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Winter fireworks show

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Special to The Times

Winter is a season of surprise. It keeps a loose schedule, rarely hangs on for long and, occasionally, brings rains. Although some people find these months too dreary, gardens can take on a glow -- a sparkle of seasonal fireworks whose colors cut through the gray.

Winter performers from California and beyond provide a dynamite display -- bursts of blooms that explode in brilliant yellows and reds, oranges and pinks, purples and flashes of blue.

The midcentury ranch house of Northridge retirees Ralph and Barbara Crane slows traffic -- and inspires neighbors. Now appearing: aloes with waxy red towers of flowers, grasses with seed heads of violet and amber, and Euphorbia ‘Sticks on Fire’ with incandescent stems. The show also includes an emu bush (Eremophila ‘Valentine’), an Australian fuchsia (Correa ‘Ivory Bells’), Mexican tarragon, native salvias and strawberry trees from southern Europe and Ireland.

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Although the Cranes have lost count of their plants, they have a method to their madness. All are from Mediterranean climates and require little water. Three signature plants are repeated out front to unite texture and tone: an Australian ground cover that blushes in the cold (Myoporum parvifolium ‘Burgundy Carpet’), a very blue agave from the Southwest and Mexico (Agave parryi) and a tall, arching grass from Texas (Muhlenbergia lindheimeri).

The pyrotechnics reemerge out back, with pots full of winter-blooming firecracker plants (Russelia equisetiformis) and Christmas cactus in pink and magenta. A separate edible garden sports red-stemmed beets and neon pink Swiss chard ‘Bright Lights.’

Across the valley in Sherman Oaks, stands of red-hot pokers ignite the winter garden at the Spanish-style home of Freda and Henry Vizcarra. Planted less than two years ago from 2-gallon cans, the red-hot pokers have grown into grassy mounds as wide as manholes, each with more than a dozen chest-high yellow-and-red spikes.

This robust variety, Kniphofia ‘Zululandii,’ from the Transvaal region of South Africa, was chosen by designer Marie Gamboa of Garden Pacific in Silver Lake. She chose ‘Zululandii’ for its size and sizzling shades “so typical of Spanish landscapes.”

“They explode at vacation and party time,” Gamboa says, “and continue well into spring.”

Bees and hummingbirds find the flowers irresistible. The Vizcarras also are enamored, and now that their 12-year-old needs less turf on which to play, they want more Kniphofia in another spot.

One source for red-hot pokers and other unusual plants is Shelley Jennings, owner of Worldwide Exotics in Lakeview Terrace. Her home garden adjacent to the nursery comes into full bloom each winter.

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South African bulbs are coming up, including orange Chasmanthe, salmon and yellow Homeria, “puppy proof” red-leafed Oxalis -- all “color poppers,” she says.

Her other seasonal favorites are Montanoa schottii, a daisy tree from Mexico, and Hypoestes aristata, a South African shrub with lavender spikes.

“And aloes, of course,” she says. “Those blues and oranges after a rain -- it takes your breath away.”

Elizabeth Schwartz, who teaches “Gardening With California’s Native Plants” at UCLA Extension, has other suggestions: Ceanothus ‘Dark Star,’ which has sapphire flowers, and other California lilacs, which are flowering early this year.

In the dry shade of trees, she likes to plant creeping barberry (Mahonia repens), a 2-footer with small yellow flowers. ‘Golden Abundance’ is an 8-foot hybrid with plenty of late-winter flash. Both provide blue berries that attract birds.

For the best fruit, though, choose toyon, the common red-fruited species (Heteromeles arbutifolia) and the yellow variety called ‘Davis Gold.’

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“Wonderful color and lots of it,” Schwartz says, “until the birds demolish the berries.”

Manzanita also is fantastic, she says. There are dozens, from ground cover to tree size, and most demand good drainage. Arctostaphylos ‘Lester Rowntree’ is spectacular for its deep red bark, gray leaves, pink flowers and round red fruit. ‘Sunset,’ named for the magazine, has gorgeous bark and faint pink flowers.

Manzanita flowers are favorites of hummingbirds, as are blossoms of native Ribes. Schwartz cites the white-flowering currant (R. indecorum) and ‘Dancing Tassels’ (R. malvaceum), which has long, drooping chains of tubular pink blossoms.

Of course, practically every garden has room for more. Schwartz just planted a dogwood with the seriously protracted name Cornus sericea ssp. sericea, better known as ‘Silver and Gold.’ It lights up her hillside with bright, leafless golden stems.

At the Vizcarras’ garden in Sherman Oaks, designer Gamboa just added more winter pizazz.

On the south-facing “desert side” of the frontyard, she grouped blue-green agaves and yellow-spiked Aloe vera with glistening golden barrel cactus.

Beneath ancient deodar cedars, the darker woodsy side has shell-pink sasanqua camellias, a radiant yellow Mahonia and a dormant Japanese maple (Acer palmatum ‘Bloodgood’).

This little tree could leaf out next month, one can’t say for sure. But when its crimson foliage emerges, our winter show soon will be over.

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Lili Singer can be reached at home@latimes.com.

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Colors that can set your yard ablaze

A sampler of plants from around the world that set cool-season gardens aglow:

Aloe species: Succulents with yellow, orange, red or pink flowers.

Strawberry tree: Arbutus unedo. Shaggy red bark, snowy manzanita-like flowers and round orange-red fruit. ‘Elfin King’ is a 4-foot dwarf.

Manzanita: Arctostaphylos species. California plants with beautiful bark, flowers and fruit. Attract hummingbirds.

‘Sticks on Fire’: Euphorbia tirucalli. Succulent shrub with pencil-thin salmon-red stems -- and caustic, milky sap.

Toyon: Heteromeles arbutifolia. Native shrub or small tree with leathery leaves and large clusters of red or yellow berries.

Red-hot poker: Kniphofia species, also known as torch lily. Perennials in varying heights, all with long-lasting flowers that bees and hummingbirds love.

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Muhlenbergia lindheimeri: Graceful tall grass with long-lasting seed heads.

‘Burgundy Carpet’: Myoporum parvifolium. Low mat of tiny leaves that darkens with the cold. Crowds out weeds and needs little water or care.

Barberry: Mahonia species, also sold as Berberis. Native shrubs with yellow flowers and bird-pleasing berries.

Mexican tarragon: Tagetes lucida. Perennial with golden flowers and strongly scented, deep green leaves.

-- Lili Singer

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