Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
We're back for another hour. You're listening to Let's Garden
with Scott Berline. The station hasn't yanked us yet and
the cops haven't been able to get in the door,
so we continue. I'm here with Sarah Geiger, being designer
with Wimberg Landscaping Wimberg Landscaping dot com, owner of the
brand new Verdigree plant farm, master, landscape technician with the
(00:23):
Ohio Green Industry Association, beekeeper, veteran of the Peace Corps,
and college graduate times five.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Yeah, all these blah blah.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
Now, neither of us are what you would call turf people.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
No, not just not our thing where you know, it
was kind of around you know, there was a turf
crew at spring.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Grove, all right, you worked at spring Grove.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
There's always turf talks when we go to conferences and stuff,
so I try.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
To avoid them.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Yeah, Tim, horticulture is a big industry. There's a lot
of layers, all kinds.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Yeah, and that's a very different group of people when
you hear these conferences, and you can almost spot the
turf guys apart.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
From everyone else.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
But you sent me an article earlier this week that
was really cool. It came from the Atlantic and it
was written by Hannah Kiros. I guess it's pronounced about
American grass could ruin the World Cup.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
This is interesting.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Apparently the rest of the world, all the best soccer
players around the world hate our pitches. And I'm going
to subs it's not a pitch, it's a field. This
is America. It's a field.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I like pitch. Oh, it's like has kind of a
I don't know, a flavor to it.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
It just feels like we're trying to pretend to be Brits.
It just feels like that to me. But anyway, our
poor record on grass apparently he has prompted fans and
the soccer analysts alike to speculate the turf will be
the villain of this year's tournament. And this article goes
into all the tales that are involved with getting the
(02:03):
grass just right for a soccer game.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
I was pretty stunned.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
It's amazing the amount of research. Now FIFA, I forget
what that.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Stands for, but it's it's the soccer people.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
The soccer people corrupt as hell from what I hear.
But you know that's just an opinion.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Do I have to press this button?
Speaker 3 (02:22):
Not yet not yet.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Anyway, they set all these standards, and one of them
is you can't have a fully synthetic field, which is
what a lot of our football fields are, so they
have to come in with some kind of grass, you know,
on top of that. Let's see what they are. All
the good points in this article. Lots of millions of
(02:45):
dollars of money given over to figure out how to
turn American football stadiums into well football.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Stadiums, actual football.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
Actual football.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
Apparently, if the grass is even half a centimeter too
long it changes the game.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
Or too short, I believe that.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
You know, you think of putting greens and everything. Yeah,
it's that stuff is so highly engineered.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
And you think about, you know, the players are used
to a certain reaction. Yeah, so if if the pass
is set in that direction at that speed, the player
knows how to angle and get to.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
It, they should be able to have some familiarity with
the surface. Of course, every stadium is going to be different.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
Yeah, So if that grass is half a centimeter too short,
that ball is kidding past that player and it makes
them look bad. Half a centimeter too long, it goes,
it just slowly rolls right and makes them look bad.
Players don't like to look bad.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
No, apparently I've heard. Oh what else did it say? Here?
Speaker 1 (03:51):
In countries that really care about soccer, that's yeah. Stadiums
are open air airs to the sport. The grass is
fed by sun. It's engineering so involved that the author
of feva's Pitch Maintenance manual called the UK the Silicon
Valley of turf, and same apparently with fields and guitar, guitar, guitar, Brazil,
(04:17):
South of Africa, everywhere in the world except apparently here.
One thing they pointed out of having the World Cup
in North America from Mexico to Canada is a lot
of the grasses that work well in Canada. All the
grasses that work well in Canada won't work well in Mexico.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
Has to be factored in. What type of grass are
you using?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
They could be quite different, I would think.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
But one of the researches, what it's interesting. One of
the things they do is called sod on plastic so
apart away from the field, seeds are sprinkled. Sprinkled, you
can tell a non horticulturists wrote this article. Are sprinkled
onto a two inch deep layer of sand laid on
a plastic tarp okay, which forces root system to grows sideways.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Okay instead of down.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Then they slice the sod into strips about four feet wide,
roll it.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
Up like a rug.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Okay, so a piece of written by a non horticulture.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
They put it in a truck and keep it at
thirty five degrees during transportation, and then it's laid over
a new layer of sand at one of the NFL's
artificial turp fields on top. And since the roots remain
intact and start growing downward once installed on deeper sand,
the carpet is almost instantly playable.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah. So that sounds to me very similar to just
a really elaborate way to say they install sod.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Not quite because it.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Grows on the plastic okay, so it's different.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
But then they have a machine what's that called, Well,
it didn't say the name, but it looks like a zamboni.
This machine goes in and plugs in plastic fibers.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Oh right, it sews it in its every like five centimeters.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Or something like that.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
So there's so they're weaving a net.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Of grass and plastic and plastic to make a field.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
It seems like that would be it.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
That's consistent. It came out yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
You know, like you pull on the thread on the
sweater and it just run ravels completely if it gets
on your cleat. Yeah, next, then it's embarrassing.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
This comes apart. Yeah, it's embarrassing.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
It looks bad and the player looks bad, and it
going crazy. Every fan around the world is blaming the
United States and our stupid turf.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
Yeah, that's not good. Not good.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
No, But anyway, there's all these plant researchers at at
Michigan State, Penn State, where else, Tennessee doing all this.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Oh yeah, there's some firepower behind this. But like, okay,
so two things struck me about this article. First, it's
just the amount of research and resources going towards this.
They have interns out there on the pitch, yeah, with
a three foot level h taking data to find divets.
(07:21):
You know. Yeah, so some some poor interns out there
on hands and knees, and then they've got all of
this science to get this grass to grow. But the
other thing that strikes me is this would be a
super easy problem to solve with just time. You know,
we we know how to grow grass pretty much everywhere
sports problems.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
These are multi use facilities, and uh there was you know,
maybe a concert the week before we.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
In Houston, there was a rodeo I think at the
end of March. So they had solid dirt at the
end of March and to remove it, got to remove it.
So I mean that has had some time to root in.
But if you think, you know, you've got like a
two inch layer of roots that you're putting down and
you have two months before you are hosting like the
(08:14):
biggest soccer games in.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
The reporting event in the world.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Yeah, at the elite level, a global level. Yeah, you know,
I just I don't know. I can see how it's
not it's not going to be as rooted. It couldn't
have the same texture playing field and something that it's
been there for years.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
You know.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
Anyway, we've got to go to break.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
When we come back, we'll talk about more plants, more things,
and take your calls. You're listening all its garden Scott Perline.
We will be right back. And I am here with
Sarah Geiger, bean landscape designer with Wimberg Landscaping, and let's.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
Talk design for a little bit.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Sure you just finished a well not it's not finished,
but you've got over the hump on a really big
design for an industrial campus.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
It's in the works, in the works.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yeah, yeah, quite the accomplishment, I imagine.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Yeah, we're all excited about it. You know, any public
facing garden is an opportunity to share gardens with people.
And yeah, cool that a company is investing in green space.
And absolutely love to see that, would love to see
more of it.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Yeah, you used a lot of technology for this, from
what I understand.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
Yeah, I designed in three D. I was a little
bit of a computer nerd growing up, you know, I
was like early adopter of AOL and all of that stuff.
So I'm pretty techy, but I have I was in
the field for so many years before I became a
full time designer, and I just designed, you know, on
a garden car or in the garden, moving plants around,
(09:59):
moving can tainers around, looking at it from different angles,
and so designing in three D, I make a three
D model of the space. A lot of the plant
models that I use are actually made for people who
make video games. So those like immersive spaces with the
graphics and video games have become so good that there's
(10:20):
all of these plant models, and I use them to
make and other designers use them too. But like, think
of like kind of a video game space, and you
get the aerial image of the site and you measure
it all out, and then you put the plant models
in and you can get a decent sense of how
the plants look from different angles, and you know, different
(10:44):
times of day.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
You even can go through a landscape as if you
were walking right.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
So yeah, once the model is complete, then you can
do a walk through video and point the camera at
different angles and captured different vignettes and capture the experience
of walking down a pathway. What would this garden feel
like as you're moving through it?
Speaker 1 (11:07):
And you told me about an app that you can
actually just sort of scan your using your phone, use
your phone to scan a space and it'll even give
you topography.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Yes, that's incredible. It's very cool, And that's an app
people can just download.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
I think, yeah, and there's a free version. It's called
poly Scan. They do market it to people like me,
but I think it's mostly for architects and interior designers
because you can scan a room as well and get
a three D model of that. And if you're a
techie person. You can put it into a sketch up
(11:43):
which has a free version online, and you can you
just have this little sandbox that you can kind of
play around in a Yeah, and the ground scanning technology,
it's just I just use my iPhone. I don't have
a fancy iPhone. If I had an iPhone Pro, it
has light our capability, which even more details. But just
my regular iPhone fifteen, like lower level. I can go
(12:08):
onto a site, open the app, and scan the space.
And before this, I was working just from aerial photography
for the most part, and you know site pictures, site videos. Yeah,
but for example, I designed another garden where it was
under mature canopy. It was a new construction, so there
(12:29):
was like a lot of site disturbance. The aerial views
were not current, and even if they were, it's kind
of hard to get ground level detail in like a
forested place. So I could walk along the ground and
you know, I could see right where the water went
through this space, and I could design right where you know,
(12:49):
the water edge plants need to be These.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Are great tools, but to be a good designer, you
still need to know plants absolutely more than anything. Yes,
and you can be a great designer without even knowing
those tools. Yes, but plants are first and foremost. When
can you use those tools in that approach? Well, first
of all, let's talk about your approach. Okay, when you
and you do both home gardens and campuses.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
I do mostly home gardens home gardens.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
So let's say you come to a home garden. How
do you approach the design. Let's say it's a blank
slate too.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Oh, a blank slate, Okay, that's my favorite. Actually, yeah,
it's harder when there is a lot of existing material
because then you have to make hard decisions. And what's
so I love starting with a blank slate. So I
talked to the client, we walk the space, I find out,
you know, what they like. First of all, you know,
(13:46):
I'm not going to design. What I would put in
the space is you know.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Someday, someday, when you're going a designer, you can go this,
this will be my design. You will like it for you.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
No, I mean, I really do want people to love
their gardens. So I want to get a sense for
how they're going to use the space and everything. And
then I look at how light moves through the space.
I look at how water moves through the space. I
really think in terms of ecologically. I do a lot
(14:23):
of hiking and studying natural plant communities. So my style
of gardening is I want to create a plant community
on the site that can evolve into something self sustaining.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
And that's really the movement in horticulture right now. You know,
there are different avenues and different types, but that is
the main flow of where horticulture is heading.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Gardening, so the water movement is huge, you know. I
look at the soil, all the basic things like that,
and usually I start with the structural plants. I think
when I was a younger gardener, I was I started
with color and I would pick a palette and then
(15:04):
I would pick plants to fit that. Now, color is
usually one of the last things that I think about.
I think about structure first.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
I always start with the big plants. Where do the
trees go? Where do the big shrubs go? And that
cut for me, that sort of sets it, yep, the
table for where everything else will go.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Yep. Yeah, yeah, that's the feel. You know, it creates
the conditions. If you're putting a tree there, you know
that you if you're going to plant plants under there,
they have to be able to establish in sun and
live and the kind of shade that that tree makes,
and every tree makes its own and.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
It changes that two inch caliper tree that you put
in and not much shade underneath it. Now, in five
years it's more shade. In ten years, it's all shade.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Right.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
So it's and.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
In some situations you have to just plant in phases
like Okay, we're going to have these plants for three
years and then we're going to switch to these plants.
But sometimes you can do kind of a one and
done and if those plants established, then they will adapt
to the lower light levels.
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Yeah. Yeah, to some degree.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
Largely, I feel like you've got to tell the customer
from the get go things will change. This isn't like
I just painted you a painting and that the art
it will always be well.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
And that's just non negotiable when you're trying to design
with a plant community, because you have to cover the
ground early and eventually those plants will get shaded out.
So I'll put a baptisia in a garden, which it
takes at least three years to get, you know, big, Yeah,
(16:43):
and I'll put plants underneath of it that I know.
We'll cover the ground for those three years, look great,
and we'll just gracefully fade out over time.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Garden has its own sort of succession, you know, it
really does, especially when you're planning natural plants that you're
allowing to expand or whatever. We have to take a break,
and we'll do that and take a rest, drink some coffee,
get ourselves going back again. You are listening to Let's
Garden with Scott Berlin. We will be back in about
(17:14):
five minutes, I think too, Let's Garden with Scott Berline.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
That's me. I'm here.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
I'm also here with Sarah Geiger Beam and we're having
all kinds of fun.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
You having fun.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
I am having so much time time too.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
This is fun now. You design, you give talks, you
grow from seed farm, you're even at Ogia Master certified
Landscape technician. Clearly you should be hosting the show and
not me. But you're here and that's good enough. Thank
you for that. Folks, call us if you want to.
(17:47):
We'll take your questions about gardening design, especially at eight
hundred and eighty two three eighty two fifty five. We're
talking design right now, and I've designated this segment, I've
called it agreed just common egregious or common design mistakes.
So you see a lot of gardens.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
I go out and see at least at least one
hundred gardens every year, maybe more than that.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Yeah, yeah, and of course you don't make any egregious
or common mistakes in your of.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Course, my designs are flawless, flawless, yeah, every time.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
What are some of the things you see though that
that really were people really struggle? And this isn't to
make fun of anybody. This is to learn from it.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Right, I mean, I just want to say, like, I
knew nothing about gardening until I was eight.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Five years old, eighteen eighteen.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
I was an adult before I ever planted anything. Fell
into horticulture accidentally, So yeah, I get it. I didn't
have a garden growing up. You know, if you don't
have somebody teaching you gardening, then you're just doing the
best that you can. You know, you get a house,
There's what do I do.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
I put my son Tom and his wife and manage
just bought a house, and you know, I'm helping them out,
but through their questions, frankly, through their dumb ideas I'm
like seeing how how big it is. Yeah, you know
for somebody with no experience.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
Yeah, I get that. It's overwhelming. And I see that
in a lot of my clients, you know, so it.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
Yeah, So what are some of the things you see?
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Well, the number one thing that I see is just
people not considering mature plant size.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
That's an easy one to mess up because those plants
are small when you put them in.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
And you know, you see people putting green giant arbor
i dy two feet away from their foundations in this
little tiny corner out by the sidewalk. You know, it's
like that's going to block your driveway.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Yeah, you know you have to choose between your car.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
Yeah. Or I'll go out and I'll meet with a
client and they want me to design a garden around
you know, some existing shrubs and everything. So, oh, I
see that that's a smoke bush. What smoke bush is that? Oh?
I have no idea. Well, you know the new ones
are like little pom poms, yeah, yeah, much smaller, and
the old ones are monstrous. And if I don't know
(20:18):
what variety that it is, you know, so like, and
they weren't considering that, so you know, it's I think
it's very common. You see something in the garden center.
It looks great on the bench, but you know that
nice purple shrub might get two feet tall, and it
might get ten feet tall.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
So I'll add one of the like a big design
mistake is to be too impulsive at the garden center. Yes,
you just buy something because it's pretty. You don't know
the plant you stick it in.
Speaker 2 (20:44):
Yes, and you've never been guilty of that. No, not me, no, no,
you only make really well researched plant purchases.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
I'm the worst at that. I am the worst of that.
It took me.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
It took me probably ten years of what I called
the Year the Edit, to get my garden looking like
a garden. It was such a collection.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
Yeah, well, that's next on my list is one of
everything that's a big design mistake I see in really
enthusiastic gardeners, and I get it. I like to trial plants,
and luckily, you know, as horticulture professionals, we get access
to plants that are headed for the dumpster and everything.
So you know, I do have a little bit of
(21:25):
a one of everything going on in my garden, but
not it's not a design choice, right, you know, and
I have spaces for it to kind of keep it
contained and everything.
Speaker 3 (21:37):
Sure, yeah, and you can.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
You've got spaces where you can call that's that's a
design garden that you know back there is where I trial.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Stuff, right, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
And I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
You can't be a designer a good one if you're
not trialing stuff. Yeah, the preferably in your own yard,
not in you know, your customers, right right.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah. The home garden is super important, and we have
we have a display garden at Wimburg, which is great.
It's like it's beautiful, it's like a second home garden
because I can just see how things evolve throughout the
year and that. Yeah, that that is super important. So yes,
try things, maybe keep them in containers or just have
like a test plot. But your garden should have consistency.
(22:25):
You should have numbers of plants, even if you're not
planting them in groups. There should be some common threads
and some you know, structural anchors and things like that.
Another common one a pet peeve of mine is planting
things too close to the foundation or foundation beds that
are undersized. Lot.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
Yes, I've seen it out yet.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
A lot of times. You know, you'll see like a
big two story house with a big dramatic facade, and
there will be a bed that is twenty four inches
deep from the foundation, which is not even really out
of the rain shadow of the house.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
And then a handful of sad little shrubs and perennials
and a lot of mult Yes, that's not a.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Garden, no no. And it's amazing how well plants can
survive that close to the foundation. It's not that they
won't grow. And people always ask about like, oh, well this,
you know, get into my house. Well, I can't say
if it will or it won't be like probably not,
but design wise, when a plant grows like that, it
(23:30):
gets distorted. If it's an evergreen, it gets kind of
this like like inflated, bulbous shape, and the whole house
kind of feels just like a little claustrophobic.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
I think foundation plantings are among the hardest to do.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Really well, I agree with that, yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Because it's such a weird space.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
It is a weird space, and I think I wonder
if it's kind of a uniquely American design space the
way we have our yards. Question, because another thing I
was going to say is like, uh, pulling beds out
from the foundation is a really good thing. You know.
(24:14):
Not only can you be in the garden, which I
always prefer to create spaces and garden rooms, and it's
you looking at a garden as one thing, and a
viewing garden is a wonderful thing. But for me, unless
a garden can be moved through or be in, or
if it can be viewed from a window in your house,
why do you have it right? Honestly? And maybe there
(24:37):
are good reasons, like it's an eco, it's a bird border.
You know.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
One of our friends are a friend of both of us,
is on the line. Kevin O'Dell is with us. Kevin,
what are your thoughts this morning?
Speaker 4 (24:48):
Morning? Good morning, Kevin, Good morning with Sarah. One of
my thoughts is when you guys were talking about purf is,
I think since we all like to experience with different
kind of article culture, I think maybe Scott should have
a pitch in his front.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
Yard some of the I'm going to.
Speaker 4 (25:11):
Put in there. As you guys are talking about your ungardening, Uh,
I think there's many many ways of doing that, and
I call one of the main things that's upsetting me
right now. Of course, there's been many, There are many.
Speaker 3 (25:26):
You're always set. I try not to be that.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Every time I see a new gravel quarry planeted in
somebody's yard, it upsets me. I mean, you know, I
don't know why the world's turned in to use gravel
for moult. You use gravel for mulch. It's it's it's
just not a garden. You know, it can't be a garden.
It's it's going to keep plants from growing, from spreading.
And I don't know why the emphasis, and even among
(25:53):
so called professionals that's the answer to everything is put
put put gravel down.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
It's definitely a trend, and we'll have the master of it,
Jeff Epping. He was on the show a little a
few weeks ago, and we'll have him as a speaker
at Plant Trials day. He's a big proponent of gravel gardening,
which is different than gravel maults.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
Yeah, I was going to say, I think it's important
to just draw the distinction between a gravel garden and
gravel malts.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
One thing about gravel multch. I have one hundred percent
agreement with you on it. It is hard to keep
it clean. It gets all kinds of trash in there,
weed's grown through it.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
I personally I hate it. I would never have it
in my home garden as a malt or rocks. Yeah,
it's difficult to keep the organic matter out and there's
and it's difficult to weed it. Really, you know, it
doesn't break down, which you know can be cost effective
over the long term, But is it really going to
(26:50):
give you the look that you want right off? You know?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
Seems so easy at first, Kevin.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
I think in gardening trends, I think you're going to
see a trend in in years to be people will
be selling used gravel out of their homes. Could be
there's gonna be a market out there.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Guys.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
It's certainly, you know, not to everybody's taste. That's definitely effectively.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
I agree, Scott. I mean, they're just my attitude. Our
attitude is, you know, you plant ants, you don't even
mult you just plant plants and get it full, and
you know it takes care of the weeds, they help
each other, the cooling and benefits to everything to do
with plants and decomposing mult composts whatever. I use compost
(27:35):
at my home. But uh, I just really want this gravel.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
To go away.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
We don't have that power, Kevin.
Speaker 4 (27:47):
You know, how often do you want to stop and
just nicely tell somebody you're screwing up? How do we
do that?
Speaker 3 (27:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (27:55):
People, it's just I think it is a trend right now.
We've you know, this forty year trend in things and
the water gardens, rain gardens, rose gardens. It all becomes
a thing. Yeah, it's temporarily hopefully and some of us well, yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
And I think we learned from all something from each
one and.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
You know, incorporate elements of it in different and regular
or conventional landscapes. Yeah, it's all a big learning curve really,
and everything's getting tried right now, it seems like.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
And where it all ends up in this field.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
And that's what I like about there.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
And there's a lot of outside people who are telling
us how to do our work and pushing it this
way or that way.
Speaker 4 (28:38):
That's what they made the Internet for, Scott, that's what
they made. You're wrong, You're wrong.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (28:46):
You both have a really wonderful day, and it's always
exciting to speak to you individually or together. There's always
smiles out there with the most horticulturals.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Yeah, and you're the same right back at you.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Thank you, Kevin for your That winds up perfect for
a break, Why don't we take one. We'll be back
in just a few minutes. And I'm here with Sarah
Geiger being good friend of mine, designer at Wimberg Landscaping,
And in a few minutes we'll have Shannon Curry join us,
so I'll be very exciting. She's a speaker, writer, educator,
(29:22):
especially with native plants, grasses, and so she's fun. It'll
be a lot of fun to have her here. So
we were talking design. We were talking some mistakes, things
like that, but one thing we wanted to talk about
was containers as a design element because a lot of
people don't have big spaces and a container. They're very popular,
(29:45):
pretty easy to maintain and do well.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
And I think a lot of new gardeners get started
with containers, and I think that's a good place to
start as a new gardener.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
So well, first of all, and this I might be
just sort of launching this on you, but how do
you design a good container?
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Uh? So it depends on the size of the container.
You know, there's classic formulas, uh, thriller.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Spiller, filler classic can't go wrong.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
So thriller is anything that is tall and.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
Structural in the middle or the back of the.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
In the middle, if the container can be viewed from
different angles, or if it's pushed into a corner, you
can put it in the back and put lower things
in front. The spiller is something that sort of vines
or flows over the edge of the container to soften
the edge of the container.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
Containers just sometimes because the container can be cheap, and.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Yeah, the container. I don't have really nice containers, so
it's nice if it's covered in plants. But even a
really nice container, it can look kind of severe if
you see that whole full circle all the way around it.
So you want something to soften it. And then the
filler ones are just in between. And that designs a
good container. Uh, you know, if you stick to those principles,
(30:58):
there's a lot of flexibility than that. But I took
care of uh exterior containers and interior plants for five years,
so five years of my horticulture career, no plants in
the ground and keeping an exterior container in scale. Yeah,
(31:20):
that is that's a tough thing, and you have to
pinch back the filler plants because they tend to overwhelm
the other plants. And you have to kind of pool
out the speller plants if they're getting swamped, and make
sure they're getting enough light. And you have to do
just little little early interventions like that to make sure
that the container is balanced so it's not a plant
(31:42):
to and just let it grow crazy, kind.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Of change them out throughout the year too.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
Yes, yes, and you can let it go crazy in
some spaces.
Speaker 3 (31:49):
That's work.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
Good places in a landscape to put a container, you know,
for that visual effect, you know, so it doesn't look random.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yeah, So I like to use cans is sort of
a focal point or a visual gesture between spaces. So
if you have one area that like a patio that
leads to a sidewalk or you know, something that goes
around the corner, it's nice to just put the plant
(32:18):
at that space. Another thing containers can do is draw
your eye through the garden. So if you want to
draw attention to a distant vista or you know, uh,
make a suggestion that, oh, there's something interesting around here,
you can put a container, uh as a way to
kind of draw interest and lure people through the garden,
(32:41):
or even if you're just sitting there, it just gives
this sense of expectation. That's nice.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
Absolutely, you know, it's a great you know, opportunity or
it requires a most that you changes every year, so it.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Gives you that creativity creativity.
Speaker 1 (32:56):
Yes, and and like I said before, you could change
them out two or three times a season. That's becoming
more and more common. Yes, I liked what you said
about putting it as a visual to draw you through
the garden. You know, if you have a porch with
no real clear guard rail or whatever you know, to
(33:18):
you on either side, right, it is almost a safety feature.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Right, Yeah, so you can get that sense of safety,
that sense of enclosure if you have maybe you have
a covered porch that gets late day sun. And like
I'm thinking of a client in particular, she wanted to
put a shade tree on the side of her lawn
that was not going to shade her in the late day,
(33:44):
and so there really wasn't a place to put a
tree there. And it's like, well, you could do a
large container and you could put a palm or a
collocacia or something in here and it would do well
with the indirect light and it would just give you
and you're not going to be sitting out on your
chu in December anyway.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
So you know.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
And it's containers are great ways to use plants that
you wouldn't be able to use in.
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Your guard normally, like like tropical plants.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Yes, so by now everybody should hopefully have gotten their
tropicals out into the garden, even in Minnesota, I would
assume maybe. And a lot of times your your tropical
plant doesn't look that great now when it comes out
at first. What can you do to just expedite rey
turning the health and growing happily in a container in
(34:30):
your yard?
Speaker 2 (34:31):
So it depends on the plant. Some wake up slower
than others, and a lot of tropicals just really need
the heat before they really fully wake up.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
What temperature is too low?
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Again, it depends on the plant. But I some of
them can take pretty pretty cold if they Yeah, cannas
and Strelitsia can actually take pretty cold if it's accustomed
to it. Okay, So I have a big bird of
Paradister Delysia, and I leave that thing out and tell
(35:08):
frost or right before frost, you know, so it can
handle down to you know, thirty five or whatever, and
it doesn't really die back, but other ones are more tender.
So I just for me, if I can get my
tropicals alive to the point where they can re sprout
(35:28):
in the spring, that makes me happy because they do
grow so fast. But if you have any houseplants, now's
the time to take them outside and just flush the
roof all really well, because salts accumulate in any indoor plant,
and you know, they're not really getting rain to leach
out anything that builds up.
Speaker 3 (35:46):
It just stays your floor.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
Yeah, there's any like white crusty or orange crusty stuff
around the pot or on the top of the pot,
take it outside and just flush it out with the
hose for five minutes or something.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Yeah. Yeah, Well, we're running up against break, but we
have Shannon Curry joining us after the break, which would
be really fun. She's a great speaker, writer, educator, especially
with native plants and grasses and sedges. You are listening
to Let's Garden with Scott Berline
We're back for another hour. You're listening to Let's Garden
with Scott Berline. The station hasn't yanked us yet and
the cops haven't been able to get in the door,
so we continue. I'm here with Sarah Geiger, being designer
with Wimberg Landscaping Wimberg Landscaping dot com, owner of the
brand new Verdigree plant farm, master, landscape technician with the
(00:23):
Ohio Green Industry Association, beekeeper, veteran of the Peace Corps,
and college graduate times five.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Yeah, all these blah blah.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
Now, neither of us are what you would call turf people.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
No, not just not our thing where you know, it
was kind of around you know, there was a turf
crew at spring.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Grove, all right, you worked at spring Grove.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
There's always turf talks when we go to conferences and stuff,
so I try.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
To avoid them.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Yeah, Tim, horticulture is a big industry. There's a lot
of layers, all kinds.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Yeah, and that's a very different group of people when
you hear these conferences, and you can almost spot the
turf guys apart.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
From everyone else.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
But you sent me an article earlier this week that
was really cool. It came from the Atlantic and it
was written by Hannah Kiros. I guess it's pronounced about
American grass could ruin the World Cup.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
This is interesting.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Apparently the rest of the world, all the best soccer
players around the world hate our pitches. And I'm going
to subs it's not a pitch, it's a field. This
is America. It's a field.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I like pitch. Oh, it's like has kind of a
I don't know, a flavor to it.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
It just feels like we're trying to pretend to be Brits.
It just feels like that to me. But anyway, our
poor record on grass apparently he has prompted fans and
the soccer analysts alike to speculate the turf will be
the villain of this year's tournament. And this article goes
into all the tales that are involved with getting the
(02:03):
grass just right for a soccer game.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
I was pretty stunned.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
It's amazing the amount of research. Now FIFA, I forget
what that.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Stands for, but it's it's the soccer people.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
The soccer people corrupt as hell from what I hear.
But you know that's just an opinion.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Do I have to press this button?
Speaker 3 (02:22):
Not yet not yet.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Anyway, they set all these standards, and one of them
is you can't have a fully synthetic field, which is
what a lot of our football fields are, so they
have to come in with some kind of grass, you know,
on top of that. Let's see what they are. All
the good points in this article. Lots of millions of
(02:45):
dollars of money given over to figure out how to
turn American football stadiums into well football.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Stadiums, actual football.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
Actual football.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
Apparently, if the grass is even half a centimeter too
long it changes the game.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
Or too short, I believe that.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
You know, you think of putting greens and everything. Yeah,
it's that stuff is so highly engineered.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
And you think about, you know, the players are used
to a certain reaction. Yeah, so if if the pass
is set in that direction at that speed, the player
knows how to angle and get to.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
It, they should be able to have some familiarity with
the surface. Of course, every stadium is going to be different.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
Yeah, So if that grass is half a centimeter too short,
that ball is kidding past that player and it makes
them look bad. Half a centimeter too long, it goes,
it just slowly rolls right and makes them look bad.
Players don't like to look bad.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
No, apparently I've heard. Oh what else did it say? Here?
Speaker 1 (03:51):
In countries that really care about soccer, that's yeah. Stadiums
are open air airs to the sport. The grass is
fed by sun. It's engineering so involved that the author
of feva's Pitch Maintenance manual called the UK the Silicon
Valley of turf, and same apparently with fields and guitar, guitar, guitar, Brazil,
(04:17):
South of Africa, everywhere in the world except apparently here.
One thing they pointed out of having the World Cup
in North America from Mexico to Canada is a lot
of the grasses that work well in Canada. All the
grasses that work well in Canada won't work well in Mexico.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
Has to be factored in. What type of grass are
you using?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
They could be quite different, I would think.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
But one of the researches, what it's interesting. One of
the things they do is called sod on plastic so
apart away from the field, seeds are sprinkled. Sprinkled, you
can tell a non horticulturists wrote this article. Are sprinkled
onto a two inch deep layer of sand laid on
a plastic tarp okay, which forces root system to grows sideways.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Okay instead of down.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Then they slice the sod into strips about four feet wide,
roll it.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
Up like a rug.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Okay, so a piece of written by a non horticulture.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
They put it in a truck and keep it at
thirty five degrees during transportation, and then it's laid over
a new layer of sand at one of the NFL's
artificial turp fields on top. And since the roots remain
intact and start growing downward once installed on deeper sand,
the carpet is almost instantly playable.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Yeah. So that sounds to me very similar to just
a really elaborate way to say they install sod.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Not quite because it.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Grows on the plastic okay, so it's different.
Speaker 3 (05:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
But then they have a machine what's that called, Well,
it didn't say the name, but it looks like a zamboni.
This machine goes in and plugs in plastic fibers.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Oh right, it sews it in its every like five centimeters.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Or something like that.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
So there's so they're weaving a net.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Of grass and plastic and plastic to make a field.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
It seems like that would be it.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
That's consistent. It came out yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
You know, like you pull on the thread on the
sweater and it just run ravels completely if it gets
on your cleat. Yeah, next, then it's embarrassing.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
This comes apart. Yeah, it's embarrassing.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
It looks bad and the player looks bad, and it
going crazy. Every fan around the world is blaming the
United States and our stupid turf.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
Yeah, that's not good. Not good.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
No, But anyway, there's all these plant researchers at at
Michigan State, Penn State, where else, Tennessee doing all this.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Oh yeah, there's some firepower behind this. But like, okay,
so two things struck me about this article. First, it's
just the amount of research and resources going towards this.
They have interns out there on the pitch, yeah, with
a three foot level h taking data to find divets.
(07:21):
You know. Yeah, so some some poor interns out there
on hands and knees, and then they've got all of
this science to get this grass to grow. But the
other thing that strikes me is this would be a
super easy problem to solve with just time. You know,
we we know how to grow grass pretty much everywhere
sports problems.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
These are multi use facilities, and uh there was you know,
maybe a concert the week before we.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
In Houston, there was a rodeo I think at the
end of March. So they had solid dirt at the
end of March and to remove it, got to remove it.
So I mean that has had some time to root in.
But if you think, you know, you've got like a
two inch layer of roots that you're putting down and
you have two months before you are hosting like the
(08:14):
biggest soccer games in.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
The reporting event in the world.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Yeah, at the elite level, a global level. Yeah, you know,
I just I don't know. I can see how it's
not it's not going to be as rooted. It couldn't
have the same texture playing field and something that it's
been there for years.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
You know.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
Anyway, we've got to go to break.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
When we come back, we'll talk about more plants, more things,
and take your calls. You're listening all its garden Scott Perline.
We will be right back. And I am here with
Sarah Geiger, bean landscape designer with Wimberg Landscaping, and let's.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
Talk design for a little bit.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Sure you just finished a well not it's not finished,
but you've got over the hump on a really big
design for an industrial campus.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
It's in the works, in the works.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yeah, yeah, quite the accomplishment, I imagine.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Yeah, we're all excited about it. You know, any public
facing garden is an opportunity to share gardens with people.
And yeah, cool that a company is investing in green space.
And absolutely love to see that, would love to see
more of it.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
Yeah, you used a lot of technology for this, from
what I understand.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
Yeah, I designed in three D. I was a little
bit of a computer nerd growing up, you know, I
was like early adopter of AOL and all of that stuff.
So I'm pretty techy, but I have I was in
the field for so many years before I became a
full time designer, and I just designed, you know, on
a garden car or in the garden, moving plants around,
(09:59):
moving can tainers around, looking at it from different angles,
and so designing in three D, I make a three
D model of the space. A lot of the plant
models that I use are actually made for people who
make video games. So those like immersive spaces with the
graphics and video games have become so good that there's
(10:20):
all of these plant models, and I use them to
make and other designers use them too. But like, think
of like kind of a video game space, and you
get the aerial image of the site and you measure
it all out, and then you put the plant models
in and you can get a decent sense of how
the plants look from different angles, and you know, different
(10:44):
times of day.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
You even can go through a landscape as if you
were walking right.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
So yeah, once the model is complete, then you can
do a walk through video and point the camera at
different angles and captured different vignettes and capture the experience
of walking down a pathway. What would this garden feel
like as you're moving through it?
Speaker 1 (11:07):
And you told me about an app that you can
actually just sort of scan your using your phone, use
your phone to scan a space and it'll even give
you topography.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Yes, that's incredible. It's very cool, And that's an app
people can just download.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
I think, yeah, and there's a free version. It's called
poly Scan. They do market it to people like me,
but I think it's mostly for architects and interior designers
because you can scan a room as well and get
a three D model of that. And if you're a
techie person. You can put it into a sketch up
(11:43):
which has a free version online, and you can you
just have this little sandbox that you can kind of
play around in a Yeah, and the ground scanning technology,
it's just I just use my iPhone. I don't have
a fancy iPhone. If I had an iPhone Pro, it
has light our capability, which even more details. But just
my regular iPhone fifteen, like lower level. I can go
(12:08):
onto a site, open the app, and scan the space.
And before this, I was working just from aerial photography
for the most part, and you know site pictures, site videos. Yeah,
but for example, I designed another garden where it was
under mature canopy. It was a new construction, so there
(12:29):
was like a lot of site disturbance. The aerial views
were not current, and even if they were, it's kind
of hard to get ground level detail in like a
forested place. So I could walk along the ground and
you know, I could see right where the water went
through this space, and I could design right where you know,
(12:49):
the water edge plants need to be These.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Are great tools, but to be a good designer, you
still need to know plants absolutely more than anything. Yes,
and you can be a great designer without even knowing
those tools. Yes, but plants are first and foremost. When
can you use those tools in that approach? Well, first
of all, let's talk about your approach. Okay, when you
and you do both home gardens and campuses.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
I do mostly home gardens home gardens.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
So let's say you come to a home garden. How
do you approach the design. Let's say it's a blank
slate too.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Oh, a blank slate, Okay, that's my favorite. Actually, yeah,
it's harder when there is a lot of existing material
because then you have to make hard decisions. And what's
so I love starting with a blank slate. So I
talked to the client, we walk the space, I find out,
you know, what they like. First of all, you know,
(13:46):
I'm not going to design. What I would put in
the space is you know.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Someday, someday, when you're going a designer, you can go this,
this will be my design. You will like it for you.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
No, I mean, I really do want people to love
their gardens. So I want to get a sense for
how they're going to use the space and everything. And
then I look at how light moves through the space.
I look at how water moves through the space. I
really think in terms of ecologically. I do a lot
(14:23):
of hiking and studying natural plant communities. So my style
of gardening is I want to create a plant community
on the site that can evolve into something self sustaining.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
And that's really the movement in horticulture right now. You know,
there are different avenues and different types, but that is
the main flow of where horticulture is heading.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Gardening, so the water movement is huge, you know. I
look at the soil, all the basic things like that,
and usually I start with the structural plants. I think
when I was a younger gardener, I was I started
with color and I would pick a palette and then
(15:04):
I would pick plants to fit that. Now, color is
usually one of the last things that I think about.
I think about structure first.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
I always start with the big plants. Where do the
trees go? Where do the big shrubs go? And that
cut for me, that sort of sets it, yep, the
table for where everything else will go.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Yep. Yeah, yeah, that's the feel. You know, it creates
the conditions. If you're putting a tree there, you know
that you if you're going to plant plants under there,
they have to be able to establish in sun and
live and the kind of shade that that tree makes,
and every tree makes its own and.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
It changes that two inch caliper tree that you put
in and not much shade underneath it. Now, in five
years it's more shade. In ten years, it's all shade.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Right.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
So it's and.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
In some situations you have to just plant in phases
like Okay, we're going to have these plants for three
years and then we're going to switch to these plants.
But sometimes you can do kind of a one and
done and if those plants established, then they will adapt
to the lower light levels.
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Yeah. Yeah, to some degree.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
Largely, I feel like you've got to tell the customer
from the get go things will change. This isn't like
I just painted you a painting and that the art
it will always be well.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
And that's just non negotiable when you're trying to design
with a plant community, because you have to cover the
ground early and eventually those plants will get shaded out.
So I'll put a baptisia in a garden, which it
takes at least three years to get, you know, big, Yeah,
(16:43):
and I'll put plants underneath of it that I know.
We'll cover the ground for those three years, look great,
and we'll just gracefully fade out over time.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Garden has its own sort of succession, you know, it
really does, especially when you're planning natural plants that you're
allowing to expand or whatever. We have to take a break,
and we'll do that and take a rest, drink some coffee,
get ourselves going back again. You are listening to Let's
Garden with Scott Berlin. We will be back in about
(17:14):
five minutes, I think too, Let's Garden with Scott Berline.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
That's me. I'm here.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
I'm also here with Sarah Geiger Beam and we're having
all kinds of fun.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
You having fun.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
I am having so much time time too.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
This is fun now. You design, you give talks, you
grow from seed farm, you're even at Ogia Master certified
Landscape technician. Clearly you should be hosting the show and
not me. But you're here and that's good enough. Thank
you for that. Folks, call us if you want to.
(17:47):
We'll take your questions about gardening design, especially at eight
hundred and eighty two three eighty two fifty five. We're
talking design right now, and I've designated this segment, I've
called it agreed just common egregious or common design mistakes.
So you see a lot of gardens.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
I go out and see at least at least one
hundred gardens every year, maybe more than that.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Yeah, yeah, and of course you don't make any egregious
or common mistakes in your of.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Course, my designs are flawless, flawless, yeah, every time.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
What are some of the things you see though that
that really were people really struggle? And this isn't to
make fun of anybody. This is to learn from it.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Right, I mean, I just want to say, like, I
knew nothing about gardening until I was eight.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Five years old, eighteen eighteen.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
I was an adult before I ever planted anything. Fell
into horticulture accidentally, So yeah, I get it. I didn't
have a garden growing up. You know, if you don't
have somebody teaching you gardening, then you're just doing the
best that you can. You know, you get a house,
There's what do I do.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
I put my son Tom and his wife and manage
just bought a house, and you know, I'm helping them out,
but through their questions, frankly, through their dumb ideas I'm
like seeing how how big it is. Yeah, you know
for somebody with no experience.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
Yeah, I get that. It's overwhelming. And I see that
in a lot of my clients, you know, so it.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
Yeah, So what are some of the things you see?
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Well, the number one thing that I see is just
people not considering mature plant size.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
That's an easy one to mess up because those plants
are small when you put them in.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
And you know, you see people putting green giant arbor
i dy two feet away from their foundations in this
little tiny corner out by the sidewalk. You know, it's
like that's going to block your driveway.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Yeah, you know you have to choose between your car.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
Yeah. Or I'll go out and I'll meet with a
client and they want me to design a garden around
you know, some existing shrubs and everything. So, oh, I
see that that's a smoke bush. What smoke bush is that? Oh?
I have no idea. Well, you know the new ones
are like little pom poms, yeah, yeah, much smaller, and
the old ones are monstrous. And if I don't know
(20:18):
what variety that it is, you know, so like, and
they weren't considering that, so you know, it's I think
it's very common. You see something in the garden center.
It looks great on the bench, but you know that
nice purple shrub might get two feet tall, and it
might get ten feet tall.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
So I'll add one of the like a big design
mistake is to be too impulsive at the garden center. Yes,
you just buy something because it's pretty. You don't know
the plant you stick it in.
Speaker 2 (20:44):
Yes, and you've never been guilty of that. No, not me, no, no,
you only make really well researched plant purchases.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
I'm the worst at that. I am the worst of that.
It took me.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
It took me probably ten years of what I called
the Year the Edit, to get my garden looking like
a garden. It was such a collection.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
Yeah, well, that's next on my list is one of
everything that's a big design mistake I see in really
enthusiastic gardeners, and I get it. I like to trial plants,
and luckily, you know, as horticulture professionals, we get access
to plants that are headed for the dumpster and everything.
So you know, I do have a little bit of
(21:25):
a one of everything going on in my garden, but
not it's not a design choice, right, you know, and
I have spaces for it to kind of keep it
contained and everything.
Speaker 3 (21:37):
Sure, yeah, and you can.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
You've got spaces where you can call that's that's a
design garden that you know back there is where I trial.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Stuff, right, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
And I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
You can't be a designer a good one if you're
not trialing stuff. Yeah, the preferably in your own yard,
not in you know, your customers, right right.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah. The home garden is super important, and we have
we have a display garden at Wimburg, which is great.
It's like it's beautiful, it's like a second home garden
because I can just see how things evolve throughout the
year and that. Yeah, that that is super important. So yes,
try things, maybe keep them in containers or just have
like a test plot. But your garden should have consistency.
(22:25):
You should have numbers of plants, even if you're not
planting them in groups. There should be some common threads
and some you know, structural anchors and things like that.
Another common one a pet peeve of mine is planting
things too close to the foundation or foundation beds that
are undersized. Lot.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
Yes, I've seen it out yet.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
A lot of times. You know, you'll see like a
big two story house with a big dramatic facade, and
there will be a bed that is twenty four inches
deep from the foundation, which is not even really out
of the rain shadow of the house.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
And then a handful of sad little shrubs and perennials
and a lot of mult Yes, that's not a.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Garden, no no. And it's amazing how well plants can
survive that close to the foundation. It's not that they
won't grow. And people always ask about like, oh, well this,
you know, get into my house. Well, I can't say
if it will or it won't be like probably not,
but design wise, when a plant grows like that, it
(23:30):
gets distorted. If it's an evergreen, it gets kind of
this like like inflated, bulbous shape, and the whole house
kind of feels just like a little claustrophobic.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
I think foundation plantings are among the hardest to do.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Really well, I agree with that, yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Because it's such a weird space.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
It is a weird space, and I think I wonder
if it's kind of a uniquely American design space the
way we have our yards. Question, because another thing I
was going to say is like, uh, pulling beds out
from the foundation is a really good thing. You know.
(24:14):
Not only can you be in the garden, which I
always prefer to create spaces and garden rooms, and it's
you looking at a garden as one thing, and a
viewing garden is a wonderful thing. But for me, unless
a garden can be moved through or be in, or
if it can be viewed from a window in your house,
why do you have it right? Honestly? And maybe there
(24:37):
are good reasons, like it's an eco, it's a bird border.
You know.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
One of our friends are a friend of both of us,
is on the line. Kevin O'Dell is with us. Kevin,
what are your thoughts this morning?
Speaker 4 (24:48):
Morning? Good morning, Kevin, Good morning with Sarah. One of
my thoughts is when you guys were talking about purf is,
I think since we all like to experience with different
kind of article culture, I think maybe Scott should have
a pitch in his front.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
Yard some of the I'm going to.
Speaker 4 (25:11):
Put in there. As you guys are talking about your ungardening, Uh,
I think there's many many ways of doing that, and
I call one of the main things that's upsetting me
right now. Of course, there's been many, There are many.
Speaker 3 (25:26):
You're always set. I try not to be that.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Every time I see a new gravel quarry planeted in
somebody's yard, it upsets me. I mean, you know, I
don't know why the world's turned in to use gravel
for moult. You use gravel for mulch. It's it's it's
just not a garden. You know, it can't be a garden.
It's it's going to keep plants from growing, from spreading.
And I don't know why the emphasis, and even among
(25:53):
so called professionals that's the answer to everything is put
put put gravel down.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
It's definitely a trend, and we'll have the master of it,
Jeff Epping. He was on the show a little a
few weeks ago, and we'll have him as a speaker
at Plant Trials day. He's a big proponent of gravel gardening,
which is different than gravel maults.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
Yeah, I was going to say, I think it's important
to just draw the distinction between a gravel garden and
gravel malts.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
One thing about gravel multch. I have one hundred percent
agreement with you on it. It is hard to keep
it clean. It gets all kinds of trash in there,
weed's grown through it.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
I personally I hate it. I would never have it
in my home garden as a malt or rocks. Yeah,
it's difficult to keep the organic matter out and there's
and it's difficult to weed it. Really, you know, it
doesn't break down, which you know can be cost effective
over the long term, But is it really going to
(26:50):
give you the look that you want right off? You know?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
Seems so easy at first, Kevin.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
I think in gardening trends, I think you're going to
see a trend in in years to be people will
be selling used gravel out of their homes. Could be
there's gonna be a market out there.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Guys.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
It's certainly, you know, not to everybody's taste. That's definitely effectively.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
I agree, Scott. I mean, they're just my attitude. Our
attitude is, you know, you plant ants, you don't even
mult you just plant plants and get it full, and
you know it takes care of the weeds, they help
each other, the cooling and benefits to everything to do
with plants and decomposing mult composts whatever. I use compost
(27:35):
at my home. But uh, I just really want this gravel.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
To go away.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
We don't have that power, Kevin.
Speaker 4 (27:47):
You know, how often do you want to stop and
just nicely tell somebody you're screwing up? How do we
do that?
Speaker 3 (27:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (27:55):
People, it's just I think it is a trend right now.
We've you know, this forty year trend in things and
the water gardens, rain gardens, rose gardens. It all becomes
a thing. Yeah, it's temporarily hopefully and some of us well, yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
And I think we learned from all something from each
one and.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
You know, incorporate elements of it in different and regular
or conventional landscapes. Yeah, it's all a big learning curve really,
and everything's getting tried right now, it seems like.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
And where it all ends up in this field.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
And that's what I like about there.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
And there's a lot of outside people who are telling
us how to do our work and pushing it this
way or that way.
Speaker 4 (28:38):
That's what they made the Internet for, Scott, that's what
they made. You're wrong, You're wrong.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (28:46):
You both have a really wonderful day, and it's always
exciting to speak to you individually or together. There's always
smiles out there with the most horticulturals.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Yeah, and you're the same right back at you.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Thank you, Kevin for your That winds up perfect for
a break, Why don't we take one. We'll be back
in just a few minutes. And I'm here with Sarah
Geiger being good friend of mine, designer at Wimberg Landscaping,
And in a few minutes we'll have Shannon Curry join us,
so I'll be very exciting. She's a speaker, writer, educator,
(29:22):
especially with native plants, grasses, and so she's fun. It'll
be a lot of fun to have her here. So
we were talking design. We were talking some mistakes, things
like that, but one thing we wanted to talk about
was containers as a design element because a lot of
people don't have big spaces and a container. They're very popular,
(29:45):
pretty easy to maintain and do well.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
And I think a lot of new gardeners get started
with containers, and I think that's a good place to
start as a new gardener.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
So well, first of all, and this I might be
just sort of launching this on you, but how do
you design a good container?
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Uh? So it depends on the size of the container.
You know, there's classic formulas, uh, thriller.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Spiller, filler classic can't go wrong.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
So thriller is anything that is tall and.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
Structural in the middle or the back of the.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
In the middle, if the container can be viewed from
different angles, or if it's pushed into a corner, you
can put it in the back and put lower things
in front. The spiller is something that sort of vines
or flows over the edge of the container to soften
the edge of the container.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
Containers just sometimes because the container can be cheap, and.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Yeah, the container. I don't have really nice containers, so
it's nice if it's covered in plants. But even a
really nice container, it can look kind of severe if
you see that whole full circle all the way around it.
So you want something to soften it. And then the
filler ones are just in between. And that designs a
good container. Uh, you know, if you stick to those principles,
(30:58):
there's a lot of flexibility than that. But I took
care of uh exterior containers and interior plants for five years,
so five years of my horticulture career, no plants in
the ground and keeping an exterior container in scale. Yeah,
(31:20):
that is that's a tough thing, and you have to
pinch back the filler plants because they tend to overwhelm
the other plants. And you have to kind of pool
out the speller plants if they're getting swamped, and make
sure they're getting enough light. And you have to do
just little little early interventions like that to make sure
that the container is balanced so it's not a plant
(31:42):
to and just let it grow crazy, kind.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Of change them out throughout the year too.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
Yes, yes, and you can let it go crazy in
some spaces.
Speaker 3 (31:49):
That's work.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
Good places in a landscape to put a container, you know,
for that visual effect, you know, so it doesn't look random.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yeah, So I like to use cans is sort of
a focal point or a visual gesture between spaces. So
if you have one area that like a patio that
leads to a sidewalk or you know, something that goes
around the corner, it's nice to just put the plant
(32:18):
at that space. Another thing containers can do is draw
your eye through the garden. So if you want to
draw attention to a distant vista or you know, uh,
make a suggestion that, oh, there's something interesting around here,
you can put a container, uh as a way to
kind of draw interest and lure people through the garden,
(32:41):
or even if you're just sitting there, it just gives
this sense of expectation. That's nice.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
Absolutely, you know, it's a great you know, opportunity or
it requires a most that you changes every year, so it.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Gives you that creativity creativity.
Speaker 1 (32:56):
Yes, and and like I said before, you could change
them out two or three times a season. That's becoming
more and more common. Yes, I liked what you said
about putting it as a visual to draw you through
the garden. You know, if you have a porch with
no real clear guard rail or whatever you know, to
(33:18):
you on either side, right, it is almost a safety feature.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Right, Yeah, so you can get that sense of safety,
that sense of enclosure if you have maybe you have
a covered porch that gets late day sun. And like
I'm thinking of a client in particular, she wanted to
put a shade tree on the side of her lawn
that was not going to shade her in the late day,
(33:44):
and so there really wasn't a place to put a
tree there. And it's like, well, you could do a
large container and you could put a palm or a
collocacia or something in here and it would do well
with the indirect light and it would just give you
and you're not going to be sitting out on your
chu in December anyway.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
So you know.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
And it's containers are great ways to use plants that
you wouldn't be able to use in.
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Your guard normally, like like tropical plants.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Yes, so by now everybody should hopefully have gotten their
tropicals out into the garden, even in Minnesota, I would
assume maybe. And a lot of times your your tropical
plant doesn't look that great now when it comes out
at first. What can you do to just expedite rey
turning the health and growing happily in a container in
(34:30):
your yard?
Speaker 2 (34:31):
So it depends on the plant. Some wake up slower
than others, and a lot of tropicals just really need
the heat before they really fully wake up.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
What temperature is too low?
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Again, it depends on the plant. But I some of
them can take pretty pretty cold if they Yeah, cannas
and Strelitsia can actually take pretty cold if it's accustomed
to it. Okay, So I have a big bird of
Paradister Delysia, and I leave that thing out and tell
(35:08):
frost or right before frost, you know, so it can
handle down to you know, thirty five or whatever, and
it doesn't really die back, but other ones are more tender.
So I just for me, if I can get my
tropicals alive to the point where they can re sprout
(35:28):
in the spring, that makes me happy because they do
grow so fast. But if you have any houseplants, now's
the time to take them outside and just flush the
roof all really well, because salts accumulate in any indoor plant,
and you know, they're not really getting rain to leach
out anything that builds up.
Speaker 3 (35:46):
It just stays your floor.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
Yeah, there's any like white crusty or orange crusty stuff
around the pot or on the top of the pot,
take it outside and just flush it out with the
hose for five minutes or something.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Yeah. Yeah, Well, we're running up against break, but we
have Shannon Curry joining us after the break, which would
be really fun. She's a great speaker, writer, educator, especially
with native plants and grasses and sedges. You are listening
to Let's Garden with Scott Berline
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