Questions about Lilly pilly (syzygium oleosum)

[eez0]

I have 6 lilly pillies in 9L pots. I planted them around July and they have grown from 20cm to 150cm more or less. These things grow quite fast! xD

They are too tall for these pots and strong winds are blowing them to the ground. I purchased 20L pots as replacement, but maybe should I just go a little bigger, like 30L?

Also, how should I shape them? Without any pruning so far, so are growing with a main trunk with four horizontal branches at various levels, and others are growing with multiple trunks (although one is bigger than the others).

This was the situation earlier today 😅

[elouicious]

There are a few of these Giants at the San Francisco Botanic Garden-

Bigger the pot the better

[pagnr]

Many of the Australian Syzygium species are shaped as hedges or standards. Also they are often kept as permanent large container plants. As rainforest plants they are adapted to sit and wait for a canopy opening to take off. How much are you fertilising them. If you don't want them to rapidly out grow the pots, maybe hold back on the fert.

[eez0]

Many of the Australian Syzygium species are shaped as hedges or standards. Also they are often kept as permanent large container plants. As rainforest plants they are adapted to sit and wait for a canopy opening to take off. How much are you fertilising them. If you don't want them to rapidly out grow the pots, maybe hold back on the fert.

0 fertilization, but they just grow grow and grow. The vendor at the local nursery had told me that these beast grew very fast, but I just wasn't expecting them to be that fast

[pagnr]

Syzygium oleosum is not a huge tree in the wild, quoted at 8 to 15 m. They should slow down after they grow into 30 to 50 litre pots.
Don't let the root get into the soil thru the bottom of the pot, they will take off again.
I have not seen too many in the wild here in Australia, only ever saw a few in the NSW rainforest, mainly just off the beach. They weren't big trees there.
Other Syzygiums can get a lot bigger.
Are you sure they are oleosum, they are fairly similar to paniculatum, australe, and a few others. Easy to tell apart when in fruit, a little harder from foliage alone.

[elouicious]

sorry!

thought this was Syzygium smithii

oleosum's common name is blue lily pilly I believe

[pagnr]

"Syzygium smithii grows as a tree to 20 m (66 ft) high by 5–15 m (16–49 ft) wide, with a trunk attaining a diameter of 70 cm (2.3 ft). The largest tree was recorded at Dingo Creek Flora Reserve, south of Tenterfield NSW being 30 m (98 ft) tall and a trunk 60 cm (2.0 ft) wide.[6] "

There are a lot of sub types of Syzygium smithii ( Acmena smithii ), but 30 m metres is a nice sized tree. It must drop a lot of fruit, and feed a lot of birds and bats ?

[elouicious]

Yes I would Imagine they make great bird food-

not very good for eating imo

[eez0]

I ended up putting them on soil and cutting them at 1m tall to create a low hedge at both sides of this path.



in theory, they're oleosum, at least that's what the nursery says. However, as elouicious pointed out, it seems oleosum is named blue lilly pilly, but the fruits from these (well, from the ones in the nursery which presumably are the same) are pink. But, to make things more confusing, looking in Google images for Syzygium Oleosum shows images with blue and pink fruits 🤷‍♂️

[K-Rimes]

I have two blue lilly pilly in ground here. They grow slowly but seems most things take a few years to get settled in after going in ground vs immersed in rich tasty potting soil. I water them very seldom and they handled snow and frost like a boss.

Lovely to see Canary Islands collectors I’ve been twice and love that place.

[elouicious]

I'm hoping mine survived the 18f storm

[Lumi-Ukko]

Resurrecting this thread to see if anyone can definitively answer a question I have regarding growing Lilly Pilly from seed. I have circa 20 plus seeds I collected from a random tree I saw. The fruit were a magenta colour so I'm not sure exactly the type of Lilly Pilly. Tasted pretty good so figured I'd try to grow them. Anyhow, the germination rate was incredible with almost all seeds germinating within two weeks.

Even more surprising was the number of stems that came up per seed. Polyembryonic on another level. Some seeds sent up 8 stems!

Here is where I am a bit at a loss. There's very little information I can find on what to do with these stems. Should I/can I divide them into separate pots? Or should I cut away all but one stem? If latterly so, is there a hard fast rule or do I take the strongest looking stem? My last concern is if taking one stem, am I taking a tree of one sex or are all trees self fertile?

To reiterate, I never really expected such a successful germination rate, considering my forays into other fruit seed growing.

[elouicious]

Its probably Syzygium paniculatum if they were magenta and tasty,

https://tropical.theferns.info/viewtropical.php?id=Syzygium+paniculatum

the trees get large, but take a while to do so, I guess it is endangered now so you should absolutely plant it out, cant speak as to the polyembrony but they are supposed to be bushy when young so I would wait

P.S. my oleosum survived 18f

[Lumi-Ukko]

Its probably Syzygium paniculatum if they were magenta and tasty,

https://tropical.theferns.info/viewtropical.php?id=Syzygium+paniculatum

the trees get large, but take a while to do so, I guess it is endangered now so you should absolutely plant it out, cant speak as to the polyembrony but they are supposed to be bushy when young so I would wait

P.S. my oleosum survived 18f

Yes, identical looking fruit so must be Paniculatum. The fruit struck me as having a similar taste and texture to its cousin, the Malay Apple, only more 'lavender' flavoured.

I have the opposite issue with temperatures where March to June are in the 100-110f range and in the main bone dry with clear skies. If I can nurse them through this stage as seedlings, I'm sure the mature trees will do well here as the UV cannot be any higher than tropical Australia.

As you suggest, I'll let the seedlings grow some more, before making a decision on what to do with all the stems. The largest is about 4 to 5 inches tall currently.

[Mike T]

The lilly pillies mentioned are the common small cooler climate species but there are dozens of species which are more exciting than that lot. There are 20 or 30 species in my district. Some of the 50m rainforest giants are majestic. S. fibrosum has small but quite nice apple tasting fruits, S.papyraceum has bright coloured fruit, S.wilsoni is very small with lovely pink flowers and I could go on and on. Maybe the more glamorous ones like cormiflorum and suborbiculare would have been better abroad.

[Mike T]

The ones you have can be hacked roughly and can form good hedges at 2m. They are tough and in your climate will need some extra water.

[Lumi-Ukko]

Thank you Mike! Do you think Paniculatum will survive in a USDA 12A zone (it's the closest I can associate us to)? So far they are doing great in our hot dry season, though still small.

I'm quite excited by them as the berries tasted great and am hoping they will be the same when one day they fruit.

I need to look up some of those varieties you mention since we have a small jungle cabin outside of Cancun where water is less scarce and they may do well. Also will give the spider monkeys something extra to eat as they're losing a lot of trees to development.

[elouicious]

The lilly pillies mentioned are the common small cooler climate species but there are dozens of species which are more exciting than that lot. There are 20 or 30 species in my district. Some of the 50m rainforest giants are majestic. S. fibrosum has small but quite nice apple tasting fruits, S.papyraceum has bright coloured fruit, S.wilsoni is very small with lovely pink flowers and I could go on and on. Maybe the more glamorous ones like cormiflorum and suborbiculare would have been better abroad.

Please tell us more!

I love syzygium fruits but am precluded from growing the more tropical ones, would love to get some seeds