The Tropical Fruit Forum

Just an update on the same tree after one season of growing.  It self pollinated and I have three fruit hanging on this tree that will most likely ripen in the summer/fall.  I will start to hand pollinate this year to see if I can bigger fruit.

Ken

My mango trees are only in the ground for less than two years.  I picked off all the fruit earlier this year to focus on growing trees bigger... or I thought.  A few weeks ago, I saw a small wrinkle inedible fruit on the ground that really surprised me.  Up on further investigation, I found another bigger fruit hidden deep inside the tree.  It's from a Candy Corn seedling that I planted in 2019.  The black spot was from rubbing against the wrinkle fruit that fell.

Thats once clean graft   

Good looking fruit Ken.  Hooe all is going well in the backwoods.  You too Jason.

Farm is looking better slowly.  Finally has something to share.

Painter Cherilata grown unprotected on a east-facing hillside in San Diego.  It was grafted on a cherimoya rootstock in 2021.  The fruit self-pollinated last summer and grown to about a golf-ball size before winter hit and it stayed the same size through the winter.  The fruit continue to grow bigger once the weather warmed up in the spring.  Since this was my first cherilata, I wasn’t sure when to pick it.  So, I let it dropped on its own about two weeks ago into a mesh bag.  It took a few days more for it to soften up.  The fruit stayed firm with a mesmerizing ruby color inside and out.

Some people described its flavor as strawberry yogurt.  I would agree that there were hints of that.  I could also taste some good sweet dried plum flavor as well.  The texture was a little uneven with some part of the fruit firm, while other parts are custardy.  All the seeds from this fruit had not developed and remained small soft wrinkle shell.  The seed sacs were unappetizing though.  By the way my family ate all of it up quickly, I would say it is tasty.  Not bad for the first fruit on this small young tree. 

Hi Bill,

I like to have 4 female and 2 male trees.  If we are getting new varieties, I will get more trees.  SoCal.  Escondido, CA

Ken

I will take them if still available.  Thanks.

Ken

    Dongkui(东魁)  female qty: 2
    Black Diamond  female qty: 2
    WuSu(乌酥)  female qty: 2

San Diego

Hi Bill,

I like to change my order to this,

    Dongkui(东魁)  female qty: 2
    Black Diamond  female qty: 3
    WuSu(乌酥)  female qty: 3

San Diego


Thanks,


Ken

Brad,  I plan to do mine 15x20' because I will drive a tractor through.  I would think 15x15 should be adequate on your property.  10x15 may also be workable if you don't mind doing more pruning.

Ken

One of my Santa Rosa seedlings has its very first fruit ready for picking today.  I will bring it for tasting.  It's a good looking fruit.  It should taste ok, perhaps good.  We will find out.

Ken

Per Aug 5th press release, HLB was detected in a lemon and orange tree in a residential Oceanside neighborhood.  This detection triggers a 5-mile HLB quarantine to restrict the movement of citrus, a mandatory survey, and treatment of all citrus trees within 250-meters of the site. 

Although my property is not within the quarantine zone, it is uncomfortably within a few miles.  Maybe I won't bring citrus fruit after all.

https://www.cdfa.ca.gov/egov/Press_Releases/Press_Release.asp?PRnum=21-091

Good luck with your tough growing conditions. Gary from Palm Springs used to be here a lot. He is in a suburban house. In his back yard and more (of course!) Gary planted fruit trees (mostly mangos) close together. They reinforced each other to retain moisture and shaded each other. I think he had a high stone/concrete block wall helping his efforts. Enough to create a wet mini-oasis in his dry area of California. He created his own wetter micro-climate. He admitted as much to me directly about 8 years ago on this forum. I believe Simon is well acquainted with Gary.

The video of a tour of Dr Richard Cambell's mango-centric farm near Miami. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeCrZC_5slU
He has an upper canopy of fast growing non-fruit trees that shade the fruit trees below. I think this would be a good approach in your so called hellscapes. Plant these "nurse" canopy trees to protect your young fruit trees. At a certain point when your orchard is established. When the fruit trees are mature enough to shade each other and become sun-resistant. Then you cut down all or some of these upper canopy trees. Or maybe cut their height in half.______ Perhaps inter planting banana stalks will shade young fruit trees enough. Moringa perhaps?

Also  I have seen photos of the large organic Keitt mango orchard in California. It was a few years ago but if iirc it was a three acre orchard out in the middle of nowhere. Nowhere meaning there was just bare dry, barely vegetated land surrounding it on all sides with some foothills rising in the distance. Find this guy, visit his farm and ask him how he established his Keitt orchard. Being organic and all he can probably name his Keitt selling price. As in how many large mango orchards are there in California? One? Two? Five? Cannot be more than five.

I am open to correction on any of the above__

Hi Zands, 

Thanks for the advice and sharing your knowledge.  I believe the Keitt mango orchard you are referring to is near the Salton Sea, similar to what's in Palm Springs.  Besides Keitt, they have lots of VP too.  The condition there is much more extreme than mine.  They do whitewash their trees during summer.  I believe they are doing well and have expanded more mango acreages. 

I am only about 10 miles from the coast with ocean breeze every afternoon.  I am hoping that I don't need to go to extremes to grow fruit trees here.  But, I am prepared to do whatever it takes to get them going.

Ken

Looking forward to another great party.  I will most likely bring some citrus.

Ken