that are supposed to make it possible to unite them into a Great Wall around the bed, they never fit, and they are never the right size. To add further frustration, no matter what it says on the packaging they are inevitably too flimsy to easily poke in the ground in really good desert soil. They punch holes in the irrigation system, probably because I never know where that tubing is, and are generally a royal pain in the patootie. But I have to give them credit, this ugly metalware saved our beds from the dogs’ pathways long enough to rewire their canine brains to the existing paths. I didn’t notice that the dogs had rearranged the garden path system to their own liking for the first week or two. By then their new path was well established in their minds, and was on its way to becoming permanent. Instead of going around the edge of the perennial bed between its border and the porch, their wildcat path ran in a straight line from the patio to the

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wash, bisecting the west perennial bed, thereby cutting off at least twelve inches from their run for the ball. To reorder this canine universe, I began by setting up a maze of the linking metal borders. It looked like a stylized snake in green metal working through the bed. It worked, however, perfectly and immediately. But it was hideous and made weeding and working in the bed almost impossible. I would lift out the entire run of wire border, lay it aside to work in the bed, and then try to reinstall it. This is when the trouble began. Like an electronic gadget that never goes back in the box the way it came out, that perfect alignment, which fit the dimensions of the bed exactly when I pulled it out, could never be recreated. I struggled, I swore, I tore, I generally threw it around, but it was never the same twice. After three or four times of this, I had had it; I removed it completely and began to look for a better solution. The dogs were close to using our path, but it would take a little longer for their training to be complete. Out of this desperate need to reform the dogs came the easiest solution, and the one that helped establish yet another good design idea in the garden. We moved in an array of large pots, most of them over twelve inches in diameter, or at least very heavy. We put them close together, and later began to arrange them in what seemed to us an aesthetically pleasing way. One large pot was perched on the top of an old piece of clay pipe, not only securing the corner but giving a bit of height to the entire area. It is planted with a double pink variety of oleander and gives a lift of color to the patio during the long, hot summer. A hybrid between Agave attenuata and A. shawwii is perched on a glazed black pot that came without a hole. The black fades away into the maze of leaves and the agave looks like it is floating over the bed. Later we planted that agave in the ground, but a swell looking Agave ghiesbrechtii has taken its place. It was important to block the other side of the perennial bed for a while as well. Although we had planted a virtual wall of shrubs, the leader of our little pack was a tank of a dog who could plow through anything. Without a second line of pots, she and her pal would just launch over the pots to get to the patio. On that side, we decided some nice potted cactus that even she would not mess with would do the trick. Naturally, there were dozens to pick from in the shade house, and we quickly assembled a collection of the most daunting cacti and agaves we had. One of the things I love about dogs is that they live in the moment and only have a long memory for a few things they really love; luckily that does

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not include pathways. After about a month, the dogs used only the real path system for their daily romps and had entirely forgotten the shortcut. After a couple of months, I was reasonably sure that their brains had been rewired to the new message and we could have removed the pots if we had chosen. The ones on the far side eventually were moved after the shrub border grew up and the charming variegated Agave tequilana got huge, but the ones on the patio side of the bed are still there and, over the years, have been enhanced with new additions. I think they provide a charming display: flowering oleanders in the summer, and an ever-shifting array of aloes, bromeliads, agaves, succulents, and flowering bulbs at other times. Who knows if I would have been so dedicated to the large pots if there had been no need to solve a problem with the dogs? I have heard many people say that they need a lawn because they have children or dogs. I do not have an opinion about why children can only play on grass, but I do know about dogs, and they don’t give a fig what the surface of the ground is as long as you are throwing something in front of them. My own dogs do not live with grass and seem to be fine about it, so I am always a bit suspicious about this supposed dog/lawn association. Most of our dogs have not taken up the revolting practice of eating plants except of course for the ritual of eating grass so they can regurgitate it on the patio. When we first brought Cassia, the Australian cattle dog, home from the Humane Society, she immediately set upon a precious Welwitchia mirabilis, eating it and most of the plastic pot that contained it. It is miraculous that she was allowed to stay. Eating plants was a short-lived habit for her, although the joy of playing with plastic stayed with her longer. This was nearly as bad, and almost as destructive while it continued. She would race up to a pot, grab it up on the run and fling it in the air, pot, plant, and soil, then jump with joy when it all crashed to the ground. It was horrible, and I finally learned to keep a supply of empty pots around the yard for her until she just grew out of the craze, like a teenager finally tired of blue hair. All of our dogs adore the compost pile and supplement their perfect feeding program regularly with half-rotted goodies. This is a pretty harmless behavior that mostly results in unsightly bits of red pepper or cabbage cores loosely arranged around the garden. Rosie, a small, tiny-pawed black mutt, now sadly no longer of this earth, was particularly fond of broccoli stalks. She would root them out of the compost pile without fail, parading around the garden with the immense, green stalk in her mouth, like a parody of a Chicago politician, until she found the perfect spot to settle down to eat it

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up. She gnawed them like a bone, with the relish of a child with Halloween candy. This, too, is a pretty benign habit and doesn’t cause much trouble for me or the garden. Play is harder to control than running the paths, especially when the dogs are young. Play can be incredibly destructive for the garden, but is so vital for young dogs that you have to figure out a way to accommodate it. When Cassia was young, her best play pal was Maggie the golden retriever who lived across the street. They got together to play often and were about the same age, both young and full of vigor. It was delightful to watch them play real dog play, rather than the semblance of play that humans provide, but it could be hard on the plants. I found that the sweet, pink-flowered perennial, rock pavonia (Pavonia lasiopetala), was too brittle to withstand the rolling and tumbling of playful dogs and had to be relocated. Countless plants were flattened; some recovered beautifully. The manfredas had to be caged, again with those hideous metal borders, to prevent repeated trampling because their brittle leaves broke at the slightest step during their vigorous play. But eventually the dogs grew out of it and, as they matured, stuck directly to the paths as long as someone continued to throw their balls. About a year after we got Cassia, the delicate Freda came to live with us. A sweet foundling, she became a great pal and permanent plaything for Cassia. She is much more demure in her play requirements. She has no idea what to do with a ball, but is a determined watch dog, and runs willy-nilly around to get to the noise, whether in the alley or on the road. She learned the paths well, but this sweet newcomer brought another dog difficulty with her—digging. This is one trait in dogs that is a long-lasting problem in the garden. If only I could point and get her to apply all that energy to a spot where I need to plant something, instead of the seemingly random choices she makes, it would be much easier. Her holes are huge, often something more like a trench. Most of them are under creosotes in the outer part of the garden, and over the years we began to wonder if they begin with some rodent’s hole. While the rodents are here all the time, the holes tend to show up mainly when we are out of town. Legions of plants have been uprooted out of the raised bed near the porch, one of her favorite spots. I have placed stones, rocks, potted plants, and other barriers over the years, but she always finds a tiny entree for her digging. Rosie could dig a good hole, too, but hers were tidy and small, made for her to take a nap in on a hot day. This type of digging was a reasonably benign habit; you would find them way back in a bed or under a large shrub,

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where the soil was a little moist and the shade was permanent. Now Rosie had the run of the house and could come in at any time, but she preferred to take her morning siesta in the holes she built in the garden. There are good things that the dogs could contribute to the garden, but fail to. They could keep out rabbits, but they don’t. But even though they fail as the savage killers of rabbits that I wish they were, their presence does help deter rabbits, a bit. They make rabbits nervous and uncertain about our yard, almost convincing them that the garden should be considered only a tiny stopover, not a favorite teahouse. The other nice thing that my dogs help me with in the garden is that they notice things. While they do not seem to care whether the Habranthus robustus, with its trumpets of delicate, pink flowers has bloomed again, or whether the podranea (Podranea ricosoleana) needs water, they can point out a bad dripper; a strange or unusual item in the garden; anything that is in the alley, living or dead; and birds. The dogs have caused a good deal of trouble in the garden, even though they have made us consider a few good ideas. They have decidedly caused more work on our part, but they are an irreplaceable part of our lives. Sitting in the garden in the evening without their company would be as dreary as sitting out without the plants. Walking around looking at the place without their insistence that we toss the ball, so conveniently placed on the ground at our feet, would feel as empty as having all the plants droop or the birds flee to a better place. They finish the garden off, they make it a complete home, and they wouldn’t dream of letting us do it all alone. When I think about what my pets have taught me, it usually amounts to a variation on the same thing—do not sweat the small stuff, stick with the big picture, forgive all small transgressions, never bite the hand that feeds you even when it takes you to the vet, and enjoy exactly what you are doing right at the moment you are doing it. And never leave home without your best toy. •  •  •

As a rule, lizards are the most benign and delightful of the cold-blooded creatures that weave through our garden. Even before we lived in the desert, which is replete with these guys, I had a minor love affair with a green anole in our garden in New Orleans. These little reptiles are such a soft shade of green and have such big, endearing eyes, I can’t help but slow down and watch while they pounce on unsuspecting insects.

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The variety of lizard life here in the low desert has been a wonder to me, and a great many of them live in this garden. They are incredible at keeping down crickets, roaches, and a wide array of other troublesome insects in the garden. I can’t help but admire their pluck and their complete indifference to whether we are here or not. The most common lizard visitor is the Western whiptail, a long lanky animal with a tail that is much longer than its body. Whiptails feed by walking around under the dross of falling leaves, spent flowers, and seedpods that forms the general mess so abundant at the bottom of a well-grown plant. They scavenge like little vacuum cleaners, and just one sounds like a herd when it is intent on scouring the detritus, searching for the bugs and grubs that make up their diet. Watching whiptails at work occupies a lot of good procrastination time, and since procrastination is my vehicle for getting most things done, they are welcome visitors. Clearly they are uncomfortable with wide-open spaces. As a whiptail approaches one edge of the patio or other, it stops and shifts its head from side to side to see what might be lurking around. I notice they also give a quick look upward, just in case a hawk might be in the neighborhood. Eventually all must seem right, because the whiptail suddenly spurts across the patio to the security of the other bed. The patio is about fifteen feet across, which means it is about thirty times their size. To put it another way, it’s as if we had to run across something that was a football-field long and weren’t sure if there were mountain lions, rockets, or unhappy aliens along the way. Lizards on the run look sensational; they rise up slightly on their legs, and their great tail appears to be held straight out from the body. Like a whizzing dinosaur, they are off and across in the blink of an eye. But within the beds, the pace slows down as the lizard ambles along, checking under leaves, weaving its head back and forth, looking for movement I suppose. Whiptails burrow into anything soft; in our yard, the long-abandoned sand bed behind the lime tree on the east side of the house. Twice we have inadvertently murdered one as we dug in the sand. It is a terrible thing to kill a lizard like this, and I advise a slow and cautious approach when digging a hole in the sand or other soft earth in the early spring before they are seen around the garden. The much larger Western collared lizard only shows up from time to time in our garden, although I became extremely familiar with one that lived behind my greenhouse at the Desert Botanical Garden. These fellows climb trees and appear to be especially fond of the furrowed bark of

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mesquite. I don’t know what they are doing, other than presumably staying out of the way of dogs, cats, coyotes, and the like, but they can hang on vertically for many hours. The male of this beautiful lizard has a blue throat that he likes to show off if he thinks there might be a female in the vicinity. When he wants to pretend that he can run me off, he expands himself by rising up on his legs and inflating his chest. I don’t know what kind of threat I pose. I am much larger than he is, but if I get too close I am in for the whole show—puffing out, breathing heavy, pumping the iron of his leg muscles. Considering that is all the armor he has and the considerable size difference between us, it is a spectacular show of bluster. But then, bluster and daring is a great deal of what I admire about lizards. Living with all these lizards around gives me another great excuse to indulge my aversion to keeping the place too neat. I like it a little messy, a little jumbled, and a bit wild. Over the years Gary and I have more or less switched places on the neat versus tidy continuum in the garden. Early on, he favored a denser, more jungley look, and I was all in favor of more order and tidiness. But now, and particularly in this garden with all these wonderful visitors and residents, we have both given ourselves over to a much less rigorous order and less pin-neat presentation. This fits much better with my innate laziness and, conveniently, also meshes better with the natural look and style of this place. Gardens in cities, especially when they are filled with a wide array of plants and a healthy dose of native plants, are refuges for the wildlife that once called the place home. Admittedly, some of that wildlife is more welcome and easier to live with than others, but everything has its place, and learning to accept and work with each other is part of intertwining our lives in a garden. Although I find spying on all the wildlife a joy and a delight, and allow it to consume shocking amounts of time, entertaining me isn’t what these creatures are here to do. These are not performances they are undertaking out there, but the essential activities of their lives, and they are entirely serious about it. Getting in their way, creating overwhelming obstacles, or making the place a poisonous atmosphere, not only sends them away but depletes the lively garden we have tried so vigorously to create. Nevertheless, few things have tested my resolve for a live-and-let-live approach than the snakes that love the yard. I have never been a snake person. When I was in college, an idiotic boy thought he could impress me by taking a pet snake, cornering me with it at a party, and then “rescuing” me from it. I resisted the snake without lifting

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an eyebrow and never spoke to that jerk again. Yet I found the incident unsettling and uncomfortable and, over the years, have not grown any fonder of brother snake getting too close to me. Snakes I have met in the wild don’t affect me so much; I simply don’t like the idea of being left alone with them in a place neither of us can exit quickly or without walking past each other. While I touched one once, I didn’t enjoy it, and I am sure the snake didn’t either. But when you have as many rabbits, rats, mice, and other small creatures preying on seedlings, tomatoes, leaves, and plants as we do, you learn to get along. I make deals with them all the time, though I am not certain they are listening. The deal is this: don’t scare me by hiding in a place where I can’t see you and then suddenly burst on the scene, and I’ll try to be tolerant. One February, as I shifted a big column of black plastic pots, I discovered a great gopher snake that had been living for years between our yard and the one next door below the pile, waiting out the winter. Never have I moved so quickly, and when I came back after realizing what an idiot I was, it had barely moved. It was so cold, and it was so asleep, it could barely get out of the way. I left a little pile for it to use as cover, moved the rest, and found that by the warm spring it had moved along. It was that episode that convinced me we needed a deal. That particular snake lived between our yard and our neighbor Lisa’s yard for many years. It would show up in her garage, which gives me the creeps to even think about, and she would coax it out with a broom. It did not seem to resent her activity and would shift out of the way easily. From time to time, all we saw of it was a rope of skin, beneath the cascading saltbush or behind the toolshed, as it released one skin to let another one emerge. Later, perhaps that same year, maybe the next, it hid behind the screen covering the faucet by the study window. I had to invoke the deal, and couldn’t use the faucet for a few months after that. I still make sure that I am paying attention when I use it, because I’m pretty sure that the deal is a one-way street. After a time, it had forsaken Lisa’s place and was a more or less permanent part of our garden. It got to where we could count on that snake showing itself once or twice, almost always in the warm spring days of late April and May when it has just emerged from its winter sleep. During this period, I kept up a sharp lookout every time I was in the garden. One Saturday morning in May, while I was working in another part of the garden, Gary found it lying at the bottom of the stairs soaking up the sun. He then

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made the dreadful mistake of telling me about this sighting just as I was descending the stairs with drinks for both of us in hand. Next thing I knew, I was on the ground, snuggled up to a very nice agave, with a twist in my ankle, and a bruise on my butt. Gopher snakes make absolutely no noise, no matter how fast or how slow they move; and because they probably find you as scary and unsettling as you do them, they don’t leave or move until the last minute. It makes for a jumpy existence for both of us. That big and possibly quite old gopher snake was killed by a neighbor in what can only be described as misplaced snake machismo, and Lisa, Gary, and I missed him for a while. The following year a new one, much younger, with the bold stripes and wide markings that show its age, showed up. But just as things were getting pretty good between us, some yahoo murdered that snake and left its body hanging from a creosote in the alley. Honestly, if I can learn to live with them, then I enjoin the rest of us to try harder as well. Scary they may be, beneficial they definitely are, but harmful these gopher snakes are not. If ever I encounter one that is not inclined to respect my deal, I am not too proud to go the other way, quickly. The snake I could learn to love, if I were inclined, is the delicate red racer. These are, to me, truly beautiful creatures, elegantly proportioned with slim bodies and small heads and colored a rich, rosy pink. The first one I saw was at a construction site within the first year or so we lived in Arizona. I say I saw it—it was more like I got a glimpse of a pink haze and had to go searching to realize I had seen a snake. I had no idea that snakes could move that fast, but with suitable inducement—fear, or to strike for food—snakes can move faster than we can see. But even in snake terms, racers are speedy critters. One summer afternoon I opened the front door and found a red racer curled in the corner by the door having a nice siesta. I was so startled I slammed the door, but once again came to my senses, and almost immediately reopened the door to see if the snake was still there. It wasn’t, but I looked around and noticed it entwined in a small black dalea by the sidewalk. I could have sworn it was panting, and it certainly looked panicstricken. I realized it must have launched itself like a missile at the plant in the seconds since I had opened, closed, and reopened the door; I had certainly scared it as much as it had scared me. We stared at each other for a while. Neither of us moved. Finally, I slowly closed the door; when I checked some time later it had moved on. This time, the snake got the message, and I have never seen another one at the front door again.

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In living with all these various lives, sometimes unintended things happen for the worst for one or the other of you. That was the case with the bird netting. It started when various cactus wrens and thrashers began to take over the vegetable garden, eating the tomatoes before we even got there to check on their ripeness. We tried a lot of ways to deal with that, but when they began to turn their attention to the seeds of beans, squash, cucumbers, peas, and okra before they had even emerged, we knew that firmer measures were required. I had tried using bird netting on a peach tree a few years before, but found it unwieldy, ineffective, and better at snaring birds that I then had to unhook and release than in keeping them away. Birds in nets are in great danger of killing themselves, and it takes a lot of patience to remove them. I got tired of it, and so did they, so I gave up, and ultimately got rid of the peach tree. I thought perhaps if I spread out the netting over a frame it might work. Once again those hideous hinged-wire borders were set up and the net was secured to them, stretching over the bed. It was awkward, but it looked like it might work. Within a week, we went down there and found a dead red racer enmeshed in the net. It was horrifying and so sad. We have no idea what actually killed it, but because snakes do not regulate their body temperature internally, and it was early in the spring, we figured that a night out in the open probably killed it. We left it in its net shroud and disposed of the entire miserable net coffin. Later, we found another racer, entwined in the mesh of a pile of netting that we had removed and left under the mesquite. That one, too, was disposed of with its net shroud still in place. A week or so after these sad activities, we came down to the vegetable garden and found yet another one entwined in the net, but this one was vigorously alive. We were uncertain how to proceed. It was firmly snared in the miserable netting, and if we moved too much, then it did too, scraping its delicate, scaly skin, and fastening itself even more securely. However, it looked pretty healthy and was certainly full of energy. Gary got the pitchfork and gently lifted the entire snarled-up mess, snake, netting, and wire frame, and moved it over to flat ground. This, of course, made the snake feel that freedom was close, and it started to move too much. We backed off and let it calm down. It became clear that the only way to release it was to cut the net away, but this snake was understandably skeptical and did not easily cooperate with the idea. In the end, I took a long bamboo pole, of which we have dozens hanging around, and carefully used it to hold the snake’s head down. It worked

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wonderfully; the snake became inert while Gary took the garden scissors and cut away the netting. Once fully released and all the net was removed, we backed off. The snake did not move, but I could see that it was still breathing. We were worried that our Good Samaritan act had caused more harm than good, but it still had a clear, sharp eye. We figured it was just wary and did not trust the pole, us, or anything else. Who could blame it? We left for a short while, but when we came back to check on its progress the snake was gone. We assume it made it to the messy underbelly of the white oleander near the vegetable garden. I disposed of all the bird netting that same day and have pledged never to use the stuff again. I have never run across a red racer in the vegetable beds since, so I figure they must come out at night or extremely early in the morning, prowling around for the mice and small rodents that invade that place. In this activity they are most welcome. I can’t see any reason to set hideous traps for them when they are working so hard for us. Some of the other reptiles are strictly ornamental, at least from my point of view, and the best of them is the desert iguana. There are some animals that make you think that you, and of course your neighbors, must be doing something right because why else would such a desert icon live in your yard? Desert iguanas are shy, and unlike a lot of desert dwellers we usually see them in the late morning. They have a fierce look, with the blunted snout so typical of their kin and a direct, challenging glare. Their bodies are long, colored beige or tan, and their huge tails fall away from them like a regal train. They stand more upright than other lizards, which are usually more or less parallel to the ground, and the entire effect is unmistakable. Many of our neighbors are as enamored of the wildlife of the area as we are, and we give each other periodic reports on sightings of them all, but in particular of this shy creature. Although I have personally never seen more than one desert iguana at a time, there must be more because we frequently see young ones, half-grown ones, and those that are clearly adults throughout the summer. They have never shown up in the backyard—I suppose the fence and the animals are a good deterrent—but are residents of the driest parts of the front yard, near the caliche ledge. •  •  •

Our neighborhood and the buttes across the road are home to a band of coyotes that we hear much more frequently than we see. We are all sure they run the alleys, and cats that roam at night are especially susceptible to

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their predations. We had a wily old male cat named Tugger who survived a coyote attack—how he managed it we will never know. I imagine the coyote came off badly in the deal; Tugger was a fierce thing. The sad truth is that I often wish I could lure a coyote into the yard just long enough to dispatch the rabbit that I cannot seem to either fence out or run out, but the coyotes don’t talk over their battle plans with me. A close relative to the coyote, the gray fox, is a little easier to find close by. This elegant canid has kept up family life in our neighborhood for a long time. As far as we can tell, there is one pair, and they raise kits every year. Sometimes it is in a wash north of our house, but more often no one knows where the kits are born until the adults bring them out for a late evening feeding. One year, one of them took to spending the day on Lisa’s roof, right against the chimney. These beautiful animals are nocturnal and will find a high tree or a roof to spend the day, with that luscious tail wrapped entirely around them like a blanket. Once on a walk, I turned a corner and there was the female in a driveway about half a mile north of us. We both froze. She was injured; one of her hind legs was held up and when she moved she limped. It did not seem to affect her much—she stood her ground and waited for me to make the first move. It was a clear game of chicken, of who would move on first, and I gave in quickly. She was so beautiful and so wary, I hated the idea of her thinking of me as a threat. Last spring for the first time we saw one of the foxes in our yard. I was standing at the dining room window early in the morning waiting for water to boil. Gary was puttering around somewhere else. I looked up and saw a fox, big and gray, walk right through the front patio. I quickly moved to the kitchen window, calling Gary as I went, wondering how long it would hang around. It stopped a minute and bent down, but I could not see what it was doing, and by the time Gary arrived he barely saw its tail as it loped out of view. When we went out to see what it had been fooling with, thinking it would be the carcass of a mouse or something like that, we found a great fox hairball. Here we were delirious with the excitement of seeing this lovely wild animal right there in our front yard, and all it had done was throw up on the patio. Just goes to show that romance is usually misplaced where nature is concerned. I think the wildest of the wild animals that ever showed up was the javelina. We live almost in the direct middle of a large metropolitan area,

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and while the neighborhood is clearly home to a huge array of wild things, javelina are not common deep within a city, although they are the bane of homeowners living along the urban edge. No one told this javelina that, and one March morning, as I was working on the back patio, Lisa hollered my name and told me that she was looking at a javelina. I ran to the front yard and, sure enough, right there on the east side of the yard, a javelina and I were staring at each other. Now, javelina are not especially pretty animals. They have coarse hair and a body that strongly resembles a pig, although their feet are tiny and delicate. They breathe noisily and can’t see much, so it is best to make some movement or noise if you want them to move along. I am certain they can smell well because one of the reasons they are such a problem in a garden is that they feed by rooting around looking for underground delights. They are also renowned for eating almost any kind of vegetation, including cactus, which they simply bowl over, uprooting it to get to the delectable insides. This was obviously not an animal that I was going to welcome into our garden with open arms. The javelina ambled across the street and up the wash. All this time Lisa and I kept a watch, mainly because we could hardly believe our eyes. When it was all over, and the javelina had moved on down the street out of view, she told me that she had been kneeling on the ground weeding, and for some reason looked up and there it was, about three feet away, just staring at her. Talk about a shock. That javelina stayed in the general vicinity for months, and there were reports of two of them at one time. That made me anxious; javelina are ferocious around their young, and I could see nothing good that would come of having a family of them around. But whether it was one or two, they stuck around for about a year and moved on to better locales. Me, I was delighted to have seen it, interested in how it ever got here, and thrilled when it decided to move along. •  •  •

Pests in the garden are like dust—you clean the house and walk away smug in the knowledge that it is clean. A week or a day goes by, and the house reverts to a disaster zone that somehow you never saw coming. It is much the same with pests of any stripe; insects, worms, bacteria, even birds. But it is the rodents that really drive me to distraction. Although they seem to be invisible, their damage is not. They are sneaky and wily and apparently know exactly the limits of my abilities and my schedule, as well as those of the dogs.

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The garden has great stretches that are not entirely tame and appear entirely unoccupied. Long lines of creosote that surround the outer perimeter increase its spare, uninhabited look. But if you walk around and glance at the ground, you notice that it is riddled with holes. Some are quite large, perhaps three or four inches across, and would hold a good-sized snake or an adult guinea pig. I have no idea who makes this hole, possibly a rock squirrel or maybe ground squirrels, but it makes me nervous. Whatever made it must have an enormous appetite and is clever enough to build such a hole right below my potting table without me ever noticing its construction. Naturally, paranoia strikes first, and I was convinced for a long time that the largest gopher snake in the world lived there. Other holes are small, tidy, and extremely regular. These are rarely more than an inch or so across. These are the homes of a wide array of mice I expect, although I have never gone out at night to find out for sure. Beetles make such holes as well, but I cannot tell the difference without seeing the creature walking in or out of its subterranean home. Sometimes we find that a hole has been confiscated, not only by the snakes, but by a spider. I suppose some spiders are able to dig their own holes, but I am more convinced that many just take over openings abandoned by one of the endless numbers of rodents in the garden. I don’t know what makes a hole satisfactory for a while to a rodent or why it is abandoned, but vacant holes don’t stay that way long. Soon after abandonment, an awning of the fine mesh of spiderweb appears across its face. It is hard to see the spider—she is crafty and stays well out of the sunlight—but water, or a perfect angle of the sun, reveals the web to me. Apparently her prey is not nearly so lucky, but I consider her a champion at pest control and leave her to her web and her murderous ways. There are so many lives working their way through their daily rhythms in our garden, and many of them are these small rodents, leading subterranean and often nocturnal lives. They can easily live through generations before I ever see them, much less understand their daily routine. But once in a while one takes after something that I really love, leaving a clear calling card. I am not a tremendously observant person; it is nearly always Gary who first notices a problem, but even for me the nibbled-out parts of the Consolea falcata were impossible to ignore. Consolea is a small genus of Caribbean cacti whose pads look like they were rolled out in a pasta machine. The pads are deep green, much longer than they are wide, with only a modest number of spines if there are any at

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all. This cactus quickly forms a sturdy main stem and within a few years is a charming, although crookedly formed, tree. I bought this consolea from one of my favorite vendors during the years of running the plant shop at the Desert Botanical Garden. In a fit of cute, he called them roadkill cactus, which I found both revolting and inaccurate, but all of them were scooped up for the novelty they were at the time. I am not sure what induced me to plant it in the ground—it was only about eight inches tall then—but it was placed against the eastern wall in the shade of the African sumac and the graythorn. It quickly grew to impressive size, clearing the wall and blooming when the mood seized it. One February afternoon as we were resting on the patio, cool beverages in hand, Gary said with characteristic calm, “Ah, what is eating the consolea?” “Eating it?” I repeated like the dolt that I felt, what could possibly be eating something that big that I had not noticed? A quick look confirmed that there certainly was ample evidence of some creature’s continual feeding on our plant. We had long ago dealt with a hungry cactus longhorn beetle’s predations on another cactus, but this looked different, and after careful watching we couldn’t find any evidence of that bug. Along the top edge of selected pads, zigzag marks decorated the margin, leaving a wavy ribbon of browning edges as the interior of the pad dried. It was tidy and regular, as if a living pinking shear had taken to the edge of the pad. All of the affected pads were high on the plant but strangely at the same level. There was no damage above and none below this level. It was quickly obvious that all the damaged pads were along the top of the wall. Clearly the beast had teeth, and must be a rodent. As we looked around the plant and the wall, we imagined how it happened. Our interloper used the African sumac to get on top of the wall; we were reasonably sure that a rodent could not run up the wall like a lizard—or could it? Once on the wall, it was a highway straight to the delicacy it sought, and it just roamed around the consolea eating at will. As a rule, we have been able to remain indulgent to the animals in the garden and allow them their bit of fun; they have to eat after all. But there are limits, and that invisible rodent munching on the consolea pushed them hard. Yet in this case it ran out of room, or got tired of consolea; in any event the ravages quit and we ceased to worry about it. If only it were that easy with rabbits. I cannot abide rabbits and know that they have no place in the garden. I got over the cute bunny thing a long time ago, as the force of their destruction mounted to unthinkable levels. Unlike almost all the other rodents

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hanging around the yard, they cannot control themselves. They don’t ever seem to be satisfied, and ravage every living thing they encounter. To rub it all in, they hang around to make babies in the shade house to make sure that the next generation of marauders knows exactly where to go for the feast. What a rabbit won’t eat does not bear thinking about. Of the plants in our garden that would appear to be well-armed enough to be immune to teeth, they have devoured more than I can count. Hechtia is a wickedly armed genus in the bromeliad family, a tough desert plant I like a lot. These are plants with a rosette of thick, curved leaves, each of which is rimmed by sharp thorns. I cannot handle them without leather gloves, but rabbits eat them up. The first one planted in the front never made it past establishment before it was eaten to the ground. The next attempt required a cage for a short time to protect it. When the plant got large and the leaves were so tough that I was sure even the rabbits would give it a pass, we uncovered it. It was gone within the week. I have seen rabbits girdle large barrel cactus, rip out the growing heart of small mammillaria, nibble out the edges of agaves, and devour thornless prickly pears. Apparently glochids deter them slightly, because cholla and most well-armed prickly pear are less affected. Countless evergreen bulbs have been pruned injudiciously and at the wrong time of year by their insane eating. If they are hungry enough, nothing stops them, and they have a perfectly tuned radar for the plant you just put in. I am sure it is the tender new growth that attracts them, but they act like they have been waiting for it all their lives and pounce on a newly planted perennial or shrub within the first day it is in the garden. They really are the living limit in pests, and every time I see some well-meaning nursery person offer a wide-eyed customer one of those containers of coyote urine, or fox smell, or any other alleged repellent, I want to leap in, dash the thing to the ground, and warn them ever so clearly: NOTHING WORKS BUT CHICKEN WIRE AND GUNS so do not waste your time or money. I have never seen a rabbit more than sniff at such repellents and, if they work, they do not work for me. The theory is sound, but if the urine isn’t coming from a live coyote or fox at the moment it sees the rabbit, and therefore has a sporting chance of getting it for dinner for the kiddies back in the den, it doesn’t have much effect. It might make you feel good, it might make you suffer under the delightful illusion that you are protecting your plants, but

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you are mistaken. Rabbits, like cockroaches and ants, will be here long, long after we are gone. They are just very, very good at what they do, and they know how to make more of their kind than even we do. Gary once tried to shoo a rabbit out of the yard by hurling a small stone its way. To his utter amazement he hit it square on the head and killed it. The thing dropped without a murmur. After the shock wore off, he was delighted with his newfound skill, only it could never be replicated. Word must have gotten out that he was a good shot, and now no rabbit will let him get out the door, much less wind up his arm. We found a packrat nest once in the front under a large and extremely overgrown pencil cholla. Their real name is white-throated woodrats, but packrat is much more descriptive of their style. This native desert rat collects every bit of stray junk that it is able to carry back to its large, messy nest. Sticks, bits of cactus, bones, plastic and paper litter, dog and coyote droppings, and even stranger things like snake skins and mummified reptiles are eagerly added to the pile of junk covering their underground burrows. Just as ours did, packrats routinely build their nests at the base of a cactus, the bigger and more overgrown the better. These critters also have the unfortunate habit of being enamored of building a nest in the engine of a car that is parked outside. Old timers and those who live in rural areas developed the habit of leaving the hood of the car or truck open when not in use to dissuade them. The real danger is not the nest per se, but their equally unsavory habit of chewing on the wiring in a car and particularly the plastic that surrounds it. This can render a car not only useless when you go to turn it on, but can frequently cause severe and permanent damage to its wiring. There are a number of other common desert rodents that we have never seen. The tiny grasshopper mouse, the extremely shy kangaroo rat, and a wide array of others occupy holes in the ground or under woodpiles during the day and forage on beetles, larvae, seeds, fruit, and other delectables at night. They are as invisible to us as we imagine we are to them, each of us wandering around the same garden, each of us knowing it intimately in our own way, but rarely meeting each other. There is a new rodent in the neighborhood, having shown up about eight years ago, first in neighborhoods near us but quickly moving throughout the valley. That is the roof rat. Roof rats, despite their name, like to live it what looks like a beaver dam of raised earth, but because they can climb so well they are often found in

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attics or roof crawlspaces. Their mounds, which are similar to those built by rock squirrels, are usually up against or beneath something; a stack of pots, old metal pieces lurking at the edges of the garden, a pile of stones rescued from a neighbor’s project but waiting for an idea, or the stacked block that forms the wall of the compost pile. When they first showed up, I had no idea what they were and rarely saw them. But I noticed that there was a suspicious and odd pile of soil alongside one of the vegetable beds. As I was watering around there I noticed that the soil seemed hollow and tended to slump. Suddenly, a bolt of brown fur came out of the hole and scampered away before I could even be startled. At the time, I shrugged and called it just another of the mysterious rodents that live around the place, but now I know it was a roof rat. They haven’t actually killed anything yet with this choice of home location, but it does give the place a certain white-trash feel—as if next we’ll pile appliances on the porch. I don’t quite know what to do about this creature. They have become so common so quickly, I don’t know if control really works. Poisons are impossible—we have pets and other friends that we value a lot. But these renegades are unsavory, and they eat a lot of fruit. In fact, they are so fond of fruit that in yards with a lot of citrus they have become a terrible pest. Roof rats are not a North American species, at least historically, but they have been around for a long time in the southern Atlantic and Gulf Coast states from Virginia to Texas and throughout Florida. They have also made their way to the Pacific coast of California, Washington state, and Oregon. It is widely speculated that they came to Arizona on wheels, in the hold of cars or trucks moving trash or plants or soil or just about anything. We will probably never know, but they are here, and we have to deal with them. Right now, we just stay alert and try to rearrange any big mounds we find to keep them on the move. I suspect trapping or some other measure will be next. All these animals have challenged us, continually pushing against our desire to try and live congenially together without a constant need to kill or remove everything in our way. Rodents don’t really get that concept; they are basically fast growing, greedy mouths, ready food for the next guys up the food chain. Most of the other animals are what we’d call considerate, or at least tolerable, and are the best reminders I know of the fact that we are only one of countless creatures on this earth—and all of us deserve a chance at a secure place to live. For every morning that is punctuated by

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the singing of the coyotes, there is the afternoon gazing at the latest victim of the rabbits. Living a little wild is just a small struggle, one that will continue as long as we have this garden. I temporarily claim victory when we seem to have outmaneuvered one of them and am awed by the spectacle of watching all these lives play out next to ours. All of these animals remind me that we live in a large, complicated, intertwined world—one that we ignore and demean at our peril. I think if all our gardens inspired us to live more carefully with each other, instead of insisting on our dominance over all of the rest, it would be a more peaceful and richer world. In the end all our interests are the same: find a good mate, get a good meal, live in a safe, secure place, raise smart, good looking kids. It’s hard enough in the best of times; the least we can do is create gardens that help that along as best we can.

The Outback

it was a number of years before we addressed the issue of the outer garden, which we came to know as the Outback. There wasn’t much there when we arrived; three native mesquites, a small saguaro badly in need of care, a foothills palo verde in the farthest corner, and dozens of creosote. This area faces west for the most part, with most of it higher than the rest of the yard. It was, all in all, a hot, severe place, surrounded on three sides by the alleys. Along the wall that separated the Outback from the rest of the garden was a large oleander whose origins were baffling. Could anyone truly have planted it to face the abandoned area and the alleys? Perhaps—but all former owners were long gone, and both it and the bunny ears prickly pear (Opuntia microdasys) just seemed odd and out of place. We never watered the oleander or the prickly pear on purpose, and eventually took out the cactus when it had lived long past its prime and was in the way of other projects. But we did start a campaign to rescue the saguaro. I spend a lot of time with newcomers and novice gardeners and invariably, one of the things that baffles them the most is the care of succulents, especially cactus. Most have never lived with succulents, except perhaps for one or two in pots on the porch. I have come to understand that for many people these exquisitely adapted plants don’t register as “real” plants in the same way that shrubs, or trees, or salvias do. I have had people ask me in all earnestness whether cactus ever need watering. I have been bewildered by people who acknowledge the fruit on their cactus but insist it never 135

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bloomed. I have even had people ask me if they are in fact plants, and it is all I can do to wonder what else they think they might be. Many species of cacti, saguaro in particular, are native and more or less abundant throughout this area, and loads of gardeners here, experienced and not, imagine that they can just live on their own without any intervention from us, regardless of the circumstances. But here is what I have learned by living with these wonders for a long time and watching them grow in my garden and others. Where saguaros thrive in natural and exuberant abundance is where it is warm, like here, but where there is about twice the annual rainfall of the Phoenix area. This doesn’t mean they can’t or won’t grow here or elsewhere—they clearly do—but often they are either relics hanging on to a historic range, or they are in poor condition, or both. Given all that, I remain firm in my conviction that here in the low desert supplemental water about once a month in the summer is necessary to maintain a healthy saguaro, irrespective of its size. In addition, I have learned that it takes a large slug of water to rehydrate a severely depleted plant, and it is best if that water is delivered in stages rather than all at once. I am reminded of a starving dog: you can’t give it all the food it needs at once, it will just throw it up because its poor system can’t handle all that bounty at once; but let it absorb a bit by little bit over time, and its entire system understands once again how to absorb and take in food. It is much the same with badly abused plants, including saguaros, and boy have I seen a bunch of abused ones. The greatest sin visited upon these wonderful plants is to take large ones, yank them out of the ground, put them in a new place and fail to water them at all under the delusion that they are native so they can grow just fine. Well they could if they had a functional root system, which of course they don’t right off, or if they had much the same watering schedule over time that they had in their former home, which is an iffy proposition at best. So when I looked at the little fella out in the outer garden and saw how depleted he was, how tiny the expanse between its ribs had become, and how soft the skin was, I knew it would be a while before it looked fine. It did take some time, but it was worth it. Now it is the centerpiece of the outback garden, and although not large enough to flower yet, it will someday—you can just tell. We ran a waterline out to this hinterland early on and set up three faucets, more or less with an eye to the future. But we struggled for years with what in the world to do with it all. Various plans were considered and

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rejected, and it became clear fairly early on that nothing good could arise out there until we could afford to extend the fence. An avalanche of dumped materials accumulated while we waited for the fence funds: leftover sod from a project down the alley, and odd prunings and limbs from a wide array of trucks that roamed the alleys, constantly looking for a quick, cheap way to get rid of their load. Huge amounts of concrete and other material from various construction projects were already there when we moved in but seemed to grow with each passing season. We rarely saw anyone out there, but the accumulation grew clandestinely and began to be significant. Finally, funds in hand, we hired a contractor and had an extension built for the block wall that enclosed the back garden. Building a wall in our area is no mean feat: footings are scoured out of pure caliche, especially on that end of the property. We removed all the creosote in their path, and found that creosote are astonishingly easy to uproot, a little lift and tug and voila, the entire plant is out of the ground. We have never noticed the absence of even one of them. This wall united with the existing wall to create not just a larger garden but a whole new way of thinking about the entire back area. The large gate to the alley was gone, its opening now a gateway into what became the permanent vegetable garden. What had been the outer wall was now an inner wall with a big, white oleander rising over it like a cloud. It seemed ungainly to reach the area only through the vegetable garden, so the fence man and I waved our arms around, and he cut an opening in the existing wall to create an entry to the newly enclosed area more or less at the terminus of the stairs. To bring it all into the same aesthetic as the rest of the place, Gary painted it the same sandy pink as the house and the existing wall. Then it was time to figure out what to do with it all. I suppose all gardeners face this dilemma from time to time, but it seems to me a more common issue with a large garden. There is often a portion that is far from the house, outside the general daily action, but still too close to just let it maunder about on its own, sheltering whatever weeds, shrubs, and pests it prefers. While that might be a charming idea for an experiment in urban gardening, even such a casual gardener as I couldn’t put up with the wreck it actually appeared most of the time. Gardens aren’t nature, they are constructions, meant to be used and enjoyed. If they don’t look at least minimally inviting, what is the point? The evolution of the Outback began with an area dedicated to growing rugged, but ultimately fairly large, succulents and other desert species. We

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lovingly know it as the Jardin, in homage to a wonderful garden of much grander dimensions in the Mediterranean region. The existing resuscitated saguaro is its centerpiece, and now a Yucca treculeana has grown large enough there to bloom regularly. They are surrounded by an array of agaves, cacti, hesperaloe, and other desert plants that can take the difficult conditions. Once more, we resisted a regular irrigation system but are careful to water the area monthly during the summer. The progress of the plants there has been both stately and impressive. The other opportunity that we could hardly pass up once the fence was done was the recognition that there was now room to build a shade house and a small propagation area. The obvious place was against the existing wall, so that both the old and new wall would form two sides of the shade house. There was a native mesquite there that we could never consider removing, as we had already gone to a lot of trouble to keep it, so it became the western edge of this new growing area. When we first arrived and surveyed the Outback in detail, we noticed that what looked like two native mesquites growing along the big wash was actually three. Two were so close together you could not walk between them. I could not come up with a reason to keep them both, so I cut one down. As expected, the remaining tree flourished, growing taller and stronger without its twin. What I did not expect or anticipate was how tenaciously the stump left behind would cling to life. Almost without exception, legumes, and especially those from arid regions, have a huge number of latent buds at the base of the trunk, more or less where the main stem meets the ground. From the tree’s perspective this is highly desirable. Ruin of the main plant above ground by fire, greedy grazers, wind, drought, or other destructive forces, fires off the hormones that sends these buds into action, and the tree begins to regrow and recover. It’s marvelous, when you think about it. Unless you are trying to get rid of it. At first the small branches that erupted from the ground were interesting, and I would prune them once a year or so. But it quickly became clear that this light approach only renewed the tree’s impetus for growth, and without more intervention, we would have a tree on our hands within a year. We don’t have a stump router, and I won’t use the products that are advertised to kill a stump—they are much too wicked for my taste. But waiting for it to rot was clearly not going to work. So I just tried to kill it by continuous removal of those little shoots. Eventually I succeeded, but this is not a task for anyone with a busy schedule. Sometimes I had to go at it with saws when I got too busy to stay

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after the smaller, easier shoots. But in the end, if you are faithful to the task, the store of nutrients in the roots is finally exhausted and the stump dies. It took a long time, a lot of vigilance, and I still look over at that stump from time to time to make sure that a 3-foot shoot has not emerged overnight. I think it is easy to underestimate how much the availability of time and energy determine the look and shape of a garden. We both know that with unlimited time, or a full-time gardener, this garden would be much different. But then perfection has never been our goal, and we and our friends greatly enjoy its chaotic nature and slow (really, glacial) evolution. What looks lackadaisical is actually just the reality of how much time is at hand; but it all seems to eventually work out, and its very casualness suits all the other lives in the garden beautifully. So far, the trade-off has been worth it. After such a long bout with the mesquite stump, the thought of removing any living woody legume holds us back a bit and is probably why I did not take out the jacaranda deformed by a freeze when the opportunity presented itself. If I ever decide we need to remove a tree again, I would just dip into the bank and hire someone to at least get rid of the stump. Precious time spent in the garden should be more pleasant than watching for tenacious shoots to come up so you can kill them. Once you are a plant nut it becomes clear that you need to think seriously about where to keep all your plants. Clearly, most plants prefer being in the ground, but rare is the place that has room for them all, and rarer still is the time to get them all settled into the ground. That means, for plant collectors, there are a lot of potted plants hanging around. Until the shade house came along, the increasing horde of potted plants was a continual source of worry, embarrassment, and plant death. At first I thought I could just keep them on the side of the house behind the lime tree. This should have been a great location, plenty of sun, out of the way, out of sight, and fairly large. The only thing it lacked was water, but that was easily remedied. But this area never took off as a good holding pen. Its out-of-the-way location made it too easy to forget about them, the sun was more of a problem than a help, and it was virtually impossible to provide workable shade over them. All the plants were standing on the ground, which meant that pretty quickly their roots had found the soil and were firmly settled there. It was a mess that got worse and worse until we finally gave it up and moved them all to the back porch. This new location developed its own version of grim reality. The back porch is large, so they all fit in fine, but it is dark, with a solid roof. It is also in clear view of the living room, and while I have always dreamed that a

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greenhouse attached to the house, which you could walk in and out of as if were a room, would be delightful, this was not it. It was a dirt haven, it was a bug haven, it was too dark, and the plants were not liking it at all. We were anxiety ridden over the whole thing and couldn’t quite decide what to do about the entire mess. Once the wall was built to enclose the Outback, I knew we had the perfect place, but what kind of construction and how to go about it were questions holding things up. And then, just like in a bad commercial, the resolution came to us in the aisle of Costco. You could almost hear the trumpets sound as we both stopped dead in our tracks, staring at the solution right in front of us. It was marketed and labeled as a portable shade rig for a car or boat. It had white metal poles that rose up high enough to walk under, with a heavy, white canvas-type covering. It cost $160, which was far and away cheaper than any of the greenhouse kits we had been exploring. It came home with us that very afternoon. Gary dug holes, and I poured the concrete in which we set the poles to make the structure secure. Gary figured it needed more wind resistance, so we measured, made a couple more trips to the building supply store, and fitted and added long strips of metal along the sides and over the top. We ditched the white canvas covering and ordered two 30-percent-shade cloths, with the idea that one would stay up all year and the other would be there only in the winter. I gave up after the first year, and now both stay up year-round and the plants love it. Serendipitously, we found some heavy-duty shelving, bought some others, and gleefully moved the plants to their new home. For a number of years my parents gave us a gift certificate to Home Depot for Christmas, and each year we spent it on a bit more of the pavers for the floor. When it was done, in good public garden fashion we christened it the Ed and Amy Kutac Shadehouse Floor, in recognition of their aid in its completion. Later, I found a cold frame that I set up off the floor for seeds, and I was in business. The shade house sits snugly between the wall and the big mesquite, and while there are still way too many plants hanging around in there waiting their turn, it is a splendid place and makes caring for them, worrying over them, and selecting them for new garden locales a pleasure instead of a trial. After a while, we thought it might be a nice touch if we lined the walkway from the inner garden to the end of the Outback with Important Plants. That resulted in a path now lined with dasylirions, nolinas, and a couple of palms in the genus Brahea, all of which might look important in our

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next lifetime. Although there is an irrigation system for them, these plants are moving slowly toward maturity, in some cases incredibly slowly. But then, we are not in a rush and are enjoying watching their deliberate pace to grandeur. At the farthest end of the area, where the fence comes more or less to a point as the two alleys unite, the ground fell away abruptly, making it five or six feet lower than the rest of the garden. Stepping in, you could not see over the wall. A foothills palo verde that sprouted on its own rises up there, and a rambunctious graythorn on the other side of the wall hosts legions of birds, but this little pit was a puzzle. For a time, we thought of building a work area there, but its greatest use has turned out to be as a dump, a place to take all the plant trash that is too small for the alley men to take away and too large or inappropriate for the compost pile. It is marvelous to have such a place; I feel virtuous and planet friendly every time we empty a wheelbarrow there. Over the years, the level has been raised about three feet, and we mine it for potting soil for new beds from time to time. It is behind a wall of creosote, as far away as you can get in this garden, and causing us no harm or difficulties. Most gardens are not large enough, especially in the urban core, to have anything like an Outback garden. For us it has been both a great trial—trying to find things that fit and work there—and also something like a relief valve. Certainly I am thrilled with the shade house/propagation area, although I do wish we could bring the number of potted plants under greater control. Yet the sense of space, room to roam or to wander, is irreplaceable. It isn’t wild at all but feels less controlled and more unruly that all the rest of the garden. And for me, that feels delicious—offering a place that always seems new, with a different perspective on both the neighborhood and on our own house and garden. From here I can see just how huge the two native mesquites really are, how big the southern sky is as it soars over the buttes and houses around us, and how snug and settled and almost invisible the house remains even though I am only a quick walk from the back door. The odd and often difficult Outback, despite all our struggles to wrestle it into shape, has become a place of reflection and great peace in this garden and, ironically, one of its greatest treasures.

Bugs

we live in a world with uncountable numbers of insects and invertebrates, a group we collectively call “bugs.” These lives are the most numerous on our planet (I think this is true) but to most of us they are either invisible, irrelevant, or too much in our way. It is fanciful, and tantalizing, to imagine an insect-driven world, supported and arranged to suit their needs. In such a world tall would be anything over a couple of inches, and huge would be anything beyond about six inches. Buildings, roads, stadiums, and airports would be entire worlds—continents really. Far might be any distance over a few yards, and a mile or more might be similar to crossing the Pacific. The daily lives of most bugs, if scaled up to human size, would horrify us. It is no wonder insects are the basis for so many B-list science fiction films. But who are we kidding? The world already chiefly belongs to them. We are so large compared to them and so wrapped up in our own needs and concerns that we merely pretend to be in charge; insects manage the realm in such a quiet, virtually unseen, manner that we are easily left to our comforting illusions of control and pride. Only a tiny fraction of the tens of thousands of insect and invertebrate species around the world are considered “beneficial” by us. Yet, the truth is, all have their place and their role in keeping life intact, and life as we know it would cease to exist without them. If you doubt their power, consider the challenge laid out by Dave Langston, a retired entomologist in Arizona, to every audience he addresses. His 143

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admonition goes like this: recall how long, and how vigorously people have been trying to get rid of insects, probably since man became man. And with what success? Not a jot so far as we know. He points out that not one single insect species has become extinct owing to the targeted efforts of men. Many species have faced extermination as a byproduct of our actions, chiefly by habitat loss, but so far our pathetic wars on them have not even scared them. I can believe it. It is obvious to me, after years spent in intimate and often contentious relationships with a host of bugs, that they are in charge. They are generally oblivious to our presence. We are of such trivial consequence to the smooth running of their lives that we are more like odd weather events, creating a nuisance for them from time to time, than a serious threat. But they have an immense impact on our life, an impact particularly noticeable in the life of our gardens. The world insects inhabit in many ways reflects our own. Slavery and subjugation is rampant and firmly established. Cooperation and loving attention is lavished on selected females—chiefly only for as long as it takes to mate—and occasionally on the young. Countless insects and bugs simply leave their young to raise themselves and to make their way to adulthood all on their own. The infirm are not only left to die but often assisted to their deaths, as supper. Although there is little to suggest that insects kill for any reason other than food or colony protection, many insects dispatch others in some of the most gruesome and horrific ways imaginable. It gives me the shudders just to picture what takes place at a spiderweb, or how an aphid lion disposes of aphids, or the ravages of those tiny parasitic larvae on the back of a tomato hornworm. On the other hand, I have to stand back and admire their tenacity, their incredible gift for work, and their astounding ability to get on with what they do no matter how small they are or how many obstacles are presented in their path. Numerous insects, particularly bees and ants, serve as fine examples of living together, serving the greater good, and tending the home fires. And the truth is, nature as we know it, including us, would cease to exist without them. It is easy to get caught up in the tales of their destruction in a garden, how bad they were in any given year, or how recalcitrant in the face of our onslaughts. But it is a wise gardener who remembers how much good insects and bugs do in the garden, as well as how much of a partner they are in the success of our gardening endeavors.

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Bugs are the engine of a compost pile, turning and working through all the leavings and detritus, churning and grinding it through their minuscule guts, breaking it all down into bits tiny enough to enable even smaller invertebrates, bacteria, and fungi to finish off the transformation of leftover lettuce leaves to pure, black, garden gold. Bugs are also the reason that all the things that have lived and died on the earth are no longer with us, cluttering up the place. Imagine four billion years or so of critters and plants, living and dying over the earth. If they had not all been neatly and firmly disposed of, chiefly by bugs, where would we be? Living on the biggest garbage pile in the universe is where. Insects are also one of the principal agents of continuing plant life, ensuring that the flowers are pollinated and seeds are produced. Although it is nice to imagine that plants’ flowers are made attractive to please our sensibilities, plants actually evolved gorgeous flowers to seduce insects to gather pollen and move it to another flower’s receptive pistil. Seed, fruit, crops, and indeed our very existence hinges on the shadowy daily doings of a vast array of insects and bugs. We could be more grateful than we are. So before you grab that bottle of poison, or lift your hand to wipe off the aphids, or grab the secateurs to dispatch that nasty big grasshopper gaily munching on your favorite perennial, give the bugs a moment of respect. They deserve a salute, like the warriors of old inhaling the dying breath of their victims to absorb their strength, an offering of respect for a life given in support of ours. As I see it, then and only then can you properly wield the knife. •  •  •

There are lots and lots of bugs in our garden; some I pay strict attention to, others wander around without garnering much notice. I, like most people, generally pay attention to them when they are causing trouble, and so it was with the cactus longhorn beetle. In the late spring, when the evenings are cool and last for a long time, we sit on the back patio enjoying the end of the day. One spring, we noticed that the San Pedro cactus (Trichocereus spathianus) had something wrong with the tips. A quick look confirmed that there was indeed something going on. This is a slim-bodied cactus with numerous stems of varying sizes arising from the base of the plant. Most of its stem tips are within easy eye range, and a close look showed that they were brown, with tiny gouges that looked suspiciously like teeth marks. The marks, however, were odd,

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not quite right for teeth, but gnawing was certainly taking place. There was no evidence of the black goo of bacterial infections or the strange discolorations so typical of virus. We decided it was a mystery and kept wondering about it for a number of nights to come. Then one evening, not too long after we first noticed the symptoms, we found our marauder. At first all we noticed was a large bug, almost two inches long, ambling up to the cactus. It was black, hard shelled, and had a remarkable set of horned projections coming out of its head. Like most insects, when we stood up and leaned over to get a closer look, it ignored us completely. I felt like Alice poking her big head into the miniature world below. This creature was not particularly graceful; he had a hump-thump kind of walk, first a quick step, then a long step, creating a certain bizarre rhythm. But this did not hold him up, and he made good time crossing over the patio, proceeding another three or four feet into the bed to the base of the San Pedro cactus. We had no idea at the time what it was, and were just looking at it with a blend of curiosity and awe. Sometimes insects are like that; you get to spy on them, and it is another soothing way to spend time in the garden. As soon as the insect found the base of the San Pedro cactus, it began the ascent of one of the 5-foot stems. It was a deliberate move, and it proceeded non-stop, heading directly for the top. We were fascinated and quickly calculated that this was similar to either of us walking straight up a 30-story building one evening just to get to the top and take in the view. As soon as it mounted the top, it set to work on the tender tip, munching and chewing its way around the full girth of the stem. To our astonishment, we realized that this was our culprit. At first it nibbled delicately around the area, but soon it tucked in for a nice long feed, working methodically and surely. Despite our fascination, we felt we needed to rescue the cactus and quickly cut short this insect’s career in our garden with a pair of pruners. A little investigation informed me that this was a cactus longhorn beetle, an insect with a long history with the cactus species of the lower Sonoran Desert. They are a flightless member of a huge group of insects that all have long front legs, highly specialized pinchers, and long, often white-banded, antennae. Some of the tropical members are absolutely incredible, up to four inches long, with antennae twice that length, marked by vivid and odd color variations. The Asian longhorn beetle hitched a ride into California, probably on timber shipments, and is causing great chaos over there.

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The one in our garden has a close relative that lives in the higher elevation desert grasslands, and another that lives in the forest and grasslands of Arizona that, unusually for this group, can fly. Our small, humpbacked cactus longhorn beetle marches around the desert floor eating cactus seedlings, chewing on a wide variety of pads, cholla stems, and tips. San Pedro cactus is a South American species, so it appears that almost any good cactus will do. Their feeding choice makes them a pariah among collectors of cacti, because all that bounty is just a feast for them and, apparently like us, new and exotic flavors are more interesting than the old tried and true ones. Some of the damage that you see from time to time on barrel cactus, resulting in an explosion of smaller heads on the top, is the result of injury sustained by the feeding of this little critter. Cactus longhorn beetles lay one egg within the tissue of a cactus. Here they are even more indiscriminate and will leave eggs even in plants on which they do not normally feed. The tiny larvae burrow into the soft tissue, feeding along and leaving a tiny trail of green, then black, residue outside the hole. Large cacti can withstand the predation of many larvae within their tissue and show no appreciable damage. Smaller plants, however, can be ruined, and the death is dramatic; the plant seems to suddenly melt and fall down. Small saguaros, less than 6 inches tall, are especially vulnerable to quick death when they serve as the nursery for this beetle out in the wilds of the desert. If you find yourself with more cactus longhorn beetles than you can abide, pick them off one at a time—it is the surest way to control their numbers. Once you have reduced them to an acceptable level, it will take a long time for newcomers to make the long trek over from a nearby garden or desert area to reestablish in your garden. By some estimates this migration takes five years or more. They show up in our garden, at least to the point where we notice them, in the warm weather, especially after a monsoon shower. I remove any that are causing serious problems, but I have no illusion that they are all gone, nor would I want them to be. One of the greatest delights of this garden is how many naturally occurring critters have found a congenial home here smack in the middle of a the fifth largest city in the country. I am willing to share, but only up to a point; balance is everything. We finished the shade house in late July, and once the shade cloth arrived and was installed, it was ready to receive the plants. This meant a great

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movement of the potted plants into their new home. By this time, most of the plants had been moved off the porch and were staged down near the compost pile. We had them on used wooden pallets to keep them off the ground and fully expected that, when we took away all the pots and turned over those pallets, it would be like opening the proverbial can of worms. I also expected to find things that had been long lost. We were not disappointed. The dogs had lost two throwing toys known as Kongs over the years, and we could never find them. I was convinced they were under those pallets. Instead, I found a ball that I do not remember every owning, but which delighted the cattle dog who would run after anything. No Kongs; but after the rude intrusion of sunlight there was a blizzard of various insects and bugs, scurrying away with a thousand quick frantic movements. Most of them were small roaches and crickets. Then a few pillbugs (or sowbugs) lumbered out of the way. Some people call them roly-polys for their habit of curling up into a hard, round puck when they feel threatened. I adored these little bugs when I was a girl and had whole groups of them in jars and other containers just to watch them curl up like this. Somehow they lived, but you have to admire their resilience in the face of infantile bug play; they were a source of great fascination for me. Pillbugs are actually terrestrial isopods and are not insects at all, but invertebrates. They are more closely related to other creatures that carry their skeleton on the outside like shrimp, lobsters, crabs, and water fleas. They breathe by gills and need a humid environment, which is why they are so common in dark, moist places like under the pallets, beneath a wellwatered potted plant, or throughout the layers of the compost pile. Pillbugs eat a wide range of leaf litter, rotting wood, decaying or dead vegetation, and, when available, tiny plants and roots. I could never bring myself to go into serious control measures for them, but when they get a bit too numerous in the shade house, or I detect that they are not only underneath the pot but inside it, I just move the pot around. Keeping pots out of contact with soil by raising them up slightly or shifting them around helps keep the numbers of pillbugs down. Frankly, they are much too valuable in the compost pile to get too worried about them, and they are easy to keep under control if you make the place where you found them drier, brighter, and less congenial. Beneath the pallet there were also two large luminescent beetles. Their shiny black backs were coated with a thin veneer of brilliant metallic green. They were very clumsy and looked like they were desperately trying to

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get under the soil. To do this they tipped themselves up, face first in the soil, and began to squirm and generally thrash around. One of them just panicked, spinning in circles of dismay, running and turning, running and turning, but they both finally succeeded in getting below the cover of soil. I am pretty sure that this was a pair of bark-gnawing beetles, but I am not entirely certain. This was one of only two or three times I have seen this beetle, which is generally found under fallen wood or beneath the bark of dead trees. It feeds on the larvae of other beetles. They are dark dwellers, and that would explain their extreme panic when I moved the pallet. And I wonder, like other watchers of this sensational insect must, why such a denizen of the dark has such brilliant coloration. There were also a few darkling beetles, aka stink beetles, clown bugs, or pinacate beetles. Their genus name, Eleodes, derives from the Greek for “olivelike,” and that aptly describes their oval shape and jet black coloration. I like the term pinacate, which comes from the Nahuatl and means black beetle. These insects are very dark, with the most peculiar and startling defense response. When they feel threatened, the beetle turns its face to the soil, raises its backside in the air, and releases an oily spray that can travel many inches, often up to a foot, away from the insect. It stinks horribly, and they stand nearly on their head to release it. Dogs that have encountered them won’t fool with them again, and that of course is the general idea. Pinacate beetles are mainly active at twilight or dawn until the fall, when they are more likely to be seen during the day. It is reported that they are great walkers, traveling and wandering, seemingly at random, along the desert floor. Few animals or insects besides ourselves wander aimlessly around, so they are likely in search of something—perhaps food, which is generally plant matter, dead or alive, including grain if they come upon it. They have been known to take in fruit and dog food when it is available. Above ground, and considerably more visible, are the ladybugs (perhaps more properly known as lady beetles and sometimes ladybird beetles) with their rounded shell in red and black. These are wonderful companions in a garden. They, and their larvae especially, eat incredible numbers of aphids and scale insects, but in my experience, the release of those pitiful trapped ones in purchased containers rarely works out well for you or the ladybug. There are native species in the garden and introduced species in the marketplace, and they can be very difficult for the novice to tell apart. However, they all share the voracious appetite for aphids that marks this group.

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It is common for the purchased ones to simply fly away, looking for something more to their preference than your yard. I like to just encourage ladybugs to take up residence in the vicinity of the vegetable garden by leaving some litter and weeds around as long as I can stand it, and allowing aphids to stay a little longer than I’m comfortable with, to leave food for their larvae, called aphid lions. Then I wait for them to emerge, and they always do. Most of us have found grubs while digging in the garden, especially in the fluffy rich soil of a vegetable garden. Gary’s parents once had a dog, aptly named Cricket, who adored these things. She would hang over the edge of any hole you were digging waiting for you to unearth one and then pounce on it like a lion before you could even lift it out with the shovel. She never seemed to reach her limit. Birds also love them, and I usually just take these larvae, which feast on young seedlings and their tender roots, out of the vegetable garden and lay them along the path. It is never long before a thrasher or a cactus wren has spotted it and devoured it in one great gulp. I like to help things along when I can. In our area, many of these grubs are the larvae of the annoying but not especially harmful June beetle. We knew them as June bugs where I was raised, and they have a habit of trying to fly right into your face or your arms and stick to you with their raspy legs. They make a loud buzzing noise and generally are a nuisance more than anything. The screen on the patio door usually has two or three hanging on during the late summer when they are very active. But without doubt, the most impressive insect in the garden is the enormous adult palo verde borer. In the early days of the garden, we weren’t sure what they were and, sitting out on warm evenings just as the monsoon was about to begin, listening to cicadas deafen us with their calls, we would see this immense insect rocketing around the patio. It flew like it didn’t know what to do, or where to go, and would crash and bash about the garden. Gary got into the habit of taking a baseball bat and trying to connect with the thing, sometimes successfully, sometimes not. We quickly found out its proper name and a lot more about its habits. When the big blue palo verde went down, we found the hole was littered with the 5-inch long, white, extremely revolting larvae of this beetle. There is a lot of discussion about how much damage these larvae do or do not do to tree roots. There is one camp that insists that they kill a tree, and another that insists with equal vigor that a healthy tree can easily withstand

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their predation and that they are only the final agent of death in old ones, like pneumonia. Who knows? But they are certainly able to eat a lot of something to get that big and, considering that they are known to remain as larvae for up to 5 years, that could amount to a lot of roots. Even the dogs were intimidated by these creatures, although Rosie gamely took one away to eat it. I could not watch. As far as I know there are no reliable measures to either get rid of or prevent these critters from laying their eggs and living beneath your garden for years on end. I have to admit that I find the adult an interesting visitor in the garden, and they have now come to be a marker of impending rain, much like cicadas, so that a year without them bodes very bad indeed. It used to be that the standard for the beginning of the monsoon or thunderstorm season here in the low desert was a run of three days with a dew point over 55 degrees. In 2008 the weather service changed its mind, and now it is considered a season that begins on the fifteenth of June and ends at the end of September. While all that is fine and makes perfect sense to me, I continue to judge the beginning of the season by the activity of the palo verde beetle and by the shrill call of the cicada. Cicadas would be a completely invisible visitor to the garden if it wasn’t for their astounding call. It is the males that are so worked up, and naturally it is all for the benefit of drawing in a receptive and willing female to mate. But what a cacophony it is. After two or three years in the ground as small larvae, feeding lightly on the sap of tree or shrub roots, the cicada tunnels out in late spring or early summer and climbs up a tree. There it molts a few times; if you have sharp eyes and are out a lot you find the husk left from these molts around the base of your trees. Once all the molts are done, the male starts up the chorus. Adults are good-sized bugs, some up to two inches long, with the hard shell, big rounded eyes, and long wings of their kind. The wings are clear and look more like a frame than a wing. The sound is made by a set of ribbed membranes near the abdomen that contract and relax at astonishing speed to create the distinctive high-pitched sound. It is reported to be among the loudest insect sounds in the world, and that is easy to credit if you have ever sat beneath the tree on which a male is sounding off. To make it all that much more enticing for females, males of one hatching sometimes gang together and sing all at once. The pitch and loudness is enough to be painful to the human ear in some circumstances, and when a chorus is singing together, you cannot hear or speak over the noise. Some report

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that you can hear a single cicada at a distance of 440 yards; that is, four football fields plus a bit. At a distance, the sound is enchanting and awe inspiring—close up it is annoying. Male cicadas sing the loudest during the heat of the day. This is considered to be a strategy to avoid predators, chiefly birds, which are more active in the morning and evening hours. Once a female has fallen over with glee at some male’s sound, they mate, and she runs off to lay her eggs. This is most often done at the ends and edges of mesquites, and sometimes other woody desert plants. The female makes a tiny saw cut—it looks like a minute version of the wooden musical instrument known as a fish—and lays her eggs there. This activity usually kills the end of the branch and serves as a gentle, natural pruning on the plant. It is never enough damage to notice, much less harm the tree. Once the eggs hatch, they fall off and burrow into the ground to begin their life underground. We try to leave the house open for as long as possible in the late spring. For years we did not use a screen on the patio door because there were no mosquitos to speak of here. That changed about five or six years ago, and the screen is now a necessity to hold these biting buzz saws back. But before that, the house would nearly fill every spring with the delicate green lacewings that were attracted to the lights. These are delicate fliers with small, slim bodies dominated by over-sized, gossamer thin, pale green wings. Lacewings are common over most of North America and occur in our garden in the late spring, usually in vast numbers. The adults feed on aphids and other soft-bodied insects, as well as nectar and pollen. But their tiny larvae are voracious feeders on aphids, red spider mites, thrips, and whiteflies; the eggs of leafhoppers, moths, and leafminers; small caterpillars; and some beetle larvae. I don’t know what attracts them in such numbers to the garden, but I am thrilled they are here. They don’t bother a thing, unless you are an aphid, and I consider them one of my greatest helpers out in the garden. One May I was out trying to pollinate a manfreda, and one flew directly to the stalk on which I was working. I imagined that it was curious about what I was doing—for sure it kept a sharp eye on me—but that was probably pure fantasy on my part. It is more likely I interrupted a good feast of manfreda nectar or pollen, and it was simply waiting for me to get out of its way. It never moved, patiently waiting for me to back away, which I did eventually, once done with my work.

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I was once lucky enough to find lacewing eggs down beneath the large mesquite, in a messy area where a rambunctious podranea covers almost everything near it. For some reason I was messing around down there and a little string of what looked like tiny pearls caught my eye. I stared at it for a while, called Gary over and, while we were pretty sure it was a line of insect eggs, it was a long time before we came to understand that they were almost certainly the eggs of green lacewing. They hung from a thread, tiny little cases of pure white, dangling in the leaves. How could anything that tiny, and that vulnerable, ever make it? But considering the host of lacewings around the place, they must know better than we do. Lacewings are another good excuse not to be too rigorous about cleaning up, at least in some parts of the garden. The adults spend the winter in leaf litter, and once the weather turns to spring, the females lay those beautiful eggs. It takes less than a week for the larvae to emerge and attach themselves to their new plant home. In the late spring, out in the front on the desert milkweed (Asclepias subulata) we almost always find an array of hawk wasps along the stems. These are beautiful red and black slim-bodied beetles that are visitors to the desert milkweed. They use the desert milkweed as a sex palace in the spring. Here they find each other and perform the astounding feat of coupling with each other for hours at a time, occasionally even flying while joined up. Entomologists speculate widely on why such a behavior would ever be beneficial; it seems self defeating. But it is possible that it works to make them seem larger than they are, and since they are black and red—often the color of danger and bad taste in bugs—it may work to deter any predator. Who knows? Perhaps they are merely randy little things and this is their one big moment. Grasshoppers aren’t common in the garden, and only once did they arrive in such numbers and with such appetites that they devoured almost everything they landed on. Those were big, gray-brown guys, with a fierce attitude and just as ferocious a way of eating. But the tiny emerald grasshopper I found once in the west perennial bed was a true charmer. I was watering with a spray wand around the back patio, and when I got in the vicinity of the California fuchsia, a small, green bug launched out of the adjacent shrubbery and landed on a pale gray chair cushion. It was a tiny, bright green grasshopper, with all the moxie typical of most grasshoppers. It stood its ground, glaring at me from the cushion, looking neither pleased nor friendly. Considering it was about one inch long, and I am around 67 inches tall, I was impressed with its attitude. There is

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something aggressive about the posture of grasshoppers anyway, perhaps because of those overly large back legs that look poised for any attack. This one made me think of the axiom, so often applied to tiny, noisy dogs: He doesn’t know how small he is. This minute grasshopper looked so fierce, so ready for action; you could just see his figurative dukes go up. He stayed there until I finished watering and left the patio, watching my every move. When I looked back after returning the hose, it was gone, back into the shrubbery that had hid it so well. I saw it just that once, but it brought up a smile and made the chore of watering a fine adventure that morning. I have the most awfully ambivalent attitude toward ants—the tremendous industry, clever communal solutions, and plain doggedness awe me, but those same traits result in the most insistent and pervasive assaults on my garden, my house, and my person. My attitude and admiration depend greatly on the circumstances, and whether or not I am coping with them outside in the garden or inside in the kitchen. My fascination with ants began early on. When I was a girl in central Texas we had lots of large and lumbering ants around the barnyard. These big red ants built immense underground compounds into which there was only one opening. We called them red ants, and around the main, or perhaps the only, entrance to their caverns the ground was swept clean as a cinder cone, with the small hole from which they came and went perfectly centered in the clearing. These ants did not bite unless they were greatly disturbed, but you would remember a bite for a long time if it happened. With care you could watch them for a long time, and both you and they remained undisturbed. I remember parking on a stool outside the boundary of that swept earth, spying on them for long intervals, astonished at their comings and goings. My sisters and I would sometimes lay down a corn chip, or a piece of bread, or a leaf, just to watch how they worked. If the piece was not more than twice its size, a single ant simply hoisted it up, arranged it more or less on its back, and hauled it away. This was an especially common maneuver when they were hauling leaves. Larger pieces required a cooperative approach, with three, four, or up to six ants working to drag the prize to the hole. Astoundingly, they did not lift it up in a kind of Chinese dragon approach, or push it along, but turned around and dragged it by moving backward toward the opening. Once there, a larger group would begin work on the piece, frantically cutting it down to size and shoving the bits down the hole. They worked hurriedly, racing in and out of the hole.

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Occasionally, we miscued and laid down a piece that was just too large to haul or drag. Once the ants realized this, they began to tear it down to size right where it lay before dragging and shoving the pieces over to the hole. All of this, no matter what method was used, took some time, and I couldn’t take my eyes off of them. Mouths too tiny to see were gnawing and sawing until the pieces were moveable, legs that looked like specks of dust were hefty enough to lift up a piece over twice their size. How could I not be impressed? Although those particular ants aren’t found in this garden, much the same methods are used by the smaller ants here to devour the food they bring home to the queen and all those larvae. As a general rule, I leave outside ants alone unless they are in the walkway of the vegetable garden, right where I put my foot when I turn on the tap, or inside a pot that I fiddle with a lot. Most of the ants that bother me outside are the native fire ant, a fierce protector of everything it values, biting in a kamikaze-like attack if you get too near them. These fellows sting hard; they are not large but they hurt, and somehow there is never just one on you but a dozen or two. So I either steer clear and try to leave them alone, or take quick and fast measures if that is not working out. I know from reading that there are numerous other species of ants here but frankly, ant taxonomy eludes me—I have enough trouble dealing with them without trying to attach a name to each and every kind. Because I have no interest in using the drastic poisons marketed to kill ants, I am in a continuous quest for methods that might work reasonably well and fit my overall need for control, but will not send Mother Earth screaming for the exits. I have tried a vast number of these methods; some have worked moderately well, some have been a colossal failure, and others are still under study. Pouring boiling water down the hole is a lousy method, at least in this garden. Common sense should have told me that this was a ridiculous idea but I had to try it anyway. It never resulted in more than short-term annoyance to the ants. First of all, ants have cleverly built their underground homes with a complicated series of tunnels and various elevations intended to control unwanted water. This is why you don’t see ants floating around after a normal desert rain, only after a near flood. Then there is the fact that even boiling water, once taken from the stove, walked out to the garden, and poured on the ground has little hope of staying more than warm after

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traveling even a few inches in the cool soil. In addition, a kettle holds a paltry amount of water compared to the number of ants and the scope of the tunnels. It did not take more than one or two attempts at this method, widely recommended to me by a lot of people, to give it up. Later I turned to petroleum jelly when the ants began to wander up the stems of the okra and eat the emerging buds. Around the same time, the ants were also causing absolute havoc on the eggplant, something that only began after twelve years of successfully growing eggplants in this garden. At first I left them alone, thinking they were just heading for nectar, or maybe aphids on the plant. But then it became clear that they were eating the fruit, taking great gouges out of it, and ruining it entirely. They would do this to fruit of any age and size, and I became obsessed with trying to keep them off it. I read about the application of petroleum jelly to kill ants in some earnest treatise on organic gardening and thought it sounded easy enough. Clearly, the writer had not tried it on okra or eggplant or perhaps on anything in the desert because it was a catastrophe. While it did indeed deter or trap the ants, it also destroyed the stem of the okra, turning it black and mushy in a day or two. I figure that the goo got so hot that it cooked the stem; they all fell over within a day or two of the application, and I lost the entire okra crop. The jelly goo was no more successful on the eggplant, although it took a bit longer to ruin the plant. I considered using a collar of paper wrapped around the stem and putting the jelly on that instead, but was so heartsick at the loss of the okra and the eggplant that I gave up the entire petroleum jelly approach as another fiasco in my dealings with ants. The next year I went back to my sources and found enthusiastic testimonials about the use of diatomaceous earth. This sounded good in theory, although by this time, I was enormously skeptical of anything that pretended to control ants. I had already been through a number of other products, too dreary to list, all of them a complete failure. At least diatomaceous earth was easy. I had learned years ago that the stuff that is sold for swimming pools by the same name is not the stuff you want. Horticultural grade diatomaceous earth is generally obtained by mail order, and that is what I did. I coated the plants with it, dusted it over the leaves and coated the ground around the plants. It seemed to do all right; I did not see ants on the fruit, and they certainly seemed to avoid the stuff. But it has a terrible flaw; it cannot get wet.

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The ants must have had guards on duty 24/7, because the second the white clouds dissipated, either from time or from getting wet, and an opening was available, the ants were there. I thought the product worked all right, if you have either the time or the dedication to spend all your waking hours making sure to replace it if and when it gets wet. The latest efforts involve cornmeal, and the jury is still in consultation on this method. Again, who knows what odd organic growing source I read this in, but it sounded so easy and so odd, I had to try it. The first attempt was in a large pot in which an ant colony had set up camp. This is a common occurrence in the shade house and very annoying. The first time I saw the colony I went in and spread cornmeal all over the top of the pot surface. I came back in two days and all the ants were gone. I called that an early success, but will never call it a total success until I have used it a number of times in a number of situations just to be sure. That leaves me with one tried and true method, one I have used for years. It is tedious and time consuming, and I call it the orange peel method. When I first learned it, I thought it was too good to be true, but it works very well at ravaging ant colonies. But in the case of the fire ants it must be done repeatedly to have any hope of containing them, because our native fire ants do not have a system of underground tunnels accessed by one or two discrete openings. Rather, they live in a loose aggregation of soil, with tunnels running willy-nilly all over the place and numerous openings in the three- or four-foot area that each colony occupies. If you have ants with the single entry hole, like ones of my youth, this method is a snap. The orange peel method works like this. Cut up an orange or two, peel and all—in fact, the peel is the most important part. Only oranges work for this; no other citrus contains the correct chemicals to get the job done. These do not have to be very high quality oranges, and considering that you have to do this in the summer, that is a good thing. Put the pieces in a blender or food processor with enough water to turn it all into a thick slurry. Pour it immediately onto the entry hole of the colony. In the case of the fire ants, stirring up the area where you see their little mounds helps distribute the fumes better. But beware—the ants do not take this lying down. Leave it there at least a couple of hours, or until it becomes dry. The orange peel is full of a volatile chemical that is toxic to ants, with the vapor released by the blender action, and it quickly floods throughout the chambers. Because it is volatile, it doesn’t stick around long, so it is important to make up the goo and spread it around without delay. It helps to lay it down

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during the hottest part of the day, again because volatilization is quicker with heat. With luck, it kills lots of ants, or at least makes them hate living there. But again, repeated applications are necessary with fire ants. Our dogs love the stuff, and will eat it up when it dries. It looks disgusting but is harmless. Alternately, you can just lift it off and throw it into the compost pile. Once dry, its work is done. The truth is that ants are actually friendly to a good garden in their own way. They clean up tons of messes and remove all kinds of dead insects, leaves, fruit, and other detritus. Many of them feed ravenously on aphids and other plant-sucking creatures. They turn the ground over and over, bringing air and water to zones deep below the surface. If they weren’t so quick to bite, or if they would leave the okra and eggplant alone, even the fire ants might get a better hearing in my vegetable garden, and I wouldn’t spend so much time and effort on elimination strategies. Of course the invasion of the house is entirely another matter. Tiny ants of another type than the fire ants begin to show up around the sink in the early summer, when it is hot and dry. They find their way inside through minute cracks in the caulking around the window over the sink. The first inkling that the ants are back comes from Gary, who is often up in the night looking for a drink of water or a light snack, when he finds a thin trail of ants, indicating that it’s time for vigilance and ant control. Ants communicate with each other with chemical signals from their mouths and their feet, rubbing and touching each other in order to pass along the information of where they have been and what they have found. This is why the trail is so important, and why they are slavish in following the exact dimensions of the trail laid out before them. Ants going toward the food pass on the location to ants returning from the colony, who are also reinforcing the information that they are on the right path. Find an ant that is not on the path and you find a frantic, frenzied ant randomly scouring the ground trying to find its way back to the chemical trail its brethren have laid. Some suggest that if you simply wash the trail with soap and water thoroughly and repeatedly you more or less break the spell, and the ants will not return to that spot. It might work. I have often wondered how they keep the map of our place in their collective head over the months when they are not inside at all, but it must be a safe spot because they have rarely failed to show up at least once most of the summers we have been in the house. One night Gary came upon an especially large horde roaming around the sink and the counter adjacent to it. He grabbed the first thing at hand

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under the sink and began wildly spraying the ants on the counter. It turned out to be Windex, and it immediately killed them all—it was miraculous. I figure it must be the ammonia, but this ordinary, cheap household product kills ants quickly and surely and is probably no more, and possibly much less, harmful to all and sundry than the heinous products on the market particularly targeted to rid you of the ants. When you think of the journey they take just to get into the kitchen and look for the most minuscule meal, it is breathtaking. Surely there must be easier and faster pickings somewhere out in the garden. First they have to make the journey across the yard from the nest. The few times I have tracked them back it is quite a distance from that window, especially for an ant. Then they must mount their own version of the assault on Everest, crawling vertically the four feet or so up to the window. I guess I could calculate how far that would be for me to climb, but it exhausts me just to think of it. Once they reach the sill it is pretty smooth sailing to find the tiny crack that some enterprising scout has located and voila—they have returned to the promised land. As I wash them up with the dish towel, a tiny flint of regret crosses my mind, wondering why am I bothering to kill them so thoroughly. They are very helpful; they remove all kinds of tiny debris that I cannot even see. On their first one or two forays, they do not roam out of the kitchen sink and its immediate environs, and they leave before dawn. But the thing is you can never trust insects, much less ants, to behave in ways that are comfortable for us; they are inspired by the maxim—give them an inch and they’ll take a mile. Before you know it, your trusted ant cleanup pals could be looking for treasure in the dust bunnies under the armchair, rooting through the dog beds for the goldmine of dust and bits they bring in, marching into the bathroom following the delightful aroma of water. And we would no longer be living in the house—the ants would. Would we then have to write them polite notes, or send them little presents to gain permission to enter the house while they were busy? It just would not do. So we kill all the ones that are brave or stupid enough to come in the house every night and continue to seal and worry over the cracks and wipe up the trail as best we can. This agonizing death campaign continues until the return of the monsoon rains when they generally take their leave, preferring to live out in the humid air of the desert.

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Once, after a particularly savage campaign on our part, when I had killed hundreds that came in and assaulted the cupboard where the honey is kept, I was so saddened by it all that I left the bodies where they lay. I had the fanciful idea that the word would get back to the nest that this was a killing ground, and they would stay away. In my pathetic hope that they would get the message, I was willing to wait to clean up the bodies in the morning. Naturally, and as always, I had underestimated the ants. When I came in early the next morning, there wasn’t one single ant body in the kitchen. They had taken their dead back and done whatever it is they do with them. It then became clear that in this campaign I could only expect small, local victories. This is a smarter, faster, more determined critter than I am—and I salute their resolve. Over the years I try to stem the tide coming into the kitchen, and slow down so much killing, by sealing the base of the window with a glue made of boric acid and water. Boric acid is an excellent killer of all kinds of house insects; big balls of it are renewed every year under the sink and in dark recesses of the cabinets to nab roaches and crickets. This concoction works well because it seals up the cracks that provide their entry, and any boric acid mixture that sticks to their bodies and is subsequently licked off by other ants kills the groomer, making the returning ants unknowing accessories in the murder of parts of the clan. However, the glue does not hold up long, must be replenished often, and melts completely if it becomes too wet. Only once did the ants change their point of entry to the house, and at first it alarmed me a lot. One day I found a huge cluster of ants in the hall, and a thread-like trail of them going in and out of the minute space under the front door. I was alarmed; had they found a way around all the controls we had in the kitchen? But there was a purpose, and I should have known that because, after all, they are ants. Beneath all that pile of ants was a dead cricket, and they were hard at work dismembering it and removing it from the house. Now how can you get worked up over a parade of little mother’s helpers like that? They, unlike my lazy cats and dogs, do actually participate in the housecleaning. But I wasn’t thrilled with them in the hall, so I removed the cricket, the ants dutifully followed, and that was that. They have never taken up that entry point again, but I knock wood as I say that. I regret that bees are so widely taken for granted. Because European honeybees sting if you worry them too much, and their African relatives are

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sometimes dangerous, bees are in something of a hiatus in public opinion right now. But they are the workhorses of most of our agriculture, flitting through fields and orchards, pushing pollen on any willing plant dozens upon dozens of times a day. The sudden demise of many commercial hives has been a wake-up call to our extraordinary dependence on such tiny creatures, and should sound a note of alarm to anyone who grows or eats food. When the first word of the great demise of honeybees around the nation began to sound, almost ten years ago, I kept a sharp eye on the garden. I didn’t see a change in the number of bees, or at least I thought I didn’t. But this garden has a huge number of plants on which they feast routinely, and that may have helped keep it as a refuge for one colony or other. At least I hope so; I would like to be remembered in beedom as being a help to the cause. Honeybees are extremely fond of the red fairydusters in the front, and when they are in full bloom, there is a bee on almost every flower all day long. Bees wake up early; they are there before I get the papers in the morning, needing only the suggestion of daylight to begin their foraging. When the big blue palo verde was still alive, it was a magnet for all the bees in the neighborhood, but the honeybees were the most obvious. From the back porch you could hear them; there were so many feeding avidly on the bright yellow flowers that the entire tree hummed. Bees that are feeding that intently are extremely tame, and you can walk right up to them and they never notice your presence. That is when I notice another lovely bee there, a small graceful gray bee that seems to be slower and more deliberate than the rest. But it wasn’t just the blue palo verde; bees are all over the blooms of the various hesperaloe that dot the entire garden, on any agave in flower, on each manfreda flower, and frankly, on almost everything in the perennial beds, as well as the herb and vegetable garden. Although all bees are welcome to do their pollination work, it is the carpenter bees that take center stage for their antics. The giant, black, lumbering flyer is the female, and she flies erratically, as if she hasn’t quite got it down, buzzing wildly as she goes. Carpenter bees used to get in the house often before the screen went up, and the dogs would go berserk until I caught her or ran her off. I don’t know what carpenter bees feed on outside of this garden, but here they are fond of any agave that is in bloom, many of the large flowering trees like palo verde, all forms of yellowbells, and the brazilwood. Most of these plants don’t have sturdy enough stems to hold the bee up while it tries to get to the interior of the flower, so feeding becomes

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an antic in itself, with the bee floating and seesawing with the movement of the flower. Yet awkward as it is, it must work, because the bees are abundant and always come back to their unwieldy feeding stations. The male is entirely different, and there are many fewer of them than the clumsy females. They are noisy, fuzzy, golden creatures about half the size of the female. Their buzz alone signals that they are in the area, and we start to look around once we hear the sound. My bug partners add a lot of verve and interest to the garden, even though some of them are great challenges and keep me reaching for books and information, while others are so delightful that they stop me in my tracks just to watch their comings and goings. Most live here permanently, whether I see them every day or not, and all of them are part of the rich fabric of the garden. A few come and go, visiting seasonally or happening along when conditions are just right. I am convinced that it takes a combination of luck and timing to encounter some of the quietest of them, or those that prefer to live underground. But for all of them, I am certain that we take all their good work for granted. Their perseverance in the face of all our interruptions, and the single-minded assurance with which they take on their daily tasks, is the beating heart of this garden. Without them it would be a bleak and lifeless place, and I find myself liking them more and more the longer we live together.

The Patios

The Main Patio from the very beginning of our time in this house we envisioned a patio right outside the back door. The house has a large back porch that adjoins the living room and a big glass door that walks you right out into the patio. It seemed a natural for people like us: a patio that would be an extension of the house, a view that would bring the outdoors in, a cozy place to entertain or simply to sit. For this idea little discussion was needed, as we were both in sync from the very beginning. There was a sickly mimosa in the dead center of the area destined to be our main patio, and during our first walk through the place, even before we bought it, we had mentally removed that tree. We went into action almost immediately upon moving in to remove the tree and begin to plan the patio. We laid out the dimensions of our idea with rope and some old hoses to get our design juices going. Then the septic work began and tore the entire place to bits. But when the construction was done, and the stairs and other parts had been laid in, we found that we still had a big space for the patio that was now even easier to access and looked like it belonged right where it was. Once again we laid out the dimensions with the rope and hose and swept the soil to form the floor of the patio for the time being. Frankly, we could easily have left it at that. Here, packed down soil turns to adobe pretty quickly, and it wouldn’t have been that hard to keep it firm and in place. But we had other ideas. 165

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There were some leftover cut flagstones from Gary’s first stone building project—the raised beds along the entire length of the house—and we used them to define beds around our imaginary patio and the paths that flowed from it. We imagined large, flagstone paving but the budget wouldn’t support that yet, so we lived with the earthen patio and the barely emergent beds for a while. As it happened, this was a good thing, and worked out so well for us that I encourage my students to use this idea in their own conversions or new yards. It takes a while to see if paths are really running where you want them to go. It is helpful to find out that the trees you inherited or planted are really in the right spot, and that the path runs alongside them—not smack into their middle—as they mature. Living with the outline gives definition and shape to a new garden, and you feel like you can live in it and use it right away without a great commitment of time or money. It also makes it much easier to find just the spot for a new plant or a new idea. Most of all, for us it meant we could wait as long as our time and money permitted to finish things off and still have a place to work, plant, and sit in the garden. When the funds had accumulated and it came time to finish off the patio, we returned to the rock vendor for pallets of large, flat flagstone to pave it. Laying a patio is hard work and can only be done by laying out each stone one at a time. This time-consuming hand labor makes Gary’s heart sing, and each of the three patios shows the care and devotion he has taken to get just the right stone in just the right spot. He won’t use a power tool; he barely uses any tools at all for this work, striking and busting the rocks with a small hammer, his feet, or other rocks if they need a bit of sizing. It is an old-fashioned kind of work, and for reasons only he understands, he prefers to take on these kind of projects in the summer, when he can work through the morning, build up a great sweat, and then rest for the afternoon. It undoubtedly removes a lot of the poison that builds up from toiling away with computers and the folks who understand them. I have no such romance or interest in wrestling with stone. My job is to get in the way and field-check his layout to be sure the stones are level and don’t encourage tripping. I do this by walking over his design, repeatedly, and rocking around on the stones. I find all the “rockers,” which Gary then lifts and nudges and cajoles, a little soil here, a little depression there, until they are more or less level. This works well for the initial leveling, but this layout is never permanent; as the soil settles and dries out, the levels rise and fall. I am also a vocal member of the design team—although I know I

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should learn to leave it to him. But wives and husbands are notorious for never learning to hand it over and give it up. About halfway through the layout, he decided it would be a good idea to run diagonal lines, formed from the rectangular lengths of cut stone, from corner to corner, making an X through the entire thing to add interest and break up the monotony of the flat stones. I could not quite see it; I considered the great stretches of stone lovely and was not in favor of this idea at all. We haggled about it for quite some time, but he was unmoved by my reservations and finally wore me down with the age-old panacea—let me lay it out so we can see it, and if it doesn’t look good I will remove it. How could I not agree to that? Really in my heart of hearts I knew it was just a delay of the inevitable. He did it, it looked absolutely perfect, and that is the way it is today. Plantings around this patio have varied over the years and have shown what can happen as tragedy strikes the plants and as age impinges on them. The loss of the huge Mexican palo verde set off a cascade of planting alterations beginning with the Chihuahuan orchid tree. That lovely plant, with its gaudy, dark flowers laid out flat on the limbs, lasted for many years until repeated wind damage sent it on to its reward. It was replaced by the Chinese lantern tree, which has made it own impact on the entire bed. Over the years the bed in which these trees lived has morphed and changed many times over. It began as a place to attract hummingbirds, then an herb bed, but once the brick beds were built we relocated all the herbs. Later it transformed into an all-purpose perennial bed, which is how it stands today. Here is where a lot of the newer perennials and bulbs find their home. It has always been a little wild in the front and lean in the back, and someday perhaps we will land on just the perfect set of plants to make all the soil disappear. The front was anchored for years by the irrepressible and nearly constant flowering of a red justicia. When it finally gave out after almost twenty years, probably of old age, its place was briefly held by a stunning, intensely red-flowered salvia called ‘Red Storm.’ That plant died the next winter, and now a new red justicia has returned. On the same side of the patio, the succulent plantings under the African sumac have been more permanent. True, the vining aloe needed to be rejuvenated recently, and the Easter egg emu bush (Eremophila racemosa) would never bloom. Yet the Yucca grandiflora has become dominant, virtually a force of nature, and the assorted aloes, agaves, euphorbias, bromeliads, and kalanchoes that share space there have thrived and lived through the years forming a delightful and carefree part of the view from the patio.

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On the opposite side of the patio there has been more of a shift in both perspective and plants, owing to the growth of everything there. Originally the patio was lined on this side with a few aloes and bromeliads, and a couple of Mexican oreganos (Poliomintha maderensis), backed up by Rodney’s aster and Mt. Lemmon marigold. Behind them and beneath the desert fern (Lysiloma thornberi) was a Sabal bermudana and a prized selection of Mexican redbud (Cercis canadensis var. mexicana) given to me years ago by the dear Jimmy Tipton. A bit of leftover garlic chives, a few bulbs, and a glorious winecup (Callirhoe involucrata) finished off the edge. But things have changed mightily over the years. The desert fern grew and is now a wonderful, spreading shade tree. The shrubs on the far side—bee bush, fragrant rain sage (Leucophyllum pruinosum), and little-leaf cordia—all became large. This was just as intended; they are there to seal off the view to the west and provide shade from the western sun for this our most-used patio. But it made for a big shift in the sun/shade ratio, and the first to hate it was the Mt. Lemmon marigold. We moved it to the brick beds, but that wasn’t acceptable and it failed pretty quickly. The next to go was the Rodney’s aster, although a few relics remain that need to be rescued. Then the bulbs quit flowering and had to be relocated; and finally the Mexican oregano refuses to bloom as well as it used to, and now a new home must be found for it, too. This is the price of an older, maturing garden. You have to look at your plants as having wheels, roaming around the garden, finding the best spot at the time for them to thrive. Only trees don’t roam around well, so I say pick carefully where they go. Everything else is subject to the whims of the growing garden, not to mention our continuously shifting tastes and perspectives. As it stands, we are looking at a deep, dark bed that still offers great protection for the patio seating, but won’t support much in the way of flowering desert perennials or bulbs. What to do? Now I look for excellent plants that give us color and interest in their leaves, and those that find dry shade a comfort rather than a trial. The bed is now accented by the Mexican redbud shooting up through the murky light with its deep green, ruffled leaves, and a variegated Yucca gloriosa var. recurvifolia ‘Margaritaville.’ The slow progress of the Sabal bermudana, as it inches its way to maturity one leaf at a time, is underlain by the rambunctious Turk’s cap that takes up as much of the space as it can with its improbable red flowers. This one is probably a hybrid between Malvaviscus arboreus, which has large, velvety leaves and huge flowers that fall from the stem like scarlet lanterns, and the smaller, tidier

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M. drummondii with its upright flowers. It combines the large leaves with upright flowers that are profuse along its sprawling woody stems. It is a big rambling thing whose size is helpful right now as we struggle to fill the increasingly shady bed. This patio and the recovered back porch, free at last from its role as a plant growing area, are now an outdoor dining area, the extensions of the house we imagined. We sit out there every evening we can, we cook and eat there, and we entertain there. This is where we sit during long visits with relatives and friends, sometimes to eat or drink, sometimes to shell beans, sometimes just to watch the garden and its various visitors. Numerous editions of furnishings have lived there—rejected recliners, relict patio furniture, and finally a nice wooden table. It is where I cut out fabric because the light is so good, or where we have coffee every chance we get, allowing us to gaze in wonder at how much the red bird of paradise has grown, or at the feeding of the lesser goldfinch and the hummingbirds. It is where we find out that peach-faced lovebirds visit the Argentine mesquite, where I watch thrashers and cactus wrens as I read the paper. It is the hearth of the house and the focus of the garden, and it is right outside the living room door.

The Monsoon Patio After the Outback was fenced and the shade house was built, we turned our attention to the blank space at the end of the long path that wound to the end of the property. This is a difficult part of the garden: far enough away from the house to forget about for long periods of time, big enough to let your imagination run wild with possibilities, but full of snares. We kept thinking of things to do with it and rejecting them; for a long time it seemed like all it would ever be was a large open rock pile. The biggest snag in figuring out what to do with this space involved a set of twin perils: keeping congenial relations with the neighbors and dealing with a hot location that completely lacked shade and was underlain with serious rock. Because it is the highest point in the yard, it almost overlooks a neighbor’s backyard. While we considered a number of options, we kept coming back to the problem of height. Views are a source of continuous discussion in our neighborhood, and have from time to time created great difficulties between neighbors; putting in a big shade tree did not seem wise. When our neighborhood was originally laid out over sixty years ago, houses were situated to provide some kind of view of either the buttes to the

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south in Papago Park or of Camelback Mountain to the north. But people need trees, as do their gardens, and numerous trees have been planted over the history of the neighborhood. Some neighbors chose eucalyptus species, which grew so large they towered over houses; others chose mesquites, or occasionally palo verdes and ironwoods. I can only suppose that whatever view fights went on over those selections were settled long ago, or the original pugilists moved, because these trees were not the source of the most recent kerfuffles over views. Those began over ten years ago when owners throughout the neighborhood began making additions to their houses. During this building frenzy, a member of our village built an addition (perfectly legal, as it turned out) that rose high enough to block the longheld view of someone downhill from them. It caused a near riot in the neighborhood. Petition signatures were sought, pleas were made at neighborhood gatherings, people took sides, and in general the whole thing was a year-long mess. In the end, a zoning correction was passed so that such a thing would never be permitted again, or so the ones who cared so much hoped. Happily, the homeowner did not have to tear down their addition, which had been rumored as a possible remedy. In urban places, especially older or more settled ones, a less aggressive take on rights and privileges would serve us all well. This is a peaceful neighborhood, without the horrors of a homeowner’s association—the lack of which everyone is in earnest agreement about—but it was a trying time during the view wars. We began to turn our attention to the final design of the back area just as those confabulations settled down. Clearly, given the mood of the moment, trees of any appreciable height were out. But this is a hot, severe spot, facing west and without a smidgen of shade to mitigate it. We were going to have to be more creative if we were ever going to be able to use the area. We scratched out on paper, we mulled over coffee, we thought and considered, trying out ideas on each other and our friends, and finally we came up with an idea—an experiment, really. Neither of us is a formal-garden sort of person, but for some reason the idea of trying out an arrangement along the lines of the old French and Italian formal garden layout, but using only regional native plants, appealed to us. We were familiar with the basics—strict symmetry, minimal or no floral color, a small plant list, and a clear, clean arrangement, often through the use of regular pruning. We thought it might work: many desert plants, especially woody ones, have exquisite form all on their own, and if we cheated a bit on the pruning so what? It was our garden after all.

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We measured and arranged the ropes and hoses again, and finally decided on a square patio, with half-moons cut out at the corners, a central round feature to suggest a fountain, and a seating area at the back that looked out over the entire thing. It still sounds so lovely, even though, as it stands, it is barely past the first turn after all this time. Gary set to work building the patio and lining the edges and the interior spaces with what was now his signature cut flagstone. In the dead center, he built a round piece that in any other garden would have been a fountain, but he made it a planting bed and set in a variegated Agave sisalana. We lifted the idea of an agave fountain wholesale from an exposition planting done years earlier by Carrie Nimmer in a downtown Phoenix park. It was a clever idea there, and it suited this desert-themed formal area admirably. In many ways it has been the most successful part of the entire effort. One of the finest lessons I have taken away from growing and working with plants in this extraordinarily hot and dry place is that good design does not have an inherent plant palette. Just because you saw a photograph of a perennial garden, or a lushly planted cottage entry, or a spectacular formal layout, does not mean you have to have those exact species to make it your own. I like to sew, and I know people who make clothes and jewelry and quilts. Sewing people of any stripe rely on patterns for these projects, but the pattern is just the beginning. The choice of materials is the maker’s own, reflecting the fact that blue looks better to you than the red shown in pattern, or that florals fit in better than the stripes indicated, or that you’ve finally found a pattern that fits that odd but snazzy black-and-white cloth that has been lurking in the closet for years. It is exactly the same in a garden; it is just that the material is plants. Ideas don’t have to be realized as mirror images of the original to work. Garden styles and designs, like those for quilts or garments or jewelry are just that, ideas, suggested patterns rather than finished products. So while the stately cypress and the glorious yew hedges that European formal gardens rely upon for their foundation would fail here, others can stand in their place. We began with the corners; here we needed something that would grow tall and straight, and be taller than it was wide. It would help if it accepted some pruning. We chose hopbush, although to our sorrow, at the time the native, small-leaved form was virtually unavailable, and we had to settle for the much more common, long-leaved form. Gentle pruning each spring has turned these fast-growing shrubs into the narrow spears we needed at the corners of the patio.

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However, we found out in the vicious January ’07 freeze what a sad choice this form of hopbush was, when they all froze to the ground. I worked an entire weekend pruning away all the damage and shaping all four of them to be more or less the same size again so they could begin to reform themselves into their former statuesque pillars. Now, just over two years later, they are over 6 feet tall, but it was a trial and a great setback to the overall scheme. In each quadrant of the patio, we felt that a shorter, rounder shrub was called for, and this time jojoba got the call. Its gray color would contrast well with the deep green of the hopbush, and its habit of growing into a tight, rounded ball with virtually no pruning was a plus. Again, setbacks were the name of the game. Three of the jojoba grew happily and at virtually the same rate. They marched together into a perfectly regular and uniform size and shape. They were generally receptive to our desires and our culture, and of course we were pleased. But one lagged behind and, in the year after the freeze, died, ruining the rigid symmetry the design required. With a big sigh, we got another one, planted it and encouraged it with double the water of the others. This little trooper caught the fever and accepted our entreaties and has now almost caught up with the others. I think I will always look a little more fondly on that jojoba for having raced into compliance with such purpose. Toward the alley, at what is more or less the back of the patio, we envisioned a semicircle of large shrubs to form a backdrop for a seating area. The circular planting would visually close out the area we use for dumping prunings on one side and for the vegetable garden on the other. This was such a ducky idea; we just could not wait to get started. We began with a pair of exquisite narrow-leaved rosewoods (Vauquelinia angustifolia) that we had found at a clean-out sale at Boyce Thompson Arboretum. They are perfect, love the spot, are growing tall and full, and will be a spectacular backdrop to the seating area. Space dictated that we needed two species on each side to form the circle and unite it with the patio. First we tried the uncommon mangle dulce (Maytenus phyllanthoides), because they are large, evergreen, and look much like a green version of the jojoba. It turned out that mangle dulce wants much more water and deeper soils than our place could provide. Although they gave it their all, eventually one of them died and the other looked like it wished it knew how. We took pity on the survivor and put it in a pot in the shade house to wait for a better locale.

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Undaunted, but getting a little weary, we were thrilled to find the equally uncommon but attractive Kearney’s sumac (Rhus kearneyi) at the Desert Botanical Garden sale. We had great confidence in this choice; it was native to the area along the Arizona border with Mexico, an area so desperately hot and dry its main roadway is known as the Devil’s Highway. Once again, we were tricked. One died almost immediately, failing even to establish. We left the other one in the hopes that if it made it, we would find another to match it later. We have yet to find another, and the remaining shrub still looks like it wishes we would just give up and find a more suitable home for it. We christened this difficult area the monsoon patio early in its development because it provides a full and uninterrupted view of the southeastern sky. This huge expanse of sky rises directly over the big native mesquites south and east of the patio, and the monsoon storms roll in from that direction in the summer. This patio offers a place to visit the evening sky, to watch the buildup of the roiling clouds and their night-splitting lightning displays, often fifty miles away. It has also become our go-to place to watch the fireworks that are kindly provided by a nearby country club on the Fourth of July. So, while the patio is far from the image of it we still have in our heads, we plug along with it, considering other choices, working with the rock pile that is the soil out there, taking in its lessons and enjoying what it gives us back. The shrub arc is still just a dream, and we have yet to settle on the third species to fill in the quadrants of the main patio. The backdrop to the future seating area looks lonesome and unwelcoming. But we are nothing if not persistent and patient. This patio has shown me once again that gardening is a process, not a result, and most of the fun and joy is in trying, not in finishing. Patience and persistence makes for good farmers and good gardeners, and it is never wise to give up a good idea just because it takes eons longer to enact than you imagined. I feel there is too much emphasis in gardens, public and private, on quick results rather than on process. These are living art forms, after all, and I deeply appreciate any gardener who is willing to plant small, looking into the future rather that just into next week. I remember standing beneath the massive cardons (Pachycereus pringlei) at the Desert Botanical Garden at a time when I was doing research on the early plantings there. They were part of the initial plantings of that garden, brought up from Mexico in old refrigerator boxes in a truck. Those

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boxes would only hold something 5 feet tall or less, and so that is how big they were in 1939 when they were planted. I think about them when I see gardens all around this area planted with massive boxed trees, mature-sized yuccas and ocotillos, huge, unwieldy, and quite old cacti, and fully formed shrubs. I wonder what these “instant” landscapes will look like 70 or 80 years on. Those cardons are glorious, monumental and commanding plants that have graced their garden setting for a lifetime because someone planted them small. They have become not just larger but more interesting as time has moved on, and they are barely halfway through their long life span. Gardens are a place to learn to live together with all the other lives there, to discover what the plants need and want, to give each one the room and the space to thrive, and to start them young so they grow into the place. Our cultural impatience will doom many of these gardens that are established with old plants and planted with an eye to short-term effect rather than graceful longevity. They will all die out together—victims of the shortened life span of their already mature plants, and then where will we be?

The Front Patio The front patio is our newest addition, completed only a year ago although, like most of the work in this garden, it had been a glimmer in the back of our minds for a much longer time. It was the original reason for building the wall, which predated it by many years. The building of the wall more or less created the front patio space. It occupies the extra room running from the front porch along the front face of the house to the wall. In the summer, while I was visiting relatives, Gary decided the time had come to finish this area off, which meant laying down paving; he gave it his deft touch over one long summer weekend. He moved soil, he rearranged and settled the flagstones, he left openings for the existing plants, working the patio around them, and allowed for access from both the sides and from the front porch. Naturally, that wasn’t the end. Laying the stones made the entire area look so nice and so settled that we began to use it immediately, but quickly saw that the plants there needed considerably more of our attention than we had previously thought. They were wildly overgrown; some were too big and overhung the new patio and some had been removed for the stone work and needed to be either restored or relocated. Most of all, it just looked

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like the back of a garage where you toss things you don’t know quite what to do with. Whacking and thwacking our way through the mess of black dalea and flame anisacanthus (Anisacanthus quadrifidus) to bring both under control, we found a gorgeous Agave titanota that had lived happily underneath them for so long we had forgotten we had planted it. Now it was big, bold, and looking for a new life. We moved it closer to the door into a tidy hole near the porch. It is now the hallmark when you leave the front door. The desert milkweed that had looked so good for so long and more or less marked the front door was more of a hindrance once the sidewalk was restored. With the jungle of dalea and anisacanthus tamed, it was clear that something tall and important was needed in their midst. The milkweed was just the thing, and it was relocated a few feet back to its new home. We lifted out the wilderness of useless seedlings; put in fairyduster, firecracker penstemon, and desert lavender (Hyptis emoryi); relocated some of the Agave bracteosa and one of the Agave arizonica; restored the gorgeous Agave victoriae-reginae that had been moved to make room for the stones; added a golden-eye (Viguieria deltoidea) and a desert saltbush (Atriplex polycarpa), and just like that—we had a settled and happy planting. It was like cleaning out a closet; it now looks so fresh and new, tidy and just right. Gary also built a little raised area in the middle of the long wall to mimic a fire pit, because the entire patio was so tiny that any form of fire was out of the question. He first suggested putting in a sensational wavy-leaved Agave lechuguilla, affectionately known as ‘Mr. Wiggles,’ which really does look like green flames. The area was so tight, however, I knew the first guest, or one of us, would be impaled within a week. We settled on lady’s slipper (Pedilanthus macrocarpa), a striking Baja native with countless tall, thick, whitish stems, which will grow to be a kind, non-prickly masterpiece. We both drift out there every time we can, gently spying on the neighborhood from our new vantage point, marveling at the winter light on the buttes across the road, seeing different birds and a wholly different view. I have been entirely seduced by this new small patio, using it to read on winter afternoons when the house is chilly and the light is dim inside. We sit out there for cocktails before dinner with friends. We fall into it to relax when we feel more open, more social, more interested—saving the back patios for times when we feel the need to cuddle, hide, and close ourselves in. And what have all these patios done for us and our life in this house? Plenty. The main patio gave us a personal space, a place to feel enclosed

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and secure. It is the most private and the most a part of our house, where day-to-day life spills from the house to the garden and back again. It is where most of the action takes place. The monsoon patio is an encouragement to try something odd, something different, and hope for the best. It forced us to accommodate to the neighbors, because they are good and kind and worth having, and has shown us that it can be just as satisfying to look up to the stars, storms, clouds, and fireworks when trying to find a good use for an outdoor space. The front patio has brought us out into our neighborhood, made us pay more attention to the buttes and their shifting light, and given us an entirely new appreciation for our front garden. It had been so easy to leave the front to its own devices, seeing it only when going to get the mail, watering, or driving home. Now it is a lovely spot, no longer lonely and unused but full of our thought and attention. When I consider the patios, I think one of their greatest contributions to our garden has been the release they gave to Gary’s great creativity, particularly with stone. All the time he spent wrestling that stone to reveal the shapes, forms, and ideas in his head has been some of his most treasured time, and it is nice to think that those stones are as permanent as anything can be in a garden. These patios have forced us out into the garden at all times of the year and during all seasons, allowed the garden to join our home life, provided places to sit, to cogitate, to eat, or even to write. They have given us more room, literally, and taught us so many good things. They have provided the theater where we watch the action of the birds, insects, and critters who share this garden with us. We got all that for a few pallets of stone, a cleared-out space, and a few plants along the edge—a good bargain I’d say.

People

Gary i have never made a garden with anyone but gary. I tried once, but it was an utter failure, marred by a lot of problems. When I think back on it, the overwhelming reason for its failure was that so many people were involved: some were incompetent; some uninterested or, worse, looked on the entire effort as a problem akin to pesky rodents or drenching hailstorms; a few were eager but couldn’t manage the time to see it through to the end. Ultimately, despite months of effort, it failed to become more than a good idea gone bad; I was exhausted by the effort to overcome the obstacles and finally abandoned it. It drifted to that lonely place in the back of my mind that holds all the good things that might have been. However, a lot of good ideas arose during the tedious business of not building that doomed garden and a few never left me: the possibility of a walkway lined with masses of rosette succulents like red hesperaloe, where the wands of coral flowers would drape over your head like an honor guard; or the breathtaking beauty that tidy plants like twin-flowered agave (Agave geminiflora), used in great sweeps, could achieve; or how soothing a welldone color-themed garden can be. Once I got over the disappointment, I realized that I had learned a lot even in failure. It became crystal clear that what makes a garden zing is the fruition of a single, personal dream; it might take in the ideas of others, but rejects their prejudices, personal dislikes, and unruly ideas. A garden, 179

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in short, feels most successful when it is the expression of the ideas, attitudes, and interests of whoever built it. That may be why so many public gardens are wonderful collections of plants but too often lack soul and verve, and why so many beautiful professionally designed private gardens are predictable and dull, chock full as they often are with overused popular concepts. I am convinced that all of us are instinctively drawn to any garden—whether we realize it or not—that has at its root someone’s vision, where the backbone is personal and a gardener’s interests, enthusiasm, and attention is evident. The building of this garden has proven considerably more successful than that other communal gardening effort. This one is an intertwined activity, threading through both our lives as a long, slow trail, leading us from a vaguely articulated garden idea to the snug harbor of a comfortable patio or the pleasures of a maturing planting. The approach of each of us has shifted and changed over the years, as ideas run through our heads, both individually and separately, for years on end. Until one day it is time, and an idea bursts out like a moth from its cocoon ready to take on either the skepticism or the interest of the other partner. Two people who are building a garden have both separate and collective ideas of what comes next, how a bed should be shaped, to what use a particular part of the garden is best suited, and, most difficult of all, how an area needs to be revamped and rethought; that’s what makes conjugal gardening such a fascinating endeavor, as well as one so ripe for contention. Our garden building has and probably always will be full of conflicts, compromises, changes of direction, and shifts in emphasis, making it a wild ride rather than a smooth sail. That is why it is so much fun, so worth doing, and so completely satisfying in the end. We often tell people that the only thing we argue about is plants—and that is true for the most part. There isn’t enough money to argue over, the dogs and cats aren’t enough trouble to cause conflict, and who could bring themselves to argue about cars or appliances or furniture? That only leaves the garden. These arguments, which might seem fierce to an outsider, are the anvil on which the most successful parts of the garden have been forged. In the end, it is always our garden, rather than his part and my part—an alternate scheme I have seen occasionally, and which I find unbearably sad. Ironically, it is in the dreary monotony of watering that we have our most fundamental and intractable differences. In this dry, dry place, water is not just important, it is vital to plant life. Yet still, we find room for serious conversation about our varied approaches.

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I think of watering as a scheduled activity, something that occurs like brushing your teeth, setting the alarm clock, or putting out the trash—if you do it routinely and regularly you won’t forget it. So I am always looking for a schedule. I have used ugly calendars, or a coded system in the kitchen, and still long for an old-fashioned blackboard for the porch to sustain my nerdy need for schedules and records. It is no surprise that I love timers and set them up all over the place. Gary is entirely the opposite. He places his trust in an intuitive viewing of the plants, ideally on a daily basis. To him, wandering around and looking at the place is sufficient, and if something looks a little dreary, you go get the hose and you water it. In his worldview of watering, there is no concern with penetration rates, depth of watering, emitter size, or head pressure—it is all a matter of feeling out the needs of the plants and responding to their entreaties. When he comes back from toiling through another day of office work and feels a little bleak, out of touch, or stressed out, his answer is to get out the hose and wander around the garden randomly squirting whatever comes his way. It is a dreadful way to water and has killed countless plants—particularly potted succulents—over the years, but he cannot be talked out of it. And talk I have, in calm tones, in tones of the most strident fishwife, in tones meant to soothe a recalcitrant child, in tones meant to scare the pants off a linebacker. I have reminded him of all the best science in watering, I have reminded him of the death of every dormant succulent watered out of season, I have reminded him of everything I can recall, but it all falls from his shoulders like the water out of his hose. Over the years, I have alternately considered Gary’s watering style from a purely rational point of view (why can’t you be a little more orderly—so many would not have died), from a hysterical and sexist point of view (you are just wandering around waving that extension of your you know what), and finally from a kinder, gentler point of view (go ahead—it’s harmless and relaxing as long as not directed at potted plants, other than the palms, which will suck up any amount of water that you give them). Because my fundamental interest is in minimizing this hugely boring chore, I adore automated watering systems and have learned to install and program them to suit my and the plants’ needs. For Gary the automated system is just a helpful addition to his watering, rather than the other way around. As a result, a version of this conversation takes place almost every week during the summer.

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“Why are you watering—the irrigation went on this morning (or, will go on tomorrow morning)?” “They need water, see how droopy they are? It has been very hot (dry, windy) this week—they are not getting enough.” “Why do we have the expense and constant maintenance of that irrigation system if you don’t want to use it?” “I do want it, but just this one plant needs water, that’s all.” He continues his evening prowl, hose in hand until the falling light drives him in. Yet here’s the part that is true and that I hate to admit; he always spots the problems with the plants before I do. He watches, he frets, he worries; he is the mom to this garden. I cannot change that, I don’t even want to change it—it is lovely and charming and wonderful—but there are still times when I wish that he would put down that wretched hose and punch the timer on. Nothing matches these watering discussions for vigor, whining, pure idiocy, and wretched excess, but trying to watch over each other’s pruning styles comes close. Each of us is convinced that the other one is a piker at pruning, needs copious amounts of instruction, and cannot be trusted alone with cutting tools. Honestly, it often devolves into a comedy worthy of Shakespeare. I wonder what chores or duties two gardeners in another clime might have that would offer such endless and continual discussion. Somehow I can’t see discussions of leaf raking techniques lasting that long, or lawn mowing alternatives making it past Conversation 101. On the other hand, thinking back on it, I do remember that in our Louisiana garden the blade height of the lawnmower sometimes did grab our attention. The weather, of course, is always cause for grand and leisurely conversations, but since there is nothing to be done about it, it can never carry the same conversational weight as trying to cadge, convince, or cajole the other person into an alternative way to water or prune. The other great arena that any two gardeners attempting a garden together must enter is design or its simple-minded cousin, layout. Here we have different views and different ideas, but we work toward some version of a Quaker settlement, where the objective is to win the other over, not to prevail from sheer force of will. This, naturally, slows things down immensely and, as a result, there have been numerous projects that could have been over and done with in a weekend, but that have dragged on for years.

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Paper does not help us much; we are more attuned to the sitting-outin-the-proposed-area-and-waving-our-arms-around-for-emphasis school of design. We must have run through a million versions of each part of the garden, and if all the time invested in these conversations was strung together we would undoubtedly find that we have spent years trying to decide how to approach an area, what to plant in a newly renovated area, or just what is or could be the point of another section. If we had spent anywhere near that amount of time actually working in the garden, it might look better and be a bit tidier—certainly fewer plants would be living in the shade house—but we would never feel right about it all. Our need for conversation and for the whole-hearted acceptance of the other has determined the excruciatingly slow development of this garden. This glacial pace, with incremental progress from year to year, together with the paucity of finished projects, is undoubtedly part of the reason that visitors have such varied reactions to our garden. We have all been conditioned by gorgeous garden magazines to more or less demand that a garden be “done,” or at least nearing completion, once visitors are allowed in. Such impatience misses the point. Completion is not our goal. The quests, and the trials, and the gentle unfolding of the life of the garden are what suit us; watching it all transform, however slowly, into the scene in our heads is much more fun than getting it all done in one or two seasons. Speed doesn’t work for us, in part because neither of us is able to work in the garden full time. Even if we were, I am certain we would continue in the same vein; rushing to the end just doesn’t seem necessary. They say couples who live long together become more alike. I suppose that is true, in a way, but I think what actually takes place is the two form a completely new self that is the union of them together, woven from the mutual experiences, the long slow times together, and what they managed to build together. For us, our plants and the gardens in which they live have given focus to our life together, showing us our strengths and weaknesses in the process of creating something together. It is a daily reminder of how all the years have come together to create a life in common. While it is clearly a garden that is uniquely ours, it is also full to the brim of all the people who have come in and out, filling it with their gifts and treasures; replete with memory-filled plants, sweet gifts, and fascinating experiments; and home to the leftovers of collecting passions long gone. The plants in the garden form a magic blend of memory and reminiscence that works like an underwater snag, waiting to snare us in an

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unguarded moment, drawing back vividly to the surface a time, or a trip, or a person. With these reminders the garden forms a net, support for when times are not so good, when beautiful memories can help, when life pours over us in an unbearable cascade of demands, sorrows, and failures, when a tiny wasp, an unexpected flowering, or a slight breeze is all it takes to wrap us up and hold us together.

John John was an old man when I met him. He grew plants, not for food or out of need, but for fun, and they were his greatest passion. He was chiefly a fan of succulents, particularly cacti, but ironically his two finest and longest lasting contributions to our garden are a particular form of red hesperaloe and a splendid crinum. His garden, when I knew him, was a tiny strip between the lawn and a retaining wall outside his apartment. John suffered with a cantankerous neighbor who hated his lovely plants; un-neighborly efforts to remove them were prevented, for a while, through the intervention of a gentle landlord, who thought the plants helped the place out. John’s garden was hardly more than a border along the back wall, but it was crammed with a patchwork of odd, interesting, lovely, and weird offerings, and he watched over it like a brooding hen. I learned a lot from John about the plants he grew and about various historical lights he had known in the world of succulents, but mainly I learned to be patient. John was elderly and lived alone; you could not shut him up. He talked without a stop for breath. I am sure he was nearly deaf, although he was too vain to admit it. Although conversations could be, in all, a bit tedious, listening carefully and looking over at his plants, I knew there was a lot to learn. Most of all, I learned to appreciate how much his plants kept him active and alive and contributed to his overall optimism and well-being, despite his obvious physical frailty. He cared about them deeply, each and every one of them. They were his best friends, his surest support. He could count on them, and, even if they died, he had a good time with them. He wasn’t at all philosophical about the loss of any one of them; in most cases he took it hard, sighing heavily and saying “oh, no” in a small, hurt voice. But generally the plants treated him well. Maybe too well.

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My job was to rid him of excess plants, take them off to the Desert Botanical Garden plant sales (which I ran at the time), sell them, and report back to him how well they did. John had a long association with the Desert Botanical Garden; he cared about it a lot, and by that time of his life it was his way of staying attached and helping out. He had a monstrous form of the bunny ears prickly pear that he adored and that I found horrid, which just proves that there is absolutely no accounting for what your friends can and will love. He took off pieces of it regularly, rooted them, and sent them off to the plant sale. I could never love it as much as he did, but it sold like a dream. He hinted strongly at requiring adoption papers for the buyers, but I had to be firm about that; hundreds of people came to these sales and he knew I could never do such a thing. He sighed and, each time, asked again for such a record; each spring and fall I had to gently refuse. He gave me the mother plant of that ghastly prickly pear after a particularly ugly encounter with his neighbor, when John felt pressed about his plants. I kept it, I planted it, and I was delighted that it hung on until after he died. I could never have explained to him that it died for the lack of him, not because it was in my care. I have never forgiven the neighbor who finally succeeded in breaking up John’s garden. I don’t know how he convinced the landlord to allow it, but it was one of the meanest things I have ever seen done. They could not see the beauty in John’s meticulously kept border, where no weed or interloper was allowed in, and finally forced him to dismantle it, plant by plant, distributing his beloved plants to a few friends. That crank broke an old man’s heart. John had made it his goal to live to 90, but it was shortly after he reached that milestone that the dreadful neighbor succeeded in having all the plants removed. John died within a year. Certainly he had lived a long and, by his account, a happy and full life, but I still deeply regret that there was no way for him to die with his garden intact outside his door. I still have a number of his plants, taken as pieces and parts before the great demise, some of which are still outstanding parts of the garden. The small, trailing cactus with the deeply imbedded orange flower that he called Opuntia johnsonii and is now known as O. quitoensis sits right on the edge of the patio. No matter how many times I told him the new nomenclature, he still called it by the name he knew. And why not? We both knew what we were talking about, and that is the point of a name, after all. He and Gary and I dug out a portion of his wine-pink crinum that stunned me by growing in full sun at his place. He had received it from a friend

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decades before and brought it with him when he moved to his current place. I originally put it out by the toolshed, and it thrived for years until the great South American mesquite took away most of the summer sun. A couple of years ago, I moved it to a sunnier spot in the beds near the main patio, and it was much happier for a time. In the end, the heat finally took it out; it makes me very sad to no longer see its exquisite, deep pink flowers each summer. John also had a splendid form of red hesperaloe, which I call ‘John Hales’ in his honor. It has flowering stalks that arch over, almost to the ground, and blooms nearly year round. One of the creosotes threatens to overtake it on a regular basis, and I have to prune it back every few years to keep John’s plant the focus of that segment of the Outback. He gave us our first Agave americana var. medio-picta, that exquisite white-striped form of the old standby. John was an uneasy friend, but he showed me how much pleasure and delight could be found in the tiniest of gardens. He also helped me refine my patience in dealing with friends and relatives as they get older, frail, querulous, or dependent. He left me with a lot of great plants and good memories of walking around that small garden, digging up things while he instructed me from his small stool. I listened to his stories, I marveled at the quality of his plants, and I watched him struggle to maintain his dignity and independence in the face of great old age. His plants supported him completely until they were taken away from him, and he collapsed without them. They held him up and carried him along in his old age. I trust they will do the same for me.

Bud If I were a fairy godmother, I would ensure that everyone found and cherished the love of their life and that everyone found and treasured a friend like Bud. He had retired from teaching just about the time we met him; our mutual and profound interest in plants formed our introduction to each other and was the initial anchor for what became a deep friendship between the three of us. When Bud died without warning, his orphaned plants were a great concern to his family and to us. He had a vast array of plants that reflected both the various periods of his life and the ups and downs of his serious gardening, including cactus, agaves, fields of haworthias, and a wide array of other odds and ends. The most consistent thread in his plant life was his orchids, which delighted and baffled me all at the same time.

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We, his family and other friends, adopted, sold, and gave away all of his plants, whittling down the numbers over the months after his death until, by the summer, they were all gone. Sometimes I think of them, scattered to the four winds, finding new homes, accepting or rejecting them, delighting new gardeners and collectors, forming new collections, and providing great joy. Bud’s plant contributions to our garden are numerous; many came long before he died, while others were adopted in that miserable spring. I grieve over the ones that don’t make it, because I feel like I am letting him down. But my conditions are different than his, and most of the plants know the difference. His rampant enthusiasm for plants was contagious, and his career as a teacher made him want to let others in on all the details. It was his greatest legacy. We shared a firm belief that what you know counts for nothing if you do not pass it along. That grand generosity—not just giving away extra plant pieces and parts, but also all the know-how, tricks, small successes, and failures—made him a special friend and a great gardening pal. He loved to see people ooh and aah over his plants, especially his astounding and breathtaking orchids, but he was just as pleased if he could show you some new product, offer a bit of advice on your problem, or learn a new trick from you. Although he was a man of great impatience and absolutely no tolerance for fools, with a quick and certain temper that was exciting to behold, his patient kindness to beginners is what everyone who knew him remembers the most. He embodied a simple gardening creed: your knowledge of plants is not a competition, although a little discreet showing off of particularly exciting results is acceptable; boasting is kept under strict control; credit is always given where it is due; and your own teachers and mentors are forever acknowledged and remembered. Every time I stroke an agave that he particularly liked, or watch some of the bulbs he gave me bloom again and again, I am reminded of these lessons of sharing and acceptance that make for great teachers and unforgettable friends. But he also had a dirty little secret that most gardeners share; he was a confirmed snitch. Nothing was safe near him if he wanted a piece of it. His complete insouciance in taking pieces of plants horrified me, and finally I simply told him he could not do it around me. Of course I felt that seeds were completely acceptable, and we both took discreet amounts of seed of anything we came upon if we liked it. That is how I came to have what I know as Bud’s hot pepper. It wasn’t really his; it actually came from a Thai restaurant we visited once, where it grew in rampant abandon on the side of the parking lot. It grew well at

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Bud’s also, and I took some seed of it when we were clearing out his place. Now it grows in my own garden, and in others where I have given it away, yet another testament to the expansive nature of gardening among friends. He and I once judged a succulent show together, an enterprise we were both extremely reluctant to get involved in. We decided if we could do it together maybe it would not be so bad or stressful. What fools we were. People care a dreadful lot about such things as ribbons and awards at these events, and it is a heavy burden to be on the giving end of the praise. The entries that year were modest; they were fine, but nothing was truly exceptional. We gave out praise as extravagantly as we could. Then we saw it, shyly tucked away at the end of the exhibit, a little mixed planting of succulents with a peyote cactus (Lophophora williamsii) right in the middle of it. I can’t imagine how anyone could have expected that either of us would miss such a thing—Bud had a number in his own collection, and I was constantly fending people off in the shop at the Desert Botanical Garden who thought if they asked for it by its botanical name I wouldn’t know what they were talking about. This plant is technically illegal to possess and clearly against the rules of the show to include in an exhibit. When we pointed it out, there was mock horror all around and, for a time, steady denial that it was what it clearly was. We stood firm—honestly, the bravado was almost comic—and finally the entry was removed. We made a pact that day: no more shows, no more judging ever, no matter who asked or how much they begged. We held firm to that promise. Losing Bud was one of our greatest sorrows, but it is a great solace to find him around our garden. His garden was so different than ours that only the succulents seemed to find a good home here, yet when I look around they are all over the place. There are so many that sometimes, forgetting where a particular plant came from, I look at the tag, only to be reminded that it was his. I have to admit I like the ones that he gave us over the years a bit better than the ones we adopted after his death. But in the end they all secure his life, and our memories of our time with him, throughout the garden.

Tom In the first decade or so that we lived here, the greatest insult that could be hurled at any garden design effort, or at any of a wide range of types and combinations of plants, or frankly at almost any effort at public landscaping, was that it looked too “California.” This was a time when newspaper

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editorials and op-ed pages and designers and thinkers throughout the area engaged in a wide array of useless conversations about how to prevent the Phoenix area from turning into “another L.A.” Looking back, all this effort and conversation was both ironic and pathetic. These noble attempts to enjoin the greater populace, and what passed for community leadership, to stem the tide of greed, quick returns, and steady but cheap housing, and to seek a wiser course, naturally fell on deaf ears. No matter how spectacular the comparisons or how gruesome the forebodings, not a single warning was heeded, and of course much of greater Phoenix came to resemble Los Angeles all over again, with even less water and much more heat. Brave and knowledgeable gardeners, growers, and designers relentlessly continued to buck this tide and, consequently, much of greater Phoenix’s public plantings and a great deal of the newer parts of the area look more like the desert in which we live—or least pay homage to it rather than smooth it over with an alien facade. This is a trend that I strongly support, deeply enjoy, and have spent no small part of my working life promoting. But I also know that we could take a more careful and considered look at our horticultural brethren by the sea, because California is a place from which we could learn a lot. It is not just the breathtaking variety of plants that are grown in California, which is enough to send any plant lover’s heart into palpitations of joy, but also the wide array of both public and private gardens, specialty nurseries tucked into impossibly small places, industrial-strength nurseries helping define half of what the country grows, and the wealth of exploration still underway, that shows California has been focused on horticulture much longer than Arizona, often with astonishing results. There is plenty to learn from what California horticulturists and gardeners have managed to achieve; I consider myself, and my garden, fortunate to have had long and intimate relations with some of them. Our personal introduction into the scope of California horticulture was through Tom. Tom and I spent countless hours of our youth together at Texas A&M, valiantly slogging our way through graduate school; I in geography, he in horticulture. I was there to find my way, but he came with his in place—breeding roses. We met in a plant taxonomy class; that education shaped both our lives, not just professionally but with each other as well. We were lab mates, and his irreverent humor and sturdy sense of fun, in addition to his already vast plant knowledge and even greater curiosity, sealed a lifetime friendship. He had met Gary (another happy result of spending time in the halls of learning) only once before we moved west.

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On our first Thanksgiving after moving to Arizona, we couldn’t wait to go to California for a visit. Tom and his partner John served as our guides to the countless faces of California horticulture, which over the years have made a great impact on our garden. Over time we also began to accumulate California friends and colleagues who shared a passion for plants and all that they offered in that golden state. The first morning at Tom and John’s house in the San Fernando Valley, as I stood out on the deck and beheld an ordinary urban garden transformed into a rose palace (I think he told us there were some 500 plants there at the time), I knew I was someplace new and different. Plants were already a big part of our lives—we had moved to Arizona originally with a plan for a small nursery—but this bowled me over. Riots of orchids on the porch, succulents I barely recognized in pots around the patios; all of it new, interesting, and beckoning. I knew that roses would never take my heart the way they did Tom’s, but all the other plants that filled in the corners around those plants, that fell out of his pots and secured the nooks behind and underneath them, they just might. California and its nurseries took us completely by storm as Tom and John ushered us around, introducing us to their favorite nurseries. We felt like we had been asleep for a long time and had awakened in some kind of Eden filled with treasures and delights laid out like a banquet just for us. I had never seen so much diversity; even a modest mid-range nursery held more types of plants than I had seen in most of the nurseries I knew in Louisiana and Arizona. Specialty nurseries in both of those places were uncommon—a few succulent nurseries in Tucson and one azalea/camellia palace in New Orleans notwithstanding. Here in southern California we found tiny plots, tucked into back gardens or huddled behind commercial developments, packed with stunning arrays of both types and species of plants. Cultivars were much more common than in Arizona, and frankly still are. The most minute spaces, crowded under a railroad bridge or between two buildings, were full of plants. Most astounding of all were entire nurseries under the power lines that criss-cross the great city, filled with citrus, succulents, or tropical plants. One grower of great renown lived in a modest neighborhood with his array of plants crawling up the hill that was his back garden. Some of these small nurseries specialized in just one genus, or one small group of plants, and many were in their third, fourth, or fifth generation. It was a new world, and we were thrilled to be caught up in its spell.

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Everything was new and exciting, and we feasted on it like starved hyenas. At the time, Arizona cared what plants and produce came across state borders to contaminate their homegrown products; we would return with our small station wagon stuffed with plants, covered with sheets to protect them from the sun. The inspectors never cared too much, barely noticing the bounty, but we felt like pirates who had the good luck to find the island where the treasure had been buried. Eventually we calmed down, but not before we acquired from California two of our garden’s greatest features—dryland bromeliads and a dedicated community of fellow plant nerds, both of which have made an immense impact on our garden and our lives. On one of our ramblings in the Los Angeles area our friends took us to a tiny nursery—now long gone—near some railroad tracks, which specialized in bromeliads. I already had a longstanding love affair with this family of plants, having raised a number of different ones in New Orleans. I sold them all when we moved to Arizona, correctly figuring those species would not like it in the dry, hot climate of our new home. I was right about those particular bromeliads, but that speck of a nursery was crammed to the rafters with plants and opened my eyes to a wondrous world I had not even suspected: bromeliads that prefer hot, dry growing conditions. I began to bring home an array of members of the genera Dyckia, Hechtia, Puya, Deuterocohna, Bromelia, and Abromeitiela. It took years before I finally gave up on Tillandsia—it is just too dry here for them to be happy. I gobbled them all up and found over the years that these bromeliads have become some of the most reliable and consistent plants for this garden. If you look around the back garden, you begin to notice that they are part of the fabric of the beds, growing happily in the sun, in the shade, behind a tree, beneath a shrub, accenting the wash. They are everywhere, but have a gentle approach and subtle appeal. And none of them more so than the hechtias. Hechtia is a genus that is centered in Mexico, with a few species that range up into south and west Texas, and it is these tough hombres that are my greatest interest and have been the greatest success in the garden. It is no surprise that they love it here. False agave hails from the Big Bend area and on into the dry, limestone hills of western Mexico; Hechtia glomerata is found in gravel and sandstone south along the Rio Grande River and on into northern Mexico.

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H. montana, which sounds like it should be from some pine-soaked forested region, is in fact from southern Baja California and on into Sonora and Sinaloa. The false agave are tucked under two creosotes in the back, one going toward the alley, the other facing the wall of the shade house in the ferociously sunny south-facing bed in the front that lies beneath the garage window. They all simply live in their little spots, snug and happy to all appearances, receiving the rain that seldom falls and a few waterings in the summer when we are awake. Late in the spring, they send up thin flowering stalks that hold their intriguing white flowers. The flowers are not especially showy; they look like they are pre-dried on the stalk as if forming an arrangement. They last a long time and, once the clump is large, make a lovely and long lasting show. One of the first hechtia we planted, the name of which is lost in the misty records, was in the front. It was promptly eaten to the ground by a rabbit in what I still consider an amazing feat of rabbit munching. This plant had curved thorns along its long, arching leaves, and we put it in the front because it was used to rugged conditions. It was gone in a flash; only the stump remained. I felt like I should put out a guard for a rabbit that could do such a thing—it is surely the superhero of rabbits, and I am convinced it must be able to leap buildings and walls and see through steel. Hechtia montana, with its well armed, celadon green leaves, sits comfortably on a slope facing the potting area and the shade house in the Jardin. Here there is no irrigation, and when we are watering something else we often remember to shoot it a drink. It thrives, and has made numerous offsets that all look elegant and healthy. Hechtia macdougalii is truly the most spectacular of this arid group of hechtia, with its wide, deep green leaves coated with a fine mist of gray hairs on the underside. Like all the rest, it is wickedly armed, so it is advisable to put it where you want it right off; moving them is a bloody chore and not for the faint of heart. The one that lives at the top of the alley stairs routinely sprouts seedling African sumacs that can only be cut off, never entirely pulled out, owing to the complex armature of the plant. Hechtia glabra, a species from Veracruz, represents the softer side of hechtia life, with smooth, green leaves, whose few spines are nearly invisible and so pliable you can bend them. Naturally, that made it a perfect subject for the rabbit’s foraging, and it looked to be in serious danger. I quickly formed a dome of chicken wire over it. It is now nearly fully recovered but has been shifted to a pot.

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Another softer species is the large-leaved Hechtia lundelliorum that was a gift from Tony Avent, and it went into a pot to keep it away from the beastly predators. This turned into a great idea, one of countless accidents that have worked out well. It is absolutely stunning in a low-slung pot, with its half dozen or so rosettes and their long, light-green leaves that fall gracefully over the side. I wish it would flower; I have no idea what they will look like, but you can’t rush these things, and I keep a sharp eye on it every spring just in case. That lovely little nursery also gave us one of the greatest treasures of our hechtia crowd, sold to us then as Hechtia tillandsioides, but over the years I am certain is more likely to be H. caerulea. The principal clump hangs off the edge of the raised bed near the patio in the back, and of all the places it has been tried in this garden, it likes this one the best. It, too, has no teeth to speak of and long, lean, falling leaves that give it a coarse, wide-leaved grassy look. Like most bromeliads it makes offsets freely, and all of these individual plants, or rosettes, cram into the others to make a tight, flowing globe. I had this plant a long time before it flowered, and it simply bowled me over once it did with its tall, branched, dark purple flowering stalk. As the stalk matured and flowers began to form, it faded to a pastel shade of lavender. Over the years, it has grown and increased so there are now numerous rosettes that bloom at once, creating a lavender haze over the apple-green plant. It hardly seems real, and I marvel every single time at how such exquisite flowering emerges from so tough and resilient a plant. For reasons only the rabbits understand, they don’t take out after the dyckias like they do to the hechtias. We began gathering up dyckias from the same nursery initially, and when I look around I am amazed at how many are still around after all these years and how well they complement this garden. The first dyckia I recall purchasing was Dyckia platyphylla, undoubtedly because it’s just so attractive. The leaves are wide but not particularly long, and create a tight arc from the base. They are deep, glossy green with big, prominent teeth that are not nearly as fierce as those of the hechtias, though it is virtually impossible to bend them. It tends to form rosettes so close to the base that they look like they are crawling up a short ladder, and an old clump is so firm you imagine you could walk over it. For a long time, I had the plant in the ground in the Med bed, but something changed—it got hotter, or sunnier, or something, and it began to look peaked and pale. I yanked it up and put it in a pot, a nice little pot

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almost the color of its leaves, and it is now a much happier fella. This is one of the things I love about all these rosette forming guys—agaves, manfredas, bromeliads, and so on—you can just dig them up and move them around almost with impunity. The hardest part of fooling with them is staying safe from their armament, but the plants seem to have no care about such treatment, and it makes adjusting them to new conditions a breeze. Over the years a number of dyckia have come and gone. The extraordinary Dyckia marnier-lopostolle, with its wide gray leaves and white spines hung on for a long time in the bed below the study window and then suddenly just gave it up. I keep intending to try again, probably in a pot or the raised bed this time. The selection of D. brevifolia that is smooth and completely spineless and that some crazed grower named ‘Naked Lady’ did fine for a number of years until it too just faded away. But the Dyckia rarifolia and D. remotiflora that I got at other California locales and that were part of my growing program at the Desert Botanical Garden live on in the shade house, blooming and spreading delightfully. I should plant some of them in the ground now that it is clear the rabbits do not favor them, but the rabbits make me nervous, and these qualify as rarities in our garden. They are both small plants, an old clump barely fills up a 6-inch pot, so they aren’t much trouble as potted plants. Over the years other dyckias have found their way in; Dyckia leptostachya was a gift from Texas friends and D. pseudococcinea came from the now defunct nursery of Paul Hutchinson. Some of each make their way in the raised beds by the back porch and are two of the handsomest dyckias we have. When they bloom I and the hummingbirds are in thrall to their vivid beauty. Dyckia flowers are colorful and intense, usually a shade of orange, occasionally brilliant yellow, and are held as a trio up and down the tall stalk. Their petals fold in such a way that they appear to be a fluted triangle, making it a snap to know at least what genus you have if the tag falls out. My results with the genus Puya have been much more mixed, and it is not the fault of those charming nurserymen who seduced me long ago. They did after all encourage me to try Puya laxa, which grows along the wash in the back with no care at all from either of us. Its long, recurved leaves are smothered in white hairs, and unlike most of the species, the flowers are small, almost hidden in the maze but of such an intense royal purple you wish they were larger or more prominent. It has sulked, however, since the big blue palo verde died, causing it to grow in full and unrelieved sun in our ever hotter summers, and is now a potted plant because I cannot bear to lose it after all these years.

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I have tried and lusted over many other Puya species over the years, but most find our heat and aridity difficult. So far only the charming Puya laxa and the handsome P. dyckioides continue to thrive in this garden, so I have to make pilgrimages to California to see the great bounty of the others. From those same ramblings also came our Deuterocohnia meziana, a marvelous plant that we put beneath a behemoth creosote near the main patio. It resides there to this day, and is becoming so large I may have to take a few rosettes out and find them a home. Rabbits just walk past it; I can only be grateful if somewhat baffled. It blends smoothly with the surrounding agaves and cacti of that bed, with its gray-green leaves and long, branched flowering stalks. This species has a strange flowering habit; it continues to bloom on the same inflorescence year after year, so it is important not to cut off an old flowering stalk until it dies naturally after three or four years. Flowering is not gaudy, but the lovely yellow flowers are charming nonetheless. These bromeliads, with all their successes and failures, are a clear indication of what we have always thought this garden was about—experimentation with a wide array of plants to find what works and what does not. Through the years in this garden we have found unexpected treasures—like most of these bromeliads—that are outstanding and more or less effortless members of our garden clan. All it takes is a high tolerance for plant death, an acceptance of continuous replacement, a roving eye, and a voracious appetite for spending money on the likely, the promising, or the alluring. It helped that we made a lot of plant friends both here and in California and it was Tom, and John as well, that set all that in motion. Not long after we began our California soirees, John took a sabbatical from attempting to educate the young and spent some of his time as a volunteer at the Huntington Botanical Gardens’ plant sale. For the fun of it all, and also because it involved plants, we often came over to join in the festivities. At the time I was running plant sales in Phoenix, and it was something of a busman’s holiday to go see how other gardens did it and what they offered. It was also a candy store for plant nuts like us. The first year working at that sale was hugely intimidating. Tom and John ran the perennial tables, and we knew nothing about campanulas or violets or frankly almost anything that was on offer. Tom and John were good teachers and lots of books were available; over the years we began to find a few we recognized and a bit of knowledge stuck. On those rare occasions when it was a perennial familiar to us, we leaped on it and regaled all their customers with its charms, to the point of tedium I am sure.

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When we roamed around the sale seeking promising plants for our own garden, it wasn’t the new magnolia, the latest in variegated groundcovers, or the seductive little flowering shrubs from New Zealand that caught us by the throat, much less the tender charms of yet another sedum or crassula— it was the palms, agaves, succulents, bromeliads, and bulbs that piled up on our side of the table. Occasionally, something else grabbed our attention. It was here that I first bought the Easter egg emu bush, and I still recall with despair the one that got away. It was the best yellow-flowered Hesperaloe parviflora I have ever seen. But it seemed expensive at the time and we passed it up. Yet all these years later, I have not seen its match for a clear bright yellow color. I learned my lesson and have never again balked at picking up something that seemed unusual enough, unique enough, or interesting enough to be tried in our garden. While this attitude can be hard on the bank account, it is great for the garden, as long as we maintain a sanguine attitude toward the losses, and that is all we really care about when you get right down to it. But more than anything it was the great community of horticulturists and gardeners that flocked to those sales, both as volunteers, workers, and customers, that formed such extraordinary memories and have filled so many corners of our gardening lives. Such people always seemed to surround us in California, and many of these fellow travelers in the world of plants became life-long friends and part of our permanent community. Others we only see occasionally at their nursery, at plant events, or during visits, but we all greet each other like long-lost cousins, which I suppose in a way we are. It is charming and sweet and it is why I always feel right at home as soon as I cross the river, even though I am pretty sure I can’t see my way to living there. Some places are like that I suppose; you fall right in, you are loved and comfortable and genuinely fit in—but you know that it is best to be a visitor, to be on the sidelines. It would never be the same if you were there all the time; surely the glow would diminish with too much exposure. Or would it? Despite our deep friendship and long-standing plant hunting expeditions together, Tom and I have resisted exchanging too many plants from our own gardens, chiefly because we have such different taste and styles, not to mention growing conditions. However, he did give me one of the finest and most astounding bulbs I shall ever own, Hippeastrum papilio. At the time he gave it to me it was extremely rare in cultivation, and it was a gift of pure love. I moved that plant from New Orleans, I put it in the ground in a number of places, and over nearly twenty years it grew well but failed to

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even hint at the remarkable bloom for which it is so renowned. Of course Tom’s bloomed extravagantly, and I began to despair that I would ever personally see its flower in my garden. Finally, exasperated, I potted it up and put it in the shade house, and within a couple of years I found it in full bloom one summer, snug in the back of the shade house. The flowers are immense, with graceful, wide petals marked with maroon and yellow-green striations. To my joy the flowers last a couple of days, plenty of time to call Tom and report my completely unwarranted success. It turned out that in a fit of cleaning or some other unruly activity, his had somehow gone missing and he was in need of a new one. And isn’t that just great, when a plant you have revered for decades that was the gift of a beloved friend can be restored to that very friend’s own garden. Or it would be, if I would just remember to take it with me next time I go to the Golden State. I have managed to weasel in a few agaves that work at Tom’s place, and now there is a spectacular Agave gypsophila in a blue pot right out front of their house that is particularly handsome. But one of our donations was a near disaster for their garden. Malabar nut (Justicia adhatoda) is a handsome, white-flowered perennial, originally from Sri Lanka, that grows to about 4 feet tall here in the desert. I learned about it out at Boyce Thompson Arboretum almost as soon as I arrived in Arizona and grew it at our first house. It was so successful that it came with us and lives happily beneath my study window in the snug shadow of the lime tree. It is a lovely thing, replete with spikes of pure white flowers over most of the year. I think it would have more of its wide, soft leaves if I gave it a bit more water, but it fits its place wonderfully, and we are both content. Naturally, I wanted to pass it along; it just looked like a California sort of plant. I brought over a cutting for Tom on one of our early visits. He planted it in a prominent place, right in front of the dining room window where its white flowers fit right in, and we all imagined we would gaze at the commanding view of the mountains over its arch of flowers. But it was too happy and grew to such enormous size with such speed that within a season it had smothered the window and obliterated the view. He began to fear for plants in the vicinity, and by our next visit it was gone. Tom is rarely tactful about such things, and John was frankly horrified, so it was a good while before any other interlopers from the desert were permitted to join the ranks of the chosen. It just goes to show that the soft air, gentle nights, and near-perfect year-round weather of southern California does come at a price.

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California gardeners have been incredibly generous to us and our garden; the list of their gifts and trials is vast. True, not all of them remain to this day, but that is hardly the point. In the plant world, death and decline is your greatest teacher, and it is the spirit in which they are given and received that is much more vital than their longevity, although it is always a happy bonus when they manage to continue on. I used to howl with laughter when various nurserymen, gardeners, and friends in California would hand over a plant for me to try that they deemed to be probable for our area because it had grown well in Temecula. At first, because I had never been to Temecula, I was convinced it was the oven of southern California. Each of them was earnest and thoroughly convinced that if it would grow there, it would thrive in the Phoenix area. Most of those generous trials did not make it through their first summer here, and it has been hard to convince a great many of our California buddies that, although Temecula may get pretty warm, even hot for a bit, it is not even in the running for a truly hot spot. I have by now been to Temecula many times, and while I concede that it is, by southern California standards, warm—if this is the hottest weather they ever know they need to bend down in thanks for the gifts they have received. In the earliest days of our California explorations, the flow of information was more or less a one-way street. I absorbed the plants and interests and the knowledge that had been gathered there on plants that were familiar to all desert gardeners or soon would be. I went to symposia and learned more than I could absorb, and took away gifts and treasures to try out back home. Over the years, all that California time opened my eyes to a broader range of what it meant to be a nursery, what was involved in creating a garden, and how irresistible it was to find and maintain a well-meaning and interested group of gardening pals. I have treasured our California connections for over twenty-five years now. We keep going back to renew them, keep them fresh, and get plant excited all over again, always looking for something interesting, new, and useful to try out and see how it survives in our garden. So many plants live or have lived in this garden from the years spent visiting, nursery hopping, speaking, and working in California, I wonder that it doesn’t look more like a California kind of place. But it doesn’t, undoubtedly because we are always looking for something that will fit in, that has a decent chance of being successful here. Many have not worked but the quest is still on, and it will be for a long time to come. As times have changed, and the water situation throughout the southwest has become more dire, I have been able to pay our California colleagues

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back a bit. Now I go over there and help them become inspired by great desert perennials, willing desert shrubs, and, of course, the agaves and yuccas that we have all always revered. I sometimes feel like I am teaching my teacher, for I learned far more than just a few more plant names from the enthusiastic crowd across the Colorado and hope that I will continue to do so for decades to come.

Ruth Every so often we think of trying another garden, imagining what it would be like, where we would do it, what sort of plants it should have, and so on and on. It is idle chatter for the most part—the kind of thing you indulge in on a long, luscious evening when the bats are out in force and the stars begin to glitter invitingly over the back patio. I usually wonder, rarely out loud, if I am too old for such an adventure, but then I think of Ruth and am encouraged to try it if the opportunity comes up. Ruth Bancroft, over 100 at this writing, and her lovely succulent garden in northern California is a revered destination for anyone interested in succulent plants. It was one of the first gardens that inspired the Garden Conservancy founders and is still one of their crown jewels. But for me, it is a wonderful collection of beautifully grown agaves, aloes, yuccas, manfredas, and other delights, and the place where I have been privileged to twice sit on a log or a porch and visit with its founder. She told me that she started the garden around her seventy-third year, which just fascinates me. She had always gardened, and a vast collection of iris along the side of the house remains from that time. But somehow` succulents began to show up and start hanging around, and then they began to increase, and like magic it all coalesced into a great recognizable project for her. I am sure the details are known to her and others, but for me, the salient message was that she started something at an age when most of us would consider ourselves on the waning side of life and that she was lucky enough to see a good deal of it mature. I take great inspiration from women like her. I have always thought I did everything about ten years later than was generally considered appropriate. I married a bit later than usual, I found my true career in plants after the other three fizzled out from lack of interest, and I published my first book a bit longer into my life than might be customary. I used to haul around

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the fact, leftover from a long-ago passion, that Tolstoy published War and Peace when he was fifty. It seemed encouraging, but I found it even more meaningful when I realized that the beloved Julia Child was fifty when she first went on television, and look how that turned out. After meeting Ruth, and sitting on that log, listening to her irrepressible enthusiasm for the aloes, agaves, and other plants at her place, the life she had before the garden, and how much pleasure she takes in it all, I came to think of age in a different way—frankly as even more irrelevant than I always had. So the idea of trying something new, whether in this garden or in some other, doesn’t engender quite as much caution as it probably should.

Neighbors Anywhere you garden, whether in a large city, a modest suburb, or out in the rural countryside, neighbors figure into your gardening life. In urban gardens the proximity and, frankly, the tastes of your neighbors gives them extra impact on your own place. Neighbors who value plants, perhaps are even gardeners themselves, are a great joy. They understand the addiction, often participate in it fully, and get just as much pleasure as you do (often more) from the unruly vine that refuses to stay on your side of the fence, or the loaded fruit tree that generously lets fruit fall on their side. It is also important to have neighbors and friends who want to relieve you of the bounty of a successful garden. In this way you can populate the entire neighborhood with your favorite plants, especially those that reseed gracefully in your garden. But this is a habit that can be fraught with danger. We had a neighbor who spread feathery cassia around the neighborhood because he thought it was pretty. It is, but it is also something of a thug. The charming, gray-leaved shrub blooms deliriously in February, filling the entire street with bright yellow flowers that nearly smother the plant. In great numbers or up close, it has a musky, old-room fragrance—not altogether unpleasant, but hardly the stuff of perfume either, and during its peak bloom the entire neighborhood fills with the fragrance. In the spirit of too much of a good thing, all that bloom means that there are loads and loads of seeds, tons in fact. This species hails from the dry parts of Australia, where it covers a vast range, much of which is terribly similar to the low desert of Arizona. This is a recipe that accounts for a lot

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of the great pests around the world—highly adaptable plants capable of growing in a wide array of situations suddenly thrust into a congenial or similar environment. Like all bullies, they cannot control themselves, and through the years, feathery cassia has marched, unaided by cultivation, throughout the neighborhood. When we first moved in we found a dozen or so in the front garden and removed them almost immediately. Its true nature was becoming clear at the time, and they also did not fit the garden scheme out front. Over time we heard the stories of how it came to be such an important part of the neighborhood. We watched as it came up in the washes and byways of the entire area, and our suspicions about its true nature were confirmed. Now we pull every seedling we can find, in the wash, in the alley, in the front garden. And although it has been almost twenty years since we removed them from the front garden, a couple of seedlings will still emerge in a wet year. In one of those great ironies of life, two of our greatest success and treasures in this desert garden came from our neighbors in New Orleans. One is the white-flowered form of the four o’clock given to us by a gardening neighbor there. It is a treasure, and it calls to mind our first house and gardening together in the steamy Gulf Coast. On hot, languid summer nights, it opens its tiny flowers, with their heady, sweet aroma, so white they glow in the dark, seducing moths all night long. The other is the golden dewdrop or Mexican lilac (Duranta erecta). Unknown to us when we acquired it, this is a native of the sere, limestone islands of the Caribbean, including those right off the coast of Florida. We brought it with us from New Orleans out of sheer sentiment; it is so beautiful, we loved it and could not bear to give it up. We planted it at the side of the stairs on the edge of the back patio, where its long, delicate cascades of sky-blue flowers were visible all summer long. It all worked out beautifully, although over the years the original died, possibly of old age, and has been replaced by its cultivar ‘Sweet Memories.’ While this is a charming plant with royal purple flowers rimmed in white, it does not form much fruit and we miss that. On unselected forms, the cascades of round fruit form a second “bloom,” hanging like strings of golden pearls from the ends of the stems. In this house, we have been royally blessed by our neighbors. They are a congenial group, and we share various plants from time to time, swapping our yellow-flowered staghorn cholla with their copper-colored one, and

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using any neighbor who asks as a testing ground for promising individuals or as the handy receivers of the overflow that results from our excesses. Neighbors also form the background of a lot of our design and planning sessions without their knowledge. As we take weekend walks through the neighborhood, we notice their efforts both in wonder and in amazement, and generally keep track of what is growing throughout the area. Looking at other people’s choices and styles permits us try out ideas without the bother of digging and planting. Looking over others’ successes and unfortunate choices blazes a shortcut through our long planning sessions and has saved us from some really gruesome pairings and ideas. On one of these walks we found that the delightful pink sprays of desert penstemon, when backed up by the riotous, deep tones of Bougainvillea ‘Barbara Karst’ kill the glory of each other. Although I like to think we didn’t need to be told, we also found that pruning an ocotillo straight across the top, like a Marine flattop haircut, ruins the form, and the plant grows out of it by shooting tiny fingerlings from the ruined canes. We were also able to confirm our long-held belief that gardens with a mulch of gravel grow the best crop of desert marigold (Baileya multiradiata). Unfortunate misconceptions are also clearly in evidence, and since we walk the neighborhood often, it is easy to follow the long road of recovery that some plants take to correct a neighbor’s errors. One neighbor must have thought their creosote were getting out of hand—a claim that is hard to credit since they were the only plant in the large garden and were spaced fifteen feet apart. One spring each and every one of them was systematically pruned to within a few inches of the ground. At first I was horrified, and thought of the mantra I tell many of my students: if you hate it that much just get rid of it. Over time, it was gratifying to see that this abominable pruning job did not kill the creosote; in fact it invigorated them. Each plant sent out a spectacular number of tiny, deep green stems from the base. But while their recovery was encouraging, they no longer looked like creosote. All the new growth was the same size, with brilliant green, soft stems, and each stem had an abundance of leaves. It was a tame version of a wild thing and now, years later, although larger, these plants still have that tamed, controlled look, and I still don’t like it at all. We have often been the happy recipients of a host of great plants, some of which we treasure, from our neighbors. The same neighbor who unleashed the feathery cassia in the neighborhood gave us a set of red squill from his

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garden when he and his wife moved away. He had experimented with them decades earlier for their arsenic components, but now grew them for their beautiful tall flowering stalks. Ours has only bloomed a few times; it takes some mysterious combination of circumstances for it to flower, but like Christmas to a small child, they are worth the wait. The pale, ethereal blue flowers are crowded along a 5-foot tall spike that emerges before the leaves; consequently it looks like the ground itself bloomed. But while the flowering is erratic and whimsical, the leaves are entirely reliable, first emerging as a deep green tight cone, then relaxing into a fall of broad sturdy straps for the remainder of the winter. Our red squill grows with no care to speak of from us, safely tucked on the side of the Med beds behind the Bismarck’s palm, and their emergence signals the beginning of true winter for us. It is impossible to name all the friends, colleagues, fellow travelers, and generous souls who have enhanced and helped create this garden. They are with us all the time, each time the plant they sent us flowers, each time one of them dies, on the tags and in our hearts, firmly attached to our garden and our lives.

In the End

it is hard to estimate how people will take to our garden, or even if they will at all. We have such a large collection of oddities, interesting trials, and foolish choices, we wonder how anyone can begin to figure out what is going on or what was our intention. Assuming, of course, that we would know if asked. And while Gary is a wonderful builder in stone, we are both more plant crazy than design savvy, and it generally shows. There are almost no repeats in the garden, and those careful admonitions to grow in groups of three are wasted on us; after all, you could get two more types of interesting new plants in there. But there are paths, there are a few views—mostly accidental—and there are some nice elements—also mainly accidents. For the most part the garden is composed of droughtadapted plants and, because of our interest, includes way too many agaves and yuccas and their kin. It is perversely fascinating to see how different visitors respond to our garden. Some are great plant maniacs just as we are, and they look at everything one at a time, investigating, asking questions, wanting to know the particulars of origin, bloom, and culture, while exploring the chances of a cutting or a seed. They probably could tell someone else everything that grows in the garden, but have not a clue how it looks overall. “Patio, what patio? Oh I suppose there might have been one, but I wasn’t looking at that—I was interested in the Mexican redbud selection over there.” 205

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There are also the steadier visitors, those who see it often and watch it evolve and move through the seasons. They come to visit the garden the same way they come to visit us: to look around, admire the first bloom of the bulbs, or the size of this year’s spinach crop, or the way that new agave is finally fitting into a planting. For these visitors the garden contains not just their plant donations, but also their smile, their walk, and their interest forever. Some visitors only see the chaos, and are politely disconcerted. A few are disinterested in all the succulents and so forth and crave more frothy leafiness and more color. A very few have found it harsh and buzz through at lightning speed, looking for a safer place, the patio or, better yet, the house. And every once in a while someone comes through who delights our souls by telling us they love the garden and could just stay here forever, it is so peaceful. Naturally I wish everyone would look upon it and say, ooooh what a lovely place you can have without a lawn, and with so many different plants. But like lots of fantasies, these happen much more regularly in front of the bathroom mirror than in the garden. We are so familiar with every little blade that each triumph, no matter how minor, is magnified and increased by the effort we have put into it, and we cannot escape the desire for each visitor to encapsulate that. We want them to honor and understand all the back chat that went into making this place, but they can’t, they never will, and it is unreasonable to ask. However, you can count on the fact that each visitor will bring what they know, what they do not know, what they like, and what they do not like, and lay it smack dab into the middle of the garden. That, more than any of our intentions or desires, is how they will react to it; with pleasant approbation, small quiet disappointment, or polite feigned interest. Yet in the end, it is our garden, and nothing our visitors say or do diminishes our delight in the place. We just keep loving it along. Like the old saw about whether a tree makes noise if you aren’t in the forest when it falls, could this place we call our garden really exist without visitors, friends, acquaintances, parties, patio wine sessions, and plant swaps? Perhaps, but it would be a poor and frigid thing, and I wouldn’t want to have any part of it. I strongly prefer to keep on marching along, in our meandering and aimless way, enjoying all the bounty, with all the other lives that have intertwined to make this little place all our own.

Index of Plants

Acacia berlandieri, 46 Acacia caven, 49 Acacia farnesiana, 49, 99 Acacia notabilis, 54 Acacia rigidula, 106 Acacia schaffneri, 106 Acacia willardiana, 3, 105–6 Aeonium, 39, 42 African sumac. See Rhus lancea Agapanthus orientalis, 46 Agave americana var. medio-picta, 186 Agave arizonica, 96, 176 Agave attenuata, 116 Agave bovicornuta, 7 Agave bracteosa, 96, 176 Agave celsii, 35–37 Agave delamateri, 96 Agave deserti, 96 Agave desmettiana, 35, 37–38 Agave filifera, 35, 38 Agave geminiflora, 179 Agave ghiesbrechtii, 116 Agave guiengola, 35, 38–39 Agave gypsophila, 197 Agave lechuguilla, 176 Agave macroacantha, 96–97 Agave margaritae, 35, 38

Agave ovatifolia, 49 Agave pygmae. See Agave seemaniana Agave schottii, 96 Agave seemaniana, 96 Agave ‘Sharkskin’, 47 Agave shawii, 116 Agave sisalana, 17, 43–44, 172 Agave tequilana, 117 Agave titanota, 176 Agave toumeyana var. bella, 47 Agave victoriae-reginae, 96–97, 176 Agave weberi, 94 Albizzia julibrissin, 10, 28 Aleppo pine. See Pinus halepensis Allium tuberosum, 50, 168 Aloe ciliaris, 35 Aloe cryptopoda, 80 Aloe hereroensis, 47 Aloe marlothii, 10, 49 Aloe striata, 65 Aloe vaombe, 34, 61, 65 Aloysia wrightii, 27, 66, 168 Amaryllis belladonna, 46 Amaryllis papilio. See Hippeastrum papilio Anisacanthus quadrifidus, 176 Arabian jasmine. See Jasminum sambac

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Argentine mesquite. See Prosopis alba arroyo sweetwood. See Myrospermum sousanum Artemisia arborescens, 44, 46–47 artichoke. See Cynara scolymus Asclepias subulata, 154, 176 Astrophytum myriostigma, 93 Atriplex lentiformis, 56 Atriplex polycarpa, 176 autumn sage. See Salvia greggii Baileya multiradiata, 202 Baja senna. See Senna purpusii Barleria repens, 65 Bauhinia divaricata, 15 Bauhinia galpinii, 7 Bauhinia macranthera, 17, 167 beaked yucca. See Yucca rostrata bee bush. See Aloysia wrightii bell-flowered hesperaloe. See Hesperaloe campanulata Bermuda grass. See Cynodon dactylon bishop’s cap. See Astrophytum myriostigma Bismarckia nobilis, 47 Bismarck palm. See Bismarckia nobilis black brush. See Acacia rigidula black dalea. See Dalea frutescens blue palo verde. See Parkinsonia florida boojum. See Fouquieria columnaris Bougainvillea ‘Barbara Karst’, 202 Brahea, 138 brazilwood. See Haematoxylon brasiletto brittlebush. See Encelia farinosa bunny ears prickly pear. See Opuntia microdasys Burroughsia fastigiata, 55 butterfly lily. See Moraea polystachya Caesalpinia platyloba, 102–3 Caesalpinia pulcherrima, 27, 106 California fan palm. See Washingtonia filifera

Index of Plants California fuchsia. See Epilobium canum Calliandra californica, 24, 60 Calliandra eriophylla, 20, 176 Callirhoe involucrata, 168 cane cholla. See Cylindropuntia spinosior Cape honeysuckle. See Tecoma capensis cardon. See Pachycereus pringlei Carnegiea gigantea, 6, 10, 78–79, 89–90, 135–36, 147 Cercis canadensis var. mexicana, 168 chain-fruit cholla. See Cylindropuntia fulgida Chasmanthe floribunda, 46 cherry sage. See Salvia microphylla Chihuahuan orchid tree. See Bauhinia macranthera Chinese lantern tree. See Dichrostachys cinerea Chisos rosewood. See Vauquelinia corymbosa Cissus trifoliata, 35 conehead thyme. See Thymus capitatum Consolea falcata, 128–29 coral aloe. See Aloe striata Cordia parvifolia, 57, 168 Coryphantha, 93 cow horn agave. See Agave bovicornuta Crassula argentea, 39 creosote. See Larrea tridentata Crocus sativus, 46, 76 Cylindropuntia aciculata, 11, 92, 131 Cylindropuntia bigelovii, 91–92 Cylindropuntia fulgida, 6, 69, 91 Cylindropuntia spinosior, 11, 69, 91–92 Cylindropuntia versicolor, 69, 201 Cynara scolymus, 50 Cynodon dactylon, 7–8 Dalea frutescens, 114, 123, 176 Datura wrightii, 27 desert cotton. See Gossypium thurberi

Index of Plants  desert fern. See Lysiloma thornberi desert lavender. See Hyptis emoryi desert marigold. See Baileya multiradiata desert milkweed. See Asclepias subulata desert penstemon. See Penstemon parryi desert prickly pear. See Opuntia phaecantha desert ruellia. See Ruellia peninsularis desert saltbush. See Atriplex polycarpa Deuterocohnia meziana, 195 Dichrostachys cinerea, 17–19, 167 Dicliptera resupinta, 20 Dodonaea viscosa, 24, 172–73 Dudleya saxosa ssp. collomae, 40 Duranta erecta, 201; ‘Sweet Memories’, 201 Dyckia brevifolia ‘Naked Lady’, 194 Dyckia leptostachya, 194 Dyckia marnier-lopostolle, 194 Dyckia platyphylla, 193 Dyckia pseudococcinea, 194 Dyckia rarifolia, 194 Dyckia remotiflora, 194 Easter egg emu bush. See Eremophila racemosa Ebano ebanopsis, 11, 68, 69, 99 Echinocactus grusonii, 11 Echinocereus engelmannii, 19, 88 Edithcolea grandis, 8 elephant tree. See Pachycormis discolor Encelia farinosa, 14, 20 English ivy. See Hedera helix Epilobium canum, 62, 65 Eremophila racemosa, 167, 196 Eupatorium havanense, 56 Eysenhardtia orthocarpa, 56 fairyduster. See Calliandra eriophylla false agave. See Hechtia texensis feathery cassia. See Senna artmesioides fern tree. See Lysiloma watsoni Ferocactus emoryi, 93

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Ferocactus gracilis, 93 Ferocactus latispinus, 93 Ferraria crispa, 46 fire barrel. See Ferocactus gracilis firebush. See Hamelia patens firecracker penstemon. See Penstemon eatonii flame anisacanthus. See Anisacanthus quadrifidus foldwing. See Dicliptera resupinta foothills palo verde. See Parkinsonia microphylla Fouquieria columnaris, 7, 10, 30 Fouquieria fasciculata, 99 Fouquieria macdougalii, 98 Fouquieria splendens, 6, 11, 97–98, 202 four o’clock. See Mirabilis jalapa fragrant rain sage. See Leucophyllum pruinosum Freesia alba, 43 Furcraea selloa, 16 garlic chives. See Allium tuberosum giant hesperaloe. See Hesperaloe funifera giant mugwort. See Artemisia arborescens globemallow. See Sphaeralcea ambigua golden barrel cactus. See Echinocactus grusonii golden dew drop. See Duranta erecta golden-eye. See Viguieria deltoidea Gossypium thurberi, 50 grapefruit, ‘Marsh’, 8 grape ivy. See Cissus trifoliata graythorn. See Zizyphus obtusifolia green santolina. See Santolina rosmarinifolia Guaiacum coulteri, 99 guajillo. See Acacia berlandieri guayacan. See Guaiacum coulteri Habranthus robustus, 55, 119 Haematoxylon brasiletto, 15, 162

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Hamelia patens, 80 Harrisia, 49 Havardia pallens, 45 Hechtia, 130, 191 Hechtia caerulea, 193 Hechtia glabra, 192 Hechtia glomerata, 191 Hechtia lundelliorum, 193 Hechtia macdougalii, 192 Hechtia montana, 192 Hechtia texensis, 42, 191, 192 Hechtia tillandsioides. See Hechtia caerulea Hedera helix, 35 hedgehog cactus. See Echinocereus engelmannii Hesperaloe campanulata, 47 Hesperaloe funifera, 94 Hesperaloe parviflora, 94, 186, 196 Hippeastrum papilio, 46, 196 Homeria, 46 hopbush. See Dodonaea viscosa Hyptis emoryi, 176 Indian fig prickly pear. See Opuntia ficus-indica Iris ‘Arilbred’, 46 ironwood. See Olneya tesota Jacaranda mimosifolia, 45, 47–48 jade plant. See Crassula argentea Jasminum sambac, 57 Jatropha cordata, 99 Jatropha integrimma, 72 Jerusalem sage. See Phlomis fruticosa jojoba. See Simmondsia chinensis jumping cholla. See Cylindropuntia fulgida Justicia adhatoda, 197 Justicia candicans, 61, 65 Justicia sonorae, 65 Kalanchoe beharensis, 41 Kalanchoe daigremontiana, 40 Kalanchoe orgyalis, 41

Index of Plants Kalanchoe synsepetala, 39 Kalanchoe tubiflora, 40 Kearney’s sumac. See Rhus kearneyi kidneywood. See Eysenhardtia orthocarpa lady’s slipper. See Pedilanthus macrocarpa Larrea tridentata, 9, 74, 107–8, 135, 202 Lavandula dentata, 44 lavender. See Lavandula dentata lavender cotton. See Santolina chamaecyparissus Leucophyllum ‘Mountain Cloud’, 47 Leucophyllum frutescens, 7; ‘White Cloud’, 107 Leucophyllum langmaniae, 107 Leucophyllum pruinosum, 168 little-leaf cordia. See Cordia parvifolia Lippia graveolens, 50 Lophocereus schottii var. monstrosa, 93 Lophophora williamsii, 188 Lycium, 20 Lycium exsertum, 108 Lysiloma candida, 49 Lysiloma thornberi, 168 Lysiloma watsoni, 17, 168 Malabar nut. See Justicia adhatoda Malvaviscus arboreus, 168 Malvaviscus drummondii, 168 Mammillaria, 93 Manfreda ‘Macho Mocha’, 35 mangle dulce. See Maytenus phyllanthoides Maytenus phyllanthoides, 173 Mexican bauhinia. See Bauhinia divaricata Mexican lilac. See Duranta erecta Mexican oregano. See Lippia graveolens; Poliomintha maderensis Mexican palo verde. See Parkinsonia aculeata Mexican redbud. See Cercis canadensis var. mexicana

Index of Plants  mimosa. See Albizzia julibrissin Mirabilis jalapa, 27, 201 Moraea polystachya, 54, 76 Mt. Lemmon marigold. See Tagetes palmeri Myrospermum sousanum, 45 Myrtillocactus geometrizans, 92 narrow-leaved rosewood. See Vauquelinia angustifolia native mesquite. See Prosopis velutina Nerium oleander, 135; ‘St. Agnes’, 27, 55 noble acacia. See Acacia notabilis ocotillo. See Fouquieria splendens oleander. See Nerium oleander Olneya tesota, 101 Opuntia ficus-indica, 93 Opuntia johnsonii. See Opuntia quitoensis Opuntia microdasys, 135, 185 Opuntia phaecantha, 93 Opuntia quitoensis, 185 Opuntia santa-rita, 11, 90 oxblood lily. See Rhodophiala bifida Pachycereus pringlei, 174 Pachycormis discolor, 20, 106 palo adan. See Fouquieria macdougalii palo blanco. See Acacia willardiana palo brea. See Parkinsonia praecox palo colorado. See Caesalpinia platyloba Parkinsonia aculeata, 10, 32 Parkinsonia florida, 6, 48–49, 150, 162 Parkinsonia microphylla, 6, 10, 135 Parkinsonia praecox, 7, 103–5 Pavonia lasiopetala, 118 Pedilanthus macrocarpa, 176 pencil cholla. See Cylindropuntia aciculata Peniocereus marianus, 93 Penstemon eatonii, 20, 176 Penstemon parryi, 20, 202

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peyote cactus. See Lophophora williamsii Phlomis fruticosa, 37 Phoenix reclinata, 44 Pinus halepensis, 8 Podranea ricosoleana, 119 Poliomintha maderensis, 62, 65, 168 Prosopis alba, 54 Prosopis velutina, 10, 100, 135, 138 purple prickly pear. See Opuntia santa-rita Puya dyckioides, 195 Puya laxa, 49, 194–95 Quail bush. See Atriplex lentiformis Queen of the Nile. See Agapanthus orientalis red bird of paradise. See Caesalpinia pulcherrima red fairyduster. See Calliandra californica red hesperaloe. See Hesperaloe parviflora red justicia. See Justicia candicans red orchid bush. See Bauhinia galpinii red squill. See Urginea maritima Rhagodia, 56 Rhodophiala bifida, 3 Rhus kearneyi, 174 Rhus lancea, 10, 33–34 roadkill cactus. See Consolea falcata rock pavonia. See Pavonia lasiopetala Rodney’s aster. See Symphotrichum praealtum rosemary. See Rosmarinus officinalis Rosmarinus officinalis, 44, 50 Ruellia peninsularis, 96 Sabal bermudana, 168 sacred datura. See Datura wrightii saffron crocus. See Crocus sativus saguaro. See Carnegiea gigantea saltbush. See Rhagodia Salvia coccinea, 61, 65

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Salvia greggii, 62 Salvia microphylla ‘Red Storm’, 65 San Pedro cactus. See Trichocereus spathianus Santolina chamaecyparissus, 44 Santolina rosmarinifolia, 44 Santolina virens. See Santolina rosmarinifolia scarlet sage. See Salvia coccinea Senegal date palm. See Phoenix reclinata Senna artmesioides, 7, 200–201 Senna purpusii, 54 Simmondsia chinensis, 24, 107, 173 simple leaf chaste tree. See Vitex trifolia Sonoran water willow. See Justicia sonorae Sophora secundiflora, 8, 56 Sphaeralcea ambigua, 14, 20 staghorn cholla. See Cylindropuntia versicolor Sternbergia lutea, 46 sweet acacia. See Acacia farnesiana Symphotrichum praealtum, 62, 168 Tagetes palmeri, 62, 65, 168 Tecoma capensis, 16 Tecoma ‘Orange Jubilee’, 64 Tecoma stans, 18, 162 teddy bear cholla. See Cylindropuntia bigelovii tenaza. See Havardia pallens Texas ebony. See Ebano ebanopsis Texas mountain laurel. See Sophora secundiflora Texas ranger. See Leucophyllum frutescens

Index of Plants Thymus capitatum, 44, 50 totem pole cactus. See Lophocereus schottii var. monstrosa Trichocereus spathianus, 145–46 Turk’s cap. See Malvaviscus arboreus; Malvaviscus drummondii twin-flowered agave. See Agave geminiflora twisted acacia. See Acacia schaffneri Urginea maritima, 45–46, 202–3 Vallesia baileyana. See Vallesia glabra Vallesia glabra, 56 Vauquelinia angustifolia, 115, 173 Vauquelinia corymbosa, 56 Vetiver zizanioides, 50 Viguieria deltoidea, 176 vining aloe. See Aloe ciliaris Vitex trifolia, 54 Washingtonia filifera, 63 Welwitchia mirabilis, 117 white boneset. See Eupatorium havanense winecup. See Callirhoe involucrata wolfberry. See Lycium; Lycium exsertum yellowbells. See Tecoma stans Yucca gloriosa var. recurvifolia ‘Margaritaville’, 168 Yucca grandiflora, 42–43, 167 Yucca rostrata, 55 Yucca treculeana, 138 Zizyphus obtusifolia, 10, 69, 77

About the Author

mary irish is a garden writer, lecturer, and educator who lived in Arizona for twenty-five years. She is the author of Gardening in the Desert by the University of Arizona Press (2000); co-author with Gary Irish of Agaves, Yuccas, and Related Plants by Timber Press (2000); author of Arizona Gardener’s Guide (2003); and Month by Month Gardening in the Desert Southwest (2003), with a revised edition entitled Gardening in the Desert of Arizona (2008), all by Cool Springs Press; Perennials for the Southwest (2006) and Trees and Shrubs for the Southwest (2008), both by Timber Press. She is a frequent contributor to national and regional publications including Horticulture, American Gardener, and NMPro. She wrote a column for the Arizona Republic from 2003 to 2008. Irish has worked as a consultant on the Annenberg Retreat at Sunnylands in Rancho Mirage, California; Myriad Botanical Garden in Oklahoma City; downtown plantings for the city of Scottsdale; the Xeriscape Demonstration Garden in Glendale, Arizona; as well for numerous homeowner’s associations and private gardens. Irish teaches classes and conducts workshops regularly, covering a wide variety of topics in desert gardening, including use and cultivation of agaves and succulents, trees and shrubs, desert palms, desert perennials, and vegetable gardening. She served as the Director of Public Horticulture at the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix for eleven years ending in 1999. She has a BA from the University of Texas at Austin and an MS from Texas A&M University. 213