This fall, I'm planting for 2055.
Most of what goes in the ground this month is for next spring. But a few of my fall plantings are a longer bet — PNW natives chosen for where our climate is headed, plus one northward migrant I'm trialing for our warmer winters.
Where it's headed looks like this: wet falls, winters and springs — and much drier summers. That's a hard combination for a garden built on the old calendar.
But there are innovative ways to blunt the damage: smart irrigation that waters to real need instead of a fixed schedule, and careful plant choices — plants that can survive the new, harsher summer conditions and still thrive.
It's research, not prescription — every garden is its own experiment. But the idea is simple: plant like the future is coming, because it is. I'll be talking about this at length at the Washington Association of Landscape Professionals conference in 2027.
