The Tropical Fruit Forum

Wow this was in a 20gal until April I put it in a 35gal.  Look at that root growth!  I don't think these are viable in containers long term.  This is the end for this one, it has been replaced by an airlayer-child to conserve space.

My soursop tree finally set a fruit.  It isn't all that large so I am not sure if it is just a small fruit or if it is still expanding.  It is firm and has no smell yet.  Can I just wait for it to become soft or fall off the tree?  Or it needs to be picked hard and counter ripened?

Inside my greenhouse where there is no wind, I found my rollinia tree fell over.  I know annonas seem to have more shallow roots than some other types but this was a surprise.  I hadn't paid much attention to it in a while but I guess it grew so many new leaves in the past week or two it fell over from their weight.  This tree was nearly bare not long ago after spider mites ravaged it.



I got some help righting it until I can get a better look at it in daylight

I live in the upper native range of paw-paw trees, though I have never seen one and my uncle who is an amateur orchardist says he's never seen one either.  I ordered ten 1yo trees and twenty seeds.  I planted most of the saplings randomly out in the woods and around a stream to see if any survive.  I also started germinating the seeds with great results so far. 

I am thinking of planting two in my yard near my other temperate stone fruit trees.  Any idea how long these take to reach maturity?  They seem like they must be slow growing as the 1yo trees I got are quite small compared to 1yo cherimoya trees I've grown myself.  Also, can they take 100% full sun?

Forty days ago I did a bunch of loquat grafts to topwork my established Christmas loquat tree, and it looks like many of them took.  I wrapped the cleft graft unions with what I think is PE tape, and I believe this tape does not breathe at all.  Should I unwrap all of the grafts now to let them breathe and avoid mold/rot, or is that unnecessary?  Or... am I more likely to be harming them in doing this as they could still risk drying out?  The scions have not pushed new growth yet but they look nice and healthy and I have pruned back some of the parent tree branches. 

I had never attempted air-layering / marcotting before, but I have done cleft grafting and rooting many times.  I was reading about marcotting and watching some videos and it seems odd to me that the leaves on the selected branch are left on.  I always remove all or nearly all leaves when rooting of grafting to keep them from drying out. 

After the bark (w/ phloem) is removed, isn't marcotting functionally the same as rooting?  Or is the wood (xylem) still transporting water into the branch and is this the reason marcotting is superior to cutting the limb off entirely and rooting it? 

I just attempted this on my ice cream bean tree and I must admit I feel like the girdled branch is going to just wilt completely by tomorrow because these things are so thirsty.  I can't imagine it is uptaking any significant amount of moisture from the peat bag/wrapping.

Sorry if this seems like such a basic question but I found a million guides on grafting but none went into any detail about *why* it is done this way.

My only loquat is Christmas and it always blooms a ton, is very healthy, yet produces fewer than three fruits per crop for the past couple years.  While reading about it on this forum I have found a number of comments describing the same behavior.  Should I just give up on it?  Or try a cross-pollinator?  Now that the recent blooms are falling off on mine I have only spotted one fruitlet so far with hundreds of blooms.  Now, mine is in a greenhouse with no pollinating insects so that could certainly be a factor, but it has bloomed outside the greenhouse also and same result.

Here are some of the anecdotes I gathered, though there were an equal number of posters saying good things about the variety:

Loquats are very cold tolerant. I had a Christmas in the ground that survived subzero fahrenheit for multiple nights in a row. It'd flowered every year but could not hold fruit so I chopped it. I have a bunch of seedlings growing in the same spot right now from fruits I'd purchased over the Summer. They have already endured low 30s so far with absolutely no problem.

I have a Christmas, and it flowers profusely but has not set fruit in 3 years. The first year it was in a container and it had lots albeit small fruit but now it blooms and the blooms die. I don't know if it needs cross pollination or if it's self compatible or if I need more bees. It's a cute little tree but I don't plant for ornamental value.

Mine is only a couple years old but same story - it has flowered profusely twice now and not set a single fruit. It's in a full sun spot so not sure what the story is. Both of us in Coral Springs too.

Kaz and some others have many varieties of loquat and didn't mention any issues with fruit set.  I wonder if Christmas simply needs a cross pollinator to be productive?   Not sure if SirGraftalot, gnappi and savemejebus have other types nearby.

I noticed this has two flower buds today.  I am not certain that this is actually uvaria chamae as the "uvaria rufa" seeds I got from the same seller (Tradewinds) at the same time turned out to be cattley guava.  It does look right for uvaria genus, though.  Once the flowers open it should be a bit more clear.  I have read that they are very fragrant but I don't smell anything yet.

The tree itself is nearly 2yo from seed, not super healthy but it is doing okay.  I think I am giving it too much water for its slow growth rate.  I'm not sure if it should really be holding fruit at all, I will probably cut any fruit off this time if it forms.

from this thread in the Buy/Sell section: https://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=52302.0

Anybody's cuttings sprout yet?

Can anyone think of any fruit trees discussed here that could be injured from brief exposure to temps 40-45F (4.5-7.2C)?

I am starting to bring my most cold sensitive plants into the greenhouse as lows are now in the 40s.

I'm aware of mangosteen and cherapu, durian, plus the various soapberries that are known to be completely intolerant of cold.  I believe the other garcinias commonly available are fine until 30s.   Any artocarpus this sensitive?  Syzgiums?  Pouterias?

The only thing questionable I could think of that I actually have outside right now is spanish lime and malay apple, which I just brought in.  The "ultra tropicals" I have never leave the greenhouse. 

Edit- cacao too

I was always interested in this fruit but had never seen it available for sale.  I bought a grafted hermaphrodite tree but it is painfully slow growing, and I'm not confident it will ever make it to fruiting.  The other day I noticed Lara Farms is selling the fruit so I ordered a box, and it just arrived today.  They seem very fresh.

It tastes nice.  As described, there is little flesh but what there is is juicy and sweet, and adheres to the large seed.  The taste reminds me more of soursop than citrus lime, and the experience of trying to get the flesh off the seed was much like eating soursop for me. 

If you bite into the fruit with the skin on there is a slight pressure inside that easily splits the skin like an egg and it comes right off.  I would say eating a bowlful of them is about the same effort as eating cherries, maybe a little more work.

I'm really happy I got to try them.  They seem like they would be a nice novelty tree to grow, especially if a single hermaphrodite tree can fruit in a container at a reasonably small size (no idea if this is actually possible).  I don't think I would bother trying to grow a big tree with a large amount of them, though. 

they still have more if anyone is interested, $9/lb for 5lbs:  https://larafarmsmiami.com/products/mamoncillo-aka-guenip-aka-spanish-lime

I got one of these plants as a small seedling (or it might have been a rooted cutting) around this time in 2021.  I put it in a container in my greenhouse and over the winter its roots had broken through the pot down into the ground and it started growing rapidly.  In spring it had started vining, climbing up my greenhouse wall.  It started flowering around this time, too, and set at couple of fruit clusters.  By mid spring I had pulled all the container plants out of my greenhouse but I left this one as it was creating some shade in the greenhouse which was nice in the hot sun.  In summer I found the fruits from earlier had dried out and become "nuts".  I opened them up, the nuts are shaped flying saucer candy.  I roasted them a bit in the oven and they taste nice.  Not quite as good as true peanuts, but I would definitely eat a bag of them if available. 

Over the summer the vine has become massive and covered a third of the greenhouse wall.  It grows like wild grape.  It put out thousands and thousands of flowers but almost no fruit set.  I assume because there are few pollinating insects in my greenhouse, I'm not sure if it would also benefit from cross-pollination. 

It seems like a good crop if you have the right environment and land.  I have read that farmers let it grow and mostly ignore it, and then come back later and cut the whole thing down and harvest thousands of dried pods at once.  Definitely not a good fit for a northern greenhouse, though.  It was getting big enough to crowd out my other trees and not producing food, and not terribly attractive looking.  I cut it all out and only found a few more pods on the entire thing. 

I had planted a cutting in spring and it seems to root easily, btw. 

this image was right when it started climbing, it was ten times this size by the time I cut it down a few months later


fresh green nuts


dried edible nuts



I cut it all out