Not everyone knows that I’m a big gardening fan but there are times when I’m walking around a client’s home that I can tell they’re surprised by the number of plants that I can identify by sight as we walk around and I’m giving them my staging advice for the exterior of their home. Yes, staging includes that all important “curb appeal” which will often mean taking a hard look at the aesthetic of the exterior of a home and the surrounding gardens (or lack thereof).
At my last home, the one I just finished closing on the sale of last week, I had done extensive exterior work using a contractor to build a wrap around deck, patio, raised beds, etc. Not only was this nice for my own personal use, but it was great in the eventual resale of the home because of all the extras that it provided. In the bedding areas I put in mostly perennials but some of the spaces were also used for organic gardening for our own vegetable food supplies in the spring through fall. Most of the plant choices were made to be low maintenance as well as drought-tolerant and we had rain barrels installed to catch water runoff from the deck for use in the garden to limit seasonal summer water use. With food prices and gas prices being what they are today, it is nice to have an onsite garden which helps limit the number of trips to the store for fresh produce and keep our household expenses down.
To keep up on various gardening ideas I frequently read the NWLife section of the Seattle Times, specifically, the gardening section. In the July 2nd edition there was an article on the “native plant of the month” named Sisyrinchium, aka Blue-eyed grass. I’m looking for ideas for my new home where we have an area that ends up with an occasional water run-off area caused by the topography of the lot and neighborhood. My thoughts in attempting to limit actual run-off and to help in slowing down the water and helping it to percolate more slowly into the ground is to put in a mini-marsh like garden where water can collect and there will be plants that help the process and that can survive and thrive in that environment.
The blue-eyed grass seems to be one of many that can fit into my little scheme. Granted, I realize I’m taking on a multi-year process of putting this in place and my first goal is to stake out the spot in our new lot that will become our new vegetable garden, but collecting ideas is part of the fun of gardening.
The best tidbit of info that I gleaned from this article though was the website put together by the Washington Native Plant Society where you can find more information on native plants, including the places where you can buy them. Growing native plants is a smart move because you’ll have fewer high-maintenance plants to deal with because native plants typically have already figured out how to defend themselves against pests and they usually require less watering than more fussy plants that have been transplanted to our environment.
So, over this holiday weekend, if you’re out gardening – have fun, be safe and “go native!”
