The Tropical Fruit Forum

Yeah that doesn't look right. Why would it be 5/8/9... and not 5/6/7/8/9...? It looks like they're native to the mountainous southern China and northern Vietnam at around 850m. From what I've read that area doesn't get that cold, probably somewhere around -2 C or so annual low. From what I've read loquat (japonica) grows in Seattle, but only sometimes sets fruit there, and that's 8b, almost 9a. If I were you, I'd be looking for one with a native range farther north. Seems like Eriobotrya hookeriana or Eriobotrya petiolata might have potential, as they're from the eastern Himalayas. I see hookeriana is reported to grow in a city called Trongsa. From the climate data there: https://weatherspark.com/y/111894/Average-Weather-in-Trongsa-Bhutan-Year-Round it looks like they dip into the teens (F), so maybe like -8C? It can probably take a bit below that, but maybe not 14C, to get to 7a.

If you're just looking for rootstock, quince works and is hardy below 7a, but from what I've read the loquat flowers wouldn't set fruit if they freeze.

This is my K. japonica:

K. heteroclita planted in-ground, was under shade cloth all summer:

K. heteroclita in pot, got hit by caterpillars pretty hard:

Was the flower purple?

Yup

I'd think the leaves would be lighter green if they were getting excessive sun.

I thought my pawpaw was just setting buds for the spring, but this one definitely looks like it's opening now. This tree flowered this spring as well, though only three flowers. Is this normal, and if not, does anyone know why? The spring flowers didn't set fruit.

https://onegreenworld.com/product-category/vines/schisandra-vine/

I got some pawpaws from them and was very disappointed in the size of the plants they sent me (2 gal plant had a definite 4" rootball), but they do have them.

Maybe they propagated Coconut's Jackfruit 'Boca orange snob', incorrectly labeled it as a chempedak, and dropped part of the name? That would explain the Boca, and Coconut mentioned in that thread that he was friends with Richard at Excalibur.

http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=11661.0

I think I've left some on the counter for two or three weeks and eaten them after. They keep ripening off the tree, and in my opinion the quality goes down as they ripen. They get gooey and lose their acidity.

Hi, woodlanders.net has Kadsura longipedunculata and Kadsura japonica plants.  They are in South Carolina.

Thank you Mr. Monkeyfish. Those don't look all that good for eating, but I think I'll order some in the spring still.

I did get my hands on some supposed K. Coccinea seeds, and found a nursery in the USA that sells K. Heteroclita, but it seems like there's a lot of varieties based on the fruit colors I've seen in pictures labeled k. Coccinea, so I'm still interested in seeds or plants from other sources.

Finally going through those links today Simon. I disagree that these show what you say they show. In the one with five specimins of S. megalanthus from commercial plantations in Colombia and Ecuador, it says, "Fruit of S. megalanthus (80–300 g) are much lighter than Hylocereus spp. (200–800 g)." There is even a section, "Possible cause of low fruit mass in S. megalanthus", which suggests it may be caused by too few of the ovules developing into viable seeds (8.7% with self-polination, 9.7% with H. polyrhizus pollen, 5.4% with H. undatus pollen, and 17.9% with S. megalanthus pollen), and that the fruit flesh may develop from the viable seeds only. I don't see anywhere in here, or in any of the others you posted, that says there is actually a difference in fruit between Colombian and Ecuadorian genetics, or that either of these are different than the wild (common) form.

It really sounds to me like those researchers took cuttings from commercial plantations in South America, grew the fruit, and didn't have any fruit over 300g. I'll also add that if they just have better pollen, like some Selenicereus species that's closer to megalanthus maybe, that caused 30% or 40% of the ovules to develop, that sounds like it could cause the fruit from South America to be giant.

Thank you both. Annonaceae, is there somewhere I could read more about these growing in QLD? I know very little about this plant.

Thanks for all the links Simon. I haven't gone through them in depth yet, but it sounds like you may have proven me wrong. The one with the hybrids is from the Israeli university I mentioned. Have you tried grafting to speed yours up? I have one megalanthus grafted onto S. grandiflorus, which seems to be growing more vigorously than my ungrafted ones, though it did take a bit over a year to push new growth, not sure what that was about. The piece I grafted is only about an inch long, possibly less, so you could make a bunch of grafts if you wanted to. I'm going to try grafting some of my seedlings once they're a few months old to Schlumbergera.

Quote from: NateTheGreat on December 08, 2017, 08:17:40 PM

Does anyone actually know if these aren't just standard megalanthus grown in better conditions? Simon, how do you know these flower later, and is it possible it's just due to growing conditions? Megalanthus are very finicky. It wouldn't surprise me if they fruit much bigger when they're in their native environment, which I think is equatorial highlands.

Nate, the Megalanthus flowers much later and I know this from personal experience and from literature. The info is easy to find if you do a search. Also, there are different selections of the Megalanthus and their appearance is very noticeable. Take a look at the pictures I posted with the gian next to a regular Megalanthus. The regular has fine that are closely spaced and are ovoid in shape where as the selected large Megalanthus is rounder and has spaced fins.

I’ve posted several threads with pictures of various selections of the giant Megalanthus including the ones that started the giant Yellow Megalanthus craze when I post about the giant fruit I found in Hong Kong about ten years ago.

I also have a post about Megalanthus crosses but you’ll have to do a search to find it.

You can get slightly larger fruit with good culture but you’ll get much larger fruit if you start with good genetics.

Simon

Thanks for the response Simon. I did search though, quite extensively in the past. I believe The New Cactus Lexicon is the definitive literary resource on Cactacae, and this distinction is not in there. Their picture of megalanthus fruit actually looks like a red undatus x megalanthus hybrid. And although there are many sources online claiming the existence of a giant version, I haven't seen anything definitive or scientific.

I searched through the most recent hundred threads you started, and all I found related to this was pictures from September 2015 of seedlings you were growing. Have you fruited these in the two years since? You may have posted pictures of fruit you bought ten years ago, but that wouldn't prove anything in and of itself, since the role of genetics in their size is unknown. I don't know Leo Manuel, maybe that is a name I should know, but I don't. Have either you or him fruited the giant yellow?

As for the fins, I don't think it is proof that the smaller one has more closely-spaced fins. What if it were to expand to twice the volume? The skin and fins would stretch out, making them further apart, and changing their shape slightly. It looks to me like in your comparison picture they both have about the same amount of fins/areoles, and in basically the same pattern.

It seems very strange to me that an improved version would exist (for at least ten years as you say), which this guy in San Diego (I googled his name and found an interview video) was growing, yet everybody else in the USA was growing the inferior version, and over all this time the improved version, which apparently grows true to seed, has not spread throughout the community. And it just happens to be the most difficult type of dragonfruit to keep happy. I hope you understand where I'm coming from and don't take this for insolence. I planted some of these seeds as well, but I suspect if I get them to fruit, it will be standard megalanthus (which would then leave the question of whether they're simply not true to seed...).

Edit: And the guy in your thread ( http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=5193.msg198893#msg198893 ) who was saying they are real and he is importing cuttings from South America is now selling seeds, which look (or looked... I thought there was a picture before) like the ones that have been showing up in SoCal stores, and which he just so happened to start offering for sale when they started showing up in stores ( http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=26031 ). Two years ago he was offering seeds for sale as well ( http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=18231.0 ), which he claimed gave true to seed thornless (!) fruit. Maybe I'm just being a conspiracy theorist here. Maybe he is importing direct as he says. It wouldn't be surprising that he gets the fruit at the same time the fruit stores do, but like I keep saying, the whole thing just seems really fishy to me.

Edit 2: This guy's explanation ( http://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=5193.msg211534#msg211534 ) sounds believable to me, but of course is unproven as well. "I think the fruit you show us is not a different variety of yellow dragon, but a fruit obtained from different technique of cultivation. In Taiwan , the yellow dragon is grafted onto undatus or costarricensis rootstock, giving to the skinny megalanthus a strong and resistant root system. That grafted plants fruits are 250 to 500 g. True giants yellow dragons come from natural hybridization , and are usually between Ecuador and Peru . The diferences with common megalanthus, besides bigger size and production,  is its genetic. The fruits are rounder and smoth in Ecuatorian type and -round-oblong and with very short scales in Peru."