Do you love flowers but hate weeding, watering, and replanting every spring? Native California flowers may be the answer. These drought-tolerant, resilient blooms are perfectly adapted to Southern California’s climate, meaning less water, less effort, and a big...
Do you have an endless appetite for citrus? Then consider the pomelo (Citrus maxima), the world’s largest citrus fruit, sometimes as big as a basketball! Native to Southeast Asia, this grapefruit cousin has thick skin, pale flesh (ranging from yellow to pink),...
Johnny Appleseed spread the gospel of the apple tree along the American frontier, traveling barefoot as far as Indiana and possibly Illinois. He never made it to California, but the apple did, introduced by Spanish missionaries who also grew oranges, olives, grapes,...
Is there a perfect tree for lazy gardeners? In SoCal, it might be the desert willow, a native plant that manages just fine without help but flourishes with a little TLC — occasional waterings and “haircut” now and then. The desert willow (Chilopsis...
Young George Washington never chopped down a cherry tree. An early biographer fabricated the story — a lie to illustrate Washington’s love of the truth. Washington was a Virginian, and Virginia was a prime area for cherry cultivation at the time. But the trees...
Georgia is the Peach Tree State. Everywhere you turn, there’s a Peachtree avenue, shopping center, medical building, school, and so on. Meanwhile, the Golden State contributes about 80% of the US peach harvest. Southern California’s Mediterranean climate...
