The Tropical Fruit Forum

You have to taste fresh S. queretaroensis to see why. The poor shelf life, limited season between May to July depending on year, and potential for crop failure is high. The monsoon rains coming to soon during the final ripening can ruin crop.

The flavor is more fruity and sweet intensity compared to dragon fruit. The texture is like a dragon fruit mixed with a ripe fig. It's syrupy sweet with intense berry flavors. Some can taste like raspberry jam. This was my experience with them at least from the plants producing in Southern Zacatecas.

This cactus is worth the trouble to grow. I can see potential in interior warm areas 9B or higher of Southern CA, Southern Nevada, and Southern Arizona.

It can take a while to fruit from seed 7 years or more. Mature cuttings are hard to source. I am 5 years in from ones grown from seeds.

My largest surviving is a seedling from a large orange fruit which was the sweetest of the fruits I tried. I am hoping in the next 2 years I can get it to flower.

Most of Exoticas inventory like others have said was bought out the last 5 years. I was down there a little over a month ago, and the only thing I thought was an ok price was a macadamia nut rooted cutting in a 5 gal I got for $70.

I bought a Diamond guava seedling about 4 years back, after tasting one of the mature Diamond guava seedlings on a past visit. The trees were gone which I tasted the fruit from, so I had to asked Steve if he had anymore. He did have some smaller 1 gal seedlings of Diamond guava, so I took a chance and grew it out. The tree fruited last year and the guava was very large with great flavor and a small central seed cavity (so I would say I got fairly lucky with the offspring). The other guava seedling which I got he called it waimea red guava. This fruited last year as well, however the fruit was not red and the flavor was ok. I would rate this guava like a B-, its a dwarf stature with good production and decent flavor so I will keep it for now. The Diamond guava seedling I would rate as a solid A.

I would not recommend going there unless you want grafted mango or a common grafted annona (gefner etc.). Everything else is mostly seedlings with variable quality, the loquat seedling may be worth it depending what mother tree they are from. The guava seedlings are a random chance you probably get a decent tree at least. You are going to get better selection of trees with ad hoc local collectors, etsy/ebay sellers, and online nurseries. The tropical fruit scene is booming in South Florida with small fruit farms and nurseries. California it seems to have stagnated with nurseries.

Seagrape season is starting now into November. I would check around locally to see if you can find some ripe fruit.

I have a seedling mango selection which was growing right next to a brackish canal in Florida. I have several seedling growing out now. I am far away from salty water but figured it would be good genetics for rootstock.

Waste of time in Southern California. You need warm nights and humidity over 60% on average. I would say its northern range is coastal central Florida in micro climate pockets.

My friends tree is close to fruiting in Florida, beautiful tree with HUGE leaves. Not something to plant unless you have the room for it.

I think we will see the most flooding and issues in riverside county. Particularly of interest is Banning, CA. It is in a valley between two major mountains and the storm is set to go right through the city. I would think a major flooding event could occur near the washes and seasonal creeks.

Solanum opacum is less vigorous then the Solanum nigrum by quite a bit. The flavor is ok it does have some papaya like tastes however it is not even close to as sweet as the Solanum nigrum selection I have. I am not sure if the 2 hybridized but most likely can?

Here is a picture of one of my best grow outs of S. peruvianum. This one has great flavor and larger fruit with good production clusters of fruit. The fruit is a medium sized cherry tomato.

I am actively saving seeds, so if there is interested I may be able to share. This is grown out from a batch of Joseph Lofthouse selections of it, via EFN.

Best off ordering fresh seeds packed in slightly moisture coir or vermiculite. May have better luck ordering from someone in the States.

S8 has a great flavor, good production, and is self fertile. I am really enjoying the desert king seedling I have.

I like how it holds fruit from November to March and has good production and flavor. The only thing I dislike it's longer stem sections and has longer spines then average.

I have Asunta 3 flowering now. Luckily I saved pollen from a superior fruiting epiphyllum about 7 weeks ago which I pollinated with last night.

I'm taking out all my in ground trees, they are to hard to protect over 7ft tall. I think only way to manage will be containers bagging everything. BSF has really made it a pain to grow fig trees.

I stopped collecting any more fig varieties. I have tried fly traps, bagging, etc. Bagging seems not fool proof either, the timing of placing the bags and getting to the fig before the scourge does.

The 3M black electrical tape works good around the union going over something like buddy tape to hold the graft in place.

What marang looks like



What a pedalai leaf looks like (bigger, more intricate design), pedalai can have more basic looking leaves too, depends on the variety but marang leaf structure is generally more simple and smaller than pedalai

A friend has a 6 year old 25ft Pedalai, Artocarpus sericicarpus in South FL (hoping fruit soon). Friend tried a lot of strains in the past, a Philippines strain that is growing seems to be the most cold hardy. Whatever strains they have in Hawaii hear they are sensitive to the cold. No issues with mid 40s, mature tree may be good down to 32f?
-nullzero

Its a Filipino pedalai, I added in the discussion because Marang has some similarities to Pedalai. Maybe like comparing an Mandarin to a Orange. Also fruitguy has a pedalai and wanted more info about it growing in Florida.