Happenings in my garden

14 years ago

My trees are finally getting old enough to start producing. It is fun going out every day and seeing what is new!

Here are some pictures of new happenings with my fruit trees lately:

My first rheedia edulis/garcinia intermedia (or who knows what else it is called!) fruit:

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My abiu starting to grow fruit, not as many as last year.

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Pitomba - my very 1st flowers

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Rollinia - first time it fruited

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Soursop getting ready!

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A visitor

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I had some jackfruits last month... maybe they were more ripe this year, as they were less sticky, and thus easier to cut/eat. But the smell still turns me off.

Loads of caimitos are ripe.

And the canistel are yellowing up.

Nispero "Prolific" is starting to develop more fruits from the zillion flowers it makes. I guess it is now mature enough.

The avocados are growing nicely (one is a seedling tree). The seedling fruit is earlier than my other tree,so it will extend my season a bit.

I tasted my first grumichama (only 1 fruit on the plant!). It was good, I will prune the bush back and hope for more next time.

I also had my first Surinam cherry from plant I grew from a different set of seeds. This one is MUCH better (larger and less astringent) than my other plant. I think the first Surinam cherry is going to be axed to make room for something else.

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Comments (18)

hmhausman
14 years ago
Beautiful! Thanks for the pics. I assume that Rollinia is a seedling. It looks very interesting. Don;t forget to post a full report when you get to try it. It doesn't look like that will be too long from now.

Harry
simon_grow
14 years ago
Your trees look absolutely beautiful. I've read in several places that the fruit quality of many trees isn't as good the first few years and may get better and better once it has several years of fruiting under its belt.

Do you have any Lychees, Longans or Mangoes growing?
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Your fence looks about 3 feet high. I think it would only keep dogs and rabbits out. Birds, squirrels, raccoons, and deer could easily get in. But individual squirrels, at least in my experience, don't eat the entire plant, they nibble at the best parts. I'm not sure what a gaggle of squirrels would do, and a flock of birds or at least two or three large birds could eat a lot. A raccoon would bend the fence a bit where it climbed over, but I don't know if raccoons eat plants without fruit. A deer jumping in would leave some kind of depression or mark(s) where it landed. One possible way to stop deer: as mentioned already, a double fence, but you don't want to leave a space between that's large enough for the deer to land. You want the space to be too small for that, but wide enough so the deer won't be able to clear it and will have second thoughts about trying. I think deer are better at jumping heights than lengths. Since you already have a fence, the easiest solution might be an electrified wire (plus a ground wire) along the top of the fence. So welcome to the battle with the hungry animals. Everything edible that I grow is inside a metal cage of some kind, and I have an electric fence around some plum trees. And I'm trying metal cages around clusters of fruit on trees...it's the only way I can get anything for myself.
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I have had the same trouble this year, ALL of my eggplants, 20 and another dozen peppers, mowed off right at the stem. I did have a woodchuck a few years ago, but got rid of him, and saw the obvious den/hole along the fenceline. I am guessing it is chipmonks this year. We have lots of bunnies but there was a fence around it that should keep them out, chippies could have crawled over/under it. I will look for groundhog holes later as well. I replanted 18 eggplants and 25 peppers, and the next day they were gone too!!!! I have 12 more eggplants, this is the last replanting. They are going in a different area and keeping my fingers crossed. I doubt it was kids, they may mess with a few but not take the time for the entire garden, it was a 4 legged critter. Oh I also had no footprints and we are getting tons of rain, which makes me think it was a very light animal, hence chipmonk.
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ch3rri
14 years ago
Soursop!!! That look so good. I have not eat fresh soursop for a long time. I only get the frozen one here.

Your visitor is very scary. Is he dangerous too?
rayandgwenn
Original Author
14 years ago
Harry- yes, the rollinia is a seedling. It will be my first taste of a rollinia, and I hear good things about it, so I am excited.

Simon- no lychees- it is too hot here at my altitude. But I have rambutan that do well. Longans- I have only a seedlings tree...I may try a grafted one next time I find one. I have about 7-8 small named mango trees, but we had so much rain this year, every flowering was a wash out- it looks like I will be fruitless.

Cherri- soursops- I get one every few months. I like them well enough, just too many seeds! I have a few seedlings that are flowering this year, but none have held a fruit yet.
As far as I can tell from his white belly, the snake is a PR racer. They are a bit aggressive, and have venom, but it won't kill a person, but it supposedly hurts really bad! When angry, they swell out their neck and they have a little cobra-like cape. Pretty cool, but this guy did not want to show off. The one I saw yesterday was not so shy- I made sure I had a long stick to scare him away!
murahilin
14 years ago
Very nice pics. How many different rambutans do you have? Do you also have pulasan or mangosteen?

How is your cherry of the rio grande doing?
boson
14 years ago
Hi rayandgwenn,

Nice pictures. How many years did it take for your pitomba to flower for the first time? I grow pitomba too, so I am a little curious.

Tomas
rayandgwenn
Original Author
14 years ago
Thanks- I always have to wait until my husband can help me with posting the pictures... I am going to learn to do it by myself soon so I can show the progress of my "babies"!

Murahilin- I have only 1 nice sized (8 ft and nicely branched) R162 and a large (8ft) seedling (which I have to move, and if it makes the move, I will try to graft).
No pulasan, but I do have one mangosteen (now about 5 ft). It was grafted but has still not flowered. I think it gets too much shade. I will really push the bloom booster next winter/spring.
The COTRG is doing great, growing like wildfire, but no flowers/fruit yet. I may give it a hard pruning before it gets too hot (to make it more bushy) and see what happens. I am hoping to get flowers soon or next year.

Boson- I think I have had the pitomba about 4 years now. I got it as a 1ft tall seedling. It is a slow grower. It is maybe 2.5 ft tall bush now. It got a bit unhappy with a short dry spell....maybe that got it to bloom? I don't know. So far, those 3 flowers are the only ones I see.
caiden
14 years ago
These are great pictures of your young fruit! I'm so glad, however, that there are no snakes where I live!
ohiojay
14 years ago
Gwenn,
Very nice pics. Thanks for sharing. How big is your g. edulis?

Sherry Ballister from Viveroanones Nursery said she had some good sized seedling pulasans. Bryan Brunner may as well.
rayandgwenn
Original Author
14 years ago
Jay- the garcinia edulis is about 4-5 ft tall. It is interesting, it started flowering from the lower/oldest branches first and the flowers are now slowly moving up the bush.
red_sea_me
14 years ago
Gwenn,
everything looks so lush and happy, including the snake. It is nice to be reminded what our plants are supposed to look like and if lucky what the fruit should look like.
good luck and thanks for posting,
-Ethan
lycheeluva
14 years ago
great pics gwenn- dying to hear how the soursop is- my one try of a soursop was of a cellophane wrapped piece that was sitting out in the sun at Robert is Here in Florida. Obviously, it was disgusting. wondering if fresh from the tree is better.

how old is the mangosteen- would love to see pics
rayandgwenn
Original Author
14 years ago
Here is my mangosteen:

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And the graft site, healed completely. It is hard to even see anymore, more of a kink in the tree:

{{gwi:1315283}}
rayandgwenn
Original Author
14 years ago
I found the post when I first got it-
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/tropicalfruits/msg0820445621488.html

So it is now about 2.5 yrs that I have had it.
ohiojay
14 years ago
That's actually very nice and really unusual for a grafted mangosteen. Most seem to stay short and grow very slow. That's great for 2.5 years!
rayandgwenn
Original Author
14 years ago
The first year it did grow slowly, maybe 6 inches. Then the second year it grew about 6 inches every 6 months. This year it's last flush added another foot or so. So it's growth is picking up, almost doubling now.
Eggo
14 years ago
That mangosteen looks great! Please send over some fresh mangosteen fruits here in the next 5yrs, ok. hahah. just kidding!
jsvand5
14 years ago
Wow, that mangosteen is looking amazing. I bet you will have fruit soon. I really need to move to PR. If you hear of any Nuclear medicine jobs out there let me know. I am tired of staring at the stick that I call a mangosteen at my house. Mine has put on ONE set of leaves in 1 1/2 years of having it. I stuck it in the ground right next to my Jackfruit a few weeks ago. It's time for this thing to either grow or die.

Happenings in my garden

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