California Rare Fruit Growers – West LA Chapter
because the best things in life do grow on trees
It was left at our October 13th meeting (Edgar Valdivia on Cherimoyas and Figs). Please let me know if it’s yours.
Because many of you have asked about the attractive permanent name badges some of our members wear, we are going to have a sign-up for them at the October 13th meeting.
To order a badge give a check or cash for $15 to our treasurer Andreé at the time of the order, i.e., before the order is placed. The West LA CRFG name badge has the distinctive CRFG logo and two lines of engraved black text (see badges worn by Sofia Ames and Jane Beer). The badge is roughly 2″ x 3″ and has a magnetic clasp, although you may request a pin clip if you prefer.
Cribbed from the excellent newsletter Margaret Frane writes and sends to our members:
“Edgar is well known in the CRFG throughout California for developing great tasting (and beautiful) dragon fruit (pitahaya) varieties. You can purchase his dragon fruit varieties, such as Tricia and Edgar’s Baby, in many specialty nurseries. Edgar grows well over 100 other fruit such as at least 20 varieties of cherimoya, lucuma, mulberry, and figs. You can see a small smaple of them on the CRFG, Inc., “Let’s Find Out” series #12: https://www.crfg.org/piwigo/picture.php?/4733/category/53.
To hear other examples of Edgar speaking, listen and watch him on: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZtoyxK-Fqs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UR-Zt-c0gu0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqrOkUAxYCE ”
From Bruce Blavin, our old Chair: “Our chapter is extraordinarily lucky to be getting this opportunity to tour a truly inspirational home garden. The owner has been growing fruit for more then 30 years and has literally hundreds of successful grafts. He continues to graft and cultivate some of the rarest varieties of fruit trees from around the world. The citrus collection is truly amazing and there is also a wide variety of Cherimoya, and even a rollinia tree. He has researched irrigation systems and has also planted a unique ground cover, which is drought tolerant.
His gardening passions extend beyond rare fruit trees and he has put together a world-class collection of Cycads, which he recently added to from a number of private collectors. There are also chickens, peacocks and other fowl on his property. The home is in a unique micro climate not too far from the beach and therefore spared the extreme heat and/or frost problems some of us occasionally face. If you are fortunate enough to make the cut off, be sure to bring a pad and paper. Our host is extremely knowledgeable and excellent at answering complicated questions. I never left him without having learned something new.”
So far Charles Portney has 75 plants picked out for the raffle: Sugarcane, blackberry, babaco, paprika, pepino, nopales, loquat, cape gooseberry… and he is not yet done. There will also be a hefty 5-gallon plant started from Stavros Olympios’ Greek fig tree plus I’m sure contributions from other members. Do not miss this!
From Cottonwood Urban Farm’s website: “In the winter of 2012, educator and LA native Elliott Kuhn began converting a dusty, vacant plot in Panorama City into a highly productive urban farm. Nestled in the basin of the Tujunga Wash, Cottonwood Urban Farm (CUF) uses creative growing techniques (season extension, intercropping, succession planting) to cultivate a variety of vegetables, fruits and herbs without the use of any large scale commercial farming equipment.
CUF is currently in a transformational phase of becoming a boutique agricultural enterprise that provides a reliable source of locally grown produce to serve the needs of restaurants, chefs and community members concerned with sustainability. With a deep connection to community, education, and ecology, CUF places social responsibility first and has an ongoing contract with a local substance abuse program for youth. The program provides participants with a 10-week ecology course and horticulture therapy through work at the farm.”
The LA Chapter visited the farm last month and came back with glowing reports. This is the WLA Chapter’s turn.
Read more about the farm here. Like all field trips, this is for members only please. No children or dogs.
Tom del Hotal, a long-time San Diego chapter member, has created dozens upon dozens of fully-illustrated presentations and briefer handouts on topic ranging from Air-layering to the handout shown here: Rare Fruit for Climates with Relatively Frost Free Winters.
By illustration, this 5-page handout is the distillation of an 81-page .pdf on the same topic. Find them all here.