With this post I participate in the contest organized by anri whose rules and conditions to publish the posts you can find in this link.

In my case I am going to tell you about the fruit plants (two orange trees and a mandarin tree) in my garden that were born naturally. And when this happens it is both a luck and a problem.

Especially when they have to coexist with a plant that gives a very particular plant that reproduces with surprising ease: the poppy.

A luck because the plants are born and grow in their natural environment, without transplants of any kind and therefore the roots develop in total normality, without taking air, and grow rapidly enhancing the plant.

The problem arises when the plants are born too close or too far from each other (especially the problem occurs in the first case). 

For reasons of time or lack of knowledge we do not transplant them right away and then it is too late. In this case we must act energetically with pruning that will give the nearby plants a way not to get in each other's way and damage their growth.

Once we have achieved this aspect we must move on to arrange the garden plants. Which is no small task. Mixing bulb plants such as dahlias with ephemeral flowering plants such as poppies with roses and other flowering plants is a task that requires a lot of care.

The dahlia for example has a large development of leaves, it expands and the bulbs multiply below the ground. It is therefore advisable to support it on stakes and in the dormant season (autumn-winter) dig up part of the bulbs and keep them in a dark, cool place so that they can be replanted the following season.

Poppies, on the other hand, grow in a disorderly manner and enjoy excellent pollination by insects, but above all they grow in a completely natural way when the wind moves the dry seeds.

If you are not careful you can have a real poppy jungle in a few years! It is necessary to thin them a little and to avoid this excessive aerial dispersion cut the dry bulb of the flower before it opens and scatter the seeds or directly pull out a plant of two.

### Fruit plants have a multiple purpose in the garden.

On the one hand with its flowers and the delicious perfume they emanate, remember for example that the orange blossom is the orange blossom flower of an immaculate white and with that sweet fragrance that characterizes it so much and on the other hand serves as protective shade, especially when the yard is not too big and is surrounded by walls, that is the construction in bricks or cement blocks that divides one property from another.

Being large and robust plants, fruit trees absorb much of the midday and early afternoon heat, protecting the smaller plants.

And on the other hand they cover with their luck many aromatic plants of the orchard, of almost permanent leaf, like oregano, parsley, mint etc. that suffer a lot from the direct sun.

Thanks for reading.