April | 2014 | Real Numeracy

by George Taniwaki

This is a continuation of my class notes from Landscaping in the Northwest without the Need for Automatic Sprinklers, taught by noted local plant writer and speaker Marianne Binetti and sponsored by the Cascade Water Alliance.

Part 1 of this blog entry is posted in April 2014.

Plants mentioned on page 5, Gold band yucca, Miss Willmott’s ghost, Blue fescue, Allium

Plants mentioned on page 6, Smoke tree, Golden ninebark, Huckleberry, Elderberry, Salmonberry

Plants mentioned on page 7, Rosemary, Sedum razzleberry

Plants mentioned on page 8, Sword fern, Sedum autumnjoy, Euphorbia

Plants mentioned on page 9, Begonia, Hen and chicks, Sempervivum glabifolium, Sedum angelina, Woolly thyme, Sandwort, Moss lawn, Blue star creeper

Plants mentioned on page 10, Sedum echeverias, Creeping jenny, Christmas rose

Note: The hyperlinks to nurseries and garden shops in this blog post were added by me and are for reference only. They were not part of the lecture and are not meant as endorsements by me or the instructor.

by George Taniwaki

Last Saturday, I attended a free class sponsored by the Cascade Water Alliance, an association of several water districts in Western Washington. The class, entitled Landscaping in the Northwest without the Need for Automatic Sprinklers, was held in Sammamish, an eastern suburb of Seattle. It was taught by noted local plant writer and speaker Marianne Binetti. It was a great class and I learned a lot. Probably the most important thing I learned was to not be intimidated by plant names. There are thousands of varieties of ornamental plants and you can’t know them all. Just go to the nursery with a plan to buy water-conserving plants, ask for help, and pick things you like.

Marianne Binetti. Photo by Joe B

Ironically, it is raining today. But I know that come summer, the Puget Sound region will have three dry months. Our house has a big yard and out in the suburbs water is very expensive. I want to learn how to design and build a low maintenance/low irrigation landscape for our yard. And you can’t beat the price of a free class.

My wife Sue and I attended a similar class back when we lived in Denver. That class featured a technique called xeriscaping and was taught by the Denver Water Department. Denver is much drier than Seattle (15-inches rain per year in Denver vs. 38 inches in Seattle). However, we had a city house with a tiny yard plus water was much cheaper due to the senior water rights held by the city.

Both the Denver low-water xeriscaping class and Saturday’s no-water class covered how to choose drought-tolerant and freeze-tolerant plants like succulents, hardy perennials, and prairie grasses. These plants are not necessarily native to the respective regions, but will grow there and look appealing. Both classes also offered information on proper soil amendment, and mulching to minimize or eliminate the need for irrigation.

Enough description about the classes. Below are the notes I took during Ms. Benetti’s lecture. I took the notes on a 6-inch square notebook I received from Northwest Kidney Centers using a pen with black ink. I cut the pages out of the book, added the colors using felt-tip highlighter pens, and scanned the pages. Enjoy!