As expected, more plants are beginning to produce flowers. The first is Ribes aureum (golden currant). I didn't really plant it. Or rather, I did plant one in this part of the yard more than ten years ago. It didn't appear to survive. In 2011 we did some work on our house which involved completely scraping that area. After that I replanted the area, and somehow the Ribes came up by itself. Maybe the old one left some seeds in the soil. In any case, it has done very well for the last couple of years. In the wild it is native to areas north of here, with only one reported location in San Diego County. But it seems happy in my garden for now.
The plant has nice leaves as well. It prefers a shady area and just a bit more water than other chaparral plants.
The second yellow flower for today is Leptosyne gigantea (giant coreopsis). I have written about it previously (October 30, 2019) so I won't go into detail about the plant, but the visual difference between then and now is dramatic. Here's what it looks like right now. I have several of them, and the others are ready to bloom any day now. When the plants get as large as this one (about 4 ft.) they tend to get very top heavy and the main stem will break. I think this one is about to break. Fortunately, this plant produces lots of seeds which sprout up all over my back yard.
The third yellow flower is the most exciting for me - Berberis nevinii (Nevin's barberry). I've had this plant for a few years but it has never bloomed before (as far as I can recall). It's a rare plant (CNPS list 1B.1) and I have never seen it in the wild. Los Angeles County is it's main turf but it is also found in a few spots in San Diego county. The leaves are extremely spiny, so I planted it in a sport where no one ever goes. That makes it a little harder to see, but still I'm very pleased to have it blooming now.
Mammillaria Update
In my last post, a week ago, I commented on my Mammillaria dioica which has been blooming like crazy. Here's a photo from today showing the current status. Still going strong. It will be interesting to see how much longer the flowers last if we get no more rain.
