What’s Happening In My Garden
There are slideshows with pictures of seasonal garden tasks in Wild Suburbia below the following list. Check out my book, Wild Suburbia – Learning to Garden with Native Plants, for more gardening information. Pictures of my garden and the South Pasadena Nature Park can be found on my Wild Suburbia Instagram feed:
Gardening Tasks by Season
- PLANTING SEASON (November through February)
- Weed out petty and garden spurge, oxalis, nasturtium, other weeds, and excess wildflowers (especially sunflowers)
- Pick, purchase and plant native plants
- Harvest, eat and give away avocados, lemons and limes.
- Sow wildflower seeds (unless you are all full up)
- Grow and enjoy lettuce, Swiss chard, spinach, sugar snaps, snow peas, etc.
- Make monkey flower cuttings
- Do not forget to deep water trees and shrubs if rain is sparse
- FLOWER SEASON (March through June)
- Rake deergrass and alkali sacaton early in the season
- Remove weeds before they set seed
- Start removing spent wildflowers including nasturtium; continue as wildflowers go to seed; leave some seeds for the birds and collect some for use next year
- Attend garden tours, and enjoy spring wildflowers
- If rain was sparse, water trees deeply
- Check automated sprinklers, sprinkler heads, etc.; set up automated drip irrigation for tomatoes; check drip and soaker hoses for leaks
- Plant tomatoes
- DORMANT SEASON: EXTREME HEAT, NO RAIN (July through October)
- Tidy up garden; remove remaining annual wildflowers
- Deep water nonnative parkway trees, citrus and avocados
- Harvest herbs, tomatoes, and other veggies
- Check irrigation, set timer in vegetable garden to water early morning on every second or third day
- Cut back dormant needlegrass, deadhead Cleveland sage, prune wild grape from trees
- Prune young oak trees for structure (August, September)
- Remove weeds, especially Bermuda grass and spurge
- Remove tomato plants, sow edible peas, prepare beds for upcoming planting season for vegetables
- Cut back sage, monkey flowers, gooseberry, etc.
- Plan and prepare beds for upcoming planting season for native plants
