Pineapple Pleasure Productivity

[Honest Abe]

At the very top of my favorite tasting mangos sits the Pineapple Pleasure, tied with Sugarloaf.
Needless to say I grow both varieties in my northeast Miami yard. My PP tree is too small to expect to hold a crop of fruit this year. My sugarloaf is plenty big. Back to topic:
 

After quite a few years of the PP trees  in production now, I’d love to know everyone’s experience with producing their’ own pineapple pleasure fruit in their’ yard.

South Florida experience would be great but would also
Be interested to know results from all over the globe to eliminate bias.

Thank you so much.

[fliptop]

We're hoping people chime in on this, too, including swfl perspectives.

[simon_grow]

I’m in San Diego and my Pineapple Pleasure grafts have been very fruitful. They produce consistently and so far seem to have decent disease resistance considering that the tree it’s grafted on also has Lemon Zest and rarely produces fruit because of the powdery mildew. I had a branch break this year because it was holding multiple fruit and the branch couldn’t support the weight. It’s an excellent tasting fruit.

The extra cold we get here in San Diego may help tilt the balance of male/female flowers and the extra cold definitely helps with our bloom induction.

Simon

[fliptop]

Thanks, Simon! Do you ever get below freezing?

[simon_grow]

We get below freezing maybe once every 25 years or so and I get frost just about every year. With the windchill factor, I usually get frost when temps are around 38F or below.

Simon

[Johnny Eat Fruit]

Good to hear Simon about the production of PP in SoCal. I hope my young tree does well in the next several years.

Included is a recent photo of my Pineapple Pleasure on Altaulfo rootstock planted in the ground from a #15 pot in the summer of 2022. Hoping for some fruit once the tree puts on more girth. 

At my location, we get freezing temperatures (Below 32F) once every 6-8 years, but many variables and microclimates vary from site to site. 

Johnny



Pineapple Pleasure Mango Tree (12-2-2022)

[Honest Abe]

Interesting info thanks Simon. Curious how it does in our climate. I’ve heard pros
Like Alex say that many of the New Zill varieties and so many other varieties that need a real chill for full blooms  do much better in California than South Florida. Very curious about Pineapple pleasure to see if it’s worth the wait to grow here in my yard.

[cuban007]

Pineapple pleasure and Sugarloaf are shy bearers…period. Are they worth growing, absolutely. They’re a nice size fruit with amazing flavors. I am speaking from my personal experience in SoFla. I don’t have them in SoCal.

[JakeFruit]

I know I've said this here before...still going on my 4th year of having PP grafted in on two trees; haven't seen a flower, yet. I girdled several PP branches in early July and we may actually touch the high 40's soon (time to find my winter gear), hopefully the streak is broken this year.

[Honest Abe]

Bump.

[Squam256]

We’ve had very little trouble getting the Pineapple Pleasure trees to flower in coastal West Palm Beach, even in mild winters.

But without proper disease control and good nutrition, most back yarders won’t see much fruit from them.

They’ve been one of the best of the Zill hybrids in flavor, and their flavor/size combination is unparalleled. Can’t think of another variety capable of producing 2, sometimes 3 pound fruit with that level of flavor.

This year they were a surprising dud on taste though for about 80% of their season. They finally rebounded towards the end but I actually stopped harvesting them for a few weeks because I was so disappointed in them last summer.

I’m expecting a major comeback from them in 2023 Though.

[JCorte]

Squam256, why do you think they were disappointing in flavor last summer?  What changed by the end of the season?

Janet

[palmcity]

This year they were a surprising dud on taste though for about 80% of their season. They finally rebounded towards the end but I actually stopped harvesting them for a few weeks because I was so disappointed in them last summer.

I've had similar experience with other varieties, IMO especially with younger trees with less ability to sequester sufficient sugars/nutrients to produce tasty fruit especially early in that trees fruit production in a given year.
IMO A lot of factors like sunshine per day would increase or decrease average yearly sugar production especially early in the season with a lot of loss of sugars as the tree puts out more growth of new leaves.
But as an example, I'll say a tree produces a gallon of sugar water per day for growth & for the 40 mangos on it. If 20 mangos mature & fall off the tree, the remaining 20 have a much better chance of receiving more sugars and odds of being sweeter near the end of the season... Also assuming length of days/hours of sunlight/etc. do not change & of course all factors change... lol... But IMO I always have a better chance of mangos being sweeter after each variety has half it's fruit picked. Some years, sweet from 1st fruit and some years nope...

[JakeFruit]

On the topic of disease, I was noticing just the other day PP has a predisposition to having sooty mold all over the branches. The only other variety in my yard that does that is Lemon Zest. If/when I see PP flowers, I'll be giving them extra attention to lessen the powdery mildew damage. My LZ gets hammered by PM; I was spraying diligently last year for the first time, but I went out of town for a week. We had a big rain storm followed by ideal PM conditions while I was gone; Lost >80% of my LZ flowers/fruit.

[bulldawg305]

Pineapple pleasure and Sugarloaf are shy bearers…period. Are they worth growing, absolutely. They’re a nice size fruit with amazing flavors. I am speaking from my personal experience in SoFla. I don’t have them in SoCal.

I harvested 19 mangos from my 3 yr old Sugar Loaf last year (planted from a small 7 gallon). I would say that was good production for a young tree. Also, no sprays were used.

[palmcity]

Pineapple pleasure and Sugarloaf are shy bearers…period. Are they worth growing, absolutely. They’re a nice size fruit with amazing flavors. I am speaking from my personal experience in SoFla. I don’t have them in SoCal.

I harvested 19 mangos from my 3 yr old Sugar Loaf last year (planted from a small 7 gallon). I would say that was good production for a young tree. Also, no sprays were used.

I love reading about people in Miami area not having to use sprays & having nice clean fruit with little powdery mildew problems.

Read some material on powdery mildew and most indicate most growth starts above 60F and tapers off at 80F with little growth above 85F...

Congraduations on your warm climate... Unfortunately Martin County, Florida has more days/nights in the 60F to 80F range (80F to 86F is tapering off growth rapidly) and IMO is why we have more Powdery mildew with more chance of fruit drop vs. fruit set than you in warmer Dade County, Fl; unless we spray spray spray  lol...

one of many google info pages:  https://hgic.clemson.edu/factsheet/powdery-mildew/

Sunlight & above 86 degrees seems to do wonders in killing a lot of the powdery mildew in Dade County etc.

My one pineapple please (pleasure? lol) was topworked but I let a few branches regrow and now have a mixed tree about 6 yrs old... Blooms easily, gets powdery mildew etc. very very easily, drops baby mango fruits the easiest.... Unfortunately is still at zero fruit but maybe next year lol..

5 LZ and 2 set a fair amount of fruit last year but as mentioned a lot of bloom & drops on other 3 trees now probably 5 yr old.
5 yr old Phoenix is identical in zero fruit making maturity but also only 1 tree that I opened up for air flow this year after spring fruit set failure... Probably just my location for temperature and lack of consistent fungal spraying for all these varieties mentioned at my Martin County, Fl location...

[Honest Abe]

We’ve had very little trouble getting the Pineapple Pleasure trees to flower in coastal West Palm Beach, even in mild winters.

But without proper disease control and good nutrition, most back yarders won’t see much fruit from them.

They’ve been one of the best of the Zill hybrids in flavor, and their flavor/size combination is unparalleled. Can’t think of another variety capable of producing 2, sometimes 3 pound fruit with that level of flavor.

This year they were a surprising dud on taste though for about 80% of their season. They finally rebounded towards the end but I actually stopped harvesting them for a few weeks because I was so disappointed in them last summer.

I’m expecting a major comeback from them in 2023 Though.

Thank you Alex, very informative, as always. Seems like a bad choice for a guy like me with a backyard and only a few spots for trees. Much appreciated. Happy holidays.

Thank you all for responses 

[Squam256]

Squam256, why do you think they were disappointing in flavor last summer?  What changed by the end of the season?

Janet

We had a really bad week of rain in the early part of June around the time a tropical system rolled through much of the southern part of our state. It’s not unusual for sustained heavy rainfall to have a negative impact on the flavor of many mangos. However, this impact is usually gone within a week or less of dry weather pattern returning.

This year though, that effect on the flavor actually spanned several weeks. Most varieties had recovered by the end of June but Pineapple Pleasure didn’t turn the corner until sometime in July, by which time most of its crop was through.

We knew the rain was the culprit because the fruit harvested in April and May was very good.

[paulmctigue]

I have had some fruit the last couple years off a topworked branch of PP. 10b Boynton. I agree with Alex, this year the harvested fruit was not like other years, it didn't have that incredible flavor like usual due to the rain