Look, Mom. I made a citrus tree from scratch!
It all started when I identified my neighbor's citrus tree as rootstock. The fruit was unpleasantly sour and very seedy, nothing you would ever eat. The leaves were in groups of three. I looked at the base of the trunk and could see where the intended top of the tree...
Avocado rootstocks: What do they matter?
Rootstocks are mysterious. They do their work hidden, underground. Yet, their influence on the trees above ground is real and measurable. For example, some rootstocks have demonstrated that they can induce the tops to make more than twice as much fruit compared to...
Madalyn onion variety: a profile
As I noticed the swollen white bulbs and the first green necks collapsing this week, I thought, Madalyn never lets me down. I think she's my favorite. I should tell others about her. Background: Madalyn is an onion variety that comes from Enza Zaden, a vegetable...
Supporting The Yard Posts
My goal with The Yard Posts is to help others grow food at home, with a focus on vegetables and fruits -- especially avocados -- in Southern California. How do I do this? I write short articles – “posts” – each Friday, and I augment each post with photos and sometimes...
The Anomalous March of 2026
One day it got up to 101 degrees in our yard, and on another day we played at the beach and got sunburned and the ocean water felt like summer -- in March. It was hot, but how unusual was that for March? And how did plants in the food garden respond? HOT I've been...
The Gold Nugget mandarin tree: a profile
“If I only had one citrus tree to live on for my entire life, this is it,” said our guide through the collection of about 1,000 varieties of citrus selected from around the world. That's quite a claim. But, coming from Ottillia “Toots” Bier, we would be wise to...
Growing an avocado grove under shade cloth in California’s Central Valley, with Tarcisio Ruiz
"Avocado trees are like Baby Bear," says University of California farm advisor Ben Faber. As with Baby Bear's porridge in the Goldilocks story, avocado trees need their environment neither too hot nor too cold. They need it just right. Well then, how do you keep them...
Bee Garden update: a more permanent pollinator patch
In 2019, I wrote a post about growing a “Bee Garden,” a patch of flowering plants that provides food for bees and other pollinating insects. The point was to bring them in and keep them around such that they would also pollinate my nearby vegetables and fruit trees....









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