The Tropical Fruit Forum

I was doing research into controlled bloom techniques, seems you can force bloom on any mango tree, using saltpeter ( potassium nitrate ). you spray this on your tree, and bam 1 week or two later you have blooms.  this does not harm the tree, I do believe you need to allow the tree at least 8 months "rest" , but in theory you could have your mango produce fruit out of season.

Another more unreliable method is to smudge your tree with smoke.

Plantations, that can beat the market get better prices on their fruit.

I have no idea if KNO3 is organic, I eventually will try this someday once I have more mature trees, and probably use the smoke method.
I believe KNO3 is also hard to get now because of the Oklahoma incident and homeland security because you can make explosives with the stuff.

anyone have experience with this?

anyway I mention this here, because I wonder if these trees that have a reputation of producing out of season do so because they are easily stressed and something like a cold front, or small drought  stimulates them into flowering.

Really I do not see the danger in this,   I mean, does Kentucky or wherever have a big citrus industry to protect.   If it was into CA or Texas maybe I could understand that.

Only people I see growing citrus up north would be people using green houses.

I believe it has a lot to do with preparation most people would agree that your typical lemon is sour and has a lot of acid. yet there seems to be no problem with popularity. and not many would eat a lemon out of hand.

So lets take Garcinia. xanthochymus, I once tried it fresh and it was very high in acid, and sour as heck.  so I had my wife prepare it the same way she makes "Jugo de Chinola" ( passion fruit juice ) and it was delicious.

Carambola most seedlings are sour, but I have come across nice sweet ones. so getting a grafted sweet variety would be the trick here.

It takes a long time for "new" fruits to become popular, even if they are great tasting, for example the Kiwi, how many decades has it been around before it became a "regular" in the local supermarket?

OK my addition would be Genipa Americana ( jagua, huito ).

There is nothing that taste like jagua, it has a unique flavor.  its almost always used as a drink.

here is the simple recipe.

peel and remove seeds from few jagua fruit.
cut the jagua into slices. place in a pitcher or bottle.
add water and some sugar. cover up and wait.

you can let this steep over night, or a few days.  ( I prefer it strong with slight fermentation ) its almost
like a liqueur.

The plant has medicinal uses, and in South America the unripe fruit is used to make temporary tattoos like Henna, but can last weeks !

I may be wrong here, but isn't that the substance where hydroxycitric acid / HCA is extracted from to make diet pills? Garcinia cambogia being very high in the stuff and is extracted commercially from the rind.

Lots of stuff you could get,  many good ones mentioned, for example the bananas could be varieties you do not find in a store like manzano,   the Dragon fruit will fit easy in any yard, Miracle fruit is bush like, and another mango like Nam Doc Mai, , Lemon Zest, or Coconut cream.  put in a few Papaya trees.

@PJ its from Gillagan's own stock of radioactive seeds.

Citrus articulata  = African Cherry Orange, also known as Omuboro.

I have been trying to get seeds for this tree, its decreasing in numbers because the roots are used like Viagra in Africa.  Tradewind once had seeds available years ago, and has not put them on sale again.

I hope to go visit this April when i get back to the states. I was  there once, long long ago after hurricane Andrew also.

I think it will be great to take pictures of the trees with all the mangoes on them in the spring.

This is the reason i made the poll, this season I suspect those that have not tasted the CC will try one if they have a chance, and made the votes, changeable, so you can add what you know so far, and make changes later as more data comes in. we can do this with other mango varieties also.

According to the folks at Excalibur, CC is very productive, the tree looks pretty big also, i believe they told me it was only 5 years old, I maybe someone can correct me on that. if that's the case, looks like it will want to be a big tree.

Curious, Which seeds you sending to Malta? the climate there is rather cool, with temps similar to that of San Jose. CA.  Malta is the only place I have traveled to outside the New World.   Very little green there, its mostly a big rock in the Med. but I like the people there, and its an interesting culture. tons of history. I went there because of my interest in the ruins, cart ruts etc. 

Any Garcinia that finally flowers, is a cause for celebration!! congratz !

I finally edited and uploaded the footage, of the banana and plantains trees.

Enjoy:

Banana Trees