The Tropical Fruit Forum

The leaves are wimpy and do that when it gets cold or very dry like we have now. But as Coconut Cream said, the trees are pretty bulletproof. I’ve left seedlings in small pots for weeks without water and they just bounce back when conditions are nice. Carambola’s are tap root trees so if you plan on putting it in the ground, you’ll want to do it sooner rather than later. It seems like the larger I let them get in pots, the slower and longer it takes for them to take off in the ground.

Quote from: Greater Good on March 18, 2025, 10:49:13 AM

Sadly, today is the day. Angie has produced and is holding a  very decent amount of fruit. I was hoping that by some miracle her stem would suddenly swell up to 2 inches in diameter.



Planted as a 7 gallon tree, she hasn't been in the ground a full year yet. I hate removing the fruit,  but it will help her get better established. Hopefully this year is an indication of how fruitful she will be for the 2026 mango season.

and they look so healthy too. 😔
Next year they'll be ready for sure!

My Angie’s first fruiting year produced maybe 5 fruits and the possums got 3 of them. The two that I ate didn’t taste that great either. It was a decent sized tree maybe 4’ tall with complex canopy and sturdy trunk but I should have just taken them off. It didn’t flush much new growth after the fruits came off. The following year was the bad year where nobody got mangoes. That year, the canopy almost doubled in size and the following year, I had 50 fruits and they tasted great.  Don’t feel too bad about waiting one more year.

Thanks for that tidbit. I typically start with mulch to cover the sand but the most productive areas of my yard are where the ground cover has taken over under the fruit trees. I don’t mow or trim those areas anymore.

Jack and Beanstalk as well as Love Plant Nursery are close to Xian’s. Also, Incredible Edible Landscapes.

Sunrise flowered heavily this year but has not set any fruit. The panicles that are still blooming appear to have only male flowers. Does anyone know if this is common for this variety?

My vote is for too much sun. My only miracle fruit that has red color on the leaves is the one that gets several hours of  direct sun every day.

I ended up cracking the stem while trying to inarch graft so I just put a couple normal veneer grafts on the suspect stem a few weeks ago when our cold weather came to an end. The whole plant is pushing now including the grafts!

Would I be crazy to plant a Jaboticaba in the lower area of my yard that drains a lot more slowly than the rest? Wouldn't that be an almost ideal environment?

I know they can handle being waterlogged for long periods of time so as long as it’s not a mucky swamp back there all the time, they should be fine. They do like shade from the harsh sun, especially when young. The other thing is acidic soil. From what I’ve gathered here, Sabara is more tolerant of non-ideal soils so I’ve planted a few Sabara seedlings in my yard and have either already grafted or intend to graft other varieties onto them.

As I was walking around my fruit trees this afternoon enjoying the sunny cool weather, I noticed my yellow jabo is also flowering for the first time. It came from 9waters on Etsy in spring of 2021 as a tiny seedling. It was recently stepped up into a 25gal pot:





I’m looking forward to comparing the yellow with strigipes.  The flowers on the yellow are pungent and smell like jasmine.

I think those would be fine. Just remember that any leaf that touches the cloth or plastic will get damaged if it freezes. You’re really protecting the trunk and branches so they can push new growth.

I planted a seedling jackfruit at the front corner of my property with the expectation that IF it makes it to fruiting age and IF the fruit is any good and IF anyone in my area even knows what it is, I may feed someone else. I’ve thought about planting a mulberry out along the road in the easement for the walkers.

Countless laws have been written and lawyers have been made rich by people who refuse to talk. If I saw a tree with tons of ripe fruit, I’d start a conversation with the property owner.

I’ve been watching that thread about the sprayer with agitator wondering why people need to spray. I’ve had an Angie producing for the past 4 years and the only thing that prevents me from enjoying all of my mangoes are the raccoons. Never any anthracnose or disease. I have a few other cultivars that will begin producing this year so I’ll have to see if it’s the variety or my location.

At this point in Florida, you would be looking for seedlings from this summers harvest, not seeds.

Kapps, imo, don't cut off the sucker.  Cut a branch of the original and graft onto the sucker to get its benefit.

Ah, that’s a good idea. Thanks!

Is it best to wait until spring to graft the evergreen varieties or is fall/winter ok?  I could probably do an inarch graft between the two stems.