Managing alternate bearing in avocado trees
Would you rather have 50 avocados from a tree every year or 100 avocados every other year? By nature, individual avocado trees do not bear the same amount of fruit every year, year after year. Their crop load fluctuates, and it fluctuates for many reasons. I know of...
Captain Bucklew’s California mango trees
Captain L. L. Bucklew began planting mango trees in Encinitas, San Diego County, before World War II. By 1956, he was up to 172 trees. Bucklew’s grove was the first commercial planting of mangos in California, and today, fourteen of these historic trees are still...
Installing drip irrigation for a vegetable garden
My friend Erik recently planted a new vegetable garden at his new house, but now he's off traveling. So right before he left I helped him install drip irrigation that will take care of his plants while he's gone -- and beyond. Here's what his garden looked like before...
How avocado trees flower
Bloom season is the most exciting for me when it comes to avocados. First, I look at the buds on the branches of trees to try to predict how many will become flowers. Then I observe the bees and flies visiting the flowers. Are there enough? Are the flowers getting...
Eating pineapple guava flowers
This week I was in the kitchen while my three kids were at the dining room table and I overheard this conversation. Miles (six years old): "There are lots of edible flowers, like pineapple guava, broccoli . . ." Reeve (four years old): "Broccoli is not a flower." Cass...
The GEM avocado tree: a profile
“I believe that 15 years from now we’ll be standing here and we’ll be talking GEM. We won’t be talking Hass. People will go, ‘What is Hass?’” said Mary Lu Arpaia to a room of California avocado growers in 2017. Arpaia knows avocado varieties. She has been the director...
Watering fruit trees with drip irrigation
I water about half of my fruit trees with mini-sprinklers while the other half is on drip irrigation. For example, the citrus trees along my driveway pictured above are all on drip. In this post, I’ll explain why I use drip on many trees, and I’ll give you my best...
Monkey flower: native plant in Southern California that feeds bees and hummingbirds
Monkey flowers dot the hills of Southern California in the spring with their yellow, orange, and red flowers. They're natives; they grow wild here. Monkey flowers also grow along the road in front of my house, but these ones were planted by me. Nevertheless, they feel...
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