HAWAI'I GARDENS
Mandarins provide luscious fruit

By Heidi Bornhorst

It's that time of year when tangerines, mandarins and oranges provide luscious golden-orange fruit. They are such an ornamental sight. I always try to find where I might stick one into my over-abundant garden.

Our neighbor, Betty T., shared some super-'ono mandarins with us. She said that they were sour the first year and now in the second year of this tree's fruiting, the fruits are perfect and plump, so 'ono and sweet and flavorful.

I almost hate to peel and eat them because they are such a pretty and festive holiday decorative element. They smell good, too. I always feel it's going to be a good holiday season when we have the wealth of a pile of golden tangerines.

There was a thing on TV about oranges preventing cancer and I jumped up and peeled one of the ones from Betty, for my ku'uipo and me.

Other golden bloomers:

I saw a whole lawn of golden- flowered Zephranthes lily in a nice old garden in Lanikai. They are popping up here and there around town, perhaps in response to the rains.

Going up the Pali, a patch of gold caught my eye on the right. There at the hongwanji was a gorgeous full-bloom golden trumpet tree (Tabebuia chrysophylla) in December! It was magnificent in the pouring rain.

Then I saw a row of the "cousins" of the golden trumpet tree, also in deep, out-of-season bloom in deep lavender-purple blossoms.

This was at the very nice and well-maintained Queen Ka'ahumanu Elementary School on Pi'ikoi Street. In between two of the lines of classrooms was a whole row of these incredible full-bloomed purple-flowering trees. These again are a school legacy, part of our invaluable heritage of public school flowering trees, planted wisely and maintained well over the years.

As I walked along Kinau, under some giant, gnarled old shady milo trees, (Thespesia populnea), and then makai on Pi'ikoi, I admired the whole campus.

There were two plantings that I thought were simple and nicely designed, and would be easy to maintain:

Golden-yellow and light-green accented Crotons, with a border of blooming yellow Wedelia trilobata. Not my favorite plant (I usually call it WEED-elia) but it was perfect, durable and cheerfully blooming bright yellow in this tough, hard to maintain landscape situation.

Congrats to the landscape maintenance staff at Ka'ahumanu Elementary. Landscape maintenance may not be glamorous, but it sure is vital to our "urban forest" and to us.

Heidi Bornhorst is a sustainable landscape consultant. Submit questions to islandlife@honoluluadvertiser.com or Island Life, The Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802. Letters may be published or distributed in print, electronic or other forms.