This thread is a good idea, especially where folks find good results (fruit). I have only have guava fruiting from seed. I have mangoes, pawpaw, cherimoya, jakfruit, soursop, white sapote, sugar apple, "spanish lime" and nispero all planted from seed.

davecito,

Have you eaten Coconas - Solanum sessiliflorum - before? My naranjilla all die very young. Maybe too much heat/light?

I have fruited a few things from seed. Some are conventional things that are propagated generally from seed, like jaboticaba, june plum, cacao, garcinia intermedia, sugar apples, etc. I have also fruited 6 mango seedlings, 5 jakfruit seedlings, kwai muk, avocado, longan, and a few more that are probably slipping my mind. I'll post some pictures as these trees fruit again. I have posted in other threads my Kohala longan seedling, my kwai muk, and my Tabouey x J-30 jakfruit. I can re-post these here if anyone is interested....let me know.

Harry

Harry, of course we are interested!

Hi, Harry. We're interested too!!! :-)

Hi, Davecito. You're so lucky to have all those volunteer seedlings!

Harry approximately how long did it take to grow a Jaboticaba from seed to fruition? have you ever airlayered one?

Harry,
Also, of those that fruited from seed, how do you rate them vs. the fruit they came from (or in general if you don't recall). It would be interesting to see what % were as good or better or a worthy quality vs. what were a waste of space and time - especially for someone like me with extremely limted access to grafted varieties.

Has anyone here experimented with techniques to induce early flowering in plants grown from seed?

Hey davecito, great pics. Although you live in a colder climate than many of us here, you have an excellent assortment of tropicals and subtropicals. As long as you are determined and have the space and perhaps a greenhouse, you can grow just about anything.

I'm still waiting for the day when someone on this forum with a lot of space and money will post pictures of a few fruiting Mangosteens growing in a greenhouse.

My Selma seedling is just popping out of the ground and I'll post some pics once its leaves get larger. Please keep the pics and information coming!

@ Abayomi

I have - they were new to me, so should I get fruit I will have to find more uses for them. The flavor is sour, kind of citrus-like. I made a salsa the one time I was able to get the fruit, and reworked the recipe to make it a bit more tart citrus oriented (lemon and lime juice, cilantro, sweet onions, hot peppers and ripe bell peppers).

So far - knock on wood - I've done ok with naranjillas - the real test will be indoor acclimatization when winter rolls around. That noted - mine really started to look miserable when it hit 95F (being brought inside, into air conditioning and they revived within 15 minutes), and I have to keep them in semi-shade. We've had a semi-drought, so watering deeply once, sometimes twice a day. I think in places with cold winters they won't last in-ground, and in places with long hot summers, they still might be more suited to large but mobile containers, due to their heat sensitivity.

They get big fast, so I have had to re-pot more often than I would otherwise. I can understand why the more exotic edible nightshades aren't as often grown (I love pepinos, tamarillos and some of the others as fruit) - they are so so delicate. Bugs, fungus, you name it. Citrus and guavas are effortless in comparison. If one can pull it off, many of the nightshade edibles do also make magnificent foliage plants as well - naranjillas, coconas, and tamarillos (which I couldn't keep alive) are all striking-looking plants.

I have a colleague who is from Colombia - her husband is in grad school here, and she turned me on to naranjillas. I've gotten pulp at a Latin grocery here in Chapel Hill, and it was delicious - great to make popsicles with, and I imagine one could make some really stunning preserves with them. I understand that fruit quality can vary quite a bit (my plants are from different batches of seed, but they have no spines, and I've been told that the spiny ones have smaller but sweeter fruit, VS the no-spines variety producing larger fruits that are either bland, or sharply sour), but I'm hoping for good results.

@ Gardenathome:

Two lucky accidents - those seeds had been mixed into some old dirt, in pots that weren't being used. I got into a habit of trying to sprout exotic seeds from supermarket fruits, and I usually try to remain organized with seeds - kepping track of what went where - but these were two 'escapees'! This was a learning experience - just how long guava and cherimoya seeds can remain viable, even in less-than-optimal conditions. I have killed cherimoyas before, so this one I've left undisturbed, as it seems to want to thrive, and apart from making sure it has adequate water, it seems to prefer not being fussed over.

This has all been such a learning experience. To anyone who is a parent (or grandparent), I keep thinking this would be a great way of getting you kids or grandkids interested in science, or gardening, or both.

Educate me please. Aside from the cost (seedling being cheaper), and the satisfaction of growing a tree from seeds, what other advantages do seedlings have over grafts? I read somewhere (maybe I didn't understand it completely?) that with a seed you don't know exactly what it'll turn out, that there are more variables as to what the final tree will bear, is that right? Or is the opposite true?

Thanks,

with grafting you know exactly what you are getting, the tree you took the scion from.

Some fruit do not come true from seed at all. some do fairly reliable like Anona, and Autocarpus and then some are almost always grown from seed like mangosteen.

grafting hasnt proved beneficial enough for mangosteen cultivation. with any seed there is always some percentage chance of variability, this is how mangosteen cultivars are created

Seedlings have tap roots and grafts do not. This can be either an advantage or a disadvantage depending on your plans for the tree. In ground tap roots provide anchoring and can tap water deeper in the earth. In a pot tap roots will circle the pot, possibly strangling the other roots and taking up room better used by feeder roots.
Cath

Cath,

Grafts will have tap roots as they are grafted to root stock material. Now plants/trees produced from air layering or cuttings will lack a tap root.

newgen,
further to mango_Kush's comments, the plus side to growing from seed is the opportunity to select for traits expressed by the selected seed. The genes in each seed can be stimulated or drawn out by particular environments, circumstances. A plant that is well adapted to a given environment can pass on the adaptability to the seeds, even when not crossed with another plant.

So if one planted many plants and one was more prolific or was resilient to disease or thrived during drought etc. the seed from that plant can express that tendency. Grafts from that plant would do the same however, grafts are essentially clones so there is little to no chance of improving the mother plant with the cutting. The seeds can lead to improvements (noting the risk of reduced usefulness and in many cases a LONG wait to find out).

Extreme cases of cloning plants literally to death were the infamous irish famine. a potato is a clone of the parent. Take taters and grow more taters with tater over and over and you can have 1 million spuds that are essentially the same. If a bug can kill one, it can kill them all.

Millions died when it did. In the short term, grafts are the way to go. I have the good fortune of lack of access to many so must work with seed in many cases. I do want more grafted plants as a stop gap measure for production certainty though. Given unlimited resources and time - which we don't have - I would got ballistic with seed.

It is interesting to note that the grafted varities folks rave about all came from seed at some point. Stop growing seed and we stop the potential for the next great named variety....

I have both grafted and seedling plants, and I don't have much preference for a few reasons, foremost among them are cost, education, and overall intent:

I am not just growing strictly for fruit production, though I would be thrilled if everything did set fruit. Many of the things I grow - citrus, guava, rare nightshades - are very handsome plants, and are a joy just for their foliage.

I am in central North Carolina, where we have about 8 months of subtropical weather, and about 4 months when nighttime temps can and usually do fall below freezing. So expecting or setting an absolute goal of getting lots of annonas, citrus, guavas or other things might not be reasonable for me. So what I attempt to grow is determined by things other than the normal kinds of agricultural influences that I would consider if I lived in South Florida, Southern California, South Texas, Hawaii or Puerto Rico.

I also grow because I would like to get better at cultivation. Seeds are the cost of ordering, trading, or supermarket fruit. If I make errors, I'm not sinking hundreds of dollars into something that I don't yet know how to maintain. Economically, I can't afford to kill hundreds of dollars in grafted trees, and with seedlings, ANYONE can afford to screw up, so long as you learn from your mistakes. With any plants, there are general care requirements, but there are also the specific adaptations a plant will make to a precise, given location - microclimates, light strength, etc...and in growing from seed, I can more affordably experiment with techniques to see what kinds of care are most appropriate to my specific conditions and specifications (and perhaps for this reason - I have a very mediocre record with grafted plants whose infancy may have been in very different environments, while my seed-grown plants have tended to be sturdier, healthier and a lot more hassle-free).

And lastly, I enjoy growing things for the sake of growing things. It's a very peaceful hobby to take up, extremely rewarding, and for me, the process and education parts of it are just as important as the results: Growing things is the labor. Seeing your plants happy and healthy is the paycheck. Any fruit is your year-end bonus for a job extra well-done.

Quebolausa,
You are right of course. Don't know what I was thinking - must have been seedling versus cutting as you surmised. Thanks.
Cath

Thanks for all the great comments! For sure I feel so relaxed working in the garden, noting new growth, taking photos, correcting some previous mistakes,....

I grow a lot of fruit seedlings just to see if I can keep that type of plant alive for a few years before investing in a grafted or air-layered variety. I have to keep everything in pots since I don't live in the tropics. My theory is that if I am going to have potted tropical plants on the porch and around the house they might as well produce fruit.

The only ones I have that have made it all the way to fruiting are strawberry guava, large white guava and key lime. I have a huge cacao inside that is just now large enough to bloom but it is an only child so I won't be getting any pods off of it. I got it as a seedling from another gardener. I've lost all of its siblings over the years but it thrives under my care, it's over head high and has branched, it's too big to haul in and out anymore for summers outdoors. I have a large collection of fruiting citrus that I purchased as mature trees after growing many from seeds and learning how to keep them happy (the key lime is the only citrus seedling to ever fruit from seed for me).

Currently my nursery area has a bunch of two year old lychees, two sapodillas, one four year old mamey sapote, and a pineapple.

davecito - I live nearby, in Raleigh. I also grow solanums. I have lulo seeds from Colombia along with Tomate de Arbol, some are just now sprouting for next years garden. I have grown them before but not from fruit I was eating. Those crops did fine but had little flavor. I think a lot of them like it cooler than here and they like 12 hour days and 12 hour nights like it is closer to the equator. If you ever get a chance to visit Colombia I highly recommend it (for the food alone).

I have a lot of plants but my failures outnumber my successes. I have even had one Mangosteen seed to sprout and grow for one year before dying of some sort of rot. Oh, and for all that is written about cold sensitivity, two winters ago my temporary hoophouse got down to 26 degrees. I lost a few citrus and some bananas but the mamey sapote came through without a problem - go figure!

John:

FYI, cacao will bear fruit without a second plant to cross polinate. Mine did any way. See link attached.

Harry

Here is a link that might be useful: First Cacao Bloom/Fruit.\

Good to know Harry - my plans for a Tarheel Chocolate Plantation have revived! My tree did better when it got to spend the summers outdoors in the shade but it is still looking healthy after a summer indoors in room with skylights and windows.

I forgot to mention my pride and joy - a seedling Cherimoya that will celebrate its first birthday soon. It looks just like the pawpaw in the garden.

The biggest failure so far is Chinese Red Bayberry or Myrica rubra - sometimes called Yumyum berry. Yang mei in China or Yamamomo in Japan. My seeds are heading into their second winter without a single sign of life. No rotting, no floating when placed in water but still no sprouting. I'll go three winters and then toss them out and make room for somebody else. By then someone will be importing these trees into the US.

Mc Dill white sapote, I should be receiving some scions from a friend this week to graft it over.

Tropic Pink guava, about 4years old

Fruit

Multiple guavas in one hole, about 4y/o

seedling papaya, abiu, cherimoya, coffee, Spanish lime, chempedak, bread nut, muntingia, rollinia, mac nuts, various garcinia, salak, plus others.

The next generation, some of the seeds from PR

just some of my stuff, thanks to all my trading partners btw.

-Ethan

@ Trianglejohn

Likewise - my failures certainly outnumber successes. Past failures include cherimoyas, sugar apple, custard apple, rollinia/biriba (never germinated, many attempts), cape gooseberries, pepinos, kumquats (squirrel attack!), feijoas, malabar cinnamon...some of those I'm trying again, with some of what I learned last time out kept in mind.

I have had a very tough time with Solanums - very sensitive. I have a couple seedling tomate de arbol/tamarillos, and have had a couple others start strong and then die. Ditto for pepinos, and a cape gooseberry. I plan on trying those again. My coconas have been placed in isolation, until I nail down a pest problem. I have some pseudolulo sprouts going. There's a few other solanums - baquicha, tzimbalo I'd like to try if the opportunity presents itself.

Solanums are a VERY intense crash course in pest management, light management, soil mixes, how to gauge water needs...so I think even the failures there are highly educational.

I have a colleague/friend from Colombia actually, and haven't yet been, though I do have an invite. She and her hubby clued me into the various goodies that can be found in some of the local Latin groceries - like pulpa de lulo! With those plants, I'll remember your light suggestions.

My parents had a mango that got killed down to rootstock from a freeze. New growth came from the rootstock and it eventually bore fruit every year. Little egg shaped yellow fruit that was fibrous. It tasted great. They liked it too and even went to the effort of peeling, cutting and freezing some. Does that sound like Turpentine mango?

I like those small primitive fibrous mangoes. Bought some at the Swap Shop flea market this year. Messy...best to eat them outside with water nearby to wash your hands

I intended to put together a post for this thread, but found that it required a much greater time commitment than I was able to deal with over the past few weeks. I am going to try to do this in several parts so I can work through the entire project, hoping someone will find it of interest or in some way instructive....if nothing else, it will help me chronicle some of the history of my yard for future look backs when my memory is failing me.

The things I am growing from seed (fruiting where noted) include.

Rollinia..............should fruit next year, put a few blooms on this past spring

Garcinia intermedia..........fruited.......small scant fleshed fruits with a sweet/sour taste......for me, not really worth the effort compared to achachairu.

Kwai Muk.....fruited.......came fairly true to seed....pleasant small fruits with salmon colored flesh.....sweet/sub acid flavor.......a nice flavored jakfruit relative in the size of a fig

Cacao.....fruited, but the fruits did not make it to maturity as the result of the past winter. The tree died back, lost every leaf and after some severe pruning, is coming back with a vegence...but no flowering as of yet.

June Plum.........seems to come fairly true to seed.

Longan seedling of a Kohala variety....fruited......the fruits were very nicely flavored, somewhat different than its Kohala parent. It was very sweet, but also mcuh smaller in fruit size than Kohala, with correspondingly less flesh to seed ratio. Not sure if this is because of its prolific fruiting. Sometimes longans have to be thinned out to acheive any decent size. I'll try some thinning next year if the fruit set is as heavy as it was this year.

Guanabana seedling....not yet fruited. I can't remember where I got the seed from, but it must have been from a fruit that was being oohed and aahhed about or I never would have planted it. The leaves are a distinctive blue/green color, much different than my other guanabana trees.

Carabao mango seedling. Actually, I have two of these. One was from fruit I purchased at Fairchild gardens at a mango festival, and the other was a seed that was collected by a friend from fruit at the Kampong. The first tree that fruited did not have fruit that looked anything like the Carabao fruit I had eaten. This supposedly polyembryonic seed produced a round fruit with orange flesh and only a very few of those. The other produce elongated fruit which were exactly what I remembered the carabo to have tasted like.

Grumichama...I have two...both seedlings. There is some variebility between them, but I am not convinced that the location in the yard and therefore the amount of moisture they get, isn't the answer to the variability. The more water, the larger and less concentrated in flavor is the fruit.

Imbe seedling.....blooms prolifically every season, but sets may a fruit or two as it is predominantly a female blooming tree with no boyfriend anywhere around. I any case, I have yet to have an Imbe fruit that was really worth the effort. Interesting growth habit and colorful fruit...but not much to write home about in fruit flavor or amount of flesh.

Jaboticaba....I have fruited several.....they have all been about the same. I did have a larger fruited variety a few years back, but it died.

Malay apple....no fruit yet.......tree was defoliated in the cold and the new leaves are much more normal size than the ones in this picture taken before the freeze.

Pindo (Jelly) Palm.....no fruit yet, maybe this year. Very slow growing.....this is about 15 years in the ground.

Abiu seedlings...I have two.....they flower like crazy, one fruited once, but I never got to try the fruit as I was away on vaction when they ripened. They disappeared without a trace before I got back.

Jakfruit, I have fruited four. One was a seedling of MIa 3 and so far has been very unimpressive with generally poor pollination and small mishapen fruits. One was a seedling of what I think was NS-1 and was quite a good fruit with crisp orange flesh and nice production until the blow over by Hurricane Wilma. Fruiting has been limted since then, but this year should get back to normal barring a freeze. Two were form the Fairchild breeding program and they were Black Gold x Tabouey and Tabouey x J-30. The latter of which is pictured below.

So far, the above are what I have pictures of......to be continued with regard to those that I have not taken pictures of....after I take the pictures.

Hi,

I have a few starfruit plants (Arkin) in pots growing from seeds. One of them is beginning to bloom now. I noticed that a few days ago.

Tomas

Wow, nice jackfruits! How old is that tree?
Thanks for the photos.

Great pics Harry, I'm glas to hear that at least one of your Carabao seedling mangoes turned out like the fruit it came from. Newbies like me have to remember that the polyembryonic mangoes produce clones but also at least one zygotic seedling that will not be a clone. From what I remember reading, the strongest fastest growing sprout is likely the zygotic seedling and thus not the clone. Just to be safe, its probably smartest to grow up at least two seedlings from any polyembryonic mango seed.

Harry, your Jackfruit looks delicious! Do you happen to have any Durian trees growing on your property?

delicious sights

Can anyone recall how many years it took the seedling grown fruit trees to start fruiting

Harry
Did you plant your Longan from seedling? If so, how many years did it take to start fruting

Maureen:

The longan (and everything I posted pictures of) were planted from seed. The longan took about 15 years to bear fruit for the first time.

Simon Grow:

I do not presently have any durians growing. I have tried to grow them in the past. They get about a foot or two tall and then die from the cold. I've never babied them. I have been hoping for a more cold tolerant seedling to surprise me. So far, the only surprise is my foolishness for thinking that it might actually happen.

Newgen:

The jakfruit tree fruited at about 12 years of age. Supposedly, they can fruit within a year with perfect growing culture. This tree was much more cold sensitive and had major die back a few years ago with a frost. This past winter it died back to the ground but is now coming back from the root. My quickest jakfruit seedling to fruit took about 3 years.

Harry

I have only attempted to germinate an avocado and mango from seed.... but just this week have I soaked 10 cherimoya seeds so time will tell if they germinate, But the avocado tree I planted 5 yrs ago next month is very tall and praying for fruit this year coming!. The mango seedlings I kept for myself are pictured as well. The rest I gave away.

Avocado Tree from seed Nov 2005
{{gwi:111364}}

Kent Seedling 1 yr old

Valencia Pride seedling germinated Aug 2010 (2 months old)

A couple more of my seedling trees. Here is a seedling Emperor lychee tree that is about 10 years old. I was hoping for bloom last year...but no ssuch luck. Maybe next year.

The large tree in the center is a seedling avocado. It was actually purchased as a Pollack and the Pollack portion of the tree is on the opposite side of the picture and can't be seen. I allowed the rootstock to grow out as this was the only avocado tree that survived the flooding in my yard in that location. It definitely has much better water tolerance than any other avocado I have ever seen. I suspect it is a seedling of Lula based upon the way the fruit looks and tastes. The fruits are small like Lula and have a good oil content for a Florida grown avocado. Unfortunately, the flesh to seed ratio is not very good to put it mildly. I leave it as I still think there is some commercial value to it in developing a water tolerant rootstock. The squirrels also like it and its better that they eat thee than my other, more meaty avocados.

Harry - that's interesting on the avocado. Brokaw Nursery in Southern California has a nice method of cloning avocado rootstock. The procedure is a sort of double graft where they graft the rootstock with phytopthera resistance onto a seedling, then choke off the seedling until the top rootstock grows roots and the bottom stock dies. Then they graft the scion onto that.

Hi Harry,
Man...your trees are so inspiring. Whenever I find myself doubting my chances of getting a fruiting specimen from one of my seedlings, I just look at your trees! I know not every tree can grow from seed and fruit in a pot. I am hopefull for my jackfruit seedling. I believe it is Tabouey J-30. I got it from Jacob and he posted that he got them from you. Have you ever seen a potted jackfruit variety that fruited when small? I am just wondering what the likeliness is of it happening. I know I have increased my chances for sucess with all my tropical fruits this year since I bought a 600 watt HPS light. I have all ready brought in the Maha Chinook and my Jack since temps are getting cold. This weekend we will be back in the 60's during day and mid 50's at night. May bring them in at night.
I have a bunch of cherimoya seedlings, sugar apples, passionfruits, and my tangerine seedling. Hopefully the marangs will grow. I will try and get pictures this weekend when I bring my plants in and have my light set up.
Andrew

Harry 15 yrs is a long time . I know lychee also takes a long time .

Andrew,
Here is a pic of a one year old jackfruit seedling with a male flower. I think that might be a female flower above it but the pic isn't very clear. I took this pic almost 2 years ago at Excalibur. Even though its flowering it probably will not hold the fruit till it is at least 3 years old. Your seedling might just give you fruit soon.

I don't think that the young seedling pictured has a female bloom. It looks very male to me. Sometimes they can be deceiving, but usually the brown color is indicative of a pollen covered exterior at some stage of being. Females usually stay green throughout their early development. A tree can bloom male blooms for years before having female blooms or even longer before setting any fruit. But, I have heard of trees bearing in one year....just never personally experienced it.

Harry

Hello
Do you have the following plants?
1-Tomatillo-ground cherry (Physalis ixocarpa)
2-Cereus peruvianus
3-Pomegranate-wonderful (Punica granatum)
4-Jujube-(ziziphus jujuba)
5-Figs-(ficus carica) -black mission
6-Agave (mapisaga,salmiana, or marmorata)
7-Agave (angustifolia)
8-Agave (maximilliana) lechugilla
9- Mormon tea (ephedra viridis)
10-Sotol (dasylirion wheeleri)
11-Avocados hass
12-Passion fruit (passiflora edulis)

Please let me know how many you have, the prices and the sizes.
I need the smallest plants or bare roots. OR
Let me know what you have for sale
You can email me: bomber6e@hotmail.com

Thank you very much

Hello ,
Read that someone might have yellow Jaboticaba seed and wonder If you would consider parting with a few seeds
Ursula
culejools@yahoo.ca

Gosh! I hope I'm not too late.

Meiwa kumquat---------------the tallest tree; 1 year old
Sweet-lee tangerine---------the 2 in PVC pipes ; 6 weeks old
Nagami kumquat------------ 2 in penut butter containers ; 8 weeks old
Sweet-lee tangerines-------the rest in drink cups; 6 weeks old

Hi! From what I've always known about polyembryonic mango seeds, the fastest growing embryo producing the most vigorous plant sprouting from a particular seed is the most likely true-to-type one (non-zygotic). The zygotic one will tend to be one of the smaller plants and usually the least vigorous of the brood. People stating otherwise now make me doubt this long held belief. Can anyone clarify?

Regards,
Zig

Zigmund
You are correct if it is citrus. you are probably correct with mangos

Hi guys!

I have an avocado that I grew from seed back in 1999. It started giving fruit around 2005. Once I started watering and fertilizing and allowed the fruit to stay on the tree till Fall I got huge, meaty, creamy fruit. Lovely flavor.

Clementine orange 3days old.

3 day old gala apple tree.

Guava

Papaya

Jun,

I would like to address your former post. It sounds like the rootstock from the Meyer lemon tree you had that grew out of the broken graft was a Ponderosa lemon. I have one growing in my yard. It produces lovely large fruit. It is not practical for anything other than being ornamental our making lemonade. The fruit will go from green to yellow after awhile. I might of preferred an orange our tangerine but I just can't bring myself to cutting it down. When I first read your post, I was intrigued by the mystery fruit and l just knew it was the same.

All the best,

Vince

Jun,

I would like to address your former post. It sounds like the rootstock from the Meyer lemon tree you had that grew out of the broken graft was a Ponderosa lemon. I have one growing in my yard. It produces lovely large fruit. It is not practical for anything other than being ornamental our making lemonade. The fruit will go from green to yellow after awhile. I might of preferred an orange our tangerine but I just can't bring myself to cutting it down. When I first read your post, I was intrigued by the mystery fruit and l just knew it was the same.

All the best,

Vince

On March 23, 2014, I planted a California Hass Avocado Pit by inserting three toothpicks into the pit, and placing the it partially submerged into jar of water. About four weeks later, I placed the pit, which began to sprout roots, into a pot with a mixture of potting soil and soil from my yard.

It first sprouted two stems at approximatedly the same time, and it later added a third stem.

Does anyone know what is the mathematical probability of this occurring. I've never seen this happen before.

June 28, 4:00pm

This post was edited by FrankFlores on Mon, Jun 30, 14 at 1:42

I have an update regarding the previous posting of a three stem polyembryonic avocado seed.

I might have been wrong about it having three stems.

I think it might be four.

I just noticed the fourth stem about three hours ago.

June 29, 2014, 7:30pm

This post was edited by FrankFlores on Mon, Jun 30, 14 at 1:43