Sweet Olive Tree Texas
This great shrub is found at numerous houston nurseries and garden centers and there will be a limited number at the upcoming march mart at mercer arboretum.
Sweet olive tree texas. The olive is an exotic fruit crop in texas. This shrub or small tree will thrive if planted on the southeast side of a house perhaps near a brick wall that will return some of the day s heat on a cool night. Also known as tea olive and fragrant olive this plant grows as a shrub or small tree. Olives are native to the mediterranean basin which usually has mild rainy winters and hot dry summers.
The best area in texas to attempt commercial olive production is in the southwest region north of laredo and southwest of san antonio known as the winter garden. According to texas a m university the heady fragrance of the tree s blossoms can be detected from a distance of several hundred feet. David rodriguez sweet olive osmanthus fragrans is a large upright shrub native to many parts of asia and belonging to the olive family oleaceae. Sweet olives will mature to 8 to 10 feet high and 6 feet wide so be sure to provide plenty of space or plan on pruning away lower limbs to create a tree form.
If you don t make the mart ask. In contrast texas sometimes has severe winter freezes that can kill olives to the ground. The sweet olive tree of the osmanthus fragrans species is indigenous to china japan and the himalayas.