California nutmeg

Photo: Cbarlow — CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Survives zone 6 through 9

Harvest calendar

Ripens: Seed released August through November, but takes two full years from pollination to reach maturity

Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.

The seed is roasted and eaten like a true nut, rich in oil, with a resinous, pungent flavor that gave the tree its common name — it smells of nutmeg when the foliage or wood is crushed, though it is unrelated to true nutmeg. Rare and local in the wild, confined to shaded canyons and streambanks of California's Coast Ranges and Sierra Nevada foothills, where old trees survive fire by resprouting from the root crown even though the top growth is easily killed. Slow to reach seed-bearing size and slower still to ripen a crop: the seed takes two full growing seasons to mature, so a bearing tree can carry two overlapping generations of developing seed at once.

Hardiness

Zone 6–9

Habit

Tree

Edible part

Seed

Ripens

Seed released August through November, but takes two full years from pollination to reach maturity

Mature size

Slow-growing tree to 15 m tall by 8 m wide

Light

Full shade to full sun — exceptionally shade-tolerant for a conifer

Soil pH

Mildly acid to neutral; prefers consistently moist soil

Environment

Cool temperate; shaded canyons, streambanks and moist forest understory

Native range

California — the Coast Ranges from Mendocino County south to Santa Cruz County, and the western Sierra Nevada foothills, mostly below 2,100 m, in shaded canyons, streambanks and moist north-facing slopes.

Status

Wild

Growth speed

Slow

Spacing

500 cm (197 in) apart — about 25 m² (269 sq ft) per plant

Leaf shape

Stiff, sharply pointed, glossy dark green needles 2.5–6 cm long in two flat ranks — noticeably spinier and harder to handle than most conifers, a useful identification point

Fruit description

A plum-like, olive-green, single-seeded drupe 3–4 cm long, ripening from August to November; inside is one large, hard-shelled, oily seed

Propagation

Fresh seed, which needs 9–12 months of cold stratification before it will germinate

Pollination

Wind-pollinated; dioecious — needs both a male and a female plant to set seed

The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.