Fine Gardening – Randy Arnowitz

Consultation / Coaching

Garden Coaching

I didn’t know that there was such a thing as a Garden Coach until I spent some time in the Northwest. While up there, I met a garden coach and then later read about one and still later, heard a story on NPR about a garden coach. It sounded to me like the coolest job. I wondered. Do I get to wear a whistle? Make folks do push-ups in the dirt? Would my clients call me “Coach”? After some investigation, I discovered that a garden coach goes to people’s homes and shows them how to garden and works with them, hands-on, in their gardens. I wanted to be a garden coach.

Then I realized that to many of my clients, I already was a garden coach. I have been showing clients how to prune their roses for years by having them work with me in their rose gardens. Many people schedule my visits specifically when they’re home so they can learn how to lift and store dahlia tubers, build a tomato cage or even set gopher traps.

Yes having a garden coach is so, uhhh, “Seattle”. But if you’d like some hands-on assistance with some aspect of gardening or just want someone to be your gardening “training wheels,” I can help with that. And I promise you don’t have to call me “Coach”.

Container Gardening

Love to garden and grow your own vegetables but you don’t have a lot of space and time? Maybe you’re renting, and your place is being sold out from under you (again)? Perhaps you travel or are not around on the weekends to water? Or, you have an existing garden but think that a few potted palms or barrels of drought tolerant, yet colorful succulents would add a finished look to your landscape.

If any of this sounds familiar, I can help you design, choose and maintain a container garden. Whether you decide to grow flowers or other seasonal color, perennials, vegetables, small trees, shrubs or succulents there are many advantages to gardening in large pots or containers.

• Save water by only watering the soil in a container and not an entire area of your garden.

• Customize your soil. If your garden soil is heavy clay or is layered with sandstone, using containers can allow you to choose the exact soil you want to plant in. For example, a rich loamy potting soil would be ideal for flowers and veggies while a sandy mix containing plenty of pumice would make your potted cacti and succulents thrive.

• Fertilizer is not wasted because the food is applied directly to where the plant lives—in the pot.

• If gophers and moles enjoy your garden as much as you do, pots and containers are a sure deterrent to these pests.

• Instead of endless hours of weeding, you can spend your limited gardening time by harvesting the lettuce, carrots, beans and other crops that you’ve grown.

If you don’t have the time or forget to water, a manual or automatic irrigation system can be added to your container garden to assure that it doesn’t dry out.

If you do have to move, you can easily take your garden with you or plan a yard, or rather garden sale.

Orchid Care & Cultivation

These days, since orchids are so inexpensive to buy (Trader Joe’s and Costco), they can be enjoyed in the home in lieu of cut flowers and then pitched into the green bin to recycle when they’ve finished blooming.

However, most of these orchids that we purchase are sturdy, cast-iron plants that, with a little light, food, water and knowledge, can be coaxed into re-blooming. Many people think that there is some mystery to growing orchids but in fact, most are killed with kindness, or rather too much water.

In addition, due to our temperate climate there are hundreds, if not thousands of orchids that can be grown outdoors here in Santa Barbara. Most will thrive in the dappled light of a bright, shade garden and can be grown in containers, attached to a fence or tree and even suspended from hanging baskets.

I can show you how to enjoy these extraordinary plants in your garden or greenhouse by helping you choose, repot and maintain your easy-to-grow orchids.

Rose Pruning & Maintenance

Sometimes it can be a challenge to grow healthy roses in Santa Barbara. They don’t like our seasonal “May Gray”and certainly resent our “June Gloom.” Also, if we have a mild winter, the bushes don’t go fully dormant and can’t get enough rest before performing again in the spring. It’s surprising too, that pruning them back improperly in the winter and even cutting blooms for the house or deadheading the wrong way can set your roses back and make for a longer than necessary down time between blooms.

Here’s a list of some of the things I can do for your roses.

• Evaluate the condition of your rose bushes. I can tell you which plants may need to be replaced due to diseases such as crown gall, lack of performance or just plain old age.

• Fertilize and mulch. I am available to feed and mulch your roses with organic and earth-friendly products as needed. After the first big feed in March, I let the roses tell me when the next meal should be. In between large meals, I like to follow up with an occasional dose of fish emulsion or other snack. I can also install or recommend the best products for mulching the ground beneath your plants.

• Prune and deadhead. Some folks like me to come by once a year in mid-January to give their roses a proper annual pruning. I prune each bush differently depending on whether it is a climber, hybrid tea or floribunda. I also custom prune to the needs and condition of each individual rose. Usually the first pruning is corrective and more extensive than the subsequent years depending on the care that the plants receive throughout the year.

Other people prefer that I come by monthly or even weekly to deadhead or cut the flowers for their homes.

In addition to that first corrective pruning, I find that a less severe pruning and sometimes defoliating at the end of the summer jump starts some of the more tired and less disease resistant plants. This makes for a fall bloom that often rivals your big spring bloom.

• Suggest and practice earth-friendly disease control by choosing disease-resistant roses, feeding with non-chemical fertilizers, proper & thoughtful pruning & deadheading, and mulching with organic compost. If spraying is needed— less toxic, biological controls can be recommended.