Growing true dates in South Florida

[adiel]

Is anyone growing true dates in South Florida?  I found this interesting article:

http://miami-dade.ifas.ufl.edu/pdfs/ornamental/ornamental_publications/growing-true-dates-in-south-florida.pdf

I am wondering if anyone has gotten some edible dates grown here.

[Jackfruitwhisperer69]

Hi Adiel,

I was sceptical at first since dates need a hot dry summer to ripen the fruit properly.

Looks like Halaway, Khadrawy and Kaktoon is tolerant of humidity and rain

Behide the Forum Madeira ''mall'' has atleast 20 mature date palms that produce huge amount's of fruit every year

Thanks for sharing

[FloridaGreenMan]

The are 3 fruiting date palms at our local library but the fruits just get fermented and are not edible. Too humid here I would assume.   

[FlyingFoxFruits]

let me know when u find a tree in FL capable of producing a marketable date fruit...we can split the fortune we will make being the only FL date growers....I'm counting on you.

[Jackfruitwhisperer69]

The are 3 fruiting date palms at our local library but the fruits just get fermented and are not edible. Too humid here I would assume.

FGM,
Are the date fruits seedless? Seedless fruit tend to ferment, whilst seeded fruit don't.

[FloridaGreenMan]

The are 3 fruiting date palms at our local library but the fruits just get fermented and are not edible. Too humid here I would assume.

FGM,
Are the date fruits seedless? Seedless fruit tend to ferment, whilst seeded fruit don't.

Not really sure if they are seedless but I will check the next time I find them on the ground.

[KarenRei]

Hmm... I've got dry air... maybe I should give it a shot if I can find a dwarf that makes good fruit...

(I guess I'm thinking about new plants a lot because I just rearranged my plants after repotting, stacking a lot more vertical, and now I've got all this extra floor space... though lol I know my existing plants will eventually eat it up)

[bsbullie]

Hmm... I've got dry air... maybe I should give it a shot if I can find a dwarf that makes good fruit...

(I guess I'm thinking about new plants a lot because I just rearranged my plants after repotting, stacking a lot more vertical, and now I've got all this extra floor space... though lol I know my existing plants will eventually eat it up)

The Phoenix palms that produce the dates are rather large (height wise and size of the crown).

[KarenRei]

Hmm... I've got dry air... maybe I should give it a shot if I can find a dwarf that makes good fruit...

(I guess I'm thinking about new plants a lot because I just rearranged my plants after repotting, stacking a lot more vertical, and now I've got all this extra floor space... though lol I know my existing plants will eventually eat it up)

The Phoenix palms that produce the dates are rather large (height wise and size of the crown).

You can get  "dwarf date palms" that are sold as houseplants around the US and as outdoor plants in warm places which have tiny, edible but insignificant fruit.  There has to be a middle ground...

Hmm, this true date palm looks reasonably short:



Quite a spread on that crown, though!  That'd look rather funny, taking up half my ceiling    Would need a massive pot, too.

[fyliu]

You also need a pollinator male if there aren't any nearby. I hear they produce better with manual pollination by growers. We have several places in Indio near Cochella that grow and sell dates. The Phoenix, AZ area is apparently also a good place to grow them. It seems like every CRFG member's garden has at least one fruiting.

I often see date palms around shopping malls as ornamentals. Too bad they're all going to waste.

[KarenRei]

You also need a pollinator male if there aren't any nearby. I hear they produce better with manual pollination by growers. We have several places in Indio near Cochella that grow and sell dates. The Phoenix, AZ area is apparently also a good place to grow them. It seems like every CRFG member's garden has at least one fruiting.

I often see date palms around shopping malls as ornamentals. Too bad they're all going to waste.

Hmm, probably impractical then.

[Frugivorous Hernan]

Hello Everyone,

First of all, I know there was already a thread about this here: http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=1841.msg25278#msg25278
I think there is still a lot more we can learn about having dates in Florida.

I am interested in having date palms and was wondering what classes of dates are possible in the soil of South Florida?

There are over 500 varieties of dates and I would think there is a lot of possibility for many of them to thrive in this location.

The more common varieties include Medjool, Deglet Noor, Khadrawy, Halawy, Zahidi, Barhi, Rutab, and many more.

The Middle East seems to be growing the majority of the world's dates since they are a fruit that like the climate of hot deserts.

States like Arizona and California also have a lot of date palms.

According to http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/morton/date.html#Climate
Dates require temperatures of 90 degrees and in South Florida it's mostly in the 80's. But maybe there are cultivars of date palms that can possibly flourish in Florida since every fruit requires dramatically different growing conditions.

Would like to hear any stories, advice, and experience of growing dates in South Florida.

[Cookie Monster]

Date palms like hot and DRY conditions. They do well in a desert environment (eg, inland california). Some will fruit here, but I've been told that they are not good.

[LEOOEL]

Frugivorous Hernan, great post, if there are 500 different Date Palm varieties, then the thing to do is to plant all 500 varieties in South Florida, USA, and see what happens. I've always lamented that Date Palms do not produce edible fruit here. Perhaps one day, University  of Florida graduates will solve this problem and we'll have edible fruit Date Palms here, just as they've done with (UF modified) Peaches.

[fruitlovers]

We have fruiting date palms here on dry side of island (west side), in driest part (Kawaihae). It never gets into the 90's there, so it's not true you need very high temperatures for fruit set. Ofcourse with higher temperatures you will get higher quality (sweeter) dates, but these were pretty decent, and highest temperatures there are in mid to high 80's.
Dates palms grow fine also on rainy side of island but fruits will rot in the rain. I've never heard of date fruitss that can withstand high rainfall, but that would be nice!

[jimisaac]

We tried several ways to plant and grow dates fruit but always ended up disappointed. I also consulted with https://coachellasbestdates.com/ where we purchase dates regularly.

[johnb51]

We tried several ways to plant and grow dates fruit but always ended up disappointed. I also consulted with https://coachellasbestdates.com/ where we purchase dates regularly.

In NJ??

[Francis_Eric]

Hi Adiel,

I was sceptical at first since dates need a hot dry summer to ripen the fruit properly.

Looks like Halaway, Khadrawy and Kaktoon is tolerant of humidity and rain

Behide the Forum Madeira ''mall'' has atleast 20 mature date palms that produce huge amount's of fruit every year

Thanks for sharing

New Orleans gets Humid, and they have dates
(tchoupitoulas street going toward uptown past Rouses grocery /Tipitina's)
4500 Tchoupitoulas St, New Orleans, LA 70115 (past Napoleon ave past storage unit)

Do you dry them I brought some back while air drying do not remember where I set them
thought they were a seed when found them.

[Galatians522]

I believe the solution lies in different cultural practices, not different cultivars. For American tastes, dates need to dehydrate on the tree. In actuality, the only part of the tree that needs to be kept dry is the ripening dates (nothing will dehydrate in the rain). Why can't we just bag the fruit cluster when the fruit reaches the appropriate stage and add a dessicant to the bag to absorb the extra humidity? Then the fruits can cure in a low humidity environment.

[Francis_Eric]

We tried several ways to plant and grow dates fruit but always ended up disappointed.

In NJ??

Maybe he tried Pygmy date palm

Do you guys in Northern Florida grow them ?

I did not know this , but walking around homestead Florida I saw What I looked up below
Phoenix reclinata (Senegal date palm ) and it was pretty flavorless
but I spat out because I didn;t know what it was

Hawthorn is pretty bland (mexican) tejocote )
if you make it in boiling pot with a some sugar brings out the flavor to me better then apple juice.
 (like apple with Vanilia added)

I hope someone could try boiling some in water and tell me if it tastes good after adding sugar
(I went in 1 /18 2020  I think do those ripen then

what does it matter to me so I am not going to look into it, but
I looked up Phoenix genus for the tropics and saw this 


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_reclinata

Phoenix reclinata (reclinata - Latin, reclining),
the wild date palm or Senegal date palm, is a species of flowering plant in the palm family native to tropical Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, Madagascar and the Comoro Islands.

 Any hybrids between the edible, and this you know of? (I looked at palmpedia didn;t see any)

[Galatians522]

In my experience the trees grow fine--except when they get Phoenix Palm Decline and all the thin fleshed species of date ripen fine. We just have too much humidity to cure the thick fleshed ones. Even the thick fleshed ones are ok until the start to cure. I have eaten a couple crisp (when still astringent) like they do in some countries, but they would not be popular at that stage in the US.

[Galatians522]

After some research, I have concluded that mature dates can be ripened off the tree through freezing, thawing, and dehydrating. It produces an "acceptable" quality product, but is not as high a quality as tree ripened dates. Apparently, dates are frequently cured off the tree (using this and other methods) in humid parts of India. I thought this might be helpful to someone interested in getting edible dates from a tree in Florida.