Doesnt increased watering yield larger size fruit? That is what I have found from my experience, at least.
i don't know....up to a certain point I don't think it helps...I acutally put a dish underneath one of my trees...thinking it would help the fruits get fat....but the surinam cherry really seemed to hate having wet feet (for about a month)...and most of the fruits turned out small and dropped.
now that i have the tree with more drainage, the fruits have improved in size and quality.
i guess lots of water is better than drought...but flooding for too long is not good for surniam....and some specimens just make small fruits no matter what.
Very interesting Adam, I have notice that my Zill from Excalibur hate wet feet but give me a larger fruit with abundant moistures & darker black ripening color than when it came out of Excalibur on the dry side, after finishing it fruiting last month. I let it go super dry to the point it drop all its leaves, I water it heavily & fertilize it, & notice its flushing new leaves & some flowering now, this plant is now repoted in a 60 gallon pot.
On the other hand my blackstars are grown in airpots & some of them sits in three inch of water for the last three years & fruited first time last February, the one not in water emergence slow not robust & only starting flower now for the first time compare to the flooded on its second flowering for the year. I let it go to dry so it will loose all its leaves & fertilize it and than let it sit in three inch of water ( killing mosquitoes larvaes every two weeks it seem a nuisance). My blackstar strain came from Hawaii wet area.
I read in Brazil or Israel that they get up to three & possibly four crops on a good year so I have decided to mimic to see if this is the case; so far fruiting have been lackluster but these 3 year olds bushes are small. However the Six feet tall multi trunk tree from Excalibur have shown a profanity for the greatest fruit production but small, maybe root bounded & barely water kept fruit small. A repotting to 60 gallon pot with organic should produce a larger fruit with better flesh ratio. The purple Lolita is some what more robust than any other varieties but kind of shy in its flowering. Vermilion Red seem to be pervasive to scale attack, so far no flowering in third year. Seem like these guys trigger is wet or dry for cropping fruits. Thank Adam Soren & Rob for more tidbits of insight. FAU Red found at FAU boca Raton Campus on the canal next to R& Park has a nice tangerine flavor with resistance to scale & drought, root cutting have not flower yet after three years. It seem for the most part they get to 3rd year from seedlings & fruit or to a certain three feet size setting & holding fruits.
Soren my black star seedling produce a 100 percent no resin true to it Hawaiian Parent, however one bush out of six flowering has red no resin fruit! So I guess the red dominance trait show its dominane in term of color by sneaking back. Surinam seeds variance are so great its hard to say what you will pull out of Forest Gump's Chocolate box, there lies the thrill of breeding & selection!
Jack thank you for the the sweet honey & tomato taste description ( if taste like tomato I can get rid of my messy everglades tomato) sound to me this smooth skin varity will be an interesting strain for my Dr. Evil Work! PM Send.