Carmen avocado tree: video profile
I put together this video profile of the Carmen variety of avocado tree to complement my profile post (found here). While the post is more comprehensive than this video, some aspects of the Carmen variety are nice to see in action. Also, in the video I have made sure...
Growing fava beans in Southern California
My kids are getting to the ages where they specialize in certain garden activities. The ten year old makes guacamole for the family, from harvesting all the ingredients to chopping and mashing them up. The eight year old enjoys potting up seedlings. And Reeve, the six...
Results of girdling non-Hass avocado trees
In the fall of 2023, I girdled four avocado trees beyond the Hass that I usually girdle. The response from my Hass tree to girdling has been consistent and predictable, but the responses from these other varieties was variable. The Hellen and Lamb trees flowered...
Cadway avocado fruit: a profile
Rick Cadway hit the jackpot. In 2005, he planted a seed from a typical Hass avocado that he bought at Costco and it grew into a tree that makes world-class fruit. This is not what usually happens. Usually, when you grow an avocado tree from a seed you get a tree that...
Who grows the rest of your food?
We are food gardeners. We grow and raise some of our food, but none of us grow and raise it all. Who grows the rest of our food? I'll share where my family gets some of the rest of our food, and I'd appreciate it if you would share farms or sources you have that...
Cats: garden defenders
Nature is comprised of a bunch of animals and plants together, eating one another, keeping one another in a semblance of balance. My yard is not nature. But in it I try to put the right animals and plants together such that they can live as happily and naturally as...
Who pollinates avocado flowers?
That’s a tarantula hawk feeding on a flower of my Edranol avocado tree. I watched it work that tree for five minutes, then fly to a Fuerte twenty feet away, and then come back to visit the Edranol flowers again. Ten minutes later, I found the tarantula hawk crawling...
All about avocado pollination
My avocado trees are in bloom. I can’t help but meander the yard at every chance to see which trees have male or female flowers, to identify insects that are visiting the flowers, to check for fruitlets forming, and so on. It’s a show with new episodes arriving daily....
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