Author Topic: Fruit success  (Read 4524 times)

sunworshiper

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Fruit success
« on: July 16, 2015, 07:36:45 PM »
I've been posting about my Angie's issues, but it has been the outlier in an otherwise excellent fruit season. Thought I'd share some pics of the successes (can't seem to post more than one image at a time off the iPad, so sorry about the string of posts)

Manilitas were excellent earlierl in the season



sunworshiper

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #1 on: July 16, 2015, 07:38:11 PM »
Now the cogshalls are doing great!




sunworshiper

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #2 on: July 16, 2015, 07:41:53 PM »
And my emperor lychee was loaded this year - it's best crop so far




Today's harvest!



Hey maybe I can get more than one image per post!

GrassFlats

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #3 on: July 16, 2015, 08:05:31 PM »
Nice Sunworshiper!  I have Cogshall that hasn't produced fruit yet.  Thinking about getting rid of it.  Is Cogshall worth it?  Never tasted it so im wondering.

Broman

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #4 on: July 17, 2015, 09:52:13 AM »
Nice fruits! Congrats!

sunworshiper

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #5 on: July 17, 2015, 05:55:59 PM »
About the Cogshall: The tree is a bit on the vigorous side for the size I want to keep it - needs a pretty heavy hand with pruning. So much so that it can interfere with production (somewhere there is a thread around showing how I pugged mine when it started getting out of bounds, which then of course sacrifices a year of production). It sets fruit without spraying, and the fruit develop blemish free and many of them are quite pretty. This year, it held a good crop, but the fruit are quite prone to jelly seed. I'm still working on learning precisely when to pick them to minimize jellyseed - picking early and ripening the last day or two inside helps a lot, but I haven't quite perfected the timing. All that said tho, the flavor in a perfectly ripened fruit is outstanding, and I've had several so far this season that were perfect. Of my 4 mango varieties, it is my favorite flavor wise. The fruit have a prominent sub-acid component to the flavor, which I like a lot. But if you want an all sweet fruit, that might not be a bonus. The part near the stem especially has a tangyness to it that I like a lot - no resin or turpentine type flavor, not really sure how to describe it. More like concentrated flavor. On the whole, I think it is worthwhile. If you have no size constraints, other varieties would win out, but for zone pushers who are willing to prune rigorously, it is a very nice variety.

simon_grow

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #6 on: July 18, 2015, 12:19:33 PM »
Awsome harvest sunworshiper,how would you describe the flavor of the Emperors? Some people don't like the flavor of Emperor because it doesn't have strong Lychee/Rose flavor but I really like the fully ripe ones. They can have a subacid component when harvested early but they can be very sweet if harvested fully ripe. Home grown fruit is the best!

Simon

sunworshiper

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #7 on: July 18, 2015, 12:46:36 PM »
Simon, I love Emperor - they are actually my favorite. In a side by side taste test with Brewster and Mauritius, my preference is emperor>Brewster>Mauritius. But I am in the minority holding that opinion, so definitely taste if possible before planting. My thanks go to Don at Going Bananas for sharing some fresh picked emperors with me on a visit to his property a few years ago. I'm hooked - they are my favoirite fruit:) The tree itself is awesome for zone pushing - it will be easy to maintain at the size it is now.

Droshi

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #8 on: July 18, 2015, 10:39:01 PM »
do you need to cover your lychee or mangoes anymore? or did you only when they were young? or not at all?

simon_grow

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #9 on: July 18, 2015, 10:55:49 PM »
Thanks for the information sunworshiper, I also love Emperors. I've had Emperors from Lycheesonline and also grown in SoCal and they are delicious when harvested fully ripe.

Emperors don't grow well in my high pH soil so I'm going to try grafting it onto Longan and I'm also trying to approach graft it to seedling lychee in hopes it will adapt better to my soil. You are so lucky your tree is already large and fruiting well. Keep up the great gardening!

Simon

bsbullie

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #10 on: July 18, 2015, 11:00:43 PM »
Simon, I love Emperor - they are actually my favorite. In a side by side taste test with Brewster and Mauritius, my preference is emperor>Brewster>Mauritius. But I am in the minority holding that opinion, so definitely taste if possible before planting. My thanks go to Don at Going Bananas for sharing some fresh picked emperors with me on a visit to his property a few years ago. I'm hooked - they are my favoirite fruit:) The tree itself is awesome for zone pushing - it will be easy to maintain at the size it is now.

You are not in the minority.   Myself and many lychee aficionados  would prefer an Emperor over Mauritius and Brewster with some growers i have talked too even prefer it over Sweetheart and Hak Ip.  Problem with the Emperor is that it doesnt do well in ground dominated by lime rock and moreso needs a little more chill than we here in South Florida can give it.
- Rob

sunworshiper

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #11 on: July 19, 2015, 10:25:29 AM »
Rob, thanks for clarifying on why Emperor isn't prefered in S. FL  - didn't realize it was a soil/climate issue. I think I am in the sweet spot for it, I get plenty of chill hours, and my soil is all sand, which is seems to do fine with.

Droshi I string the tree with old fashioned Xmas lights (c9) and for light freezes like this past winter, that is enough. If we get a hard freeze, I'll still cover it with a pvc & plastic hoop house and the lights for heat. I'm zone pushing enough that we still get freezes every few years hard enough to kill a tree outright. The old timers here that I've talked to growing other varieties of lychee let them get the size of oaks, then for hard freezes they will protect 8' of trunk and put a kerosene heat source underneath the canopy and the canopy itself holds in heat. Doing this, during record cold events, the trees are knocked back to that 8' trunk, but survive, for all other less harsh freezes, the tree gets enough heat to still produce. I don't have enough property for that technique!

Simon - good luck with your grafting experiment, sounds really neat! My tree grew really well, from a tiny little air layer. This is its second year producing, it is so great having enough lychees to gorge on:)

WGphil

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #12 on: July 19, 2015, 10:59:43 AM »
Toppy on Merritt Island had some great Emperors this year.   His last type of the year until the Longans ripen. 

  We bought Emperors from him a couple weeks back and they were top notch. 

He had a very good crop of lychee with  Longan still on the way this season.   If you are over there, he is a wealth of info.   

The trees are fantastic just to look at.   

Great pictures, your yard looks great. 






Delvi83

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #13 on: July 20, 2015, 10:02:49 AM »
And my emperor lychee was loaded this year - it's best crop so far




Today's harvest!



Hey maybe I can get more than one image per post!

It seems a very healthy litchi....it has a lot o fruit even if it's not too big, did you prune it or it's just young? Congratulations :)

bsbullie

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #14 on: July 20, 2015, 10:28:51 AM »
And my emperor lychee was loaded this year - it's best crop so far




Today's harvest!



Hey maybe I can get more than one image per post!

It seems a very healthy litchi....it has a lot o fruit even if it's not too big, did you prune it or it's just young? Congratulations :)

While the tree is fairly young, and i cannot confirm if it has gone through any pruning regiment, that tree is an Emperor variety.  Not only is it a slower grower but it has a very compact growth habit and somewhat dwarf like (note, i am not saying its a dwarf).
- Rob

sunworshiper

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #15 on: July 20, 2015, 12:11:07 PM »
Thanks for all the kind comments! Yes, I do prune this tree, very intentionally maintaining it at this size, which is the maximum size I can fit into my frost shelter. I prune off about an arms length from every branch each year at harvest. I prune individual branches as I harvest bunches, and after all the bunches are harvested, I prune any branches that didn't fruit. Toppy's emperor lychees are like 15-20' high - they are huge, so under the right conditions, even though Emperor is a smaller and slower growing tree, it can still get large. But with a once a year pruning, it is very easy to maintain small. I'll try to remember to post a new picture next weekend after I prune. This is the tree's second year fruiting, and last year was the first year it got a significant pruning. While it sized up, it didn't need any pruning to cause it to be bushy, the tips branch on their own very nicely. Last year I had around 3lb of fruit, this year, didn't measure, but I weighted one bunch at about 1lb, so I'd guess it produced 20-30lb of fruit. Will be interesting to see if this was a banner year, or if it can maintain this level of production steadily.

sunworshiper

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Re: Fruit success
« Reply #16 on: July 25, 2015, 11:28:15 AM »
I pruned the emperor lychee this morning. Here's a pic of what it looks like after pruning.