The wildflowers have started to bloom, but because of inadequate rains when they were needed the show will not be much this year.

Look for patches of bluebonnets, primrose, verbena, coreopsis and phlox. Naturalized flowers like larkspurs in irrigated beds are looking good. They will vie with the snapdragons, pansies, stocks, petunias and calendulas over the next month for best of show.

If you watered your Texas gold columbine this winter, they should be blooming at full speed right now. It is easy to let their flowers fade and the seed mature because the foliage is very attractive.

It is not nearly as easy to do the same for the larkspurs and wildflowers, however, because when their flowers fade, the foliage is brown and ugly. If you want them to reseed it must be done.

The seed must reach full size and the pods begin to brown to have viable seed. The pods must also be allowed to open and eject (or drop) the seed unless you do it yourself.

The pomegranites are blooming. The flower resembles a miniature peony, lush and frilly. The color is completely different; of course, pomegranite blooms are intense red-orange.

They last a few weeks to be followed by an unusual fruit that looks like an apple with a hat on it. The fruit is tasty.

Pomegranite juice is very popular because it is also nutritious. It would have to be expensive because the tasty part of the fruit is the jell around the numerous seeds. The access to the jell is further limited by the compartments within the fruit.

Pomegranite is a great diet food – you use lots of energy to finally eat the fruit. Pomegranites are multi-stem shrubs that grow 12 or 13 feet tall and 6 or 8 feet wide.

The plants have very few pests and do not seem to be a favorite of the deer. Pomegranites are deciduous and very drought-tolerant. They have naturalized in my neighborhood and produce flowers and fruit without irrigation.

The selection normally planted for fruit is “wonderful.” Dwarf pomegranites are an attractive ornamental shrub, but do not seem to be as tough as the standard size plant. The fruits are dried and lacquered for decorations.

The small fruits produced on the dwarf plants are especially decorative.

Loquats are an excellent landscape plant. They are evergreen with large furry leaves shaped like a dog’s tongue with a sharp end. Loquat will grow in sun or shade to 25 feet tall.

They have a disciplined growth habit and form a rounded airy crown. They can be used as a small specimen tree, as understory for large shade trees or in a tropical looking planting around the pool or patio.

They grow very fast. The first wisterias are beginning to bloom. The lavender flowers are fragrant and the plant grows very large, very quickly. The vine can be spectacular on a large trellis.

A good example is the wisteria at the San Antonio Botanical Garden. The Chinaberry is also blooming now. The light, lilac colored flowers will cover the whole crown of the tree. The berries that follow are not as tasty or decorative as the pomegranite fruit.

In fact, the birds rarely eat them and they cause great distress to swimming pool owners because they can overwhelm the Polaris and other cleaning apparatus.

Chinaberry flowers are attractive, but all in all the tree is not highly rated as an addition to a landscape. They spread in the manner of hackberries and are cold-sensitive and short-lived. Enjoy the blooms in a neighbor’s tree, but remove the seedlings from your yard.

Calvin R. Finch, Ph.D., is a horticulturist and the director of water resources for the San Antonio Water System.