By Robin Y Rivet, for Let’s Talk Plants! February 2025.
When Life Gives You Lemons…
As a child I heard lots of songs, but I never saw a lemon tree until I was 18. What do lemons have to do with music?
To confess, I’m an old “folkie” where puberty found me hanging around Greenwich Village in New York City in the 1960s. Saving up my baby-sitting dollars, I “snail-mailed” a money order to nab a single ticket for a 1967 Carnegie Hall performance starring Peter, Paul and Mary. Undaunted at the tender age of 13, I navigated sell-out crowds and public transit to procure a coveted solo seat - my first of many similar encounters. One of their jingle-like songs that stuck in my brain was “Lemon Tree”. The trio didn’t even write that tune - Will Holt did; so why the significance now?
The lemon tree in that song was a metaphor for romantic love turning sour, but we all share losses in our lives. Sadly, for me (who’s still a folk-music devotee), Peter Yarrow recently passed away this January in NY, although Mary Travers had died 15 years before. Similar to lemons, there’s often a sweetness along with the bitter. On February 23, 2025, the sole-surviving trio member “Noel” Paul Stookey will be performing here in San Diego!
Coincidentally, the venue for this concert is our latest SDHS’s meeting place at Oasis in Rancho Bernardo. How serendipitous for me?
Back to lemon trees. I have no proof, but I suspect that the humble lemon tree might be the most frequently planted fruit by San Diego residents. In SoCal, we slurp homemade lemonade, squeeze yellow, juicy bombs over fresh-caught fish, cook them in desserts, and preserve fresh lemons with sugar or salt for regional Mediterranean kitchen recipes. Freezing extra juice in ice trays retains our backyard lemon’s freshness for my culinary adventures.
Unlike oranges, we expect to pucker when devouring lemons. Hot weather isn’t required to ripen them, so coastal residents have a reasonable chance to harvest these golden orbs. Sweet tangerines also remain popular, but dwarf lemon trees can thrive in a large pot on a balcony - whereas a mandarin might struggle; expanding popularity for lemons amongst renters.
Evolving from a sour orange and a citron, the modern lemon has been around for a while. Who eats sour oranges anyway? DNA evidence suggests citrus cultivation began ~4000 years ago in Southeast Asia, so lemons may have a long connection to human history. More impressive, a fossilized record of a citrus leaf dates to ~8 million years old. So, if you’re chronology challenged, bi-pedal hominids hadn’t yet evolved on the planet.
No matter ancient history, what is truly sweet - is lemon inflorescence. Did you know all citrus flowers are edible? Lemon flower tea sounds enticing. Honestly, I grow lemons as much for the heady fragrance outside my kitchen door - as for the versatile fruit.
More recently, a 2006 book called “The Lemon Tree” documented the true 1967 story of an Arab, a Jew, and a family lemon tree. That specimen became a symbolic beacon of hope for potential peace in the middle east. Today, we’re still hoping, but unfortunately that lemon tree perished in 1998.
We now need a new and optimistic lemon tree song. So yes, I did buy a ticket. Can you hear me Noel?
Member Robin Rivet is an ISA Certified Arborist & UCCE Master Gardener – contact her: treetutor@gmail.com
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