California Gardening: A bit of an experiment..., 1 by nmcnear

nmcnear wrote:
Today I planted a Bauhinia x blakeana tree in my yard, and I'm really hoping it does well. I've been researching this species for a couple months now, and I think it should be able to handle my climate pretty well - during the winter, we have overnight temperatures below freezing on a just a few nights of the year at most due to being wedged between the ocean and the bay. During the summer days, temperatures can be downright hot (the highest shade temperature I've recorded was 108 during the 2006 heat wave), but luckily the fog rolls in most nights to cool things off and bump the humidity a bit.

In fact, it's not really the temperatures I'm worried about, it's primarily the wind. I've read these trees have somewhat brittle branches, and since I'm up in the hills it can get a bit breezy. Winter storms can produce particularly strong winds, which is something I'm concerned about since that's when they bloom. During my research I've found that people are growing this tree in places that get much colder than here in the winter, but for some reason I can't find much info about how it does in the Bay Area. I'm wondering if this is simply because it's quite a rare species around here (took me three weeks to get ahold of this tree).

Is anyone here growing this species? Does anyone have any advice on how to get the tree to establish the most robust root system possible before winter rolls around? Thanks in advance!