The Tropical Fruit Forum

Quote from: Rannman on March 18, 2021, 04:26:11 AM

Chest height for me, and I’m 6’1”. If the branches get too long, just cut the tip off to stop them growing. This in turn causes the branch to thicken up and store energy for the upcoming flowers. Each to their own, but I never need a ladder to pollinate or pick.

Yes, I agree. I am not a commercial grower and appreciate easily managing them. I'm about to get going on my new ones in ground.

OP, I prefer redwood or alaskan cedar posts. These are cemented into the ground with a raised bed or pot by them. I thought about going concrete this time but realized it's a hassle if I want to rearrange or re-landscape concrete posts going to weigh a considerable amount and it would be hard to repurpose.

Hey John,

I don’t trust anything wood in Florida! I’ve had untreated posts fail in six months and treated posts fail after a couple of years. Cedar and redwood is pretty scarce around here and expensive if you can find it (I’m not sure if I would trust it to last more than a couple years anyway). I was pretty shocked at how fast wood rots down here, very different from out west!

I live in a college town with a lot of college students and sure enough this is one of the local frat boys.

When I lived in the north west we would burry little cups of beer in the ground and slugs would crawl in and drown themselves.  I think the same principle should work here, just scale it up.

Rosigold (early) Pickering (mid) Honey Kiss (late)

Most of the information online about Dragon Fruit seems to be coming out of California. Has anyone been able to tell if there are differences in how different varieties perform out west vs east? Are there differences in flavor, productivity, disease, vigor, etc?

Question regarding genetic variation in monoembryonic mango seedlings:
If you plant a monoembryonic mango seed from a fruit that was born in an orchard with homogeneous genetics, say the large Keitt or Kent mango orchards in Mexico or CA, how significant will the genetic variation be in the seedling tree when compared with the parent tree.  Will you pretty much get a Kent mango if both parents are Kents?

There is some genetic shuffling that goes on during meiosis so no, you won’t get the same thing.  You will get something somewhat similar but there may be enough changes in flavor, fiber, size, etc that the fruit isn’t worth while.

HLB does live in the roots. Heat treatments have been shown to be effective at knocking back the disease in the tops of plants but it comes back from the roots.

I think the biggest benefit of having a backing is that you can remove the fouled tanglefoot and replace it. In my yard it gets gunked up with dirt, grass clippings, and dead bugs after a month or so. Sometimes I’ll put new tanglefoot over the old but I can’t do that more than once without making a huge mess.

In my very limited experience, weird growth that is like mixed bloom without the bloom doesn’t die and fall off like a panicle and never becomes normal growth that supports other branches. After watching it do nothing for a long time, I eventually cut it off because it seemed like it was inhibiting normal growth.

Does anyone have a link to a good visual guide for mango flowers? Ideally something with macro photos of male flowers, hermaphrodite flowers, fertilized flowers, normal dead flowers, anthracnose flowers, and powdery mildew flowers. I think I’ve been staring at my Rosigold flowers too long and I’m starting to convince myself something is wrong lol. Some of the flowers are turning brown and drying up and I’m not seeing fruitlets, PM, and I don’t think it looks like anthracnose. I’m guessing they were just not pollinated but my mind is wandering lol! I’ve been spraying with sulfur every week or two for PM since it’s been mostly dry but we have had some dewy mornings that make me think I should have chosen copper (I’m nervous about using the two too close together).

I’ve been attempting citrus. All my trees are pretty young so I can say I’ve been successful or a failure other then a lemon tree that died from what I think was some kind of root problem. I’ve been growing them in partial shade, mulching them with oak leaves and spraying them with oak tea to try and ward off greening.  My biggest challenges right now are bugs and fertilizing correctly. Between leaf miner and Sri Lankan weevils I’m down about 40% of the canopy on some of my smaller trees. I’ve been under fertilizing out of fear of burning them but I think they are much heavier feeders than I’ve been giving them credit and starved. I sprayed them with urea and micros and I think that helped so I’m going to give them another dose this weekend.

I really like using tanglefoot for ants/scale and it probably wards off some other creepy crawlies too. It’s definitely more work than pesticides but still not too bad.  I put it on all my trees in spring time when the ants start expanding their territory, just need to take it off or move it mid summer to let the bark breathe/expand.

If you feel like taking a road trip, I’ve heard Going Bananas sells fruit. I’d call before hand since they were closed down due to covid for a while and they may not have them ripe when you get there. Honestly though, I wouldn’t put in the effort. I just got fruit off mine for the first time last week and was pretty underwhelmed, they pretty much tasted like a grocery store banana.  The core that spaugh referred to wasn’t as bad on my bunch as some other backyard bananas (I’m guessing due to growing conditions) I’ve had but they’re smaller and harder to peel than a Grand Nain due to their thin skin.  I’m still happy with them since I get sick when I eat grocery store bananas but was fine with these.

After months of waiting, my first success graft to a seedling started pushing growth.  Is it too late in the year to plant mangoes? Is it too early to plant this seedling? Should I wait until it flushes more?