Pineapple Guava

This is the time of the year that the Pineapple Guava fruits are ripe and drop from the bush/tree. Once you eat your first fresh Pineapple Guava, you are hooked. Imagine Pineapple mixed with the sweetest Strawberries. When you buy them from the store, they were picked and not allowed to fully ripen and drop. The taste is usually very poor. These plants can take it below 10F and over 100F. They dont require special special soil or fertilization.

Seedlings have fruit about the size of a quarter to half dollar. Named varieties can get much larger. You should always plant two together for increased yields.

The flowers are very beautiful. The pedals look and feel like popcorn and taste like cinnamon cotton candy. I eat all the pedals and leave the stamen intact for fruiting. Many plants have edible flowers but few have edible flowers like this plant. The taste is amazing.

The one in the picture is pretty small because I ate all the big ones already.





This message was edited Nov 14, 2010 12:56 PM

More pictures from the bush.

I have a large one in my back garden. It's about 3 yrs old. Blooms prolifically, but never has fruited. Last spring, I bought another in LA, after hearing I should have two to get fruit. Stuck the new one under a tree and kept forgetting to plant it. When I was moving things, getting ready for winter a few weeks ago , I spotted the new guava plant....and it had 4 fruits on it. Never saw it bloom, so I can only guess that it had bloomed and set tiny fruit before I bought it. Still haven't planted the poor thing! I have a friend who has a huge tree. I brought a bag of the fruit home. I didn't taste the distinctive flavors of pineapple or strawberry. They were good, just not what I expected.

What size were the fruits? Anything a little bigger or smaller than a quarter is a seedling.
I recently bought about five different named varieties. They are very small and I probably wont get fruit for another two years. The largest variety is called Mammoth and they get huge. Check out the size of the fruit in this video from youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3V6Bddo1UU8

The fruits were small, but as you can see, the plant itself was small. I was impressed!

Our big tree that has so many blossoms. (Please overlook mess. We're putting up our temporary greenhouses....)

I think I am going to prune back my large bushes like yours. Mine have only grown a little taller but much much wider. It is hard to get under there and find the fruits when they drop.

I would think you'd also want to keep the snakes from nipping you under those bushes! Our yard dips down behind the tree to our pond and it was hard to see the pond from the house with the tree in the way. I wish I had "trained" it better in the beginning, so it wouldn't have so many trunks....

If you order the named ones from onegreenworld.com they come in single trunk tree form. They are very small but it gives you full control over the growth.

I went to the Louisiana Swap in May. We all went a day ahead and met in Forest Hills, LA. There are hundreds of nurseries along the highway. I can't wait to go again. Had no idea what to expect. The first one we went to was Doug Young's. We asked if we could park the truck under a tree in the shade because I had all the plants I'd brought for the swap. The clerk looked at us like we were crazy. She said we'd need the truck....the nursery was over 200 acres, only 150 acres open to the public. 'Gave us a map, an inventory, and a form to write down all we picked up. It was truly overwhelming...but sooo much fun....for me. Not so much for DH who could care less about plants. I didn't buy much, but now that I know what's there, I can go back with a plan.
As an example...If you click on the link below, go to the 'As,' and look for Acca (pineapple guava), you'll see what nurseries carry them, sizes, and, for most,...the prices. Just think of a plant, and they have it somewhere along that highway.

http://www.growit.com/Bin/AssnPL.exe?myquery=v&mytype=PltsSN&mystart=1&myassn=LAN

I hope we're going to get together again next year. I'm already starting a list of foundation plants to look for.