Muntingia Species, Jamaican Cherry

while the fruit are small, i love the flavor, they make me smile.
yes, kind of like cotton candy as as been said.

t...Read Morehe tree is a VERY fast grower. it seems to like rich soil,, but will also tolerate poor soils.
the fruit ripen fast from flower (weeks?)
and it always seems to have flowers and fruit on it.
they ripen so fast, you need to check the tree daily, or fruit will fall to the ground.

I love this tree, except for one thing! The roots spread for ever, sending up babies as they go. I am worried that they are undermining m...Read Morey house. Would love to hear the experience of others.

I first landed on this page trying to find information about planting the cherry tree. While everything I read said that this is a hardy ...Read Moretree, I got the impression that it would be easy to plant/transplant as well. My wife and I decided on planting a cherry tree outside our front gate to provide shade for my little second car. I must say first of all that we are not even close to being amateur gardeners!

Anyway... I probably planted 100 seeds over a course of 2-3 months. Nothing. In the sun, nothing. In the shade, nothing. In all types of soil, nothing. We tried transplanting. Nothing. About 10 transplants from 12" to 6' all died. We dug around the root with as much of the soil intact as we could. All died within 2 weeks. We noticed that all these transplants had one major root (probably leading to the mother tree) that we had no choice but to cut. None of them looked like they had enough root system of their own. They were "child" plants from a main "mother" tree.

So... after 3 months of nothing, we finally chanced upon 3 seedlings growing in the cracks between the wall and floor of a Tesco hypermarket of all places. It was raining and the soil was wet. We pulled the seedlings out (one was 8" high, the other 2 were 3"). Took them home and transplanted them. The big fella went into a pot. The other small fellas, outside. Regular soil (what type I don't know - I'm not a gardener I said earlier). Two weeks later, the plants seem to have survived the transplanting and look to be sprouting new shoots. I figure the reason they survived was :

- the soil was soft and wet when we took them out from the crack
- most importantly, we think they've survived the transplanting is that they were NOT "child" plants, connected to a "mother" tree. They were probably planted from passing through a bird's dropping at the side of the building, in other words, they were "mother" trees.

Anyway... sorry for the long rambling ameteurish post. I figure there are going to be folks out there who want a muntingia, but are having a heck of a time growing one like we did. We're hoping these 3 seedling don't die. Otherwise, we're planting a mango tree!!!

Does anyone tried to grow this plant from seeds, I bought some Jamaican cherry tree seeds and need some suggestions on how to germinate t...Read Morehem

Thanks