Author Topic: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US  (Read 6593 times)

All the fruit

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US (Wisconsin)
« Reply #25 on: December 03, 2019, 11:44:20 AM »
Hi,
here is a playlist of tasting greenhouse grown exotic fruits from German botanic gardens. Not my own gardening achievment but many were quite tasty😉

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e28Kzx86CJs&list=PL2AyaQ9frDUvfkZLkUQg3-Tz62I5sFoVa

jimmy_va

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US (Wisconsin)
« Reply #26 on: December 03, 2019, 12:39:11 PM »
Hello everyone, I am in Northern Virginia zone 7a. I have a greenhouse since 2009, it’s only 12ftx 15ft but I have 19 trees planting directly in the ground ranging from 3ft to 14 ft tall and fruiting. Doesn’t sounds right for this little space, right? But it works. I have great successes but also kill many trees (with love) along the way. I don’t have to use supplemental lightings, as I use solexx panels to cover the greenhouse which I can remove them and keep the greenhouse uncovered from April to November. I still have lots of fruits on my trees right now.
3 mango trees:  Coconut Cream, Glenn, Maha Chinock. All fruited.
2 Guava trees:   Vietnamese white and Ruby Red. Fruits still on the tree.
2 Loquat trees:    Gold Nugget and Premier. Both flowering now.
2 Dragon fruit plants:   White and a Red. Fruited.
2 Tangerine trees: Fruited.
Meyer lemon tree, Fruits on it now.
Kumquat with fruits on it now.
Star fruit tree, Fwang  Tong with fruits on it now.
Grapefruit tree, Ruby Red. Fruited.
Lychee, Brewster. Fruited

Passionfruit plant not yet flowered.
Longan fruit tree not yet fruit.
Wampee tree not yet fruit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6RzeB0iq8M


brian

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US (Wisconsin)
« Reply #27 on: December 03, 2019, 01:15:44 PM »
Really nice setup, Jimmy.  I am only a little farther north than you and growing many of the same trees in-ground in my greenhouse.   I am curious what is actually possible to grow without supplemental lighting.   If my jackfruit and mangosteen thrive I am thinking you can grow just about anything in a greenhouse.  My mango already has one winter under its belt and is doing great.

Kevin Jones

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US (Wisconsin)
« Reply #28 on: December 03, 2019, 10:16:56 PM »
I agree... nice set-up... well thought out.

Kevin

coyote

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #29 on: December 09, 2019, 10:37:37 AM »
I am very impressed with everyone's set ups

jimmy_va- I've been considering doing something similar to your set up some time in the future....I often think we have the ideal weather in the eastern half of the northern US for growing tropical plants summer and it's nice to let mother nature handle all the heavy lifting during that period so the grower doesn't have to

Carolyn- I really love when growers have personal connections to plants they are growing...it's quite the gift to your extended family that you can offer this small piece of botanical life from your daughter in-laws birthplace and you get share those experiences with them (:

Daintree

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #30 on: December 09, 2019, 10:45:09 AM »
Jimmy_va - what is your altitude and cloud cover there?  Do you have problems with leaf scorching when you uncover in the spring?  I wish I could "set all my plants free" in the summer!

Carolyn

jimmy_va

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #31 on: December 10, 2019, 09:38:56 AM »
Hello everyone and thank you for sharing.

Coyote- agree, very impressed with everyone’s set ups. We all work very hard for this love, also must work with what we got and continue looking for and sharing ideas as we go. I am lucky my greenhouse is next to my house, so I don’t have to worry about heat. I ran two flexible air ducks from my furnace in the attic to directly to my greenhouse, heating solved! I used the gutter above the greenhouse to collect rain water/snow melt for watering the trees as needed during the winter. It’s an incredible feeling when I uncovered the greenhouse every Spring.

Carolyn- I don’t have any problem when uncovered the greenhouse as I do this early Spring, so the transition is very smooth. The only problem I have is that my mangoes flower in January- February. There are no pollinators, and this is also the worst time for mildew and fungus to attack.  So, I usually cut off all flowers to push blooms later into March just before I uncover the greenhouse.

Sorry for the lengthy writing!

 Brian- I would love to have a mangosteen tree but I heard it’s very difficult tree to grow.
 Regarding jackfruit tree, I have a question for you and everyone. I planted a dwarf jackfruit tree (Var Small) inside my sunroom in-ground for 1 ½ year now, it’s doing great and thriving at 4 ft tall. The big question is, Do you think this tree will ever fruit? The sunroom is facing southeastern with lots of windows and 4 skylights, so I believed there should is enough sunlight. I searched and there are no information regarding indoor, permanent fruit trees.




BohicaBob

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brian

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #33 on: December 10, 2019, 12:15:30 PM »
Quote
Brian- I would love to have a mangosteen tree but I heard it’s very difficult tree to grow."

As far as I have read it is really difficult to grow outdoors but it seems there are a few fruiting in greenhouses in the continental US.  I got one as an experiment to see what is possible.  If it dies no big deal, if it thrives I will have to build a second greenhouse somewhere to keep it.

brian

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #34 on: February 14, 2020, 11:10:38 AM »
So winter is only half over but it is spring in my greenhouse.  My mango is blooming, all citrus plants blooming, jackfruit has been growing continuously all winter, 30+ different tropical seedlings all growing steadily, including garcinias.  Purple mangosteen not actively growing but looks very healthy.  Cattley guavas growing like crazy.  Durain seedlings finally coming all the way out of their seed coat.  Cherry tomatoes and bell peppers have been producing fruit all winter.

At this point I'm becoming convinced that you can grow anything if you have a greenhouse :)

The only trees I have that look worse than before winter are:

- peanut butter fruit looking haggard after a decent crop of fruit, no new growth and yellowing leaves
- cherimoya dropping ~25% of its leaves and not growing more, but seems okay otherwise.  I heard this might be normal?
- plumeria has gone dormant, like it does every year.  Dropped nearly all leaves but has buds ready

TomekK

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #35 on: February 14, 2020, 06:58:51 PM »
Those of you with greenhouses are lucky! I have to deal with a small space for my plants, in a house without humidity (like 40%). Nevertheless, I still struggle on. Here is a list of what I’m growing. These plants can quickly move off the list, replaced with others.

Cara cara navel oranges (from seed)
Ugli fruit (from seed)
Dragon fruit yellow (from seed)
Dragon fruit red flesh (from seed)
Purple passion fruit (from seed)
Yellow passion fruit (from seed)
Spanish Lime (from seed)
Avocado (from seed, oldest current plant)
Tree tomato (hit ceiling, from seed)
Jaboticaba (from seed, very young and small)
Spanish tamarind (small and from seed)
Mamey sapote (from seed)
Coffee (from Home Depot for $4)
Rose apple (from seed)
Feijoa (from seed)
Bitter melon (round type from baker creek)
Jackfruit (from seed, may soon die)
Cacao forastero (pretty sure one plant, maybe that’s a Trinitario)
Cacao Trinitario Colorado (most of my cacao)
Cacao Trinitario from logees (my first cacao)
Cacao Trinitario medium red (Montoso, one plant)
Cacao round leaf jaca (one plant, almost died)
Cacao criollo (3 +/- one plants from montoso)
I’m sure I missed something

May soon have pomegranate, star fruit, and date, all from seed
Also allspice if I get lucky and they root (haha lucky)

Previous failures:
Lemon (under-watering)
Date (???)
Rambutan (too long in paper towels)
Star fruit (too long in paper towels)
White dragon fruit (too long in paper towels)
Mango (???)
Pineapple (forgot about it, left outside, froze)
Guava (???)
Papaya (damped off)
My poor Jarillas (damped off)
Naranjilla (died with 3 leaves)
Gac (could not germinate)
Papillo (could not germinate)
Tamarind (died with 3 leaves)
Meyer lemon (???)
Blood orange (???)
Soursop (could not germinate)
blackberry jam fruit (didn’t germinate)
Mexican apple (could not germinate)
Cinnamon (bad plant from eBay)
Vanilla (bad plant from eBay)
Star anise (couldn’t germinate)
Most of the cacao I ever grew
I’m sure many others too


Every year I have the following pests: aphids on dragon fruit and avocado, mites on citrus (this year they spread before I noticed them and drowned them in neem oil, the cure for everything except papaya damping off), and finally scale on citrus. I notice scale and aphids by the sign of an increased number of ants on my plants.

My wishlist:
Durio species
Articarpus species
Inga species
Theobroma/Herrania species
baccaurea angulata
Wani
Jarilla
Papillo
Nutmeg
If anyone has these available for me to buy, please let me know!

My adventures are not over and I still have lots I can do. Build a greenhouse, for one. Maybe then my cacao won’t give me sleepless nights and barely survive with 2 times 0.5 leaves left.

Tomek

brian

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #36 on: February 14, 2020, 07:59:01 PM »
So many trees from seed, you must be very patient!   I have a ton of seedlings but for those that take forever to fruit the seedlings are mostly experimental to see how the tree will do, and if it does well I'll get grafted types.   I can't imagine what you will do once your trees start taking off, you are gonna need to build a greenhouse :)

SeaWalnut

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #37 on: February 14, 2020, 08:14:34 PM »
Guavas are verry easy to grow and to fruit.
Best tasting guava its the small Ugni Molinae.
Also strawberry and lemon guavas grow like weeds for me.
I have 2 feijoa ( from seed) wich its called the pineapple guava thogh not a real guava just related to them.
And a week ago i got the real deal,tropical pink guava,big size with red leaves.
For easy to grow and fast to fruit small trees i recommend the guavas.

TomekK

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #38 on: February 15, 2020, 12:19:04 PM »
I have reached the point where I admit to myself that, although fruit would be nice, it will most likely never happen. That’s why I’m so patient! One time I bought a grafted star fruit, and it almost immediately flowered! By the end of the summer, it even had a single fruit! Of course, the fruit was knocked off very underripe when a storm knocked the plant over, and then the plant died, either to scale or mites, I’ll never know. As for my trees taking off, maybe they will in my future greenhouse, but for now they are content to stay small, manageable, and try to survive. At least my dragonfruit and passion fruits grow well! And my avocado has become quite nicely branched with many growing tips.

Tomek

brian

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #39 on: April 10, 2020, 10:22:04 PM »
My mango tree has some baby mangos now.  This would be its first crop if they hold.


SeaWalnut

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #40 on: April 11, 2020, 12:20:30 AM »
Drought hardy sapindaceae that fruits in a pot its the dune soap berry( Deinbollia Oblongifolia).

Mark in Texas

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #41 on: April 11, 2020, 07:57:42 AM »
I got at least 1,500 citrus fruit off 3 trees over the last 10 months, all cocktail trees with many different varieties of oranges, lemons, limes, etc. 

My recently grafted 9' X 9' Sharwil is just loaded with baby avocados with 1/2 the flowers yet to open. Reed is late doesn't even have buds yet.  Ardith, Pinkerton, Lamb all setting fruit.  Mangos are setting fruit, etc.

Only problem I'm having is a cherimoya cocktail tree i grafted with Behl stock.  Flowers just fall off and I'll be damned if I can see any that carry any pollen.

Lots of pollinators come and go - bees, flies, moths, butterflies, red wasps.

Mark











Mark in Texas

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #42 on: April 11, 2020, 07:59:12 AM »
My mango tree has some baby mangos now.  This would be its first crop if they hold.



Congrats Brian!  Remember watching your progress on the house.

I need to blast mildew and fungus off mine and add an AquaFogger before summer.  Greenhouses are work.

brian

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #43 on: April 11, 2020, 10:24:10 AM »
Congrats Brian!  Remember watching your progress on the house.
I need to blast mildew and fungus off mine and add an AquaFogger before summer.  Greenhouses are work.

I must say that although my greenhouse was a ton of work to set up, it requires almost zero maintenance now - everything is automated :)   I just go out and pick fruit, and watch everything grow.

I do have a fogging system I set up last year.  I was running city water through it and using a phosphate filter.  It resulted in a good amount of scale/white crud on the plants closest to the fog nozzles, and they clearly weren't enjoying it.  I am going to try it without the phosphate filter this year to see if the white scale is the phosphate filter residue or the water itself.  I tested my city water and it is reasonably low TDS, though not nearly as clean as RO water

NateTheGreat

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #44 on: April 11, 2020, 11:39:44 AM »
Drought hardy sapindaceae that fruits in a pot its the dune soap berry( Deinbollia Oblongifolia).

Looks interesting! Are you growing this? Couldn't find much about it.

SeaWalnut

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #45 on: April 11, 2020, 02:55:54 PM »
Drought hardy sapindaceae that fruits in a pot its the dune soap berry( Deinbollia Oblongifolia).

Looks interesting! Are you growing this? Couldn't find much about it.
Ive tryed to grow it but the seeds were old or i didnt know how to germinate them.They might need cold stratification since these are quite cold hardy .
The beauty comes from the fact they fruit fast from seed .Look them up on tradewindseeds.
Also i didnt got my seeds from them but from rarepalms.

SeaWalnut

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #46 on: April 11, 2020, 03:02:49 PM »
Drought hardy sapindaceae that fruits in a pot its the dune soap berry( Deinbollia Oblongifolia).

Looks interesting! Are you growing this? Couldn't find much about it.
I made a mistake,its not on tradewinds but on Toptropicals where you can see they fruited them after just 3 years in a 4 gal pot.
https://toptropicals.com/catalog/uid/deinbollia_oblongifolia.htm?store=tt

Mark in Texas

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #47 on: April 11, 2020, 04:03:20 PM »
I didn't have maintenance either until now.  My house is super automated - iLink computer controlled vents with big 1 HP motors, 110K propane heater, fans, etc.  My fogger will run on rain water.

I must say that although my greenhouse was a ton of work to set up, it requires almost zero maintenance now - everything is automated :)   I just go out and pick fruit, and watch everything grow.

I do have a fogging system I set up last year.  I was running city water through it and using a phosphate filter.  It resulted in a good amount of scale/white crud on the plants closest to the fog nozzles, and they clearly weren't enjoying it.  I am going to try it without the phosphate filter this year to see if the white scale is the phosphate filter residue or the water itself.  I tested my city water and it is reasonably low TDS, though not nearly as clean as RO water

brian

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #48 on: June 07, 2020, 09:00:51 PM »
My mango tree still has a bunch of 1-2" baby mangoes holding on.   Jackfruit has gotten HUGE, from 18" tall to 9ft tall since I got it.. last year?  No flowers yet though.  Cherimoya growing rapidly and  flowered but no fruit set.  Guavas and citrus all have lots of fruit.  Miracle berry constantly fruiting.  Peanut butter fruit blooming again now. 

And my purple mangosteen and lucs mexican garcinia have resumed growing after doing nothing all winter.  They've only put out a few new leaves since I got them last year but alive that's good enough for me.




Mark in Texas

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Re: Growing Tropicals and Sub-Tropicals in the Northern US
« Reply #49 on: June 13, 2020, 11:48:25 AM »
My mango tree still has a bunch of 1-2" baby mangoes holding on.   Jackfruit has gotten HUGE, from 18" tall to 9ft tall since I got it.. last year?  No flowers yet though.  Cherimoya growing rapidly and  flowered but no fruit set.  Guavas and citrus all have lots of fruit.  Miracle berry constantly fruiting.  Peanut butter fruit blooming again now. 

And my purple mangosteen and lucs mexican garcinia have resumed growing after doing nothing all winter.  They've only put out a few new leaves since I got them last year but alive that's good enough for me.


Congrats!

Got my rainwater tanks, plumbing, pump in.  Next step is to hang my new Aquafog GT-500 fogger and tie it in.   Old timer who installs high pressure misting systems in million $ homes said their maintenance is a PITA.  My fogger will throw a cooling fog 30'. Will post video of it.

Like an idiot I dropped 17 fine Orange Sherbet fruit pruning off a branch to make a new terminal leader below a 3 branch area, 2 branches breaking off under their own weight.  Oh well, friend is getting some nice scions.  ;D



2,800 gals. total.



Leader Ecomatic 110 pump.  Man is this thing sweet.





« Last Edit: June 13, 2020, 11:50:47 AM by Mark in Texas »