Just because California bay, Umbellularia californica, can be used like Grecian or sweet bay for culinary purposes does not necessarily mean that it should be. California bay has a stronger and much more pungent flavor and aroma. Some might suggest substituting less than half California bay for Grecian bay. However, even if the intensity is adjusted accordingly, the flavor might be off.
As the name suggests, California bay is native to California. However, because it is from rainier climates, it prefers a slight bit more water than it would get naturally in the drier parts of the local chaparral climate. It provides nice cooling shade in large landscapes, but is a bit too dark and messy for refined home gardens. The aromatic leaf litter can annoy delicate annuals and seedlings.
Well exposed trees can eventually get more than thirty feet tall and almost as broad. Forest trees that compete with other trees can get a hundred feet tall! Small trees can be shorn as hedges. If not watered too generously, the roots tend to be rather complaisant. However, old trees can eventually develop massively distended burl growths known as lignotubers at the bases of their trunks.
Ferns tends to be . . . well, ‘ferny’, with divided or intricately lobed foliage. Staghorn ferns and bird’s-nest ferns are the more familiar of the rare exceptions. Staghorn ferns have two types of simple undivided fronds, and both types lack rachi. Bird’s-nest ferns have weirdly simple fronds that, although equipped with prominent rachi, lack any distinctive division or lobes that make ferns ‘ferny’.
If it has bark like a coastal redwood, and foliage like a coastal redwood, and a slender conical structure like a coastal redwood, it is most likely a coastal redwood. If it turns orangish brown in autumn and defoliates through winter, it is the much less common dawn redwood, Metasequoia glyptostroboides. It is one of only a few distinctive genera of coniferous trees that are deciduous.
Not all annuals last as long as petunias do through summer, or pansies do through winter. Some fill in for the in between seasons, or if longer term annuals do not last quite as long as they should. Cockscomb, Celosia plumosa, blooms best now that it is about halfway through summer, and then finishes as weather gets too cool for it in late autumn, not so much more than two months later.
Plants are usually well suited to the climates that they are native to. Glaucous (slightly reflective grayish) foliage is more common in harsh climates where darker green foliage might get cooked by the sun. Pendulous growth is more common among plants that want to shed heavy snow efficiently. Kashmir cypress, Cupressus cashmeriana, has both, but is from a tropical monsoonal climate.
Those outside California sometimes envy our ideal climates and soils. More of a variety of plants can be grown here than in most other places in America. There are not many plants that can be grown elsewhere that will not grow here. However, phlox, Phlox paniculata, is an example of a plant that can do well here, but for some reason or another, is much more popular everywhere else.
Good old fashioned busy Lizzie is hard to find nowadays, if it can be found at all. The nasty mildew that kills it so quickly might not be prevalent everywhere, but happens to be a serious problem where most of the bedding plant farms are located. Now, the formerly uncommon New Guinea impatiens, Impatiens X hawkeri, which is somehow resistant to the mildew, is becoming popular.
The common names of ‘Dutchman’s pipe’ and ‘queen of the night’ are not much less awkward the the Latin name of Epiphyllum oxypetalum, which might be why the Latin name is more common than the common names are. Some know it as ‘white ephiphyllum’ or even more simply as ‘white epi’. It is one of the more popular of the epiphyllums; and it is the most popular with white flowers.
In only a few years, busy Lizzie, Impatiens walleriana, went from being one of the most popular warm season annuals to being unavailable in nurseries. It is now making a slight comeback. Most of those planted during their planting season last spring are now so profuse with bloom that their rich foliage is mostly obscured. Although they can be perennial, almost all get replaced in autumn.
Tony Tomeo 