Our Right to Self Reliance

For several years now, my honey has brought me a tree on Valentine’s Day; specifically a fruit tree. It’s something of a feat as it’s usually at least a couple of months till the local big box stores are putting fruit trees out for sale, to say nothing of the smaller places. He knows and values, however, that I far prefer live plants to dying plant ovaries, and food bearing plants are the best!

There’s a difficulty this year; while we are in this apartment, we’re kind of treed out. Management has told us that while they love the flowers and herbs and delight in the semi-dwarf fruit trees I’ve potted up in buckets out front, frankly they’re becoming a tripping hazard and we may not bring any more in.

I suggested to him tonight that he might see if he can find a small citrus tree that would have to live inside anyway. My best friend found one at a Fred Meyer’s a few months ago, in the house plant department, so it’s apparently not impossible. I’d love a lemon tree; I use lemons and lemon rind fairly frequently and being able to pick my own off my very own tree would be a delight of self reliance. There are some lovely ones out there, too; I’ve seen pink-flowered varieties on eBay, for instance, and I know that the W. W. Seymour Botanical Conservatory in Wright Park near here has a Ponderosa lemon tree that they sometimes sell sprouted seeds from.  I dearly love plants with lineage, even if the same variety can be had elsewhere; a Ponderosa lemon tree from there would be special…not just any Ponderosa lemon tree.

I also suggested to him that people often mistakenly call banana plants banana trees, and I’ve wanted to grow my own bananas for some time now. I’ve had a shot at it a couple of times, but both times the plants died. I’m pretty sure I used the wrong soil, and have tried to learn more about growing bananas by reading up at the International Banana Society . Perhaps I’ve read enough now to be able to keep one alive to fruiting.
The only other problem there is finding a variety that truly is dwarf; eight foot ceilings means no ten foot plants, and that’s what most of the smaller bananas grow to. They refer to them as dwarf because many banana plants grow to forty feet—definitely not an indoor plant!

The only other option I can come up with would be to find just about any fruit tree and guerrilla garden it.  There are several places close by that would benefit from a fruit tree, and this is not a bad time of year to be planting one; it’ll have a really good start when things warm up and will definitely be settled in it’s planting hole by all the spring rains we’re expecting.  I wouldn’t mind giving my Valentine’s Day tree to the world under the circumstances.

I’m looking forward to seeing how he resolves the dilemma tomorrow. Perhaps I can post a picture of my new tree instead of borrowing Flickr pics!