another precocious Eugenia - sp. "Pitangão Amarelo da Unicamp"

[brian]

Anybody else get this from BellamyTrees or AndersonTropicals when it showed up in 2022?  I bought two seeds from Kameron in Aug2022, both sprouted into healthy trees and are now pushing their first flower buds.  18mo from seed to flowering is pretty quick.  They both have long spindly growth with the longest branches about 3ft, but not bushy at all.  I figure I will paintbrush cross-pollinate them  to boost fruiting odds and if I'm lucky get to try the fruit this season

There's a thread with some more info on this, I guess there was some argument about it being Burkartiana vs this type.  https://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=53455.0

I'll post some more updates if these flowers turn into fruit.

seller description is:

"Eugenia sp. "Pitangão Amarelo da Unicamp" is a small tree that is native to the understory of the Semideciduous Seasonal Forest, Ombrophylous Forest, and Mixed Ombrophylous Forest in Brazil. It can reach a height of 3-5 meters in the semideciduous forest and 10 meters in the rainforest.

The fruit is very tasty and resembles the taste of Acerola, but sweeter and more pleasant; has a great amount of pulp that can be used to make juices, ice cream, and jellies. The tree is small and can be cultivated as an ornamental, to attract bees, birds, and wild animals. Fruiting occurs from October to November."

Both of my trees look like this now:



Here's the seller fruit photo:

[roblack]

Nice, and congratulations! Hope you get to try it soon, and report back =)

Mine is a bit smaller, maybe next year.

I have 3 "e. burkartianas," and 1 Unicamp; pretty sure they are different species. The 3 burks all look the same, and from 2 different sources.

[Timbogrow]

That's cool Brian! I have 2 of those and 3 burkartiana. They are both easy to differentiate. Hope you get to test the fruit!

[elouicious]

Nice Brian! some of these will make for great interplantings or groundcovers in a food forest

[nullzero]

Looks great, I have some doing well but I'm a year behind yours Brian. Is anyone growing Eugenia sp. BIG from wildlands is it the same as Eugenia sp. Big Una from Bellamy?

[Giant Gecko]

Wow that is fast for a Eugenia!

[W.]

I also have two plants that I bought from BellamyTrees at about the same time. Mine are smaller and have yet to show any signs of flowering, though I know now to keep an eye on them.

[Fruit Jungle]

My 2 are the same age. If I knew they flowered so soon, I would have kept them in bigger pots. Very healthy species, easy to grow, hope to plant out soon. I really think this species could become naturalized here in south florida.

[Timbogrow]

-1 for me unless it comes back. Damn raccoons/squirrels need dealing with. It chewed it down to the roots and dug up the soil. Then ruined a nice sapodilla. That was my last straw with their greedy selfish attitude. Definitely was one of my favorite plants.

[brian]

-1 for me unless it comes back. Damn raccoons/squirrels need dealing with. It chewed it down to the roots and dug up the soil. Then ruined a nice sapodilla. That was my last straw with their greedy selfish attitude. Definitely was one of my favorite plants.

Ouch, that sucks.  I am thankful for the red fox population here keeps the squirrels down, but deer wreck my in-ground orchard trees every year. 

[brian]

No fruit set on either tree, unfortunately, but they are growing happily and I hope for another chance in the upcoming spring.  A number of my other uncommon eugenias put out flowers but no fruit set this spring/summer also, I figure I'll update when they actually set fruit instead of celebrating flowers.

I just up-potted this one

[NateTheGreat]

How are these doing Brian? Could we see how the trees look?

I have three small ones, from plants from Bellamy in Feb 2024. They seem pretty delicate and slow-growing so far, not what I was expecting. I thought this was like the yellow-fruited uniflora species, but the plant seems quite different from uniflora.

[brian]

I'll post some pictures today.  I think they are flowing again but still no fruits have set since I last posted.  I guess precocious flowering is meaningless if they don't fruit easily

[brian]

Here's the larger one.  It is still very leggy with long windy branches.  It does have a lot of flowers now, I just touched them all to see if that helps it set fruit.

[brian]

Finally a fruit set, hopefully it holds to maturity

[daisyguy]

I'm along for the ride. I have 4 of these purchased as seeds in late 2022 and they all flowered this spring, but only the largest one seems to have set any fruit.

[BloomAndSprout]

Edit: skimmed too fast, off topic, admin please delete

[brian]

I'm along for the ride. I have 4 of these purchased as seeds in late 2022 and they all flowered this spring, but only the largest one seems to have set any fruit.

Alright!  hope it's good

[Jaboticaba45]

Look forward to hearing about this one

Best to keep expectations low lol
Would be cool to be preseantly surprised

[SouthBayHapaJoe]

I have three trees that came directly from Helton’s Farm. Two of them defoliated late this winter and now flowering profusely.  The third didn’t defoliate and just starting to show signs of flowers. 

[brian]

I'm hoping my first fruit is just a weird runt, because it looks... quite different than expected.  Usually runts from orange colored fruits turn yellow then orange, but this one seems to be turning purple/black.  It has a ton of flowers still, and I have another one the same size, so I expect I'll get more fruit soon enough to see if any turn out right.



seller photos (multiple sellers have this, all using same photos)

[brian]

you know what, that might just be sunburn from coming out of the greenhouse. Only the top is purple, the other side is bright green.   And there's another bright green fruit the same size so I should find out soon enough!

[daisyguy]

It's been 2 months since flowers and fruits are still developing. My other fruiting eugenias (surinam, cherry-of-the-rio-grande, grumichama) went from flower to fruit in a month.

[brian]

Yeah the fruits on mine have barely expanded since I posted two weeks ago.  I guess these are slow developing

[FlyingFoxFruits]

kinda tastes like carrot pitomba and pitanga

maybe this is same as what yall are talking bout