I have a shocking confession....I'm a tussock killer! They completely RAVAGE the milkweed and there's none left for the monarchs. This year I removed one tussock covered leaf from the common milkweed. Later in the season I found an egg-covered tropical milkweed leaf and the little terrors were just starting to hatch. I did an internet search to determine that they were tussocks since I'd never seen the eggs before. However, when I came back the next day ALL the eggs and cats had been devoured by either bees, wasps, or spiders. I'm guessing wasps since they really like the tropical milkweed flowers. Tussocks are like little milkweed piranhas. Long live the Monarchs! :)

Yep, they were in the pics, they would be on the left hand side of the pics showing the grouping of trees. I find it way too easy to laugh as fozzybeth... way way too easy. shes just... lets say unique ;) thanks for the comments thought :0 we'll see what the pics look like in a month or 2 heh the Pom doesn't look so good anymore... it has lost 80% of its leaves now :( ahh, the mess will be soon over and all the remaining trees BETTER keep all their leaves!!! I am really worried about WLD. I am NOT wanting to go through it, but... being I have alrady moved them in, I should be ok I think. the leave drop is due to the change in temp, and then... I just hope I am ok on it. no bugs so far on any trees... so hoping to be safe! Make sure fozzy beth knows how crazy I think she is, and how much I apreciate all she has done... and that I am waiting impatiently on haircuts hehehe

Interesting point rich. I dunno what pollinator(s) may visit monardellas and s. mohavensis. Sounds like we may never know with "colony collapse disorder" affecting the bee populations...although perhaps it's a butterfly that does this job for these cousin plants. To ccroulet, I've not salvia hunted in JTNP for a while, they're not dog friendly there, but it seems like there's high country enough to find some mohavensis. I got a few specimens from Theodore Payne and the only one survivor from that group produced some weakly flower structures that never really opened that I could tell. This specimen is from MNP where I scooped a spoonful of wintertime sand from beneath a robust mohavensis specimen and cultivated a couple of chance seeds to seedlings.

Hello Friends, swrancher - Yes I have tasted the "Black Pearl" Way Jambu. My tree had like 9 or 10 fruit. Very interested texture. It was kind of like a cross between a regular apple and a radish. Very Juicy and very refreshing. It was sweet, but not as sweet as I would have liked, still very nice though. simongrow - Thanks for the kind words. That Emperor lychee tree in the pictures is not mine. Those were pictures posted by ajaysr5. I have a Brewster, Mauritius and 2 Sweetheart Lychee trees. Pictures of My Sweetheart are posted at the top of this thread and it is flowering and fruiting right now like crazy. As for th Emperor, last time I was at Mimosa Nursery in Los Angeles, they had some of them. I do not remember the price, just that they had them in 7 and 15 gallon. - Jacob