How long? About 3-4 years. I can't remember. I let this ensete die because it was so big. I didn't dare take it outside during the summer months because the wind would break it off. Because of this, I couldn't flush the soil with water to flush out salt build up from fertilizers and other stuff in my hard water, so it eventually went down hill. I just put it outside to finish dying a week ago. However my other 3 that I put outside during Summer are down stairs in my unlit, unheated basement room in dormancy. In the Fall, I cut them down to 5-6' stumps, repot them in 15 gallon nursery pots, and stick them in the basement till next Spring. They have large thick "trunks". I do this every year and they come back to full beauty in the Summer.

Hello everyone, I have a question , about 10 years ago I have bought some papaya from Florida. I put some seeds in a container on my patio wher I had a young blueberry bush. About 4 years later when the bush got bigger I planted it in the ground but I notice that there was new growth of limbs , with lather foliage, though somewhat similar to the blueberry bush. I tried to separate the two of them but not they were growing too close together . So I decided to let it be. It was a fast growing tree that grew about 1ft a year and required some pruning. This year when I was pruning the lower limbs I notice that the tree was bearing fruit. Never noticed blooms. But I am puzzled because it does not resemble any papaya fruit, and is more similar to a guava fruit, somewhat. So my question is for the experts: what kind of tree am I growing? Thank you for anyone helping!

I have been looking at propagation from stem cuttings, and it seems that it is superior to the seed method because you get a genetic clone and it grows into a fruiting tree in four years instead of 10. There appears to be a group of people who use pieces of aloe vera plant to stick the stems into before burying in soil. Apparently, it is a natural root hormone. I definitely am going to try it because I have aloe vera growing in my yard, and I don't want to search for root hormone and shell out money when I have a potentially equivalent product at home. I also already have two grafted avocado trees. They are small, and I had already cut back the Fuerte, but I still haven't pruned the Mexicola Grande. I might use that pruned leader as a test. The Mexicola Grande would probably make the best root stock for grafting, anyway.

Hi Tony Doe, Your Longan there looks healthy to me and with a few new branches of new reddish leaves. They look very pretty there. I'm thinking if they have new flushes, they ought to have blooms? I'm asking this question as one of mine is also sending out a lot of new flushes and I'm hoping that eventually they'll push out some blooms as well. I've been feeding them with fish emulsion, liquid compost and epsom salt. By the way, thanks so much for the link. The guy there suggested fertilizing with potassium chloride (?) I wonder if that is something you can get from Home Depot. I've read that this chemical has to be handled with cautious as it's something they use in fire crackers. But, if it works, I'm at least going to try as I can't wait to make my bloom for me this year. I don't have luck with growing longans as long as I can remember. I now realized that they are susceptible to web worm and they do not like shady areas. I planted a few of them in the south side of my yard where there are two huge oak trees overhanging and they are host to webworms. So, they died young with disease even though they were planted in the ground. Last year, I planted two more new ones in my north side with plenty of sunshine and they seem to be doing well. Here are some pictures. Biew Kiew is blooming and Kohala is sending out new flushes. Please update how your longan is doing. I do hope it will bloom for you soon. #1 = Longan Kohala Flushing #2 - Longan Kohala (almost 5.5 ft in height now) #3 = Longan Bieu Kiew (almost 4.5ft in height) #4 = Bieu Kiew's blooms.