The Tropical Fruit Forum

Do you guys have to have holding tanks for water? By code in SC county, (maybe california?) we need 10,000 gallons of water in tanks. The well has to produce above 3gpm.  I'll probably be adding more water storage tanks as my well pump is about 120' below where my holding tanks are.  I pump up and let gravity help me water down. 

yep; instagram is natelovesplants

I bought 13 acres in Santa Cruz, California last year and am incredibly stoked! I have done some restoration work in Hawaii and have a decent understanding of what growing in a tropical climate is like, which is largely why I have purchased land in California.

Reasons I bought land in Northern California:
I have a really good well (with old AG pump, 500 gpm) that is in a pretty reliable water table. Salt water intrusion will likely be a problem in the future, but I probably have time.
The market is completely untapped.
Importation restrictions from Florida or Hawaii leave untapped markets bare, or with subpar fruit.
There is no tropical/ few subtropical pests or diseases to fight here (hooray for winter).
Management of weeds is easy (dry summers, less weeds).

I was working part time managing the propagation and teaching an internship about grassland ecology and restoration but have gone full time into my own endeavors as of recently.  I was working 7 days a week and am now really grateful to have at least a day off! haha. Utimately never could have afforded the land with my pay. My family purchased the land so pretty grateful and privileged in that way.

I am about a year or so out from getting my first production crop of Babaco papaya and will have Avocados coming online next year as well as various other grafted and non grafted subtropicals: Eugenias mainly.

I plan to implement different aspects into my farm and nursery as I progress and hope to apply for grants for some research projects I'd like to take on. Some projects are: Cultivation of CA native wildflowers for nursery stock/landscaping, studying physiological cold tolerance of these subtropical/tropical species, making subtropicals ubiquitous in peoples landscapes,  maybe a landscaping business, education/tourism? I think that diversifying will certainly be important in making this a feasible enterprise. 

I would assume because it is a different species:

Mangifera indica, Mango
Mangifera casturi, Casturi

Just as

Artocarpus heterophyllus, Jack fruit
Artocarpus integer, Cempedak

Both closely related fruits but not the same thing. Different genetic differences,  etc.

Take a trip out to one of the Hawaiian Islands where it's becoming an invasive species, haha.

Yee haw! Glad to hear everyone! Thank you so much for your support!

I bought a green sapote from you after looking for one for 2 years, hope that it arrives safe and sound.

Any chance you are going to start selling seeds as well?

Glad to hear, they are such awesome fruits! Let me know how it is looking on arrival! Unfortunately I won't be selling seeds, as I can't guarantee a viable seed, but I can guarantee the arrival of a live plant, haha.

Do you sell grafted plants?

I will be selling some grafted plants in the future, but for right now don't have the stock to do so.

I have been sticking to a promise this summer not to buy any more plants, because I have far too many. You are making it really hard to keep to that pledge. A couple of those Psidiums would look really good in my collection. I am just not sure I have anything in my collection rare enough to trade for them though.

Haha, yeah it is almost a little tricky because I have over 200+ species of fruiting plants... haha

Howdy everyone!
Welcome to my nursery thread where I post updates about new stock in store! Plants can be purchased from the website, I am open to trades as well for uncommon seeds/trees.  If you are interested in selling seeds please get in touch! Get a free sticker with each purchase and check out the rad Botanical Art shirts & stickers!

Get 5% off with code TFFISTHEBEST at checkout.




Eugenia zuccarinii
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/eugenia-zuccarinii


Wooly Leaf Sapote, Casimiroa tetrameria
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/casimiroa-tetrameria

Babaco Papaya, Vasconcellea x heilbornii
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/babaco-papaya

Ziricote, Cordia dodecandra
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/cordia-dodecandra

Christmas Berry, Eugenia pseudopsidium
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/eugenia-pseudopsidium


Psidium striatulum
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/psidium-striatulum-narrow-leaf-guava





Psidium friedrichsthalianum
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/psidium-friedrichsthalianum

Psidium sp. 'Green Cerrado'
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/psidium-sp-green-cerrado

Myrica citrifolia
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/myrcia-citrifolia

Long Sleeve and short sleeve shirts!
https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/rollinia-deliciosa-shirt

The idea that we have degraded the native habitat for gophers and thats why they eat crops sounds innacurate to me.  My property is surrounded by thousands of acres of pristine wilderness preseve on one side and a developed town on the other side.  Hiking through the wilderness area theres very little gopher activity.  You see the mounds but its just not very much.  Then you go into town and theres hundreds of them in the park thats being irrigated and in yards and everywhere.  Even my own lot, half of it is untouched and the other half I grow things on.  Of course they are attracted to the side full of tender green tasties being irrigated. 

This in itself is why I almost think theres potential in trying to revegetate highly disturbed and degraded areas.  My next door neighbor has about 12 acres of untouched native grassland and I see practically no gopher activity at all.  At the top part of my property I have native grassland and have little to no gopher activity there as well.  Yet, in my heavily degraded, terraced and grazed land (for the past 20 or 30 years) I have gopher activity almost everywhere!  I hadn't even started irrigating or planting until about a month ago!  My thoughts are that we are seeing so much disturbance from the gophers because there in fact is nothing down deep, all the roots are really shallow and poor forage for them.

Honestly though, I have only been there for a year and only have gotten roots in the ground in a big way about a month or so ago.  I mean, after reading your post I am pretty much ready to start trapping them, haha.  I just dont think that we really know enough to say that it has to be one way or the other.  Considering our instinct is often to kill the pest, there has to be other ways that are more symbiotic. 

I have some pretty insane gopher pressure at my property. Previous owner said he caught 30+ in his tomato patch in one season. 
I've decided that this year I'm going to be doing no trapping.  I have planted all my trees in gopher baskets and have my garden out of gopher baskets.  I have lost about 3 tomatoes, a few potatoes, and about 20-30 pepper plants.  So far so good though, we vibing. 

Ultimately they are providing a service that I think has potential to benefit us.  We ultimately have degraded their habitat down so severeley that there is basically no natural forage for them. Native grasses are gone (roots up 20+feet deep) and have been replaced by invasive annuals with very weak and small root systems.  I think, ultimately, the real plan of management is to plant out heavily with root heavy croops to provide forage for them. 

Yep, I sell plants only for now.

Howdy everyone,

I'm selling yangmei seedlings at:

https://www.wildlandsplants.com/shop/p/myrica-rubra

Thanks for your support!

Don't forget to use the discount code: TFFISTHEBEST for 5% off.

Wow Simon! That's awesome, those are boosting.