trees and the fruit thereof
Today I planted an almond tree (Prunus amygdalus?), after weeding and preparing the ground, at Sarah’s, not far from my fence. Later, watching Gardening Australia, we were bemused and amused at the experts exchanging botanical names. I’m often looking up Latin names for my garden species and promptly forgetting them.
The prunus amygdalus is commonly called the bitter almond, in English. I think. Actually there’s some confusion, in me at least, but a clarification, as well as a lot of useful almond tree info, is offered at this Californian site, It seems that the almond is now known botanically as Prunus dulcis.
We’ll be doing some more planting tomorrow – our co-op has bought a swag of fruit trees for its members, including a ruby grapefruit and a quince for me. Today though I also put two trees in my front garden. Two Albizia julibrissin, also known as Mimosa, or Silktree. Sarah has one growing in her courtyard, a beautiful specimen. She saw them growing in a courtyard café in the city and wanted to have one. It grew so well and quickly in her little courtyard that she became concerned that the neighbour would complain about leaves in the gutter, so last winter I pruned it back heavily with the intention of uprooting it and replanting it out the back. When it came to the point, though, it was too boxed in to be removed. So now it has sprung back up to its former glory, and from the prunings, which I tossed into the back yard, four or five little mimosas have been born. We could end up with a forest of them. From China originally, they’re very popular street trees around the world.
By the way, Sarah insisted they were from cuttings, and from the look of a neatly sawed root she showed me, she’s probably right, but they self-seed muchly too apparently. Just been reading a Californian gardening forum, in which most of the forumees, middle-class yank wankers, have nothing good to say about the messy prolific Mimosa, obsessed as they are with order and control, which unfortunately seems to be a principal reason folks get into gardening.
The prunus amygdalus is commonly called the bitter almond, in English. I think. Actually there’s some confusion, in me at least, but a clarification, as well as a lot of useful almond tree info, is offered at this Californian site, It seems that the almond is now known botanically as Prunus dulcis.
We’ll be doing some more planting tomorrow – our co-op has bought a swag of fruit trees for its members, including a ruby grapefruit and a quince for me. Today though I also put two trees in my front garden. Two Albizia julibrissin, also known as Mimosa, or Silktree. Sarah has one growing in her courtyard, a beautiful specimen. She saw them growing in a courtyard café in the city and wanted to have one. It grew so well and quickly in her little courtyard that she became concerned that the neighbour would complain about leaves in the gutter, so last winter I pruned it back heavily with the intention of uprooting it and replanting it out the back. When it came to the point, though, it was too boxed in to be removed. So now it has sprung back up to its former glory, and from the prunings, which I tossed into the back yard, four or five little mimosas have been born. We could end up with a forest of them. From China originally, they’re very popular street trees around the world.
By the way, Sarah insisted they were from cuttings, and from the look of a neatly sawed root she showed me, she’s probably right, but they self-seed muchly too apparently. Just been reading a Californian gardening forum, in which most of the forumees, middle-class yank wankers, have nothing good to say about the messy prolific Mimosa, obsessed as they are with order and control, which unfortunately seems to be a principal reason folks get into gardening.
posted by Stewart at 12:31 am
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