Vacation has been over for quite a while. I returned two weeks ago. It continues to be the topic for my Six on Saturday because I took too many pictures to share within only a few episodes. The sixth picture here is from the Tomeo Residence. All of the others are from the farm nearby, where my Pa grows bonsai stock, and where I pruned several neglected apple trees. Like last year, I left late, but managed to prune the apple trees before bloom. Because of the delay though, my trip to Southern California and Arizona is also delayed. Now, if I do not go soon, that trip will need to be delayed even more, until after summer.
1. Bloom was what I was trying to avoid. Fortunately, this is merely an abandoned plum tree that I did not prune. I managed to prune the designated apple trees prior to bloom.
2. Vegetation management does not get out much. They and the swine next door control vegetation where they live, but lack access to the orchard or other vulnerable vegetation.
3. Bonsai stock is safe from vegetation management. Unlike the unvarying horticultural commodities that I am accustomed to, each of these bonsai stock specimens are unique.
4. Junipers might be the most common of the bonsai stock. This one might be Tolleson’s blue weeping juniper. It was certainly blue and weeping. I did not seem familiar though.
5. Larch is also popular for bonsai, at least in the Pacific Northwest. However, because I am unfamiliar with this genus, I have no idea what species this is, or if it is even a larch.
6. Rhubarb that my paternal paternal great grandfather gave to me when I was five years old inhabits a garden of the Tomeo Residence near the farm. I brought it here last April.
This is the link for Six on Saturday, for anyone else who would like to participate: https://thepropagatorblog.wordpress.com/2017/09/18/six-on-saturday-a-participant-guide/
Tony Tomeo 
The larch is interesting, and your rhubarb looks about the same size as mine. I just can’t find a spot it likes! Also interesting that your apple blossom is not much earlier than ours. Our apples are just coming into flower.
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Apple trees bloom later in the Pacific Northwest than they do here, although they are quite late here after the unusually wintry winter.
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Wow, Tony, you have some fine horticultural heritage! I am fascinated by bonsai, although never tried it myself. Strangely, we have a couple of tiny acer seedlings that I was considering. Perhaps I will give it a go.
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Bonsai is as artistic as it is horticultural, which is why I do not do it. I enjoy growing horticultural commodities, but do not want to begin the process of bonsai. My Pa grows some unprocessed stock, but also grows specimens that are already beginning the process of bonsai. Of course, those who purchase such specimens must finish and personalize them. Bonsai is a surprisingly personalized art.
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So glad to know that you made it in time for the pruning before bloom. What interesting pictures this time! I especially love ‘Vegetation Management.’
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After my late arrival last year, I was determined to not be late again this year. I really must plan better for next year.
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How nice to pass down plants that many generations.
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In my garden, along with the rhubarb, I also grow Iris pallida from my maternal maternal great grandmother. My niece got some also. Her daughter could be the sixth generation to grow it.
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Wow! What a gift. I hope your family can keep it going.
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Well, not everyone is interested in gardening. The rhubarb skipped two generations when I got it directly from my great grandfather. It only went back to my Pa recently. I am pleased that my niece expressed an interest in the rhubarb and iris, but I do not know how far it will go from there.
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How lovely to have plants handed down through the generations.
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Yes, they exemplify ‘sustainability’.
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I am not familiar with Larch, but I like the cones. Do you eat rhubarb?
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Oh yes! It makes one of the two most excellent pies in the entire Universe! Lemon meringue is the other, but it is a lot of work. Rhubarb pie is just rhubarb and sugar in a crust, perhaps with a bit of cinnamon
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My husband likes rhubarb pie, I think you have to grow up with it.
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?! Why? It is like totally AWESOME!
As a kid though, we sometimes got sweet cherry pie, because sweet cherries grew in the orchards here. Because we grew up with it, we thought it was normal. No one remembers where tart cherries grew.
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It’s like weird celery to me. My husband makes strawberry rhubarb pie and eats it all.
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All?! Someone needs a slap. It is AWESOME! It is even better without strawberry. Strawberry is just a waste of space that could be used by more rhubarb.
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How amazing, to grow rhubarb from a great grandparent!
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It is likely a common sort that he got from a hardware store between about 1940 and 1970. It looks just like ‘Victoria’. I enjoy it though, because I grew up with it. I also grow Iris pallida from my maternal maternal great grandmother. My niece and her daughter grow it also.
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The only larch much grown here are European, Japanese and the hybrid between them. A lot of timber plantations of them have been felled because of Phtophthora ramorum. Of the two American species in my book yours looks, from the cones, more likely to be L. laricina than L. occidentalis.
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Yes, they lack those silly bristles of the Western larch. I really do not know what it is. I sometimes find specimens among the bonsai stock that I would like to grow in a natural form, rather than as a bonsai. I sort of wonder what this particular tree would look like.
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The blooms on the plum tree are so pretty! And I love your vegetation management 🙂
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The plum tree did not get pruned for two reasons. Secondly, it was already blooming, so would have been distressed by late pruning. Firstly, the tree can not be salvaged, even with very aggressive pruning, so we intend to leave it there in its current condition to bloom and be pretty. The fruit is not the best quality without pruning, but there is another tree for that.
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