Colleen LaFleur loved to grow agapanthus when she lived in Chicago. It burned up when she planted it in Tucson's full sun.
Lynda Grams has given up trying to grow the hostas that she once collected in Minnesota.
Like these experienced gardeners, Bea Kabler, who moved from Wisconsin, had to rethink her whole concept of gardening. So did Suzi Hileman, who successfully gardened in Chicago and Marin, Calif.
All these women admit they had to relearn gardening once they came to the Sonoran Desert. They offer their trials, triumphs and tips to other gardening newbies who find that growing plants in Tucson can be frustrating and rewarding.
MIND SHIFT
"The thing that I had to learn was to forget most of those things we grew in Wisconsin," says Kabler, a Pima County master gardener who moved to Green Valley in 2008, "and turn to whole new groups of plants."
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Horticulturalist LaFleur, who handles member services at the Tucson Botanical Gardens, found quick success with what she called the "Midwest garden" of flowers she planted after arriving to Tucson in 2009.
But the need to conserve water changed her thinking. "You need to be a responsible desert gardener," she says. "That's the philosophy I'm trying to adopt."
Four-year resident Hileman, also a master gardener, learned to accept the tough desert soil. "The first year I bought a pry bar," she jokes. "I'm used to buying suede gloves.
"It is the most unforgiving dirt."
Grams, president of The Gardeners of Tucson, had to get used to growing Midwestern spring plants in fall and vice versa. "The growing cycles are very different," she says.
NEW THRILLS
LaFleur, who owned a landscape-design business in Chicago, is trying out citrus trees, something she couldn't grow in the Midwest.
Grams, who moved to Tucson seven years ago, likes "that you could garden all year-round." The biggest surprise for Kabler was cactus. "I had no idea they bloomed almost all year."
Hileman admits she's ecstatic when a plant survives her experimentation with location and watering. "I have triumphed over this environment," she says. "When things grow, you really can feel proud of it."
NEWBIE TIPS
The women offer these ideas so that new Tucson gardeners can find success in the desert:
• When trying to decide what to plant, take cues from what grows in neighbors' yards, out in the wild and at local nurseries.
• Learn local practices in a new-gardener class at botanical gardens or the Pima County Cooperative Extension, from books specific to Sonoran Desert gardening or with a local gardening club.
• Become familiar with the water-conserving xeriscape method of gardening.
• Understand the microclimates around the house.
• Recognize that care instructions on plants grown elsewhere don't necessarily apply to Tucson gardening.
• Experiment and accept that plants will die in the process.
• Give your gardening skills time to adapt. "You have to have patience," Hileman advises. "You have to be resilient. You can't blame yourself when things die."
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Resources for newcomers
• Pima County Cooperative Extension answers questions, conducts lectures and maintains demonstration gardens. 626-5161, extension.arizona.edu/ pima/garden-and-landscape.
• Tucson Botanical Gardens regularly runs "Gardening for the Newcomer" and other basic gardening classes and exhibits urban gardens. 326-9686, www.tucsonbotanical.org.
• Tohono Chul Park presents several classes on basic gardening in the Sonoran Desert and demonstration gardens incorporating native plants. 742-6455, www.tohonochulpark.org
Contact local freelance writer Elena Acoba at acoba@dakotacom.net