The Tropical Fruit Forum

My broadleafed papaya seedling looks like it will survive and it is developing the wide leaves and dark leaf stalks of its mother.The leaf veins have not yet gone red and may not go red at all.



My 4 feet tall Carica monoica looks like it needs more water but I am a lazy gardener.





My 3 feet tall C.monoica is in filtered light and get less wind than the other so it is greener.Maybe I should reward both with a drink this weekend.

I went to a mangosteen farm today that is recovering from cyclone damage of recent years and the trees are making a comeback.It is surprizing just how many fruit the trees can carry and it looks like there will be a bumper spring crop, hopefully followed by a big summer crop as well.

The picture shows the pyramid shape of a borneo small mangosteen that is replacing the malaysian comon mangosteens in the picture below.







The trees are in neat rows.





There will be many tons of fruit in 7 weeks.

A couple of weeks ago I showed a flowering event with my jaboticaba sabaras.The fruit are developing in abundance.

As a strawberry lover I rarely get good ones.The winter ones from the Atherton Tablelands cost nearly $5/lb but are fat, sweet and big.For most o the year only flavorless strawberries from great distances away are available.

How do I know what is a canistel and what is the real ross sapote? There are alot of variations in round ones with size,skin color,flesh moisture,flesh color and seed number all seemingly different in ones I see.Are there half way ones ......ross canistels perhaps?

Today I had coffee for an hour with with a highly respected and experienced tropical fruit researcher who works for the state government.He is involved with international and local projects and advises growers and has many publications on numerous tropical fruit species and varieties.I quizzed him on Russells Sweet Garcinia to get an expert opinion.It is definately an undescribed species with fruit of exceptional quality.The species is dioecious and lone females produce small seedless fruit and fertilized females produce masses of very large fruit with seeds.The lack of acceptance that it is dioecious contributed to it not successfully being spread around.There are 6 fruiting trees and all are on one property with a single male tree.They can easily be grafted onto G.dulcis.The trees survived 300km/hr cat 5 cyclone winds in 2011 and are recovering after a battering. Now I know where they are and who has them I hope to get some seeds.

Taken by the flying saucer? Still spinning after I laid the goose-egg on you? Well there is another bad boy with real muscle.I won't empty my wallet to show off a 8lber but feast your eyes on a Mossman Black Sapote.


So why can it throw down the gauntlent to the goose-egg and hold its own?Perhaps people have been imprinted and think this is how black sapotes should be.



Their quality is excellent the sphere shape is distinctive and they max out at near soccer ball (football) size.

In the last week I have stumbled across 5 Passiflora edulis flavicarpa types and 2 P.edulis.I am just about to eat one of each to find out if any are exceptionsal in flavour.


3 yellow flavicarpas in this lot.



2 edulis,1 red flavicarpa and 1 yellow flavicarpa in this lot.

There are 2 very nice tasting passionfruit of the 7 types and both are in pic 2.They are the red panama flavicarpa on the left and the misty gem edulis on the right of the second picture.

A friend dropped this hunk of banana yesterday that is 17 inches across and heavy enough to break the back of a rhino.If it was sucker I'd give it an even break.Dwarf ducasse bananas get 6 feet high and are very thick but the bananas are pretty good.It is better than my trashy dwarf williams/cavendish and I have the big ducasse's already and they reach nearly 20 feet.I can't really waste space on a banana clump when I want rare and glamorous fruit trees that I will soon be growing from seed.

My search the inca gold abiu has finally borne fruit after it seems to have gone missing from markets and nurseries.A friend of a friend had a heavily producing tree in their yard.Characteristically a small,low nipple was present, av. 1.2lbs, a single small seed and less uniformity of flesh color than it's rivals.The rich sweet caramel flavor is where it excells and this was confirmed.It is always on the recommended lists of 4 or 5 varieties and is considered a 'superior' type.

This species in spite of where it comes from appears to be the most cold and wind tolerant of all the Durios and perhaps the great subtropical hope.Like Russells Sweet Garcinia circumstances conspired to keep it in the shadows.This extract was sent to me today.

DURIO MACRANTHA

SCIENTIFIC NAME: Durio macrantha
FAMILY: Bombacaceae

ABSTRACT
An interesting species of Durio from North Sumatra is described and illustrated from a living specimen growing in Bogor.

Durio macrantha (Kosterm.) Kosterm. This new species, identified in 1992,is native to Sumatra. A fast-growing and precocious tree, it produced a heavy crop of large, high-quality fruit. The arils had the same taste, aroma, and texture as the durian.


In 1981 I received from Mr. H. Rijksen a young durian plant, which he had collected in the Mt. Leuser National Park in North Sumatra. Now 10 years later the plant has grown to a tree of 10 m high in my private garden in Gadok near Bogor, and in July 1991 it started to come in bloom. The flower bunches appeared on the bare branches; it took 4-6 weeks from the initial bud to the mature flower. The tree flowered profusely and within three months new buds appeared continuously. It proved to be an undescribed species of durian.

DURIO MACRANTHA Kosterm., species nova
Tree 10 m tall, dbh. 20 cm. Bark smooth, grey. Crown pyramidal, lowest branch 1m above the forest floor, somewhat drooping. Leaves alternate in one plane, chartaceous, lower side concave, oblong, 5-7.5 x 16-22 cm, gradually acuminate or sub-acuminate, base rounded, above very dark glossy green with minute reticulation, midrib slender, impressed, ribs filiform, prominulous in a groove; below very densely light golden brown lepidote, scales minute, flat with rather irregular margin. Petiole 10-15 mm slender. Flowers on the bare branches, consisting of a short thick main peduncle with few, 2-3 cm long, thick branches, each bearing 2-4 flowers. Pedicels stout, 4-5 cm long, gradually thickened apically. Flower buds initially depressed globose and ultimately subovoid-globose. Calyx urn-shaped, the 5 sepals connate, apically with 5 triangular, acute, 5-7 mm long broad lobes, lepidote outside. Petals free, white, glabrous, large, consisting of a thick, flat, stiff, wide, clawlike part, gradually widened apically and ending in a strongly reflexed much thinner spathulate-orbicular apical part. Stamens in 5 phalanges of 5-7 stamens each, the filaments fused in their basal half, the free parts 2-3 cm long, bearing clumps of one-celled anthers. Ovary oblong, densely minutely lepidote, showing a slight longitudinal furrow. Style reddish, glabrous, rather fleshy, up to 5 cm long, surpassing the stamens, cylindrical with conspicuous capitellate stigma. Fruit immature with numerous very hard and sharp, sub pyramidal thorns, the latter covered by numerous very tiny fimbriate scales.

DISTRIBUTION
Mt. Leuser National Park, North Sumatra, described after a cultivated specimen in the private garden of D. Kostermans in Gadok near Bogor, Java.

PHENOLOGY
Flowers open in the afternoon and drop in pieces during the night. They have no smell and no nectar. Pollinators are perhaps bats and night moths. The flowers had always a few black ants.

The branch basis are surrounded by a high annulus of tissue, free from the branch, as if they had to push the bark aside when developing.

The species is outstanding among the 3 other species so far known by the large flowers. From REINWARDTIA, a journal on taxonomic botany, plant sociology and ecology. Published by Herbarium Bogoriense.
A.J.G.H. KOSTERMANS
Reinwardtia Vol.11, Part 1,1 - 55, 5 February, 1992
Herbarium Bogoriense, Bogor, Indonesia

DATE: March 1994

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Durio macrantha (Kosterm.) Kosterm. This new species, identified in 1992, is native to Sumatra. A fast-growing and precocious tree, it produced a heavy crop of large, high-quality fruit. The arils had the same taste, aroma, and texture as the durian.



• DR KOSTERMANS AND DURIO MACRANTHA

SCIENTIFIC NAME: Durio macrantha
FAMILY: Bombacaceae

Dr AJ Kostermans, famous founder of the herbarium at Bogor Gardens in Java, described this fruit as the "durian of the future" because of its excellent flavour, heavy cropping and lack of strong smell.

Durio macrantha was first discovered in 1981 by Mr. H Rijksen in the Mt Leuser National Park in Northern Sumatra. Only one specimen was collected and it was brought to Bogor and planted in Dr Kostermans' back yard.

Ten years later, in 1991 the tree had grown to a height of 10 metres and started to flower profusely. Flowering continued for 3 months and the tree matured about 40 fruit. This was an excellent first crop for any durian species. The tree continued to crop heavily each year until 1994 when only 4 fruit were produced, probably due to unseasonable weather, according to Dr Kostermans. The tree came from an area where an annual dry season occurs which is necessary for good crop production.

Dr Kostermans decided that the specimen growing in his back yard was sufficiently different from Durio zibethinus, the commercial durian, to be a new species and he named it Durio macrantha.

Although there have been many expeditions to the Mt Leuser National Park since 1981, no more specimens of Durio macrantha have been found. Dr Kostermans' tree is the only known one in cultivation.

In February of 1994 my wife Jacky and I were holidaying in Bali when we received urgent messages from both the CSIRO and Mr. Joe Zappala, asking for our help in trying to obtain grafting material from Dr Kostermans' tree. We learned that the doctor was seriously ill in hospital, and that he feared for the survival of the tree. He wanted grafting material to be taken to Australia where the species could be cared for.

So on 27th February, I flew from Bali to Jakarta, where I visited Dr Kosterman in St Carolus Hospital. We had a wonderfully long talk about his lifelong work in botany, and all the countries he had visited. He told me how he had survived being a prisoner of war working on the infamous Burma Railway. [See the article: 'Botanist Professor Kostermans' in the People, Places and History section.]

After our long talk, I was driven to Dr Kostermans' home near Bogor Gardens by two of his grandsons. I took photographs of the tree and selected some good grafting material. I was also lucky enough to be given the last fruit of the season. We then drove back to the hospital and had another long talk with Dr Kostermans. He told me how he had sponsored 98 children from poor families, to educate them in the fields of horticulture and botany. He always insisted on a strong commitment to work and discipline and to not be afraid to face difficulties and to find solutions. Thirty eight of his sponsored children went on to become doctors, and five others became professors. Most of then now work overseas.

While we talked, there was a constant stream of family and friends coming in to visit the good doctor.

I said goodbye to this marvelous old man and headed for the airport to return to Bali. On our flight home to Cairns, we carried the durian fruit as hand luggage. None of the passengers or crew suspected anything. There was none of the usual strong durian smell. On arrival at Cairns, we found that Joe Zappala had arranged an import license for the grafting material and it was quickly grafted onto young durian trees in the quarantine area. AQIS also allowed us to eat the fruit and keep the seeds. The flavour was excellent, at least equal to popular varieties such as Montong and Gaan Yaow.

After 12 months the grafted trees were allowed out of quarantine. CSIRO got a couple, Joe Zappala got some, and I planted one in my back yard in Cairns. It was sickly for a long time, until extra root stocks were grafted to the base. It is now 3 metres high and very vigorous. It appears to grow strongly on only some Durio zibethinus varieties.

Durio macrantha is now firmly established in North Queensland.

When I said goodbye to Dr Kostermans in St Carolus Hospital, I assured him we would look after this rare durian species.

Dr Kostermans died on 10th July 1994, and is sadly missed by all who knew him.

He can rest in peace knowing his favourite durian in now safe and being cared for in Australia. He was truly a remarkable man.

 

I have heard rumblings in this forum that KP is only fair in taste and even PIN only rates it as good.It is time the truth was told.What a resume' it has, this sweet luscious fruit has swept all other varieties aside since the 1880's to still occupy the number 1 spot in the mango stakes on this continent to this day.Assessments consistently rank it as number 1 and excellent and the public demand this mango above all others in Australia and it has become synonymous with mango excellence.Plantings of all other types combined are still less than KP in spite of over 200 cvs being available.




KP is a favourite in many asian countries where it is exported to and penetration into most  asian mango markets requires excellence.



Is it the worlds' most successful mango? It certainly is amongst the finest in flavor and this poly is a cracker.Maybe monuments should be built for it.