The Ruth Bancroft Garden in Winter

Recently I had the pleasure of visiting The Ruth Bancroft Garden in winter with my gardening buddy, Ruth, and her mother Ruth (I was seriously outnumbered by “Ruths”). We picked a beautiful, sunny, crisp, Saturday (a welcome break after many weeks of rainy, gray weather). I reported on my visit to the garden in the heat of summer back in 2011, during which I took the self-guided tour (see The Ruth Bancroft Garden). One of my ongoing research projects this year is to visit San Francisco Bay Area gardens throughout the seasons, to study plants, trees, and infrastructure through seasonal cycles. This visit we took the docent-led tour, and learned even more about the garden.

Ruth's Folley winterized – visqueen protects the winter house, and individual plants

The Ruth Bancroft Garden is a collection of succulents, cacti, and plants from desert and Mediterranean climates all over the world. The garden is designed for beauty, not as a botanical collection by region, but plants are discreetly marked with tags, so you can learn their Latin names. Many of the plants are from extreme, harsh climates, so you would think they would do well in the heat of Walnut Creek. Our docent explained that many of the plants are adapted to cold weather and to wet weather, but not cold and wet weather. This presents some challenges for the garden during the Bay Area’s winter season of rain, frost, fog, and cold. One solution is to build framed, visqueen structures around some of the most vulnerable and tender plants (my folks in Southeast Alaska use a similar approach to protect a tender Rhododendron from snow, using burlap).

The pond in winter.

 You might think this practical approach would lessen the garden’s beauty. Instead it gives it a mysterious and other-worldly look. You can view a soft focus version of the plant through the visqueen, and then easily lift a venting flap for an unobstructed view and snap a picture. We found a surprising number of plants in bloom or close to blooming (apparently many aloes are winter-blooming). This attracted many pollinators, so the air hummed with bird and bee activity. We learned that many of the succulents have hybridized in the garden. I recommend taking the docent-led tour, and visiting the garden any time of the year. To learn more: http://www.ruthbancroftgarden.org/.

Protected tender palm	Cactus cluster with berries
Blooming barrel cactus	Texture

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