The Tropical Fruit Forum

It's a medicinal herb with many purposes

I would be glad if anyone could trade or sell me seeds of Saba comorensis.  Thank you.

I was browsing through Shamus'  (Phoenix,  Arizona) videos on YouTube and saw how he's successfully growing and having trees bear fruit - all in the desert.   He has many trees that require high humidity to grow.  (Or is it a requirement for fruiting?  I don't know).   But, when I looked up the climate for that location on Wikipedia,  it showed a average low humidity of 52%.  When I looked up humidity on weather reporting sites, it shows only 12% today.   So, how is he able to get fruits with such low humidity?   

My assumption was it might be due to his foliar spraying the trees.   But, that would not be on a daily basis.   Mulching would hold moisture for the soil,  not for the air above,  right?   

I've seen many trees here that have not fruited so far even though they look pretty healthy and I  always thought it was due to the additional requirement of humidity.   Please enlighten me.   Thank you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzBerXm1WCY

Narration in British  (Indian) English.  Useful for newbies like me.

Does jaboticaba require a cold spell for flower and fruit set?  I tried searching online, but could not get an answer to this.  Thank you.

Below is the climatic condition for Chennai.  Based on this, I'd like to know what all can I grow. 


I'm especially interested in jaboticaba, cassabanana and other S. American tropical fruits not available here.

Just for your idea, jackfruit, mango, sapodilla, guava are few plants that grow well here.  Mangosteen, durian won't.  Just to give you an idea.  Thank you.

The current Guinness world record for heaviest tree fruit is held by a jackfruit from Hawaii at 34kg / 75lb. 

But, in Panruti in India, fruits as heavy as 60kg are not rare.  The heaviest weighed over 70kg.

http://www.indiawaterportal.org/news/jackfruit-paradise-panruti-tn-breaks-all-records-terms-production

Does it make any difference whether Guinness acknowledges it or not?   

PS:  For those not familiar with Indian numbers - lakh = 100 thousand and crore = 10 million.

When mangoes are in season, I am thinking of trading seeds for some S. American tropical fruits.  I have never shipped any seeds before.  So, is there any special method to pack these huge seeds?  Any video would be helpful.  Thank you.

Purchased it in a store today.  It was labeled muskmelon.  Stores here mislabel fruits and vegetables most of the time.  Please help me ID whether this IS muskmelon or some other type of melon.  Thank you.

My method of germinating seeds is to fill a transparent container with soil ( just moist enough ), placing the seeds in the soil and finally covering the container with plastic cling wrap. Once true leaves start to appear, I remove the wrap, wait for a few days and then transplant them to their final location.

I followed the above mentioned procedure with kiwano seeds. I had to go out of town for nearly 3 weeks. When I returned back, 8 of the 20 seeds had sprouted and 6 of them were about 6-7 inches in height and were very healthy looking. I removed the wrap in the morning. I went about doing other works. In the evening,  I  was shocked to see the leaves had all shriveled up. The soil was still moist and not dried up.  It's been 2 days and still the leaves are the same.  Only consolation is that the stem/stalk are still erect and not drooping.

The same thing happened with another container with papaya seeds. Only 3 of the 20 seeds had sprouted.  Leaves were healthy before removing the wrap.

The day I removedthe wrap, the temperature was in the range of 82-88°F/28-32°C.

Please help.   What went wrong?  Will these seedlings survive or should I start all over again?  Thank you.