Type: Shrub, Deciduous
Exposure: Full Sun
Water Use: Low
Mature Size: 4’ H x 8’ W
Winter jasmine is a broad, mounding or vining shrub. It sends out bright lemon-yellow flowers in late February before the leaves unfold. It’s one of the first bloomers in town. Slender, bright green square stems offer an attractive show in the winter landscape. Winter jasmine is great as a covering for steep slopes, spilling over a wall or planted in groups.
In celebration of five years of bringing you 505Outside, we’d like to share our most popular articles from the website. 505Outside is your resource for beautiful, desert friendly landscapes. Desert friendly landscapes are resilient, sustainable, enjoyable and inspiring.
The Dirt on Albuquerque Weeds There are two times a year in the greater Albuquerque area when weeds can get out of hand. This happens typically in early spring after a wet winter and after a monsoon season in late summer. The first thing to do is to identify the plant and decide whether it is actually a weed. This article reviews the most common weeds in town.
Basics about Turf Grasses in New Mexico Many homeowners would like a turf grass lawn, but might feel irresponsible watering a lawn in the arid Southwest. The key to choosing a turf grass is to determine the one most suited to the specific needs of your landscape. This article discusses four different grass types.
Use Drip Irrigation for Trees and Shrubs Drip irrigation is the recommended method of delivering water to shrubs, trees and all other plants that are not considered turf grasses. This article discusses the rules of thumb for irrigating trees and shrubs.
Basics of Fruit Tree Pruning All trees require some amount of pruning, especially when young, in order to set up good structure. Fruit trees have a few special considerations related to our intense sunlight, specific pests, and where on the tree the fruit is produced. This article covers the basics.
Three Ways to Water Established Trees. Trees are incredibly valuable and provide a wide array of benefits, from increasing home values to improving mental health. It’s more important now than ever to take care of your existing trees. This article outlines three strateties for watering your mature established trees.
Learn about Irrigation and Planting here:
The Irrigation Consumer Bill of Rights
Simple Irrigation Maintenance Techniques
How to Make a Tree Watering System for Your Established and Mature Trees
A lot goes into creating a landscape plan, and it helps to have some expert help. Landscape architects specialize in designing outdoor spaces. Today, we’re sharing a plan particularly suited to our climate by New Mexico landscape designer David Cristiani. You can follow this design right down to each individual plant or customize it to fit your own yard. We’ll be sharing two more landscape plans in future issues of 505Outside.
Many plants from higher elevations or moister areas struggle when subjected to the long, torrid summers common in Albuquerque. The plants in this landscape are intended to thrive on heat, limited irrigation and minimal care — while exploding the popular myth that cacti and succulents look stark and don’t belong near our homes.
The Hotscape design embraces the environmental and visual qualities of Albuquerque’s high Southwestern desert location. Two areas of compacted crusher fines serve as a combined pathway, informal sitting area and a channel to harvest water from the occasional storm. A low berm provides visual interest, keeping the plants that cannot tolerate much extra moisture dry.
Modeled after the strikingly attractive and often evergreen plant communities native to the edges of Albuquerque, this design provides a great deal of visual interest throughout the year. The open, irregular canopies of Chinese pistache and screwbean mesquite provide filtered shade in summer and warming sunshine in the winter — an effect suggesting a desert arroyo. Fourwing saltbush screens the view to the street, and the dark, compact turpentine bush adds a pleasant fragrance with yellow fall flowers. The last, crucial ingredient to this design is the generous use of native desert accent plants, including the bold, blue-green forms of sotol, desert prickly pear and banana yucca. These local signature plants are accented further with small masses of seasonal color from low perennials and groundcovers, attracting both hummingbirds and passing neighbors!
Learn more about specific types of gardening here:
Simple Steps to Get Started Designing Your Yard
Easy Edible Plants for First Time Growers
Water Harvesting for Residential Landscapes
Type: Desert accent evergreen
Exposure: Full sun
Water Use: Low
Mature Size: 6’ H x 4’ W
This is a small tree-forming yucca. It can grow from 5 to 8 feet tall and 6 feet wide. Its trunk can grow around 5 to 8 inches in diameter. The light green leaves with pale yellow margins grow in a mass radiating near the top and can be 8 to 24 inches long. It loves well drained soil and extreme heat conditions. It produces 3-foot-tall creamy white blooms from April through May. This yucca stays neat in appearance and requires little maintenance.
Photo by Arthur Chapman
Type: Semi-evergreen shrub
Exposure: Full Sun
Water Use: Low
Mature Size: 8’ H x 12’ W
This semi-evergreen shrublike tree puts on an interesting fall display as the white seeds twist into a feathery white tail so big it obscures the green leaves. It thrives in hot sunny spaces and can live with neglect. It requires little pruning and deep watering only once a month.