Oh, the mistakes I’ve made: Thinking flowers were for girls
I found myself doing the strangest thing in the yard the other day: planting flowers. A few years ago, I could not have predicted this day would come. Flowers were for girls. Or maybe for old men who like to prune roses. But no -- I’ve since become enlightened:...
Don’t judge a tree by its first fruit
My Pixie mandarin tree is carrying its first fruit, which look pitiful. They’re small, warped. If I didn’t know better, I’d say Pixie mandarins are no good, and I’d replace it with a different mandarin. Luckily, I've had fruit off of mature Pixie trees. They're...
Dealing with aphids on broccoli, brussels sprouts, cabbage, and cauliflower
Aphids in many Southern California vegetable gardens are particularly bad this winter. What a good opportunity to test some control methods and make observations about aphid behavior. Brevicoryne brassicae, that’s the scientific name for the particular aphid I'm...
Master Gardener Spring Seminar, San Diego
You are invited! Each spring, the Master Gardener program of San Diego County holds a day of classes and workshops, plus a marketplace. This year's Spring Seminar is called "Garden Spaces: Growing Outside the Box." It will be held on March 17, 2018 at the San Diego...
Pruning avocado trees
I call this tree the Japanese Fuerte. I’d seen many pruned avocado trees, I’d pruned many avocado trees, and I’d read much about others’ pruning of avocado trees, but I’d never encountered an old tree that had been so consistently and artfully molded to a shape and...
Should you prune a bare-root fruit tree?
Whether or not you should prune a bare-root fruit tree depends on two things: One, what the tree looks like when you buy it. And two, what you want the tree to look like when it's all grown up. This being mid-January, heart of bare-root season in Southern California,...
Where should you buy a fruit tree?
"Sorry," I said as I leaned in front of a guy to snap the above photo of the label on the bag of a bare-root Carpathian walnut tree at Home Depot. “Do you know what is different these?” asked the man, pointing also at the tree beside the Carpathian walnut, labelled...
Don’t dig in your garden
A light frost kissed my sweet potato foliage to death at the end of December, so I dug the tubers up. I don't do much digging in my garden anymore, it occurred to me. In fact, I realized, besides harvesting sweet potatoes and Irish potatoes, I don't dig at all. Do...
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