The Tropical Fruit Forum

Hello Millet, thanks for the information. I just looked up Logees and it appears they are located in Conneticut and I do not believe citrus trees are allowed into California from another state? I hope we can get some of the better varieties from AU into our state. It appears that our friends in Florida already have some of the red varieties. Thanks again!

Simon

I would love to get Brix readings from all these Opuntia selections. Nullzero, do you know which selection of Opuntia currently has the highest Brix levels? I remember you mentioned that PARL selections were selected to have Brix greater than 12%. I went back to this thread http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=3935.50. and one selection I found had a Brix of 15% and another had Brix of 17% so I wonder if there are other varieties that are even higher? I tasted several green skinned fruit from the Mira Mesa farmers market that were very sweet but I did not have a refractometer back then. I will go back in Spring to see if the Green skinned Tunas are still available.

Nullzero, I believe that Fruit you collect from the mother trees on your expeditions may taste better tgan the same fruit when cultivated in our yards because the mother plants are older, fully established and I'm guessing they are rarely if ever watered. Many of us as gardeners tend to overwater our plants, especially when they are holding fruit, in order to pump them up to a large size but this can dilute the flavor and sugars. I withhold water to my Dragonfruit plants for 1-2 weeks, depending on weather, before I harvest and I notice an increase in Brix of roughly 2%.

I'm issueing an Amber Alert for the Opuntia fruit with the highest Brix! If I am able to find that super sweet green skinned fruit at the farmers market, I will as the seller if they are willing to sell me a pad or ten. I believe there will be much interest for the sweetest Opuntia fruit! BTW, the super sweet green skinned fruit had very hard seeds, similar to guava but it was so sweet that it's totally worth it. I'll keep everyone updated and thanks to Nullzero for getting me interested in this under appreciated drought tolerant medicinal fruit!

Simon

Beautiful Winter harvest! The storms and animals have taken down all my fruit except a lone Maha Chanok.

Simon

Nullzero, thanks for the links, the document on grafting Opuntia has lots of great information.

Rob, thanks for the explanation, I'm going to start grafting my Yellow DF seedlings once it warms up. I'm going to try grafting a few onto my Torrance PCH Opuntia.

Simon

Nullzero has sent out many Opuntia pads among other plant material, thanks Null, to various members. Here in Southern California, there is wild Opuntia growing everywhere but the quality of fruit is usually horrible. I would like to graft selected Opuntia varieties onto these wild cactus that are in my friends and neighbors yards. In this manner, we may be able to rapidly expand scion material because we can avoid the downtime of rooting out fresh cuttings.

I have a neighbor that has a huge planting of decades old Opuntia that gives horrible. I could top work his trees and in a very short time have loads of top tier Tunas to share and eat.

As for the Yellow Dragon, S/H Megalanthus, there are several reports about its slow growth rate. It may be wise to try and graft this variety onto a vigorous Undatus in hopes of accelerated growth and adaptability.

Careful selection of rootstock may also be beneficial in situations where soil(pH for example)and soil pests (such as nematodes) prevent or inhibit the growth of various cactus fruit on its own rootstock.

Simon

Congratulations Mark,

Your tree looks really healthy. The Japanese have been growing Mango and Avocado in greenhouses for a while. They produce very high quality fruit for the high end market. If you scroll down towards the end, you will see some Avocado trees. http://www.hawaiitropicalfruitgrowers.org/conferences/2012/2012_Producing_Consistent_High_Quality_Fruit_in_Japan.pdf

Simon

Mike, the fruit looks beautiful. I've never had abiu before, how would you describe the flavor of the Z4 fruit?

Simon

JF, I absolutely agree, Peggy is an excellent tasting variety. I love the great balance of sweet and acid for this Mango.

Simon

Here is a Peggy Mango. I ate it a little firmer than I normally like to but it was fantastic. At this firm state, the mango tasted amazingly like a very sweet Pineapple. Not only was the flavor almost identical to a real pineapple but the texture was also very pineapple like. The acidity was quite strong like a real pineapple but the 21% Brix helped to balance out the acidity.

I've eaten Peggy multiple time over several years and it continues to be an excellent Mango. Eaten at a softer stage, it is much more sweet than sour. I wonder if this variety will taste more like Pineapple or if Pineapple Pleasure will be closer to the real deal?

Thanks for the report Mark!

Today I cut open a Seedling#4 that was picked on my last visit to Leo. I did not like the first Seedling#4 I tried but this one was much better. This fruit had a Brix of 20.5%. It was much sweeter and had much better flavor than the earlier fruit I tried. This fruit tasted in between a Kent and a Keitt. The downside is that it had a bad spot on it and it had uneven ripening. One quarter of this fruit was perfectly ripened, one quarter was rotten and half the fruit was slightly under ripe.

One lesson i am learning is that I need to reserve judgement on any particular variety of Mango until I've been able to try multiple fruit throughout the season and also in different years.
Seedlin#4


I also cut open a seedling of Valencia Pride that Leo grew and the fruit tastes very similar to the actual VP. The fruit had a Brix of 20% and had very minimal fiber. My daughter liked this fruit a lot.
Seedling of VP

I harvested some Asian Black and San Diego Yellow sugarcane today and wanted to give a taste and Brix report. Sugarcane sweeten up in the Winter and the juice was definitely sweet. First up was the Asian Black, I juiced it with its skin on so the juice turned color a bit. I tested the Brix on different sections of the cane and the top of the cane near the leaves had a Brix of 19% and the bottom of the cane had a Brix of 23%. When I finished juicing all the Asian Black cane, I collected it in one large container and the overall Brix came out to 22%.

The San Diego Yellow had a Brix of 18% near the top and 21% at the bottom. The average Brix in the final collection container was 20%.

When I tasted these two varieties side by side, the SD Yellow actually had less of a mineral taste than the Asian Black. I'm starting to think that the sweeter cane will typically have more of that mineral taste which is not a bad thing. That mineral taste I'm talking about is kind of a salty taste, I'm guessing it is partially due to increased levels of potassium.

I can't pick a favorite, they are both equally excellent. I'm not posting pictures because I already posted pics of the cane and the juice of both these varieties.

Simon

Thanks for sharing the article. I love the old pictures. I wonder what is the most easily and cost effective material that is suggested for building a modern fruitwall? I would assume cinder blocks are most commonly being used as fences that may retain enough heat?


Simon