Rick and Monica Alatorre’s Garden
Richmond
Gardening experience: 6 years
Years gardened at this location: 3 years
Lot size: 5000 square feet
Showcase feature: The artistic placement of a graceful series of raised beds and attractive paving stone retaining walls, in combination with the tapestry of color found in a wonderful palette of natives, provides aesthetic appeal. This lovely garden, designed and installed by the owner, shines in fall when its marvelous collection of buckwheats are in flower. In the back garden a sandbox situated in a raised bed is sheltered by native plants that provide privacy to the children as they play. The variety of natives—deergrass, milkweed, yarrow, hummingbird sage, and California fuschia—all swaying, some towering over the children, attract butterflies and hummingbirds that flit and hover.
Other garden attractions:
- The front and back gardens were previously juniper and lawn.
- Plants of varying heights and textures create visual appeal.
- Newspaper (20 sheets thick and covered by dirt and mulch) is used for weed control.
- A potpourri of recycled products—the red-cement path that lead to the house, a neighbor’s broken concrete wall, and used chimney flues (purchased inexpensively from Urban Ore)—have been incorporated into both the front and back gardens.
- Old garden tools function as garden art; a row of spades functions as an informal fence.
- Path materials are permeable.
- Take a look at the ‘before’ photos.
Gardening for Wildlife: Since the natives have been put in, word has been getting out; the garden is now regularly visited by hummingbirds, butterflies, hoverflies, ladybugs, and other beneficial insects. They are attracted to shelter (plants of varying heights), and the fallen leaves (which aren’t raked up). Thirteen species of butterflies (monarch, acmon blue, anise swallowtail, western swallowtail, gorgon copper, gray, and California hairstreak, three kinds of skippers, west coast lady, and two as-yet-unidentified varieties) visit the saucers of sand and water Rick and his wife thoughtfully put out for them. Three bird baths (two are recycled sinks that have been sunk and add a graceful, natural look to the garden) attract a variety of birds. By setting the birdbaths among the plants, the birds can feed and bathe while being both revealed and hidden through the different angles from which people view them.