If you live in San Francisco, you've probably seen loquat trees. They are, as the article says, hidden in plain sight. In my case, it was right in my own back yard. This is only my second summer living in this house, so it might not have fruited as much last year, and last summer I was too tired recovering from Covid to do enough gardening to notice much about the yard, even if it had some fruit.

Discovering that my house has a mature loquat tree is like finding out that there's been a treasure in the back of the closet that I assumed was an air filter or something.

https://missionlocal.org/2020/08/loquat/

#loquat #SFBay #SanFranciscoStreetTrees

Several mysteries of our yard suddenly clicked. Why did our magnolia never bloom if it was really a magnolia? Why did it seem to have these weird fruits on it? Where are all these weird unripe crab apples coming from if I can't see an apple tree anywhere nearby? Surely the squirrels are not *that* industrious?

I had been thinking the green unripe loquats were a different fruit (strange crab apples) than the ripe and mostly eaten by birds and squirrels by the time they fell ones.

This morning I tasted one of the partly animal-eaten fallen fruits. Tastes loquatish. Then I pried it open, and that confirmed it. That large seed, there's no mistaking it.

I bounced around in the misty yard telling all the squirrels that would listen "It's a loquat! It's a loquat!"

#loquat #SFBay #SanFranciscoStreetTrees

It's a loquat! The huge shade tree in my backyard, which I couldn't identify and which other people said was a magnolia is definitely a loquat!

#loquat #SFBay #SanFranciscoStreetTrees