The Tuesday Crew made it to the top of the hill before we settled on a few cleanup tasks.
Dale Harshberger, Beverly Kemmerling, Irene Rowland, Nancy Taylor Walker, Janet Wall and I started by dead heading the last few spent flower stalks on the yellow aloe shrub at the entrance to the Desert Garden.
Below, Nancy wielding heavy loppers to reach the stalk that was in the middle of the patch.
The patch has grown to the point that it is very difficult to trim the inner-most stalks. Dale reached in from the other side and pushed the stem with a shovel toward Nancy so she could reach it. CVBG volunteers are nothing if not resourceful!
Janet and Dale below removing spent bloom stalks and dead leaves from the red hot poker below.
We spent the most time taking the dead leaves off the adjacent honey bush. We had left them on to shield the stems from the sun, but now the fall is here, we decided to clean them up. At first we collected the leaves to take to the green waste, but then changed course and broke them up and let them form a mulch under the plants.
Beverly, me and Irene in the “before” picture:
Dale, Nancy, Janet, me and Irene in the “after” picture:
Near the beautiful (if invasive) pepper tree on the west end of the hilltop, we found an ephemeral additional tribute to Amy Kiyoko Abe in the form of a bunch of pepper fruits anchored to the top of her dedication bench by a couple of rocks. Sweet.
Before we left the top of the hill we took a moment to enjoy the western view of Conejo Valley. Seated: Dale, Beverly and Irene. Standing: me and Nancy.
When we got back to the bottom of the hill, Bill Dobner was busy with the compost and watering the service area plantings.
The plumbagos below are at the peak of bloom right now. The more common blue one is represented in a few places in the garden: top of the hill, Butterfly Garden and S. African Garden.
The white variety is in the S. African Garden. Ignore the plant label which is marking a dormant bulb (forest lily or Velthemia bracteata) and not the plumbago!
Thanks to Beverly, Nancy and Janet for their images.
Enjoy the garden…KMM
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