I live in the northeast. Not the super cold part of the northeast, but on Long Island, NY, where the climate is tempered by the Atlantic.
Around 1995 or so, I decided to plant an almond tree. It was tagged as “Hardy Almond” and I couldn’t resist. I thought it might do well tucked behind the neighbor’s new fence and sheltered on the other side by the house. It was about 4 feet tall.
Since it’s been planted, it’s survived nor’easters and a couple of hurricanes. At around the third year it was in the ground in my yard, it produced some almonds. Just a handful. The tree has produced a varying number of almonds every year — and mostly they get devoured by the squirrels. But they are delicious. Fresh almonds taste mostly like almond milk — delicate and floral.
In 2012, we had a snowstorm that hit us in late October. Earlier that fall, we’d already been hit with Superstorm Sandy, but the early snowstorm damaged many more trees throughout the region than the Sandy did because all the trees were still in full leaf. My almond tree, too, took a hit — losing several large branches and the whole tree pulled so that the main trunk now was at an angle. I wound up cutting down several more large branches from the tree to ease the weight from the top and to keep it from tilting even further.
This year was the first year since that storm that I saw it would be a bumper crop of flowers.
In the last collage of photos, the time frame between the bottom two is 9 days. It had rained for about a week! And then I had other things going on that I couldn’t take some photos.
From the first bloom to greening and first stages of fruiting took roughly from April 2 — April 26. The peak was at April 16. Almonds are like many others in the Prunus genus. The flower emerges first on the bare branch, leaves come later. This is unlike the other flower tree in my yard, a pear, where the leaves and flowers develop simultaneously.
|
|
So, aside from the wild cherry in the neighbors yards (which have tiny nondescript flowers and whose flowers emerge after leafing out!) which are at my backyard, forget the cherry blossom festival! In my yard, the almond is the first tree to bloom, and there’s nothing like a pink flower to cheer me up and chase off the winter blues.
Besides… this parrot appreciates the fresh almonds! (which are a bitch to break open, so he better appreciate them! lol)
What’s your Spring story? Has it sprung for you?