The Tropical Fruit Forum

It looks really nice to have a setup with the birds and sitting space. I have too many exhaust fans so animals are a no go for me. yeah it’s pretty tight, only 225 sq ft so I pack as much in as I can. I did have to room to fit a hammock which I used during lockdown.

They all stay inside all summer, I’ve figured out how to keep the temps under 86F even when it’s 100F and sunny.

I’m still trying to figure out how to perfect the humidity for mangos (too dry mildew to wet ancathranose). I also think I need to make a mini greenhouse for rambutan, lanzone/Landsat sand mangosteen as I think they need even more consistent high humidity to grow well they look a little sad. I also use digital Controllers for the humidity and they always seem to break after 18 months which makes it hard or delicate plants.

I’m also trying to find out how to get enough chill hours near the windows to grow dwarf nectarines 800h. I can’t get low chill cultivars in canada. I get enough for feijoias 150? and did peaches (400) one year before I got ultra tropicals and had to turn the heat up a bit. I’m hoping the mini greenhouse will let me turn down the winter temps to save power and get more chill.

Yeah I’m not sure if organic are the way to go. Somethings seem to produce well, others not so much. I think I’ve finally figured out the climate control (sort of). Now working on pests, soil and fertilization. The problem is I don’t know any other people trying this stuff up North so I don’t know if I just suck at growing certain things or if they just take a while to produce. Be warned I have a high electricity bill but hydroelectric power here is abundant and we actually have a surplus.

Have u ever tasted the fruit?

Tropicaltoba, i dont really feed my fish, i keep goldfish and some native species, which i want to replace with goldfish ultimately. I have bought 1 goldfish feed this summer, very small quantity and that was all i fed them the whole summer. I dont usually feed them becouse i have introduced river crustaceans,  dunno which species but are very small and have a stable poppulation of theese. I also have dragonfly larvae ,some stranje muck worms that show themselves trough the muck , and all other kinds of nasties.
My ponds are not heavily stocked with fish, so what in there naturally is sufficient at this point.
For the mosquitos i dont really know if the ponds are making a dent in the poppulation, i have never seen a flock of musquitos like flying above them. Ive seen them laying eggs on the water's surface, and i do have a substantial amount of mosquitos in the yard in spring and early summer, BUT at that time wherever i go there are awlays alot of mosquitos, forests are the worst place to go with summer outfit lol. 
Ive red there are some biological means of controlling mosquitos in ponds that do work, i just let mine run as naturally as possible, i will possibly get more goldfish this summer, this should help with their control.
Also if you make a pond u can add a strong watterfal or some kind of watter aggitation device, mosquito hate moving highly oxigenated water.
Sintetic ferts, i use whatever i get my hands on..npk ones, micronutrient ones, i found a hidroponic store where they offer some stuff that is usually hard to find here, like terra aquatica brand along others. I also use kristalon, which i think does a good job.
Here are both of them right now.

Super cool. Really jealous. Gonna have to convince the wife to allow to expand my ridiculous hobbies.

Quote from: Tropicaltoba on January 25, 2023, 07:51:00 PM

Also when do I eat it?

I ate my scarlettes when they were red, heavy, chunky, juicy and big.    For black varieties, it should be totally black, I guess...

I was tempted to wait till it fell off the tree. Would it be spoiled by then?

Also when do I eat it?

Just got my first fruit 2 days ago. I used 40%peat potting mix, 40% pine bark, 10% vermicompost and 10% alfalfa meal.

Do you make your own emulsion? I too am curious where u get the crickets.

Maybe treat it as a concentrate, mix w water to experiment with? I think the only real way to tell would be an EC reader, not sure about the leachates maybe cheesecloth would work? I figure they're probably way smaller than that though

I've never heard of bokashi but after reading up on it sounds really interesting!

I keep a fishtank so all of the dirty water goes directly to the plants instead of down the drain, I have a compost bin going but I'm new to it all so idk how good I did, tried to do the whole browns to greens ratio but It's hard to say if it was done right

I do use an ec meter for my fertigation (add small amounts of liquid fertillizer every time I water my small container fruit trees) and try to adjust it based on some salinity tolerate tables I found, but I’m not sure how that translates to organic fertilizer as there is hardly any sodium
Or chloride in it.

I've done the same in the past-

Bokashi is great for composting on a small scale to produce liquid feritlizers

As tru said unless you have the same inputs to the bin, the leachate will always be a bit of a moving target but in general a dilution of 1:100 will be good for almost all applications

Really heavy feeders like some species of cactus can take it straight

What are your toxicity concerns?

(freshwater aquarium water changes are an amazing liquid fertilizer, I would like to begin experimenting with a protein skimmer from reef aquariums as well)

I’ve done a bit of reading that suggests there could be around 1-2% alcohol (my fruit waste probably turns into kombucha) and that if left to air 50% will evaporate over 5 days.

Hello from Canada,
I have a small tropical container tree greenhouse and have been working on trying to grow fruit which aren’t available (or poor quality) this far North. I’ve had the greenhouse for almost 6 years and tried many experiments with climate control as well as sustainable homemade fertilizers and pesticide free insect control. I joined this forum trying to see if there are other weirdos like me who have ideas/solutions that I haven’t thought about yet.

So far I’ve been able to fruit yellow dragon fruit, feijoia, peaches, guava, jaboticaba, namwah banana, Longan, passion fruit, sugar apple, lemon/limes.

My failures include trying to control scale with predatory bugs, mango (just ate my first one but have killed 10 trees) lychee and sweet oranges.

Hoping to exchange ideas and gain some wisdom.

Take care,
Al

New to the forum but I’ve tried pirate bugs with a lot of success. I know “organic” can get kind goofy  but It’s really cool, they will actually go and stab (for sport) the thrips like a rhino with their horn. They actually kill more then they eat. I’ve used them along with purple flash pepper plants (nice looking perpetually blooming shade tolerant ornamental) as a banker plant. The thrips also attack the pepper flowers instead and the pirate bugs can use the pepper pollen as a food source if there are not bugs left to eat.

Yep, what u looking for?