The Tropical Fruit Forum

Thanks - I won't waste my time on this one then... plenty of other fruits already on my want list.

Thanks Ethan!  Now that I know it isn't poisonous, I don't mind sharing that I tried it... but it wasn't very good (more than slightly bitter).  Do you know how it is propagated and if there are improved varieties?  I will have access to thousands of the fruit again this Summer and wouldn't mind growing it if I knew I could find a worthwhile cultivar to graft onto it.  The tree itself is attractive.

There are about a dozen of these trees that were added as lansdscaping along a street in Ventura, California.  Trees are evergreen and produce small red & orange fruits (with, from memory: multiple seeds and a cream colored center).  The picture of picked fruit was from July last year.  The photo of the tree and leaves were taken in March of this year.  Unfortunately, I lost the photos of the fruit cross-section, which I am sure would help.


PHOTO TAKEN MARCH 2013.  Tree structure.


PHOTO TAKEN MARCH 2013. Leaf structure.


PHOTO TAKEN JULY 2012.  Fruit

Thanks,

Jeff

I've never seen this type of defoliation happen here on any of my avocado trees. Deciduous trees act this way, but not avocados.

I grew up in California and remember avocados being essentially evergreen, with some shedding of old leaves during flushes of new growth.  My trees and those of my neighbors dropped all but a handful of leaves this year - the new leaf growth follows the flowers, but usually the old leaves stay on until that cycle is more or less complete.  Not this year, at least not for me.

I'll chime in from San Diego as well... seeing the same thing - lots of flowers popping and almost completely defoliated.  No wind.  Strange weather with multiple cold/heat cycles over the last couple of months.

This on three different varieties, all equally affected.

kh0110 - I'll definitely take it as I'm very interested in getting some sugar apples going here.

I can bring you a seedling (one month old) Cherimoya and some Campas Cherimoya sticks in exchange if you'd like.

My trees are too small to take budwoods from them, but I have a 5 months old chewy sugar apple seedling (seed from Cambodia) that I could part with. It has withstood the winter and still retain 1 leaf left. Its cold hardiness however slowed down considerably its growth, see picture below. If you come up to LA areas, you could pick it up but I don't want to send it.
This is first come, first serve. So if you're interested, PM me first.

 

Does anyone have any sugar apple scions they would be willing to send to San Diego?  I attempted grafts of Congrejos (thanks JF, Behl & Simon) earlier in the month and hoping they will take - but I would like to throw a couple more cultivars on my tree before it starts to flush out new growth.

I've got about a dozen sticks from my Campas tree that I would be happy to send out as well.

Thanks,

Jeff

ps-here's a photo of the Campas fruit...

I just germinated 60+ Seeds from my Campas tree - 45 of them are over 3" tall already.  Using the plastic bag method they started to sprout in 8 days (avg of about 2 wks and some took over a month).  I put the bag on top of the water heater for warmth.  Once they sprouted, I transferred them into vermiculite and they're doing great.

I also tried to germinate another batch of 20 by sowing diretly in soil mix and they still haven't come up - it's been about 5 weeks now.

My intention was to get some rootstock going - I was surprised at the overall success rate (over 80%).

Since this is a splinter of the original topic, I'll weigh in on sugar apple vs cherimoya... My wife is Brazilian and for her the Cherimoya is no substitute to eating the Fruit she grew up with.  The fruta de Conde / sugar apple is also kind of fun to eat - it's the fruit equivalent of pull-apart bread.

Oscar - I appreciate the (honest) answer!   sending you a PM.

I'll cross my fingers that JF cuts some more of the Cangrejos' sugar apple

Would love to have that one going here.

Thanks for the generosity - I'm interested in the Rollinia if you have more.

Sent a PM.

-- Jeff (San Diego)