How's Your SoCal Lychee and Longan Trees Doing This Year?

[Eggo]

Xshen, Boxturtle, for those of you in SoCal how does Sri Champoo longans do for you?  Do you get fruits?  I had been growing Edaw and Sri Champoo for over 17 years.  They flower but hold few fruits and the fruits held never really develops to full size or flavor vs the Kohalas.  I could say I never had a single decent fruit, lol.  I know they are the real deal as i got it directly from the gentlemen out in Forida that first introduce it from Thailand, his name slips my mind right now.  I've began top working them the last few years.

I'm so jealous of those lychee on longan rootstocks I'm hoping I could have some success this year with mine.

[xshen]

Chompoo does well for me. It fruited almost every year except for last year when it had a major pruning. Have you tried fertilizing with bloom booster in late spring?

[boxturtle]

Xshen

I hope so last year we had similar blooms but experienced alot of fruit drops even with good size fruits.  This year I'm going to hit it with some espsom and gypsum

Eggo

Mine was an airlayer I put in ground about 5 years ago.  It fruited two years ago for the first time.  And then I had to do heavy pruning so last season it didn't bloom.  The fruit I had was excellent quality! Good size fruit, crunchy  aromatic flesh thats sweet but not overly sweet. Seeds were medium size not as small as pepper seed longan but taste way better.  Biew keiw fruit was similiar but if i had to have only one it would be the Sri Chompoo.  Fruit is yummy and you get the scarlet red flush. 

[Eggo]

I haven't tried fertilizing with bloom booster.  I had also grafted it to one branch of a productive kohala seedling but alas never produce a decent fruit.  But by this point it may too late for me. Not much of the original tree left.  I may try to source one elsewhere, could be just what I have.  Always wanted to taste it and to see the red blush on the fruit.

[Eggo]

Getting back on topic my longans are barely pushing out what may look like a mix of blooms and leaves but still too early to tell.

Emperor lychees has no blooms but just leaves.  However, they bear in alternate years for me. Last year I had my most productive Emperor lychee crop.  Nice golf ball size fruits.  However, they are more sweet tangy compared to other lychee.

My seedling lychee is in full bloom.  Here's a current pic.  It fruited for the first time in 2020.  The fruits are delicious. It's the dry flesh type that doesnt leak juice.  I'm looking forward to the fruits again.

[fruit4me]

Eggo
Your seedling lychee looks beautiful 😍.  What you gonna name it? Does it have a small seed? How's the aroma and flavor like?

[Eggo]

lol, it shall remain nameless for now ahah.  My nose ain't that great so I don't recall any significant aroma.  It was sweet but my favorite part was that it was a dry type flesh that didn't leak juice. Some of the fruits had a full seed and some chicken tongue.  I really liked it but I only have tasted the following varieties, Brewster, Mauritius, Sweetheart, and Emperor.

[xshen]

Getting back on topic my longans are barely pushing out what may look like a mix of blooms and leaves but still too early to tell.

Emperor lychees has no blooms but just leaves.  However, they bear in alternate years for me. Last year I had my most productive Emperor lychee crop.  Nice golf ball size fruits.  However, they are more sweet tangy compared to other lychee.

My seedling lychee is in full bloom.  Here's a current pic.  It fruited for the first time in 2020.  The fruits are delicious. It's the dry flesh type that doesnt leak juice.  I'm looking forward to the fruits again.

How long did it take for this to start flowering?

[Eggo]

Over 15 years, lol. 

[fruit4me]

Have a few bunches of off season Chuleon fruits. Taste pretty good, only problem is too many cracks. Good news is, it's blooming again.  That means more fruit by October

[xshen]

Have a few bunches of off season Chuleon fruits. Taste pretty good, only problem is too many cracks. Good news is, it's blooming again.  That means more fruit by October

Off-season longans sounds really good. I wonder if the mild winter is causing Chu Leon to flower all year. I regret cutting their flowers last winter

[Seanny]

Brewster, Hak Ip, and Emperor are blooming here.

[fruit4me]

Currently still have some fruits and blooming at the same time.  Guess can call this Everbearing Chuleon

[sc4001992]

Wow, fruit4me, that Chuleon is impressive. My Sak Ip from xshen is growing super well. Last year I had fruits and they were good size fruit bundle on my grafted tree.

How is the taste of Chuleon?

[fruit4me]

Chuleon is as good as Sakip in flavor. But, Sakip is still the all around winner because its a stronger grower and the fruits are slightly sweeter. The flesh on Chuleon is very crisp, sweet, and with strong  aroma. But, the tree is a little  harder to grow. The fruits tend to crack more than others. It's  always  blooming when you don't want it to.

[sc4001992]

fruit4me,

Ok, thanks for this info, I better start grafting more of my Sakip this season so I can convert most of my Kohala trees into the Sakip trees next year.

[beicadad]

My sweetheart lychee had a huge bloom last year but has only vegetative growth this year.

I just watched some videos from chinese growers. For certain varieties with dense flowers they thin the flower clusters twice, once when the cluster is about 3 inches and once after male flowers start to bloom. Thinning can be done hand or by spraying. For those varieties of you don’t thin flowers the tree would use so much nutrients in blooming which leads to insufficient  female flowers and poor fruit set.

I think sweetheart lychee fits this category of lychees - my tree sends out super dense flower clusters, and at least in California they seem to have poor production. I will adopt that method in the future

[Seanny]

Do you have a diagram of how to thin?

[beicadad]

Do you have a diagram of how to thin?

Check this out
https://youtu.be/mpaG-GC3p5w

[sc4001992]

Ken, nice video. The hand thnning method can probably be used on loquats and avocados if you don't have a pruner. I like to use the hand pruner to thin any fruits that have to many flower. I don't ever thin my large Brewster tree and it has many fruits but I do notice it drops more than half of the small flowers before the fruits sets.

[sc4001992]

Anyone eating longan fruits in SoCal?

My trees had good fruit set, but the fruits never turns brown so I decided to pick them. They taste good, flesh to seed ratio is not good, but many fruits. It is supposed to be Kohala. I'll add some photos later today.

[spaugh]

My longans seem to take longer than lychee to get ripe.  Last year it was October into December for longans. 

[sc4001992]

Here's the photos of my Kohala fruits I picked. Just doesn't turn nice brown color like Chuleon or the ones I see at the store.

[Seanny]

Look good!

My trees flowered well but bare now.
Only 1 longan fruit.
0 lychee fruit.

[sc4001992]

Yeah, my large lychee tree had no fruits this year, must be alternate bearing or I just put to many air layers on the branches.