Crescent Hill Nursery November E-Newsletter 2013 The CHN e-newsletter is our show of gratitude to the loyal market customers at our many events aroun

 
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Crescent Hill Nursery November E-Newsletter 2013

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Hebe 'Pretty in Pink' showing off its winter bloom.

The CHN e-newsletter is our show of gratitude to the loyal market customers at our many events around the Central Coast. It will serve as a site for seasonal updates, "plant of the month" specials, the "ask a nurseryman" section, links to our partners, and a whole lot more. New for 2013 will be a "project" page which offers ideas for weekend garden activities, and more in-depth coverage of some of our recent landscape installations. The e-newsletter is a way to stay connected with our thriving and knowledgeable garden community. Please send us your comments on how to make this e-newsletter more useful to all, and don't forget to pass along the link to a friend!

Happy Planting,
Nathan Krupa (owner/grower)

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Pre-order your one-of-a-kind succulent arrangement for a unique and everlasting holiday gift!!!

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Cuphea 'Starfire Pink' gives year around color and a hummingbird buffet for both full sun and part shade gardens.

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MONTHLY BULLETIN

To all our monthly readers, please excuse the tardiness and brevity of this month's mailing. The holiday cheer has come early for Crescent Hill this year, as we busy ourselves with preparations for Holiday Wreath Season 2013. We are building off the success of the last two seasons, and attempting to offer more even more unique, durable, and affordable designs in the year to come. Crescent Hill's Redwood, Bay, Pine, Spruce, Cedar, Eucalyptus, and Protea wreaths seek to provide scented seasonal appeal, and feature our habitual lean towards the rare and unusual. A BIG Thank You goes out to our customers who have taken advantage of our annual "free tree trimming" in support of the cause. Please continue to let us know if you, or any acquaintances, have any tree work on the calendar. Of course, free wreaths are retuned for your kindness!! Our inaugural wreath market of the year takes place Saturday, November 23rd at the Sunset Center in Carmel, Ca. The 43rd Annual Homecrafters Marketplace showcases over 100 local artist's homemade crafts, and the long standing event features vendors subject to a jury panel to insure high quality and diverse offerings. If the vendors we saw at the panel are any indication, this will be a don't miss event chock full of high quality local artisans, and just in time for the holiday season!! On the last weekend of the month (November 30-Decmber 1), we will be back in Santa Cruz for a "pop-up" weekend at RCR Fabrication in the Costco corridor on Encinal St. Maps and directions to all events are available on the CALENDAR page of the website linked below. www.crescenthillnursery.com

New for 2013
Crescent Hill is pleased to announce that we will be accepting credit/debit cards at all of our local garden markets.

Please don't forget to check out our constantly changing color collage on Facebook. The frequent updates feature a who's who of the present bloomers at the nursery, plus special updates and promotions. Find us at www.facebook.com/pages/Crescent-Hill-Nursery/207330655953337)
or click on the link below on this page.

In response to the numerous requests by our gardening family and partners, we are pleased to announce that an E-NEWSLETTER ARCHIVE link is now available on our website www.crescenthillnursery.com. Please take a moment to check it out, and also tour the newly updated PLANTS section and increasing content of color photos for all our selections!!

Nursery tours are encouraged. Please come out and see our 2 acre facility in Watsonville. With over 250 varieties grown, the growing grounds are turning into a little botanical park. Please call for an appointment. Groups are welcome.

Please remember Crescent Hill recycles all 1,2, and 5 gallon plastic containers. Drop off available at all markets, or here at the nursery. Thanks again!!

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Tomato family member Iochroma cyaneum almost overwhelms with its clusters of tubular purple blooms.

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ASK A NURSERYMAN

In this quarterly section, we will answer the question of the month. The customer chosen to "ask the nurseryman" will receive a free one gallon sized pot of their choice!!

This month's Crescent Hill "Ask A Nurseryman" question comes from Nina in Carmel Valley. While recently updating her irrigation system prior to a landscape installation, we ran into a few plants which that had been in the ground for 5+ years, but suddenly bit the proverbial dust. Of course the question was; "What could have possibly gone wrong?"

As the plants showed no signs of disease/pests prior to their downfall, the obvious starting point was to check the water and make sure that the irrigation was functioning properly. After ascertaining that the emitters were not clogged, the next step was to check for the ever-present gophers. We found no signs of burrowing around the plants, and seemingly intact gopher cages. As anyone with gopher problems knows, an intact cage above ground does not necessarily mean the same is true in the root zone. This probed the investigation further, and we dug out the plants to see if there had been any breaches in security. As the cages looked in working order all the way down to the bottoms, we were almost ready to right the losses off to a freak occurrence. We began to remove the plants, and at this point struck pay dirt in our investigation!! Generally a plant which has been in the ground for so long has roots which have found their way through the cage and deeply into the soil beneath. As we pulled out the first plant, expecting a great deal of resistance, we found that they came out with a light yank. There was a glaring lack of deep roots, which a plant would normally have at this stage of its life. The rootball came out in the exact shape of the five gallon sized container it had been planted in five years previous. We had finally found the culprit!!! Whomever had planted the container failed to open up the rootball prior to planting, and its root-bound cycled sallied forth into a complete strangulation. As the picture below demonstrates, the roots had circled so tightly in the shape of the container that they eventually asphyxiated themselves. No air, water, or nutrients could enter, and the plant could no longer support life. Sure enough, this was the case with the other plants that had deceased. Experienced gardeners already know the benefits of breaking up the rootball prior to planting, and how it allows the roots to grow outward as opposed to inward, upward, around the rootball, and finally into the infirmary. Use your hands to gently break off the bottom of the rootball, as exemplified in the photo below. Make sure to break off any areas that show signs of being root-bound. If the plant has been in the container too long, you may have to use a knife or even a shovel to cut off this portion of the base. Be as gentle as possible, but do not be afraid to get aggressive when the situation warrants it. You may also need to cut the sides of the rootball in cases of extreme neglect. The plant will take this "abuse" and the end result will be the stimulation of new growth. Now as long as the specimen is planted in a hole of adequate depth and width, becoming root-bound will never be an issue. So Nina, we are sorry for your losses, but thank you for allowing this important principal of proper planting to be reinforced in this month's Crescent Hill Nursery Ask A Nurseryman review.

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The strangled rootball of one of the removed shrubs, and the obvious lack of deep rooting.

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A rootball is properly broken up prior to planting.

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