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Look for oleander, hibiscus, bougainvillea, flame eucalyptus

Late bloomer buckwheat showing off cream-colored flowers

Bougainvillea
Bougainvillea

Colorful Foliage along San Diego’s coastline lingers, despite the lack of rainfall and warmer, drier days. In the older, landscaped neighborhoods of Coronado, Point Loma, Pacific Beach, and La Jolla, you’ll find oleander and hibiscus blooming in many shades and colorful bougainvillea creeping over garden walls. Look for the magnificent clusters of red flowers adorning the crowns of the flame eucalyptus (red-flowering gum) trees.

Agaves (a.k.a. century plants) are coming into bloom in many summer gardens this month. After a decade or more (not a century) of growth, the larger kinds of agave send up a tall, yellow-blossomed flower stalk from a base of fleshy, succulent, thorn-tipped leaves. The stalk and basal leaves die, but suckers make new plants and begin the cycle anew.

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Buckwheat on the trail

Buckwheat, a late-bloomer among native plants in our area, is showing off its small, inconspicuous clusters of cream-colored flowers this month. Several kinds of buckwheat, found in dry, sunny locations throughout San Diego County, are the source of the “wild buckwheat” honey sold locally. Near the coast look for flattop buckwheat, common on southfacing slopes. Here it shares space with other low-growing shrubs of the sage-scrub plant community like black sage and California sagebrush.

Last-quarter Moon (exact at 2:11 pm). The Moon rises around 1 a.m. tonight daylight-saving time, shining at the Cetus-Pisces border. Any time from then until early dawn, look high above the Moon for the Great Square of Pegasus standing on one corner.

Venus shines low in the west-northwest during twilight, with vastly fainter Mars now just 6° to its upper left. They set before twilight’s end. Venus hardly moves now with respect to your landscape from week to week, but its background stars are sliding right along, toward the lower right. On July 2nd the Beehive Cluster, M44, passes behind Venus. Try binoculars or a wide-field scope — but this will be a difficult observation if it’s possible at all! You’ll have to catch the narrow time window between the sky being too bright and Venus and the Beehive getting too low and setting. That window may or may not exist, depending on your optics, the sharpness of your eyes for faint stars in twilight, and the clarity of the air.

The above comes from the Outdoors listings in the Reader compiled by Jerry Schad, author of Afoot & Afield in San Diego County. Schad died in 2011. Planet information from SkyandTelescope.org.

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Bougainvillea
Bougainvillea

Colorful Foliage along San Diego’s coastline lingers, despite the lack of rainfall and warmer, drier days. In the older, landscaped neighborhoods of Coronado, Point Loma, Pacific Beach, and La Jolla, you’ll find oleander and hibiscus blooming in many shades and colorful bougainvillea creeping over garden walls. Look for the magnificent clusters of red flowers adorning the crowns of the flame eucalyptus (red-flowering gum) trees.

Agaves (a.k.a. century plants) are coming into bloom in many summer gardens this month. After a decade or more (not a century) of growth, the larger kinds of agave send up a tall, yellow-blossomed flower stalk from a base of fleshy, succulent, thorn-tipped leaves. The stalk and basal leaves die, but suckers make new plants and begin the cycle anew.

Sponsored
Sponsored
Buckwheat on the trail

Buckwheat, a late-bloomer among native plants in our area, is showing off its small, inconspicuous clusters of cream-colored flowers this month. Several kinds of buckwheat, found in dry, sunny locations throughout San Diego County, are the source of the “wild buckwheat” honey sold locally. Near the coast look for flattop buckwheat, common on southfacing slopes. Here it shares space with other low-growing shrubs of the sage-scrub plant community like black sage and California sagebrush.

Last-quarter Moon (exact at 2:11 pm). The Moon rises around 1 a.m. tonight daylight-saving time, shining at the Cetus-Pisces border. Any time from then until early dawn, look high above the Moon for the Great Square of Pegasus standing on one corner.

Venus shines low in the west-northwest during twilight, with vastly fainter Mars now just 6° to its upper left. They set before twilight’s end. Venus hardly moves now with respect to your landscape from week to week, but its background stars are sliding right along, toward the lower right. On July 2nd the Beehive Cluster, M44, passes behind Venus. Try binoculars or a wide-field scope — but this will be a difficult observation if it’s possible at all! You’ll have to catch the narrow time window between the sky being too bright and Venus and the Beehive getting too low and setting. That window may or may not exist, depending on your optics, the sharpness of your eyes for faint stars in twilight, and the clarity of the air.

The above comes from the Outdoors listings in the Reader compiled by Jerry Schad, author of Afoot & Afield in San Diego County. Schad died in 2011. Planet information from SkyandTelescope.org.

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Hike off those holiday calories, Poinsettias are peaking

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Where busing from Southeast San Diego to University City has led
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4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
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