Author Topic: Longan variety for tropics  (Read 1313 times)

Gone tropo

  • Durian obsessed
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 387
    • Nth Qld Australia, zone 13a
    • View Profile
Longan variety for tropics
« on: February 08, 2022, 06:35:01 PM »
Did a search here and seems longans might be a better chance of fruiting reliably in the tropics than lychee.  I prefer the taste of lychee but here 16 South lychee is extremely unreliable and can go many years in between fruiting in some cases.  Can anyone recommend or advise if longan will perform reliably in my area and if so what cultivar would perform? I see diamond river mentioned are there any others preferable ?

waldi1

  • Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 130
    • Mexico, Guerrero, Zihuatanejo, 13b 17.60 N, 101.46W
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #1 on: February 08, 2022, 09:13:16 PM »
I´m growing PingPong very successfull

Gone tropo

  • Durian obsessed
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 387
    • Nth Qld Australia, zone 13a
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #2 on: February 08, 2022, 09:19:50 PM »
damn dont think we have that one down here

Finca La Isla

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2145
    • Costa Rica, Southern Caribbean coast
    • View Profile
    • finca la isla
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #3 on: February 08, 2022, 09:52:55 PM »
Diamond River.  My area is super tropical and Diamond river easily flowers and harvests twice a year!
Peter

Gone tropo

  • Durian obsessed
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 387
    • Nth Qld Australia, zone 13a
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #4 on: February 08, 2022, 10:38:49 PM »
Diamond River.  My area is super tropical and Diamond river easily flowers and harvests twice a year!
Peter

Damn i had a look seems we dont have that cultivar either, we have one called chompoo from thailand anyone know if that is suitable for tropics?

FruitGrower

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 270
    • South Florida
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #5 on: February 09, 2022, 12:27:08 AM »
Diamond River.  My area is super tropical and Diamond river easily flowers and harvests twice a year!
Peter

Damn i had a look seems we dont have that cultivar either, we have one called chompoo from thailand anyone know if that is suitable for tropics?

I have one called Sri Chompoo, I assume it’s the same cause it’s also from Thailand. We’re not truly tropical here but the SC fruit consistently when my lychees do not.

cassowary

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 606
    • Australia FNQ 13a Tropical Monsoon
    • View Profile
    • cassowaryseeds
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #6 on: February 09, 2022, 12:32:40 AM »
Maybe Han Sen's Ruby longan and all the malesianus verieties of course, kakus, isau, enchiantus etc.
CASSOWARYSEEDS.COM
Seed shop and Seed exchange

Gone tropo

  • Durian obsessed
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 387
    • Nth Qld Australia, zone 13a
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #7 on: February 09, 2022, 12:54:07 AM »
Maybe chompoo will work here then? Cassowary im not up to date on all the scientific names of anything, I had a look at han sens list but cant find anything called a ruby longan?

Might just be easier to stick to rambutan and pulasan

cassowary

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 606
    • Australia FNQ 13a Tropical Monsoon
    • View Profile
    • cassowaryseeds
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #8 on: February 09, 2022, 01:43:41 AM »
He's not listed it yet, he showed it in one youtube video! Yes cassowaries watch youtube too!

I have a huge seedling Longan and never seen fruit, it fruited once before cause there's seedling under it. A friend in the lowlands bought a place with a collection of different Longan verieties, only one tree ever gave fruit, it was a small one growing out of the chicken wire house, maybe just the sheer amount of manure did it.

Kakus and Isau is sweet and good. Still with rambutan you have to have good males to get good fruit set, many clones have been selected to throw female flowers. That's why some farmers spray some branches with a chemical that makes them throw male flowers rather then females, it's in the Rambutan research paper by RIRDIC i think.
The Borneo rare fruit book by A. Lamb is great as it gives many alternatives to Sapindace for us in wet lowland cliamte.

I would love to know peoples secret with keeping pulasans alive and growin to maturity, I have to have a mist spraying on the leaves in the dry to keep em alive, not even normal irrigation and mulch is enough during the dry season. Wind and full sun just makes the leafs fall off.

Tropo, I can spare you a kakus seedling if we ever meet up.

Rauls koloc should be a good replacement.
Or David. chandelers, Nephelium cuspidatum.
CASSOWARYSEEDS.COM
Seed shop and Seed exchange

Galatians522

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1868
    • Florida 9b
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #9 on: February 09, 2022, 04:15:09 AM »
Maybe chompoo will work here then? Cassowary im not up to date on all the scientific names of anything, I had a look at han sens list but cant find anything called a ruby longan?

Might just be easier to stick to rambutan and pulasan

For what it is worth, I prefer rambutan over longan. Sri Chompoo is a very good longan, though, and would come close to rambutan. However, it is not a tropical variety. We can't grow it here, but rambutan just has better fruit size and flavor to me. My only complaint with rambutan is that the flesh sticks to the seed (at least the ones we get here). I have never tasted pulasan, but hear that some people prefer them even over lychee. For me lychee is tops, but that is what I grew up eating.
« Last Edit: February 09, 2022, 04:17:29 AM by Galatians522 »

fruit nerd

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 287
    • Australia, FNQ, 13a
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #10 on: February 09, 2022, 05:01:34 AM »
I have a marcotted longan (unknown variety). Believe the parent tree sets fruit in the Daintree. Good enough for me, still small but pushing out new growth at the moment.
« Last Edit: February 09, 2022, 09:12:41 PM by fruit nerd »

Gone tropo

  • Durian obsessed
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 387
    • Nth Qld Australia, zone 13a
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #11 on: February 09, 2022, 06:08:40 PM »
Cassowary I have 2 pulasan trees one is 6ft and one is 1ft planted at the same time at the same size.  I wasnt aware of them being difficult to grow here?? Mine have survived fine so far but only one is thriving hopefully it continues to grow.  Fruit nerd that marcotted longan sounds good let us know if/when it starts fruiting.

Lychees in my opinion are much nicer than longan but they are well tested here and fail regularly.  Im not sure about these new variety's that Mike T talks about the erdon lee and other seedless one not sure if they fruit reliably on the coast here time will tell.  I will wait for reports before committing to one.

Galatians522

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1868
    • Florida 9b
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #12 on: February 09, 2022, 09:54:49 PM »
Cassowary I have 2 pulasan trees one is 6ft and one is 1ft planted at the same time at the same size.  I wasnt aware of them being difficult to grow here?? Mine have survived fine so far but only one is thriving hopefully it continues to grow.  Fruit nerd that marcotted longan sounds good let us know if/when it starts fruiting.

Lychees in my opinion are much nicer than longan but they are well tested here and fail regularly.  Im not sure about these new variety's that Mike T talks about the erdon lee and other seedless one not sure if they fruit reliably on the coast here time will tell.  I will wait for reports before committing to one.

I am not sure about the seedless, but I highly suspect that Erdon Lee will fruit very poorly in your area. I saw a genetic study once that demonstrated a close relationship to Emperor which tends to require more cold to induce bloom in my experience.

Gone tropo

  • Durian obsessed
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 387
    • Nth Qld Australia, zone 13a
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #13 on: February 09, 2022, 10:38:16 PM »
Cassowary I have 2 pulasan trees one is 6ft and one is 1ft planted at the same time at the same size.  I wasnt aware of them being difficult to grow here?? Mine have survived fine so far but only one is thriving hopefully it continues to grow.  Fruit nerd that marcotted longan sounds good let us know if/when it starts fruiting.

Lychees in my opinion are much nicer than longan but they are well tested here and fail regularly.  Im not sure about these new variety's that Mike T talks about the erdon lee and other seedless one not sure if they fruit reliably on the coast here time will tell.  I will wait for reports before committing to one.

I am not sure about the seedless, but I highly suspect that Erdon Lee will fruit very poorly in your area. I saw a genetic study once that demonstrated a close relationship to Emperor which tends to require more cold to induce bloom in my experience.

Yeh mate i think your right, there is a seedless one getting around here unsure of name but im suspicious of whether it performs in our climate either.  The only ones i know of that fruit here are tai so (Mauritius) and i think kwai may pink sometimes these are reffered to as other names, but even these are very unreliable often only fruiting once every few years.

For me a tree that fruits only once every few years doesnt make the cut, that is taking up valuable space. 

Dmaxx69

  • Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 108
    • Hawaii County, Keaau, HI zone 11b
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #14 on: February 10, 2022, 10:13:39 AM »
Here on the Big Island Hawaii potassium chlorate is sprayed on the foliage to stimulate flower production on longan trees. I recently acquired a fijian longan tree. Mine is very small yet but is supposed to be similar to longans but well adapted to the tropics.

shot

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 969
    • usa fl bokeelia 10
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #15 on: February 10, 2022, 08:21:38 PM »
 Longan Lada tropical longan with smaller leave and good seed to pulp ratio.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kdLiFUruOg

Also Alupag a very floral taste much less pulp ratio.

I do a few of these just to have something different .

Finca La Isla

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2145
    • Costa Rica, Southern Caribbean coast
    • View Profile
    • finca la isla
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #16 on: February 10, 2022, 09:11:58 PM »
Fiji longan is worth growing but is not very similar to longan.
Peter

cassowary

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 606
    • Australia FNQ 13a Tropical Monsoon
    • View Profile
    • cassowaryseeds
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #17 on: February 10, 2022, 11:04:50 PM »
Yeah fiji longan is great!

Tropo, did you put any shade or where they quite old when you planted them out?
CASSOWARYSEEDS.COM
Seed shop and Seed exchange

Gone tropo

  • Durian obsessed
  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 387
    • Nth Qld Australia, zone 13a
    • View Profile
Re: Longan variety for tropics
« Reply #18 on: February 10, 2022, 11:28:53 PM »
Yeah fiji longan is great!

Tropo, did you put any shade or where they quite old when you planted them out?

Your asking about the pulasan ? Yeh i had shade on both of them from little however i pulled the shade cloth off the stunted one ages ago as it wasnt growing and i had given up on it, I actually pruned it back to a stump 1ft high with no leaves to see if it would shoot back and it did but still growing very slowly. 

The other one i took the shade off about 2 months ago as it is 6ft high and reached the top of the enclosure this one seems to be really happy has a nice thick trunk developing hopefully continues to grow.