Tree of the week

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As another week draws to a close, L.A. Land looks forward to a mellow spring weekend in Los Angeles. This is the season when trees flower by the tens of thousands, draping the urban forest in a sweet-smelling blanket. Pieter Severynen on one of the trees that makes this ‘fragrance time’ in Southern California:

The Victorian Box – Pittosporum undulatum

‘Early spring is fragrance time in Southern California: You step outside and if you are lucky you smell a strong orange blossom aroma in the air. If so, look around to see if a Victorian box is blooming nearby. For a few weeks the tree is covered with extremely fragrant tiny white flowers. Not a spectacular or a superlative tree, the Victorian Box instead is a dependable, quietly beautiful performer. A medium-sized, round-headed, evergreen tree from southeast Australia, which is also called mock orange, it grows fairly fast initially to 15 feet tall; then slows down to eventually reach 30-40 feet tall and wide. The glossy leaves are light green when they first emerge, gradually turning a darker shade of green. To 6 inches long, they are lance-shaped and wavy-edged. Thin brown bark covers the trunk. That sweet fragrance is a characteristic the tree shares with other members of the family, such as the Willow and Queensland Pittosporums from Australia and the South African Cape Pittosporum.

‘While good as a closely planted screen or windbreak, the tree looks best when standing alone and pruned periodically to enhance its form. It loves full sun to partial shade and low-to-moderate water. Its drawbacks are hard, small, inedible, orange fruits with sticky seeds; abundant drop of leaves that may be allelopathic (poisonous to other plants); and roots that become invasive with age: Best to keep it away from pavement. But one major problem has emerged that overshadows all others: The tree becomes invasive in favorable climates. It has turned into a weed in parts of Australia, South Africa and California, and in Hawaii, the Caribbean and Pacific islands, where it invades disturbed soils. We would be wise to select safer substitutes in our new plantings.’

Thanks, Pieter

E-mail Pieter: plseve@earthlink.net
Thoughts? Comments?
Photo Credit: The city of Monterey Park