Pineapples everywhere

I say it about a lot of fruit, but pineapples are really one of my favorite fruit.

When I started out with a few pineapple tops, I could never imagine how my pineapple crop would snowball. Once it starts fruiting, most plants produce two or more little offsets on the fruit stem, these can be wrenched off, left to dry a day or so, then planted. I leave the parent plant and it generally produces suckers that fruit faster than any other means of propagation. Within a few years, I have more than 50 plants scattered throughout my garden, anywhere there's a little spot, I stick it in.

No one living in a subtropical climate has any excuse not to grow pineapples.

Pineapples are undemanding, beautiful and offer up a feast in 2-3 years. No store bought pineapple can taste like a ripened pineapple right from your garden.

For the last few weeks , we've been eating one or two pineapples from my garden every day . Most were sweet like candy, with a hint of coconut. Some were less sweet, but for the treasure trove of minerals, vitamins and fibre, who cares. Some are fist sized, some are large like their store bought parents. It likely depends on how much water and nutrient it received.

Nothing is easier to grow, just twist off the top, let it dry a day or two, then make a small hole, stick it in and tamp the soil around it. I don't do anything special, no watering, fertilizing, nothing. They just grow, take their time. Once I plant them, I leave and forget about them, until one day, they suddenly start flowering and within a few months offer up their prize.

The picture below is my new pineapple patch where I removed the dead banana plants, most of these are tops from the fruit we've been eating, some from offsets and a few store bought tops.

Tropical Fruit Festival at Mounts Botanical Garden

Tomorrow, June 23, is the Tropical Fruit Festival at Mounts Botanical Garden from 10 AM to 3 PM.

   This is a chance to enjoy delicious tropical fruit, some of which you may have never tasted. There will be exciting activities in the Garden including cooking demonstrations by Chef Allen Susser  (an additional $5 per person), a tropical fruit display featuring over 100 tropical fruits, tropical fruit samples (limited supply), Whole Foods Market sampling table plus fruit and fruit trees will be available for purchase, Palm Beach County Extension Master Gardener Booth, food trucks and music.  

$5 entrance donation to Mounts Botanical Garden.

Ahh, jaboticabas, finally!

Thee years ago, I bought a 5 year old jaboticaba at the Fruit and Spice Park in Miami. (http://www.fruitandspicepark.org)

If you haven't been there, you have to go, each January they have the Redland festival, with arts and crafts, nurseries selling rare fruit trees, food, vendors selling all kinds of ware.

Jaboticaba's are very slow growing trees in the myrtle family. They are closely related to grumichama, guava etc. Seedlings take 8 - 15 years to bear fruit. Mine has taken 8 years.
http://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/oc/freepubs/pdf/F_N-20.pdf

It was towards the end of the day and I struck luck, I paid a mere $15 for a plant bigger than local plants going for $65 or more!
I have watered it, mulched it with pine bark (acidic) and fertilized it often with a very good quality fertilizer for rare fruit.
While doing my daily walk through the garden, I noticed one green fruit on the tree, closer inspection revealed an almost ripe fruit and several others.
Almost daily, I notice a cluster of 4 little blooms appearing on some branches, right on the trunk, in random places.
This must be the fruit that I have waiting for and hoped to fruit the most. I just can't wait for the first one to ripen. I really hope I like it and it doesn't turn out like the Suriname Cherry, Marlierea or other failed fruits.

Glorious South Florida Sunshine

Our "winter" has been unseasonably hot and dry. Yeah, I know, I seem to be saying it every year, maybe we'll need to adopt a new "normal".

We took advantage of a "cold front" passing through and temperatures dropping to a very comfortable lower 70's with no humidity and went to Okeeheelee Park. Rented a paddle boat and canoe for the kids. There are bikes for rent and segways tours also.

It was just plain gorgeous, we sat on the boat and just drank in the sunshine and got sunburnt !

Here's a few pictures of the lake and park.

Beautiful clouds

Pond on the Pine flats hiking trail

Pond

Island in the lake

RFC Plant Sale Saturday March 24, 2012 at the South Florida Fairgrounds. 9 AM to 2 PM.

Mark your calendar, its the Palm Beach Rare Fruit Chapter's Plant Sale Saturday March 24, 2012 at the South Florida Fairgrounds.   9 AM to 2 PM.

I'll be volunteering.

Aloe barberae turns out to be Aloe tongaensis

I bought 3 bare rooted Aloe "barberae" on ebay in 2006.
I immediately planted one at the front of our home, the other, I grew in a container for another year or more, until I had time to prepare the rock garden I had planned.
5 years layer, the one in front hasn't bloomed yet, but the one in the backyard is much bigger and bloomed late October 2011. It was a pretty sight.
One word of advice, these Aloes like drainage, the 3rd one was planted flush with the ground in our sandy soil, yet when the rainy season came, it rotted away.
It's a magnificent plant. Maybe it was a blessing its not a real barberae, as they can get very big.

Aloe tongaensis 1

Aloe tongaensis 2

Aloe tongaensis blooms

Marlierea - not fit for eating

I bought the seeds on Tradewindsfruit.com, germinated and grew the plant in a container, then planted it in the garden 3 years ago, well it's fruiting profusely now.
The shrub/tree is really pretty, with the typically peeling bark of the Myrtacious family, fragrant leaves etc. I was really looking forward to trying the fruit, well, it's a total disappointment.

The fruit looks much like a purple strawberry guava. Like the strawberry guava, 90% of the fruit is infested with fruit fly larvae. The plant itself also strongly resembles the strawberry guava, strikingly beautiful, tough, drought tolerant.

Take a very ripe fruit, if you can find one without worms, bite it halfway, check for any squirming, then place it in your mouth, chew. The first impression is this could be quite good, a nice tart guava like taste, but it quickly gives way to the most bitter after taste, if you have taken quinine before, thats how bitter it is.

Since my gardening space is limited, like the strawberry guava, the Marlierea has to go.
I plan on planting a seed grown Atemoya in its place after all possibility of frost is gone.

I hope this helps anyone else interested in growing Marlierea, for landscaping, fantastic, for edibility, not very good. Other not so good edible plants that will soon be gone from my yard, Suriname cherry.

Marlierea

Fruit

 

Rotting fruit

Peeling Bark

Fruit with seeds