The Tropical Fruit Forum

I am in lower 8B and have Bloomsweet still ripe on the tree since there have been no freezes this year that could ruin the fruit. The sweet, rich, perfumey smell around the tree is wonderful as the fruit dry a bit. If you are a "traveler' interested in sampling some of them, there is a scion exchange next Saturday AM at Caldwell Nursery in Rosenberg, TX (southwest of Houston). There usually are some folks from Austin who drive out here for the  meetings, and the sponsor is Texas Rare Fruit Growers, an association started by Ed Self. The mature Bloomsweet has survived a brief 14 degree event and made it through like a champ. So if you like somewhat mild/sweet g/f with a lemon flavor, it is a good one.

I just thinned out lots of baby fruit this week while the fruit that were set are between 1/8" thick and 3/8" thick, and most were in pairs or clusters. I left the bigger fruit. I removed many clusters that were on the same small branch so that only one remained on each branch. I removed all fruit that were high up in the trees. That way, when they were full sized, I could more easily enclose the fruit inside plastic grocery bags that were tied above the branches. When the fruit ripen fully they just fall down inside the bag instead of all the way to the ground where they can get damaged, especially by hungry crawling bugs. Last year I waited too long before thinning and ended up removing lots of fruit that were 2" - 3" long. Since the trees tend to over-produce, I wanted more leaves to be able to nourish a smaller amount of fruit.

Despite pretty good cold protection, my only Mexican lime tree froze when young during an exceptional freeze, so I no longer want to bother with them. Depending on your taste buds' pickiness, you may be satisfied to use green, unripe satsumas as a lime substitute. Just try a couple at different stages of growth to find out if it will be acceptable. For me, it is. Second, the green, unripe fruit from Thomasville Citrangequats may possibly work. But if you are a purist who has no interest in 'outside the box' options, just buy them at the store when you want some.

After eating about 30 of the 3" diameter Dekopon/Sumo fruit over 3 weeks, I have the opinion that they are definitely worth growing. Some of the fruit were a little past prime ripeness, but still OK. On the other hand, I just cut open a Hamlin orange that was harvested about 2 months ago prior to a freeze and has been sitting in the very cool garage since then. Better fruit. Bigger, perfectly balanced sweet/tart,  rich flavor with 10% pineapple taste, and almost seedless. Wish there were 29 more. I wonder why they are not grown and sold commercially around here.....

I regret that baby paw paw plants do not have the same tenacity as baby mulberry plants. The roots are under engineered for going that gets tough. For those wanting to become paw paw people, I prefer 2 ways to begin instead of the common practice of having expensive baby plants with baby roots shipped in from a zillion miles away. One way is to visit mom and pop, small, independent nurseries and ask the owner if any of their wholesale nursery suppliers list potted paw paw seedlings for sale that are several feet tall. I would order some regardless whether they are unknown variety seedlings or not. BIGGER is BETTER and commonly cheaper than the (very small) super duper variety grafted plants. You can get the larger potted seedlings to start growing in a deep/wide raised bed of rich, organic soil that can later be widened further as the plant grows. If your soil is rocky/desert sand/clay/moon surface/inhospitable, think DEEP on the raised bed. When the paw paw tap root grows downward and collides with some kind of 'moon surface', it lacks the ability to drill-baby-drill, so lateral root growth will be the plant's focus. The seedlings can be cleft grafted later on the central leader to become whatever variety you want. The second way that I prefer is to order a bag of seeds from a known, choice variety and plant them in very deep pots filled with loose, organic soil mix from which they can later be gently removed and planted in the aforementioned deep raised bed. I would wait on the choice variety seedlings to mature to see what kind of fruit they end up producing. If not so special, cleft graft the central leader with what you want to try next. In summary, baby paw paw plants growing in laboratory conditions with 24/7 care by very experienced mass growers can be so healthy looking, but when they get kicked out of house and home and get resettled in a much less accommodating situation, many struggle big time, and many never make it.

Same shape. Same color. Same neck. Same www.sumocitrus.com sticker on each fruit. But smaller and MUCH cheaper. Just like the various satsumas here can range from 2" diameter to 4" diameter on the same tree, but normally are about 3". Krogers got the "grade B" fruit for their customers with the "value buying" orientation, and Whole Foods got the whoppers with the whopper pricing for their customers who use more discretionary  $$ to buy what pleases them. By the way, the whoppers look like they consist of about $1.50 of heavy duty peeling and $2.50 of edible fruit interior.

Thanks for the nursery photos. Looks 100% the same. Except for the puddle of juice beneath the cut fruit. If genetic variability is on display with a family's 6 kids lacking 100% uniformity, and all 200 satsumas on a healthy tree are not 100% uniform, then why should there not be evidence of it among 1000 cocktail g/f trees?....When I went to buy multiple thermometers to place around the orchard, I assumed that the box of Chinese-built thermometers in Lowe's store were likely "identical", but just to be sure I laid several side-by-side on the shelf and waited a few minutes to confirm the mutual accurate temp reading there. Well, most had different temps from the others. Variability happens.

I ate my first Cocktail g/f yesterday. It was fully ripe, messy/drippy juicy, lemon flavored, mildly sweet when eating, had thin peeling, and left a sour aftertaste. I grow Bloomsweet g/f, which have some similarities. They are lemon flavored, taste mildly sweet when eating, leave a sour aftertaste, have thicker peeling, have fewer seeds, but not messy/drippy at all. The tiny cells hold their juice very well, and the individual segments can be broken apart by hand w/o any dripping juice escaping. But the biggest thing that sets them apart is that the mature Bloomsweet trees do not need cold protection for your area. When the temps bottomed out near 15 degrees a few years ago on one night, the unprotected mature trees had partial defoliation, but no severe problem at all. As one who hates all the cold protection rituals when a threatening freeze is arriving, fruit trees like the Bloomsweet g/f make fruit growing easier. They are sometimes available locally.

I bought one in a 3 gallon pot with a Greenleaf Nursery tag that was said to be growing on "it's own roots" at a Houston-area plant sale last Winter and replanted it in a 15 gallon pot with very good drainage to address root rot concerns. I clipped off several small fruit in Spring and allowed 2 fruit to develop, and recently got to taste my first Orange Frost Satsuma/Changsha tangerine cross fruit. The flavor was outstanding. It seems to be a little less sweet than some of the other satsumas, but the pleasant surprise was that there was a noticeable cherry-like taste mixed in with a good Satsuma flavor. Almost like a Satsuma-flavored fruit punch. I let the plant go dry for about 2 weeks prior to harvesting the 2 fruit. The peeling had a very pleasant aroma that is different from Satsuma peeling. This one is a real keeper. No offense to the other satsumas, but you have just been upstaged.