TEA OLIVE

Tea Olive at 12 inches on 12-18-09.

FAMILY:  Oleaceae

GENUS:  Osmanthus

SPECIES:  fragrans

COMMON NAME:  Tea Olive

The Tea Olive is a very nice tree to grow.  They are an evergreen and produce these nice  fragrant little flowers repeatedly from late winter through early fall.  Mine was blooming when it arrived February or March and is started blooming again in October.  You’ll notice the location of the blooms are on the stem…  Even though the tree has grown over the summer, this is the same spot the blooms were in before.  The leaves always look dusty and I thought they needed cleaned.  Well, it turns out that is one of their characteristics.   They enjoy being grown in the sun to part shade in well-drained soils.  They are drought tolerant, but need to be thoroughly watered when dry.  They are winter hardy in zones 7b-10b(5 to 35 degrees F).  The Tea Olive makes a very nice potted specimen, but can reach heights from 8-15 feet…  Well, I guess I will need a bigger pot later!

Blooms on the Tea Olive taken on 12-16-09.

Osmanthus fragrans is just one of around 900 species in the Oleaceae family that grow on nearly every continent in the world.  They have been in cultivation since around 3500 BC in Crete and nearly as long in many other Mediterranean cultures.

The trees are able to withstand very harsh conditions and can live for hundreds and maybe thousands of years.  The trees become knarled and twisted with age.

I think these are new leaves or new buds. I don't think it looked like this before when it did either one... Picture taken 2-7-2010.

It is strange how you get busy and don’t notice something till later…  Well,  something different happened with the Tea Olive…  I am kind of sure those are new leaves in the above picture, since the blooms have been on the stem…   BUT, the next picture shows the other branch of the tree with a bloom on top…

A bloom on top of the other branch. Picture taken 2-7-2010.