WEEKEND GARDEN BLOGGING

This fiery shrub is one of three hazelbert trees we planted in our front yard. The hazelbert is a transatlantic tree, bred to offer the best traits of the American hazelnut and European Filbert. It grows just 8 to 12 feet tall, so it fits nicely into even the smallest garden (i.e., ours) and yet manages to produce an abundance of tasty nuts.

Our hazelberts, planted three years ago, yielded a bumper crop this year. Sadly, most of the nuts were squirreled away by bushy-tailed thieves who beat us to the harvest.

We’ll have to take solace in the hazelbert’s other fine attributes: catkins in the winter and spring, stunning foliage in the fall. I was inspired to plant them by The Complete Book of Edible Landscaping, Rosalind Creasy’s classic guide and still one of the best books on the subject. Read it and reap!