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Garden journal entry |
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Fresh new growth among aborted flowerbuds, early april |
April 10, 2021. Among the trees that I thought I lost in the big freeze was our trusty huisache, which appeared completely devoid of life in late March, after many other shrubs and trees had started to show signs of regrowth. Its apparent demise surprised me, because I've seen well-established specimens growing as rural roadside trees – but still, its twigs were clearly dead and with every passing week my hope for its return diminished. Until, in the final days of March, I saw a single sprig of new growth on a small branch low on the tree, just below where the huisache girdlers had killed a main upright. I started paying closer attention, and in the following days, I found a few more tentative sprigs, mostly low on the main trunk. I knew the tree was alive, but would it require major surgery, with large parts sacrificed to allow some lower growth to survive? It turned out that this would not be necessary – by the second week of April, most of the main branches of the tree were showing fresh leaves even along their smaller branchlets. The smallest twigs were indeed dead, and any flowering it had planned to do was rudely nipped in the bud. But our huisache, she's alive, and I look forward to the return of the yellow puffballs next spring – assuming we don't get a repeat of that freak freeze. |
Last modified:
September 09, 2009
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