Growing herbs indoors or outdoors is one of the most economical benefits of having a garden. Some herbs are no-brainers, like rosemary, Italian parsley, oregano and mint, because they require very little attention and buying sprigs of those herbs can be expensive. Other herbs such as basil and cilantro are a bit more finicky, but not impossible.

oregano

Most herbs require some amount of pinching/pruning to keep them full and happy. Make it a regular part of your harvest and it won’t seem like work at all. I regularly cut back rosemary, mint, parsley and basil as I need it, but sometimes even when I don’t. I want to keep the plants full and bushy.

Rosemary, thyme, sage, oregano and savory can tolerate dry conditions. They’re also great low-maintenance plants for your landscape because they require little water. Basil, lemon balm, dill need a bit more moisture. Mint likes wet soil, and should be planted in containers to prevent them from taking over your garden.

Here are some other tips to growing herbs:

Basil: Likes sun! Pinch out stems to create side shoots, and encourage full, bushy growth. Keep the plants well picked. When flowering starts, pinch off each flowering shoot and the leaf pair directly below. This Oregonian article has a good illustration of where to cut.

Cilantro: Perfect herb for Northwest climates because it doesn’t like hot weather. Cilantro prefers cool but sunny conditions. Too hot and it bolts (flowers). The flowers produce coriander seeds, which are also used in cooking. I seeded some a few weeks after I planted my peas earlier this spring, and have periodically re-seeded it with good success. Great for that guacamole!

Parsley: This herb is easy to grow from seed, but are readily available as starts.

rosemary

Regularly prune parsley and don’t allow them to go to seed. Trim large stems every so often.

Rosemary: A must have in the northwest.  Regularly prune rosemary, cutting off about a quarter or so, to prevent the plant from growing woody. Rosemary loves full sun, and can tolerate dry conditions nicely. In my opinion, you can’t prune rosemary too hard.

It’s tempting for many of us to pull out the heavy-duty bottle of pesticide when we find insects, diseases or weeds in our landscape. We want the problem to go away, and go away fast, whether it’s powdery mildew on our squash or aphids on our roses. But before you bust out the sprays, consider that pesticides are toxic to pets, birds, bees, and fish, and end up in our waters. (Check out the Washington Toxics Coalition site to read more about it).

You can adopt a more gradual approach to dealing with pests and plant diseases by identifying the problem and then trying less-toxic methods of getting rid of it. You’ll often hear people call this process IPM, or Integrated Pest Management, but really it’s about using common sense to tackle the problem.

First, identify the problem. It’s possible that it’s not a nasty disease attacking your plant, but symptoms that you’re watering too little or too much. Or you may find out that the bugs in your garden are actually good, beneficial insects such as lady bugs and lacewings that eat bad bugs.

Once you’ve identified what’s wrong, find the least toxic way to get rid of it. Aphids, for example, can be controlled by hosing the plant down with water. Other pests and weeds can be removed simply by hand-plucking them from the plant.

Prevention is also a good way of keeping these problems at bay. Pick plants that are disease resistant, thrive in your climate, and grow well in the site you chose for it. Reduce plant stress by watering, pruning and fertilizing properly. Use barriers like mulch to suppress weeds or floating row covers to keep bugs away. Check out these fact sheets on less toxic ways to deal with snails & slugs, spider mites, roses, and more.

One of our favorite plants, the flowering currant, is currently in bloom this month, and we’ve been watching bees and hummingbirds swarm to its flowers. The currant is just one of many plants that attract bees, which do the heavy lifting by pollinating fruit trees, squash and other plants.

Many of you have already heard of the mysterious Colony Collapse Disorder that has wiped out thousands of bee hives throughout the region over the past several years. In Washington state, the loss of the bees have fruit tree growers particularly worried since they’re dependent on bees to pollinate their apple, pears and other trees. You can read more about Colony Collapse Disorder here.

You can do your own part to encourage bees to come to your garden. Create a landscape that encourages honeybees by growing flowering plants with plenty of nectar and pollen. Bees feed on the nectar for energy, and collect pollen to feed their young.  Some of our favorites bee-loving plants include lavender (pictured above), salvia, penstemon, black-eyed Susan, sunflowers, thyme, mint, purple coneflower, and rosemary. Herbs that attract bees and do double-duty in the kitchen include: basil, oregano, mint and sage. Bees like annuals, too, including zinnia, marigold, sunflowers and poppies. Other plants that attract bees (and that we often use in Seattle landscaping projects) include: flowering currant, verbena, barberry, lilac, and sedum.

Try to keep the bees interested throughout the season by planting flowers that provide nectar and pollen year-round. Landscapes that have a variety of plants, particularly native ones, will encourage more bees.

One of our biggest pet peeves is walking into a commercial nursery and finding plants for sale that are considered noxious weeds. Washington has a state law that requires citizens to help control noxious weeds, but that doesn’t always mean you can’t find it for sale in various places. In our opinion, no Seattle landscape should have English ivy, English holly, Scotch broom or any of the numerous other weeds that spread like rapid-fire and choke out our native plants and take over natural landscapes.

Ivy in particular is vicious because it’s well-adapted to our climate, grows year-round West of the Cascades, and can cover everything in its reach. It’s hard to get rid of it once it has taken over your landscape, so we recommend the next best thing: prevention. Don’t buy any ivy (or other noxious weeds) if you can help it, even if you find a tiny little plant at the nursery and think it can’t be that harmful.

Milk thistle is a noxious weed.

King County has a noxious weed control program that tries to keep noxious weeds like Himalayan blackberry and Italian thistle, just to name a few, out of our streams, parks, and public lands. Don’t know what is a noxious weed? King County has a terrific photo index to help you identify which ones are noxious. Some are nasty-looking, like the milk thistle pictured right, but many have pretty yellow or pink flowers. Find out more by reading this citizen’s guide to noxious weeds.

There are some great plant sales coming up in the next few weeks. We want to call your attention to two sales in Seattle in early May.

As Master Gardeners, both Andy and I will be volunteering to help the Master Gardener Foundation of King County with its annual plant sale. There’s a huge selection of annuals, perennials, vegetables, trees and more. Many are grown by local master gardeners, while some professional nurseries will also be on hand to sell their goods. Proceeds go toward paying for the Master Gardener clinics, demonstration gardens, youth programs and more. The Master Gardener Plant Sale is May 2-3, 2009 at the University of Washington Center for Urban Horticulture, 3501 NE 41st St, Seattle. Hours are Saturday, 8 a.m.-5 p.m.; Sunday, 10 a.m.-3 p.m.

If you’re into growing vegetables, head to the Seattle Tilth Edible Plant Sale that same weekend. I’ll be volunteering to help out with this sale, which offers the largest selection of organically and sustainably grown vegetable starts in Seattle. You’ll find over 50 varieties of tomatoes and 20 varieties of peppers, rare and heirloom veggie varieties, an extensive selection of culinary herbs, edible flowers, and drought tolerant perennials. The list of starts includes ‘Fairy Tale’ eggplant, lemon cucumbers, golden midget watermelon, ‘Cajun Delight’ okra, ‘Gypsy’ sweet peppers and much more. Find the lists of items on sale here. The sale is May 2-3, 2009 at Meridian Park in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood, 4649 Sunnyside Ave. N. Open 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturday & Sunday.

If you need help finding the right plant to fit into your Seattle landscape, Ecoyards is here to help. We love assisting clients to find the right perennials, trees, even edible plants, to incorporate into an existing landscape or add to a newly-designed landscape. Email us or give us a call at 206-770-7879.

One of the most requested landscape features we get at Ecoyards are paver patios, walkways and driveways. Pavers offer many benefits over concrete. They come in a variety of rich colors, textures, and styles to fit your landscape design. Pavers are much easier to adjust and repair than concrete slabs that tend to crack over time. They’re also aesthetically pleasing. Take a look at some of our paver patio and walkway photos.

At Ecoyards, we’ll work with you to choose the right material for your patio or walkway. We use local suppliers that produce their brick pavers and other materials locally in the Puget Sound area.

To properly install your paver patio or walkway, we excavate the underlying soil and create a base of compacted crushed gravel that’s a minimum of four inches for regular foot traffic and even more for areas where vehicles will be driving over the pavers.  A good low-impact tip is to keep the excavated soil on-site rather than transporting it across town as fill material.  In some cases the underlying soils can be amended with compost and used in planting beds.

The next step is to place a thin layer of bedding sand, which proves a smooth, level surface for the pavers to sit on. We then set the brick or stone pavers in the style that you like, cutting pavers to fill gaps along the edges. We set edge restraint systems around the perimeter to prevent settling and spreading.

Once the pavers and edging are in place, we compact the pavers down using a vibrating place compactor to ensure that the pavers are set. Voila! Your patio is ready for you to enjoy.

Greg Rabourn

Greg Rabourn of the King County Community Stewardship Specialist/Project Program is providing a free talk today on avoiding the high-maintenance landscape trap of placing shrubs in improper places.  The talk will be at the Lewis Creek Visitor Center in Bellevue from 7:00-9:00pm.

More information is available here – http://www.ci.bellevue.wa.us/cobcalendar/Default.aspx?EventID=2295

1. Avoid using weed and feed products, which broadcast herbicides on
every inch of your lawn. Instead, choose a “slow-release” or “natural
organic” fertilizer, which gradually releases nutrients into the soil
to prevent runoff.

2. Plant drought-tolerant plants such as rosemary, lavender and sedum
that need little water once established. Efficient water use keeps
water in the rivers, creeks and streams for salmon and other fish,
especially during crucial summer months.

3. Think twice before reaching for herbicides. You can control weeds by
hand-pulling them or by building healthier soil to allow the grass or
plant you have there to out-compete weeds. Pulls weeds when they’re
early and young.

4. Plant a tree, or two or three. Trees catch rain and allows it
evaporate before reaching the ground. This reduces runoff, the main
source of pollution in the Puget Sound. Learn more from the Puget
Sound Partnership: http://www.psp.wa.gov/stormwater.php

5. Build healthy soil, which helps absorbs more runoff and filters out
pollutants. Amend your soil with compost, whether home-made or
purchased from places like Cedar Grove (which recycles most King
County residents yard waste into compost).

6. Mulch garden beds annually with compost, leaves, bark or wood chips
to cut down on weeds and watering.  Mulch also helps prevent erosion.

7. Choose the right plants for the right spot to reduce the need for
excess watering, pruning, and fertilizing. Consider native plants.

8. Water plants deeply but infrequently. This helps grass, trees and
plants grow deep roots and prevent disease. After soaking the roots,
let the top few inches of soil dry before you water it again.

9. Install a few rain barrels. Seattle, King County and other
cities provide discounted rain barrels that you can install near your
downspout. The barrels allow you to catch rainwater into 55-gallon
barrels to water your plants at a later time.

10. Mulch mow, as we do at Ecoyards. Leave grass clippings on your
lawn. It not only saves time and yard waste, but returns water and
nutrients to your lawn.

When it comes to picking plants for our landscape or for yours, we prefer to go native whenever possible. Trees, shrubs and other plants native to the Northwest — vine maples (right), sword fern, salal, beach strawberry, and Pacific dogwood — simply do better in our climate. In addition to requiring little maintenance, birds and other wildlife in our area have come to rely on these plants over decades and centuries to supply them with food, shelter and other needs.

Native plants create a natural landscape. It has the added benefit of reducing runoff — one of the biggest causes of pollution in Puget Sound — by controlling erosion and curbing flooding.

Sometimes finding native plants is the trickiest part of all. Ecoyards has secured and planted many native trees, shrubs, ground covers and other plants for our customers. We have good relationships with nurseries in the area, and can recommend some of our favorite native plants, such as red flowering currant, evergreen huckleberry, mountain hemlock, trillium, kinnikinnick, and mock orange.

King County’s Native Plant Resources site includes good suggestions on which native plants to put in sunny, shady, wet or  dry conditions. The Washington Native Plant Society also has a list of plants suited for most occasions.