picture taken June 21, 2011
I bought this Sugar Apple (Seedling) in a 3 gal container just last year. It hasn't gotten any bigger, but it's now producing tons of flowers. The leaves turned yellow during the cold weather, but it held onto the leaves until around March 2011. The yellow leaves finally dropped in April and new leaves emerged, with tiny buds! I had to learn how to pollinate the flowers fast! It's simple really. Flowers start out female and become male as they get older. Find older, faded flowers and remove the pistils (pollen) into a small container, using a brush. Using a tiny brush, transfer the pollen to a newly opened flower. Mark the pollinated flowers by pinching off a petal. It's really that easy. If you're still confused, do a search on Youtube on how to hand pollinate a sugar apple.
Picture taken June 21, 2011
Success after the first try! I was so excited when I first saw this baby fruit. It's my first ever annona fruit!
Picture taken July 1, 2011
It has grown super fast! Now I see why some cultures call this the Buddha's Head Fruit. I now have 6 developing fruit on my tiny tree. I need to stop hand pollinating! Or maybe I should keeping doing it, it's so much fun. I'll let the tree decide if it wants to hold the fruit or not. Some people even pick their flowers, thinking their trees won't be able to handle the fruit. I say let the tree decide, it's smarter than you think.
Ok, I've been hand pollinating for the past couple weeks, the last few are not "taking". The tree is also slowing down it's flower production. I take this as a sign it's had enough and will stop hand pollinating (for now).
ReplyDeleteHello, is your Cherimoya tree still viable and producing fruit? I'm interested in planting a couple of these and some other 'exotic' trees.. thanks for the write up!
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