Friday Miscellany

I've been busy with the garden for the past week but not at all focused, jumping from one activity to another.  As I did so, various sights caught my interest, if only temporarily, so I decided to consolidate them into a grab-bag post.

Staring out my home office window, I noticed some bright green spots on the mimosa tree (Albizia julibrissin) and promptly went outside to investigate.  As background, this is a tree that spends a good deal of the year naked (except for the seedpods that it drops all year).  It doesn't leaf out until late April or early May and it begins dropping both foliage and flowers once in starts blooming in late June, returning to its naked state in October.

Here's what the tree looks like at the moment when viewed from a distance

So what's happening here?!

When I first noticed the green foliage, all I could see were green leaves.  The stems started to develop a couple of days afterwards, when I took this photo.  It looked so odd and so unlike anything I'd seen the tree do before that I briefly wondered if some other plant had colonized the tree's trunk.

But no, yesterday I found signs of more conventional stem development on a couple of the tree's higher branches.  Still, the fact that it's leafing out almost 4 months ahead of schedule is very odd.

Perhaps the fact that we've had the driest start to our "rainy season" since 1930 has the tree acting as if we've leap-frogged winter into spring?  Or perhaps it overheard me talking to the arborist about cutting it back or even taking it out?  It remains to be seen whether the fresh green foliage will be short-lived or the start of a trend.

Meanwhile, across the street, the tree that MDN of Un jardin en clima subtropical húmedo identified for me as Melia azedarbach (aka Chinaberry or Persian Lilac) is positively glowing.

Right now, the tree's foliage almost matches the new paint color of the house just up the hill from it, barely visible in the background here.  Unlike my fig tree at the bottom of the back slope, I also noticed that the one here next to the Melia azadarbach still has some lovely yellow leaves, whereas mine dropped the last of its leaves during October's extended heatwave.

Back in my own garden, our citrus trees look to be headed for a banner year despite the woeful lack of rain.

The noID Mandarin orange tree is loaded with fruit, still not quite ripe but getting there.  We're already eating some of the Washington navel oranges, which are nearly the size of grapefruits and so much tastier than the fruit bought at the supermarket.  The lime tree (far right) is bearing well too but its fruit is less visible.

And our lovely lemon tree remains the best feature of the back slope.  Despite my massive giveaway of fruit several weeks ago, there's still plenty on the tree.  This tree bears continuously year-round - the only time we were without ripe lemons was the year following the the intense heatwave in June 2015, when all the fruit dropped as the temperature suddenly hit 106F.

I've even paid a couple of visits to my local garden centers since Christmas and, although they've yet to restock after clearing out their Christmas trees, I managed to find sufficient items of interest to liquidate the gift cards I received as Christmas presents.  Most of those purchases have gone into plants for the new lath house, which I'll share at another time.  However, I saw some interesting cacti on one recent trip, which I thought I'd share.

This is Opuntia subulata montrose 'Gumbi'.  I'd never seen an Opuntia sporting bright colored foliage reminiscent of Euphorbia 'Sticks on Fire' before.

The garden center also stocked several of 'Gumbi's' relatives, including this one labeled as Christmas Tree Cactus

And this hybrid (Opuntia vestita x subulata), labeled as Opuntia hybrid crest 'Roller Coaster'

This plant was also new to me.  It's Pereskia grandiflora violacea.  My photo doesn't do the flower justice.  All these plants were under a shade structure that made them difficult to photograph.

Unlike some of my favorite bloggers, I shy away from true cactus, especially the really prickly kinds.  However, I found myself repeatedly thinking about this plant, Pilosocereus azureus, after I left the garden center.  This photo doesn't fully capture its ethereal blue color.  After looking it up on-line I'm even more covetous.  But it was expensive and it apparently grows rather quickly to 12 feet tall.  Perhaps, if I can find a window-sill size plant to start with, I'll try it one day...

That's my wrap up for the week.  Enjoy your weekend!


All material © 2012-2018 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

The oranges are ripe!

In Southern California, if you have a garden of virtually any size, you will at some point acquire a citrus tree - it's a botanical rite of passage.  Even in my former tiny, shady garden, I tried growing a lemon tree in a large pot.  It didn't thrive and I ultimately gave up on it.  However, when we moved to our current house 3 years ago, we inherited 4 mature citrus trees, a major boon!  There's a row of citrus at the back of our vegetable garden and a lemon tree at the bottom of our slope.

Our citrus alley along the back of the vegetable garden - the Mandarin orange is on the left, the Washington navel in the middle, and tree on the right is a lime

Our oranges are 100 times sweeter than those we buy from the market.  Each year since we moved here, we've eagerly awaited the moment when the oranges ripen.  Well, that day is here!  The Washington navel oranges are now ripe enough to pick.  Unlike the Mandarin oranges, the Washington navels hide behind the tree's foliage.

The fruit is hardly visible behind the foliage

Last year, after the fruit was harvested, I climbed into the thicket and cut out the dead wood - it looks as though I'll be doing that again this year

I went out early this morning and picked oranges for my husband and I and lemons for my friend LD2, who consumes them in mass quantities.  I need to find someone who loves limes as they tend to go to waste, littering the ground below the tree.

We'll enjoy the oranges for several weeks and, when they're gone, the Mandarin oranges should be good enough to pick!

Life is good.