Desert plants are a wonderful way to develop the landscaping in your yard, particularly if you live in a dry climate. Many areas that have previously not been considered particularly arid climates or have not previously been so very hot and dry WILL become hotter and drier with global climate change.
The San Francisco Bay Area, for example, has noticed a marked change in summers and falls. What used to be a cool, Mediterranean climate (approximately 60° F all year round), the Bay Area has seen some of the hottest summers in its history these past five years. With the 5-year drought still threatening this area and all of California, many more areas that enjoyed mild climates may see much hotter periods with less rainfall to mitigate the dry heat.
In Southern California deserts, the environment has slowly become even hotter and drier.
As things get hotter, now may be the time to integrate more “desert plants” into your environment! They require far less water to grow beautifully and will still please you with flowers in the spring. Here are some examples of spring flowers.
Getting desert plants established is the trick. Once they’ve put roots into the soil, you can pretty much ignore them except for occasional water.
Selecting the Right Plants for Your Environment
When you think of putting any plant in your garden, you first need to imagine how it grows in its native environment. If you don’t know where it comes from, look it up! The Internet has now become our Encyclopedia of World Plants, and it is rare that you cannot find a great description of the plant growing successfully and even a photograph. Take note: is it growing in a swamp, jungle, arid desert, woodland forest? That’s where the plant LIKES to grow. Giving it anything else will be challenging because the plant will struggle to do what it has spent millions of years adapting to do.
This is basically the secret to growing all plants: If you recreate that native environment as closely as possible, you will increase your chances of successfully growing a given plant by a hundredfold! If you want to grow a plant from a super-moist tropical environment and you live on high desert plain, think again. You’ll either need to create a greenhouse-like special environment, or, if you do little or nothing, you will likely get to watch the plant struggle and eventually die.
Soil Requirements
Try to learn about the soil type that the plant prefers. Is it from a forest rich in humus built up from tree droppings? Is it from an arid environment? Each has its own special environmental requirements, some of which you can actually recreate in your yard by beefing up your soil with amendments.
Here we are talking about desert plants, so let’s look at the types of soil they grow successfully in. Soil typically includes:
- Loose Gravel
- Small rocks and pebbles
- Sand
- Excellent drainage
- Poor soil — not so many nutrients!
When to Plant Desert Plants
Every area has a season when moisture returns and the hot weather begins to abate. You will likely have much cooler nights. Try to plant during this season. It might be the fall in areas that are hot but have relatively mild winters (not much snow or no snow). Your new plants will have time to establish themselves; that is, expand their root systems so they will be equipped to gather more of the available water when summer rolls around and temperatures are high with little or no rain. They may look like they are just hanging on after having been transplanted, but it’s what is going on underground that is important. You want plants will well developed root systems by summertime.
Transplanting Desert Plants
Like ALL plants, desert plants need water at first to grow and establish root systems. Some people have the mistaken impression that they can put a desert plant in the ground and water it for a day or two, then forget about it.
Sprouting Desert Plants from Seed
We will be developing pages on sprouting various kinds of desert plants. For now, we have the information on one of the trickiest ones!