Hello everyone,

Grafted mangoes grow very slowly for me here in San Diego so I would like to try my hand at growing some good tasting varieties of polyembryonic mangoes such as Nam Doc Mai and any other that are considered as a good quality mango.  I would of course re-emburse you for shipping or I can swap you for some Dragon Fruit cuttings.  Thanks in advance!

Simon

Hello everyone,

I'm looking for mango scions to graft onto my Manilla Mango tree. I already have Alphonso, Glenn, Maha Chanok and Lemon Zest. I'm looking for any named cultivar that I don't currently have that is considered good tasting. The varieties I'm really trying to get a hold of is: Coconut Cream, PPK, Edward, Kent and Carrie but I would gladly take any good tasting variety. I have Glenn, Alphonso and Manilla mango scions to swap. I also have Simons purple, American Beauty, Halley's Comet, yellow dragon and Frankie's Red dragon fruit to trade. I live in Southern California. Thanks in advance!
Simon

Hello everyone,

I would like to know what is considered the best tasting Soursop variety? I would like to grow a plant for the leaves but I might as well try to grow the best tasting variety I can find.

I've done a little googling and have read contradicting reports as to whether or not soursop can be grafted onto Cherimoya rootstock. If soursop can be grafted onto cherimoya rootstock, it may enable me to grow it outdoors. I can successfully grow mango, papaya, banana and miraclefruit outside without any protection here in San Diego. Does anyone know of any success stories growing Soursop in Southern California?

I would really appreciate any tips and recommendations regarding selection and growing of Soursop. Thanks in advance!
Simon

Hello everyone,

Lychees grow pretty slowly for me in San Diego and I remember that Bernie Dizon was an advocate for multiple rootstock technology for Mangoes, Durian and other tropical fruit.  I was wondering if anyone has any thoughts on wether or not giving my Lychee trees multiple rootstocks will help to increase their rate of growth?  Actually, would it even be worth trying?  I've read somewhere that different varieties of Lychees have different numbers of chromosomes which can make it difficult to graft.  To get around this, some people recommend planting the seed from the tree you want to graft and then grafting onto this grown out rootstock.  My problem is that I cannot get fruit from the varieties I want so I will not be able to match the chromosome numbers unless I get lucky and they happen to be the same. 

I have a Salathiel Lychee, which from what I have read, is a slow grower.  I would like to push its growth by planting random Lychee seeds(whatever I can find in the stores) at the base of my Lychee tree and then topping the seedling when it gets about 1 foot tall and inserting the toppless seedling into the slipping bark of my Salathiel.  I would really appreciate it if anyone has any advice or suggestion to increase the rate of growth of Lychees.  I already fertilize my Lychee trees on a regular basis with Fish Emulsion, Kelp emulsion, Rock dust and occasionally with some iron.  I also inoculated my soil with redworm and mycorrhizal fungi and beneficial bacteria.  I occasionally foliar feed with very diluted liquid fertilizers. 

I'm trying to think outside the box to push the growth of my Lychee trees and nutrition doesn't seem to be the limiting factor.  The dry winds here in San Diego do major damage on my Lychee leaves and the chemicals they put in our tap doesn't seem to help either.  I believe the rate of growth is limited by the number of leaves it has(wind or lack of), nutrition, humidity, moisture, amount of sunlight and average temperature.  I may go so far as to experiment with growing Lychees in a Hydroponic setup in order to increase ambient humidity, the amount of light it gets, the temperature and also to negate the affects of wind.  If anyone has any suggestions however crazy it may sound, please share.  Thanks in advance!
Simon

Hello everyone,

Just wanted to let everyone know that they are selling Mango Nectar made with Alphonso Mangos at Costco in San Diego, not sure about Florida.  I personally like Alphonso Mangos but many people that I have talked to do not like the strong almost metallic or pine sol aroma of this variety of mango.  I will report back on how it tastes after I open the bottle.  The Mango Nectar comes in a 1 gallon container.  I really want to open the bottle to give it a taste but my refrigerator is packed and I can't down 1 gallon of nectar in one sitting.  Cheers,

Simon

Hello everyone, I am looking for giant Yellow Dragonfruit cuttings.  I'm not even sure if anyone has this variety but it is just like the normal Yellow Dragonfruit (S. Megalanthus) but the fruit is about 3-4 times the size.  I tried this dragonfruit in Hong Kong and it was really tasty.  I'm hoping that someone is growing this variety in the US.  I'm not even sure what the Genus/Species is for the giant Yellow DF but the fruit is just about identical to the smaller ones we get here.  The tastes of the giant Yellow DF is just about identical from what I remember, it was extremely sweet, almost syrupy but it was very tasty.  If you are growing this and have a cutting for trade of for sale, I would be very interested.  I am also looking for any information on how to grow both the regular Yellow Dragonfruit and also the giant Yellow DF.  Thanks in advance!

Simon

Hello everyone,

I was just wondering if anyone here has tasted Salathiel Lychee? I'm especially interested in how it compares to Kaimana. I saw a video on YouTube that shows the fruit and it looks like an awesome cultivar. I noticed that in the video, the fruit is extremely dry when the skin is broken. This feature reminds me of No Mai Tsze, my favorite cultivar. I've read that some people have suggested that Salathiel is a seedling of NMT and still others feel that Salathiel is NMT. Thanks for any information you can provide.
Simon

Hello everyone, I was wondering what is considered the best tasting passionfruit that we can find in the US?  I recently picked up some purple passionfruit from the farmers market and gave it a try and thought they were extremely delicious.  They had an intoxicating aroma and were kinda sweet with a lot of acidity.  Some of the more wrinkled fruit were quite sweet but I have a really bad sweet tooth and prefer extremely sweet fruit.  I am also growing miracle fruit at home and when I tried the Passionfruit after taking a Miracle Fruit, OMG, freaking amazing!!!

I'm serious everyone, if you have not tried passionfruit with miraclefruit, you have to put this on your "to do" list, ASAP!!!  OK, now I'm going off on a tangent but I have to also mention that I grow strawberries in my backyard but I rarely get any fruit because birds and insects always eat the ripe red strawberries before I can get to them.  After taking a miracle fruit, I decided to try some of my strawberries that were white but with just a hint of pink/red on them and they were absolutely amazing!!!  With miracle fruit, I can harvest my strawberries when they are fully sized and just starting to turn color.  This way, I can avoid competition with birds and insects and I assume they will also last a lot longer in the refrigerator.

OK, to get back on track, I am looking for what you consider the best tasting Passionfruit that we can get(Plants) in the US.  I would like a variety that is excellent eating quality out of hand without the use of miracle fruit, so, something that is already sweet and flavorful, ideally self fruitful.  I would also like another variety and it is ok if this variety is a little more sour and I am ok with hand pollinating this second variety.  I know pretty much nothing about passionfruit so any information you can give will be greatly appreciated including links and contacts to where I might find some of these suggested varieties. 

I did a little google search and realize that many passionfruit varieties are self incompatible.  From my searches, I have also found that the common P edulis is highly recommended for its full flavor, ease of care and also production.  The other variety that gets a lot of good reviews is the Sweet Lilikoi, I believe this is P. flavicarpa?  Other species that get mentioned quite a bit are P. maliformis- sweet; maracuja-concoction of leaves can make you sleepy; ligularis-sweet, low acidity; quadrangularis?  Thanks in advance for your help!
Simon

Hello everyone, I'm looking for good tasting polyembryonic mango seeds. I live in San Diego and will be happy to pay for shipping and your time. Thanks in advance.
Simon

Hello everyone, I was wondering what other mango varieties taste like Kent? Quang from Ongs nursery mentioned that Kent doesn't grow very fast here in San Diego. My friend that lives down the street from me had a small kent growing and it is not doing very well. It could be that he is not taking good care of his trees but I wanted to know what other options I have for mangoes that taste similar or better than Kent. Thanks in advance!
Simon

Hello everyone,

I have two Solo Papaya plants that I planted last year and they are flowering(one female, one herm) right now but I heard that the fruit doesn't really sweeten up here in Southern California.  I like sweet fruit and will probably pull out the two papayas if they will not sweeten up here with our weather.  Do you think my papayas will ripen and sweeten up here in San Diego or am I going to get bland tasting fruit?  Thanks for your help!
Simon

Hey everyone, I though there was already a poll on everyone's favorite mango but I wasn't able to find it so I decided to run another poll.  Please select your one favorite mango from the list.  I purposely left out many of the newer varieties since it will take several years of evaluation to get a good idea of how they actually taste.  Thanks for participating!
Simon

In an effort to try and improve the growth rate of my Lychee plants, I started to wonder if Lychees can be grafted onto Longan.  I did a google search and found this
http://chestofbooks.com/gardening-horticulture/fruit/Tropical-And-Subtropical-Fruits/Litchi-Propagation.html .  Higgin's has supposedly crown grafted Lychee onto Longan and even more exciting is that he observed that the stock appeared to show influence on the Lychee scion and produced more rapid growth than Lychee growing on its own rootstock.  Higgin's also noted that in some cases, the grafted Lychee foliage seems to undergo a change!

The increased growth rate is very exciting and the changes in the foliage may be beneficial if the Longan can impart its wind tolerance to the Lychee.  If the grafted Lychee does show some Longan characteristics, I wonder if it will affect the characteristics of the fruit as well, which can be a bad thing. 

Has anyone attempted to graft Lychee onto Longan?  I will be planting some Lychee seeds this year in hopes that I can innarch the seedlings onto my named cultivars to produce multiple rootstock Lychees.
Simon