Honeysuckle may be a blessing or a curse, depending on why and where you plant it and which type you plant. Hall’s honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica ‘Halliana’) is the species most commonly seen. Hall’s honeysuckle famously produces white flowers that turn yellow, so two colors greet your eye when you gaze upon this strong vining plant, which flowers throughout spring and early summer, if not beyond.
Hall’s honeysuckle exemplifies the adage that it’s possible to have too much of a good thing. Imagine sheets of fragrant flowers that attract bees and birds — honeybees to pollinate your fruit trees and vegetable crops, and hummingbirds, thrushes, mockingbirds, robins and waxwings to munch on and naturally control insect pests. The problem with Hall’s honeysuckle is that it can quickly grow out of bounds and completely engulf a small garden. Yet, if you have a long stretch of chain-link fence and want to quickly cover it with a sweet-smelling garland of flowers, Hall’s honeysuckle is probably the right candidate for the job.
One bonus of having Hall’s honeysuckle around is the abundance of a sweet snack when the plant is in bloom. The way to get the nectar out of a flower after it is plucked from the plant is to pinch the green calyx at the base of the flower petals. Pinch it all the way around and then gently pull on it. You will extract a string to which the flower’s stigma is attached. The stigma passes through the petal nectaries as you pull it through collecting the nectar embedded there. Once it is finally pulled through, the stigma makes a delightful treat. Kids especially enjoy learning the stigma extraction process and tasting its end product. Just make sure to warn them not to eat the toxic black berries that appear once the flowers fade.
‘Gold Flame’ honeysuckle (Lonicera heckrottii), although less widely planted, is not invasive like Hall’s honeysuckle. ‘Gold Flame’ has flower petals that appear in white, pink and orange buff — all on the same plant, all in the same flower. California native honeysuckles, such as the pink Lonicera hispidula, are also noninvasive.
Giant Burmese honeysuckle (Lonicera hildebrandiana) is the Rolls Royce of honeysuckles. It has a piercingly sweet fragrance that is more distinctive than the strong but somewhat musky scent of Hall’s honeysuckle. Its flowers, reaching 7 inches in length, are larger than those of any other honeysuckle variety. Unfortunately, giant Burmese honeysuckle is frost sensitive so it would be a wiser choice for Ventura or Huntington Beach than for Woodland Hills, although it is supposedly hardy to 22 degrees in protected locations. You can find this vine at any nursery supplied by San Marcos Growers (smgrowers.com; click “retail locator” on the left side of the homepage).
Honeysuckle is easily propagated by layering. Bend a honeysuckle shoot (still attached to the vine) and place the bent shoot in a pot. Fill the pot with well-drained soil and nest or support it within the branches of your vine. Keep the soil moist, and within six to 10 weeks roots will start to form at the bend in the shoot. Cut the shoot from the mother plant when a root mass has developed and you will have created a potted honeysuckle of your own.
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Imagine a weed that grows 20 feet tall and produces more than 50 pounds of edible fruit in a single harvest. The fruit is yellow-orange with the texture of an apricot. Its taste is sweet to tart, depending on the tree. Some people like the fruit and others are indifferent to it but considering that it grows from a tree that just pops out of the ground with no effort on your part, you have no cause for complaint. It is also drought tolerant and will easily subsist on a single weekly soaking, or less, when its shallow roots are covered with mulch. Mulch is also free, provided by its own slowly decomposing leaves. And if you have trouble falling asleep or have a variety of internal ailments, there is a bonus. Consumption of several of the fruit prior to bedtime will have a soporific effect and its dried leaves can be used to make a medicinal tea.
The uncanny arboreal weed of which I speak is the loquat (Eriobotrya japonica), one of the most recognizable local trees. Loquats are not only recognizable by their fruit but by their distinctive leaves, which are long, dark green, ribbed, and fuzzy underneath. When loquat seedlings reach a height of six to eight feet, in their second or third year, flowers and fruit begin to develop.
If you have tended a garden in Southern California, you may likely have encountered seedlings of this tree somewhere in your yard at one time or another. The reason you see loquat trees everywhere is because of birds, which have a passionate love for loquat fruit and disperse the seeds with reckless abandon. One bird prevention measure – for loquat or any other fruit tree — involves tying long lasting helium-filled balloons to your tree’s branches. Balloon strings should be several feet long since such length means that constant movements of the balloons, together with their silvery flashes, will deter avian creatures. Loquat fruit reach their ripened condition all at once, during a two- to three-week period, so you will not have to worry about your balloons deflating prior to fruit harvest.
A mature loquat tree, given equal light on all sides, grows into an attractive symmetrical dome. Fragrant flowers are displayed mostly in the fall, but may also appear sparsely at other times of the year. Like apple and apricot trees, both of them loquat relatives, loquats tend to bear in alternate years. One year the crop is so heavy that fruit must be thinned to avoid limb breakage. The next year, however, little or no fruit may grow.
There are named variety loquats that are larger and sweeter than those produced on volunteer loquat trees. ‘Big Jim’ and ‘Japanese Supersweet’ varieties are available at Papaya Tree Nursery (papayatreenursery.com) in Granada Hills. ‘Gold Nugget’ and ‘Vista White,’ a white loquat touted as “extremely sweet and high in sugar content,” may be found at California Tropical Fruit Tree Nursery (tropicalfruittrees.com) in Vista.
At one time, loquats were hyped as the tree crop of the future for Southern California. They arrived here when trade opened up with Japan in 1851. The Japanese had cultivated loquats, which are native to China, for 1,000 years. Charles Parker Taft planted a 25-acre loquat orchard in Tustin that was producing between 90 and 100 tons of loquats in 1915. By 1924, the loquat craze had reached such a frenzy that a headline of the Santa Ana Register read: “Predicts Loquats will rival Oranges,” where Taft was the one making the prediction. Ultimately, loquats turned out to be more of a fad than a significant commercial crop since there was not sufficient demand for the fruit. Their short shelf life and seediness for a relatively small fruit were strikes against them where consumers were concerned.
Tip of the Week: Birdscape is a term that refers to a garden designed to attract avian creatures. This can be achieved by planting perennials such as abutilons, salvias, and honeysuckles as well as vines and shrubs with tubular blooms (Bignonias, Tecomas, Tecomarias), since they are all candidates for hummingbirds’ attention. Cotoneaster, pyracantha, and toyon (Heteromeles arbutifolia), on the other hand, are ornamentals that yield small, spherical red fruit that serve as delectable snacks for birds of every kind. Of course, you may want to think twice about birdscaping if you are growing lots of tree fruit and berries, unless you have bird netting covering your plants. Other common ornamentals whose fruit brings birds into the garden would include heavenly bamboo (Nandina spp.), Viburnum species, holly (Ilex spp.), and ornamental cherries such as Catalina cherry (Prunus ilicifolia lyonii) and Carolina laurel cherry (Prunus caroliniana). And to make sure you maximize the chances of avian visits to your garden, it would be worth thinking about the addition of a birdbath, a birdhouse, and two bird feeders — one with sugar water for hummingbirds and one with seeds to be enjoyed by flocks of other avian species.
Please send questions, comments, and photos to joshua@perfectplants.com
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