![]() Then 28, she would soon become the leading plant dealer in the area, her rise coinciding with a time of explosive growth in the region. Sessions opened her San Diego nursery in 1885. She sought out plants that needed little water, and began to introduce many of the tropical species that had first caught her eye when she travelled to Hawaii at 18, along with exotic plants and trees from Latin America and others parts of the world that would be suitable for the Southern California climate and landscape. "Her mind," as San Diego historian Clair Crane once said, "was blank to everything except horticulture." Sessions discovered that here in California, under the great western sun, things could grow that would never survive back east. She moved south to San Diego, and after a short tenure in the classroom, she left to do what she loved most - study and grow plants. Today, the book resides in the San Diego Natural History Museum.Īfter Berkeley, Sessions worked as a teacher, then the only acceptable line of work for an educated young woman. The young Sessions spelled out the word "Herbarium" carefully in leaf fragments across its cover. For her 15th birthday, her mother gave her a black leather-bound notebook for preserving her specimens. As a teenager, Sessions made a hobby of collecting flowers, drying and pressing them. It was a good place for a girl to fall in love with the natural world. At six, she moved across the bay to Oakland, then "a small village with lots of open space." Her father and his three brothers had arrived in San Francisco at the height of Gold Rush to try their luck out west. Sessions was born in California, a rare breed in 1857, though perhaps not as rare as a woman receiving a degree in the sciences, which she did from Berkeley in 1887. She is credited with introducing and popularizing more than 143 species in Southern California, including our beloved bougainvillea, birds of paradise, yellow oleander, star jasmine, and, of course, jacaranda trees. Her name was Kate Sessions and she spent more than 50 years importing seeds and plants into Southern California. (Photo via Women's Museum of California/YouTube)Īnd for their profusion, we have but one person to thank, a pioneering woman who was arguably the Johnny Appleseed of not just jacarandas, but a host of other iconic Southern California flora. Fletcher, a scholar of Brazil, would write that their lilac blossoms were rarely seen north of the equator except in "small specimen-pieces." ![]() It's also possible that freight tycoon Phineas Banning had the trees shipped in to his Wilmington estate from the Amazon in the late 1860s. McDonough explains that those early arrivals may have "brought seeds or clippings" with them to California. Most of the schooner ships making their way west stopped in Buenos Aires, where they would have witnessed the glory of a jacaranda tree in bloom. He posits that it's possible they first arrived in California during the Gold Rush. As McDonough told me, "when exactly they came, nobody really knows." So, how exactly did the jacarandas get here? Accounts of their original point of entry differ. The vibrant jacaranda flowers and their sweet perfume is really the cherry on top of another gorgeous Spring here in San Diego."A Southern Californian would still know that it was wonderful to be alive merely for the jacaranda," a Los Angeles newspaper columnist wrote more than a hundred years ago. Future tree locations must contain existing topsoil or natural turf since the City does not remove landscaping and does not plant in gravel or rock gardens.The resident or property owner must understand that driveways, street corners, fire hydrants, existing trees, and other objects may limit where trees can be planted.A city arborist will review your parkway to determine the appropriate species and quantity of trees.The resident or property owner must agree to water the tree for three years per given watering guidelines.The location of your address must be within the city of San Diego.You must meet the following conditions to receive a Free Tree for your parkway: Once the Free Tree is planted, the City asks that you water it for three years during what is known as “the tree establishment period.” You can find more information about the ‘Watering Schedule’ here.
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