Monday, October 3, 2011

Xeriscape Post San Antonio - Part Three

This is part three of the tour of the San Antonio Botanical Gardens Xeriscape Demonstration Gardens. Part one dealt with the Manicured Xeriscape Garden and a typical traditional American Garden: Part One.
Part two demonstrates my favorite example of xeriscape - The Hill Country Landscape Garden: Part Two.
Click on those links to read those previous posts.
After reading the comments on the first post, Pam Penick from Digging fame left me a link of a past visit to these gardens by her and other fellow Austin bloggers. I will leave a link back here. Watersaver Lane
It was cool to go back and look at these gardens when they were "young". They have matured since this 2007 post. Also she gave me the name of the series of gardens, Watersaver Lane. Thank you Pam!

The fourth garden is the cottage garden: photo above. As you can see there is a nice transition from the Hill Country motif to a cottage garden motif. The cedar rail fence delineates the two very well. Also the Datura blends with both gardens.
This is a true cottage garden. Seedlings come up  and grow and are left to mature. Woah, do they grow. This is garden is definelty full.

Click on above image to read design elements, water requirements and other input requirements.
The signage fence design consisted of uniquely formed depressed pickets.
 The pathway materials consisted of decomposed granite with recycled and tumbled (to remove sharp edges) glass. Austin bloggers are very familiar with this mulch. Edging material consists of preformed limestone looking concrete uniform brick.
Flowering Pear in background with perennial salvia and bedding annuals.
Typical cottage garden stalwarts positioned in water zones common to their own water requirements. Heirloom roses, mexican mint marigold, artemesia, salvia greggi, shrimp plant and daylilly with Indian Hawthorne hedge among others. And of course reseeding annuals plan a part. An arbor over the front of the "home" distinguishes this garden theme, covered with Confederate jasmine I believe. I can imagine how much color there would be here in the spring and fall. Accessories adorn the theme.
By using plants with the same irrigation requirements we could all conserve much needed water resources. The next post will conclude my visit to Watersaver Lane, click on this link along with Pam's link above to look at more information about these "fun" demonstration themed xeriscape gardens. As Les from A Tidewater Garden put it: Xeriscape is more than Yucca and a sea of gravel, it can present color, texture, variety, and good design. David from The Desert Edge comments often about good and bad xeriscape designed gardens, you may want to visit his New Mexico garden blog site to learn more.
Onward through the fog! lol.



23 comments:

  1. Would like to see that when everything is in bloom.
    Cher Sunray Gardens

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  2. The moisture levels in my garden have changed so much since I moved here 8 years ago. Every year the garden is drier and drier as the trees grow larger. Learning the basics of water zones and xeriscaping has kept me from going crazy. It's such common sense and makes gardening more enjoyable when you're not fighting Mother Nature. Excellent and informative series!!

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  3. Thanks for the link and the quote. BTW, I have figured out the the comment issues I was having with Blogger had to do with me upgrading to IE9, which has been a real pain trying to make things like they once were.

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  4. Another great water conserved garden, Greg. Thanks for the tour and I did click to read too.

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  5. I would have guessed the arch of green over the doorway was something like boxwood, it is so dense. I have always wanted a roof garden or to otherwise garden upon my house. A hobbit hole under a hill would do...

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  6. I love the plantings over the doorway, and the little spot of grass! Great ideas - from the picket fence to the DG and glass idea. I bet it sparkles in the sunshine - a sense of color and bloom when the flowers aren't blooming!

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  7. Pictures from Spring, we need pictures from Spring!. I vote that you take another trip there in Late April/Mid-May Greggo!

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  8. Dear Greggo,
    Thanks for sharing. I have visited the SA Garden but would like to go back again. I picked up a Xeriscaping book yesterday. The book has Centaurea montanta in it. My mom grows that in her rock garden (zone5b)and I love the blue shade and flower texture. I will experiment with that (zone8) for the spring. One thing that is doing well for me in this drought (Texas) are my lantanas. The Golds are not my favotite color but they really produce.
    Jeanette

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  9. Cher and Prof. Roush- Road trip!
    Tamy- I understand about root competition. the last owner here planted silver maples. yuk.
    Les-your welcome
    Linnie- hobbit holes? a new form of landscape?

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  10. Dona-yes there is a lot of info at these gardens.
    Holley-yes I liked the arbor and vines over the doorway. Real Estate agents would hate these gardens as they 'hide' the view of the house.
    Jeanette- your current post is very interesting. glad you are investigating xeriscape.

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  11. That is a nice looking garden. It's hard to tell it's in Texas. That sounds like a great trip. Did you go the the River Walk? I've never been there, but our son went when he was a teenager.

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  12. This was a good tour.
    I live not too far from here, and still haven't been there. Your tour makes me was to go soon.

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  13. Hey Greggo,
    There's a house under that there garden? Great post. A valuable lesson for all is the grouping of plants of similar water uses together in zones. When are they going to start selling that mulch in our Kansas, Greggo?

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  14. Sue- I lived there 12 years and probably went there 30 times. I thought the gardens looked pretty good considering they were in s drought.
    Linda-my tour took place in July of this year, the gardeners were doing everything they could do to keep things green.
    Patrick-maybe you need to get a movement started with the recycled glass in Kansas City.

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  15. I really appreciate that there are some xeriscapes that don't look like dessert flora. This is fantastic...thanks for sharing.

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  16. San Antonio and cottage gardens--two of my favorite destinations. Thanks for the tour!

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  17. Thanks again for this tour -- and for the link to my post. It is cool to see how this exhibit has improved with time -- I don't remember the different fencing materials for example -- and how much the gardens have grown.

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  18. Sage,Plant Postings-your welcome.
    Pam-thank you for being the pioneer here.

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  19. Great tour and analysis, these homeowner scaled gardens have been very helpful in planning my own landscape here in SA.

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Thanks for leaving any comments, they are always welcomed. Sorry I had to add word verification as spam was becoming a huge problem. Greggo,