Last Alpine day for this week

Still obsessed with growing citrus for swallowtails, I called my son, who lives a block from us in Alpine, to see if he could shop for a kumquat tree for me next time he goes to El Paso. Was I ever surprised when he told me he has a big one in his yard. When he bought the abandoned run down place nearly ten years ago he practically dismantled the house in the process of modernizing and remodeling it. The huge yard had been left to die, but had obviously been someone's passion at one time. Most of the trees and bushes had died, but with watering and pruning, he ended up with a surprisingly decent yard. I knew there was a pomegranate tree among the survivors, but had never been told of a kumquat tree. I couldn't believe it had survived years of neglect, not to mention the big freeze of 2011. Now I'm even more determined to get one. As soon as I can figure out how to make it happen. Here's Eric's tree.

He said it usually produces fruit but didn't this year because of the terrible May freeze the town suffered. CMO barely escaped, though, you might remember, I did spend a couple of nights watering my fruit trees to save the crops, just in case. (May 2nd post)