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Messages - JCorte

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1
SHV,

Appreciate all the information and experience you provide.  You've inspired me to get myself organized and do the same.

For fire prevention, I'm planning to surround my property in Fallbrook with fire resistant plants.  Though not fire proof, they don't easily ignite and contribute significantly to the fuel and fire intensity.

I've fallen in love with prickly pear cactus fruits and Opuntia are great fire resistant plants.  I've used fire to try and burn off the glochids on fruit and it didn't harm the fruit at all.  If you plant some varieties with thorns, it's a natural protective fencing that's drought tolerant and effortless to grow.  There are thornless varieties with excellent fruit and selections for nopales.

John Schoustra, owner of Greenwood Daylily Gardens shared that moisture laden daylily foliage is hard to ignite.  A fire parted around their daylily field leaving the home untouched and several firetrucks parked on their daylilies for safety during a brush fire.  Plus they're edible and effortless to grow and drought tolerant.  The variety Dusky Rouge was selected as the best tasting by local chefs. 

This is a great post about all the edible uses of daylily flowers, young shoots, and root tubers.
https://honest-food.net/dining-on-daylilies/

Loquat and pineapple guava are also another couple of great fruiting, fire resistant trees.  Here's a link with a list of fire resistant plants.
https://firesafesdcounty.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Comprehensive-Fire-Resistant-Plant-List.pdf

Janet

2
Love seeing the updates.  Thanks for sharing and taking the time to make the videos.  Still need to watch the last one.

I know from experience how much work it takes and the challenges, nice job! 

If you're interested in trying another nectarine variety, I think Double Delight is the best tasting lower chill variety.  It's a really great fruit and has an intense classic nectarine flavor.  Completely different than Spice Zee so nice to have both.  Only issue is it's usually grafted on Citation rootstock and I've had terrible experience with anything on Citation planted in the ground.  I'm guessing that's why you don't hear much about this variety in SoCal even though I think it's one of the best stone fruits.

Janet

3
Just uploaded a video with all my in ground and potted Eugenia and Myrciaria. 
https://youtu.be/DzO8e0XHBIc?si=JYLn-8FRM8490kem

Thanks for sharing your collection. 

Agree with K-rimes your burkartiana looks great in the ground.  I've found a lot of variation in seedlings of the many Eugenias I've planted.  I have 3 Eugenia burkartianas, seeds all planted December 2022.  One is large and bushy that I just transplanted into 10 gallon pot, one only a few inches tall, and a third that seemed stunted under 12 inches tall, but just put out a flush of new wavy leaves 6 inches long. 

Hope your Eugenia beaurepairianas come back.  This has been one of the most difficult varieties for me to grow.  They're alive but leaves are really chlorotic.  Also my leaves are very different from the pictures others have shared on this thread with really wavy leaves.

Janet

4
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: Suriname Cherry true to seed?
« on: May 29, 2025, 08:52:24 AM »
Chris,

The fruits I show above is the mother tree, it was a tree that Roger Meyer planted seeds from a good tasting Surinam Cherry from his fruit hunting days. He then sold that seedling tree to Mike and since that time, Mike has been planting out some seeds from his mother tree fruits. He had one older seedling tree (maybe 5-7yrs old) that has been fruiting in a pot for a few years, and he said the fruits taste the same to him. That seedling tree in a pot is what I have now. The mother tree never had a name since it was also grown from seed over 10-20yrs maybe.

Laguna Hills nursery sold cuttings propagated Mike Spira surinam cherries.  I wonder if it's from the same tree.  I bought a small rooted cutting 3 years ago that should start fruiting soon.  Gary told me the flavor was like tangerines without any resin and was his favorite. 

Janet

5
Thanks guys for sharing the links and information.  I was just thinking about this phenomenon this morning and didn't know the scientific term for it.  What synchronicity! ;D

6
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: New Mulberry Variety ???
« on: May 24, 2025, 03:23:21 PM »
For me, anything after second crop tastes terrible. Just a waste of plant resources. I spent a couple of Summers continuously pruning back so I could get multiple crops. I did get multiple crops but it wasn't worth it after june. I was surprised that the fruit didn't get better with the summer heat

This is not my experience at all.  Later crops are definitely sweeter because of the warmer weather.  I feed my plants after I prune and top off with fresh compost and worm castings.  Maybe try changing up your fertilizer.  Plants expend a lot of energy fruiting and might not have all the nutrients they need to produce sugars in the next crop.  I also feed all my plants late fall/ early winter before their first fruits. 

7
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: New Mulberry Variety ???
« on: May 24, 2025, 10:48:01 AM »
Fruitnut, definitely appreciate your experience.  I've read most of your posts on the Growing Fruit and Ourfig forums, but I haven't commented or posted on the other forums.  I noticed that you didn't hype any varieties you were selling and just gave honest evaluations.  I always felt confident buying your trees that they were going to be legitimate and also bought trees from your daughter.  Seems like you've retired from selling trees?

Janet

8
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: New Mulberry Variety ???
« on: May 23, 2025, 10:48:38 PM »
Fruitnut, thanks for the pruning tips for constant fruiting and sharing the pics.

Janet

9
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: New Mulberry Variety ???
« on: May 23, 2025, 03:09:41 PM »
Also, I am not using the name Austurkey.  I am using Amanda's original name for it, Siam Jumbo, which is the name I originally posted info about it with Amanda's permission.

FruitTreeAddict (Jan) renamed it when she started reselling it, which doesn't make sense to me. Why would you rename a variety introduced by someone else when you're reselling the same genetics.  Calling it Austurkey, Aussie Turkey, Australian Turkey creates a lot of confusion and people think it's from Australia.

Fruitnut also used the name Siam Jumbo in his post about it.

Janet

10
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: New Mulberry Variety ???
« on: May 23, 2025, 02:53:20 PM »
Kaz, hopefully I'm wrong and you get a great new variety.  Don't give up on Amanda's tree yet.  I did get bigger fruits last fall, early fruits looked normal.  I saw Fruitnut post pictures and he had some large fruits similar to Amanda's and he got 11 straight months of production.

Marta also commented that the fruits are really good now that her tree has matured.  She was not originally impressed with it.

Maybe get yours grafted to a mature tree.

Janet

11
ScottR, what is your experience with the root suckering on the quince?

I just got my order of quince rootstocks and noticed the root suckers like EuroFruit mentioned on my other thread.  I guess a benefit could be there there will always be suckers to graft new trees.

Janet

12
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: New Mulberry Variety ???
« on: May 23, 2025, 10:11:42 AM »
I'm skeptical about this seller.  Shop is only about a month old.  The small trees he has in the video has regular looking fruits.  If this is his ancestral old tree grown in his own backyard why not show a video of the mature tree.  Maybe the pictures of the fruits are not his.

There are other sellers who show only 1 or 2 trees available to give the appearance of a lack of supply and will update quantities after they are purchased.

I've been burned many times so maybe I'm being overly cautious.

Janet

13
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: Peluche loquat white flesh
« on: May 22, 2025, 12:06:43 PM »
I'm going to graft some trees of Giant White on quince and seedling rootstock to make available for sale.

EuroFruit posted a thread on using quince rootstock to get larger fruit size on small trees.  ScottR posted photos of his fruiting trees on quince rootstock, a 5-6 year old fruiting tree only 2-3 feet tall and 8-9 year old trees under 5 feet tall.
https://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=58833.0

I think it would be great to be able to grow giant loquats on 3-5 feet tall trees in a container.  You could easily bring it indoors during the winter if you needed to.

Janet 

14
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: Peluche loquat white flesh
« on: May 22, 2025, 10:56:41 AM »
It's pretty much confirmed, my fruit does not turn orange when ripe/ overripe.  Kaz mentioned his regular orange flesh Peluche gets a mushy texture.  I have not noticed this on my white flesh fruit and the taste is good.  So far my family thinks it tastes most like an Asian pear.

This fruit was left on the counter for 5 days before I cut it open, it had 2 seeds.  I'm going to call it Giant White for now so it's not confused with the named Peluche variety. 





15
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: Chicken Claw Mulberry
« on: May 22, 2025, 09:26:11 AM »
My first fruit was very sweet. 




16
ScottR, thanks for the photos.  I read a research paper that showed improved brix on loquats grown on quince rootstock compared to seedling.  Have you noticed this? 

Do you have a favorite variety?

Janet

17
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: One Seed Loquat Fruit
« on: May 20, 2025, 08:39:17 AM »
Fletcher white is a variety that can produce one seeded fruit.

Janet

18
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: Loquat in SoCal recommendation
« on: May 20, 2025, 08:36:55 AM »
Big Jim can have both an early and late crop.  Argelino is late season with good size and to me tastes better than Big Jim.  Both are good varieties.

Janet

19
My daughter just found another one.



Closeup to show the aborted seeds



Only got 8 fruits so far.  Will have to wait till next year to see if it's a consistent characteristic.

20
I saw this one on Facebook that mostly produces these small seeds. The person said it does produce a small to medium seed on fruits occasionally as well. I had never ran into an almost seedless variety before so thought it was interesting. Is this something that is common or worth propagating?




Not seedless, but I have one that’s producing really small and aborted seeds.  Picture of the seeds from first fruit but have had a few with the same aborted seeds.  Regular sized seeds from a different variety for comparison.




21
Galatians522, I'm going to try several experiments including using it as interstock.  Maybe it would do well in container plantings in Florida, especially if they can be maintained under 5 feet tall?

ScottR, thank you for the response.  Look forward to seeing your pictures.  Gophers and ground squirrels are a huge challenge for me in Fallbrook.  So many losses...taking deep breaths, reassessing, and will be replanting soon.

Janet

22
ScottR,

Are your trees in the ground or in pots?  I'm excited to try my giant loquats on quince rootstock.  Do you remember how long they took before they started fruiting?

Janet

23
EuroFruit, thank you for the information regarding increased fruit size on quince rootstock.  All my trees are on loquat seedlings, but now I'm going to experiment with quince rootstock.

Janet

24
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: Peluche loquat white flesh
« on: May 15, 2025, 03:41:32 PM »
Here's my last comments on the white flesh Peluche.

Now that I have the Japanese loquat (Edgar's large elongated white flesh), I would not propagate this white Peluche, it didn't have much taste to me. But the Japanese white flesh loquat is large and much sweeter to me. So maybe in a few more years, I will share the Japanese (Edgar) loquat scions. I'll ask him where he sourced his tree.

Anyone who got Peluche cuttings from me and ends up with the white flesh version, just send me a message and I will send you for free the correct orange flesh Peluche.

Glad you found one that you really like.  You've never mentioned the white fleshed Peluche in any of your posts on the biggest loquat or giant loquat comparisons.  Maybe you don't have the same one as me.

As far as flavor, there are a lot of factors that affect the quality of a fruit in any given year.  Same variety grafted on my mature tree will have different sugar and acid levels depending on the location of the fruit on the tree, amount of heat when it was ripening, whether it developed while soil was holding a lot of moisture from our winter rains, etc.  My later ripening fruit of Big Jim taste way better than the early fruits.  Fertilization also has an impact.  Proper nutrient levels can significantly improve the flavor. 

My favorite and best tasting varieties change flavors the longer they hold on the tree, some get better tasting, others get bland.  It takes time to get to really know any variety.  I know they will taste different when grown in Fallbrook, which is all part of the fun for me.

I like to give at least a couple of years of fruiting before making judgements.  I was ready to remove a couple of guavas at the farm after 3 years, but thank goodness I didn't, they turned out to be excellent this past winter. 

25
Tropical Fruit Discussion / Re: Peluche loquat white flesh
« on: May 15, 2025, 03:24:33 PM »
Rain, Yes, they are!  I'm really curious to see how much the biggest one weighs.

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