For 10 years, the hydrant in my greenhouse stood with the handle up, a reliable source of hard well water. When the flow dropped off last year, I limped along, squeezing every last bit of rainwater out of my rain barrels and dragging hoses when necessary.
Then I got the bright idea to turn the hydrant off and on a few times. But the handle wouldn't move. More pressure. Nothing. Full weight. Nothing. Leverage. Movement! Snap. Uh oh.
The opportunity to dig up my greenhouse hydrant also presented the opportunity to upgrade some other things. The RO unit hadn't run for some time. The demand delivery pump was acting flaky and unreliable. So we upgraded the old RO unit with a three filter 180gpd model and replaced the old demand delivery pump. The pressure booster pump still works well. So now, for the first time in a couple of summers, the misters are back on, the tanks are full, and life is good in the greenhouse.
The plants seemed to know it was coming. I have viewed success over the years as one new, edible fruit each year. The past year has far exceeded that threshold for success. The Barbados cherry (acerola, Malpighia emarginata) has been impressive. It flowers, sets fruit reliably, and matures quickly. New crops of flowers come in rapid succession and tastes like a slightly sour cherry. It will take some time, but Acerola wine is in the picture.
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| Barbados cherry, just starting to ripen |
I got my first cherimoya (Annona cherimola) this year. The plant was grown from a store bought fruit. The tree has been easy to grow, happy in a small container, but with the habit of a lanky teenager. Right now it has three fruit, up to tennis ball sized. This will be too good to waste on wine. The first fruit will be shared with Lisa.
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| Cherimoya |
This year also brought the first Noels Big Red sugar apple (
Annona squamosa 'Noel's Big Red'). The tree was grown from seeds from Noel, FloridaGreenMan, who was kind enough to share about 4 years ago on our way to Puerto Rico. Noel's Big Red has the same small footprint that the other sugar apples and cherimoyas do, but with better, more even vertical growth. My fruit, and trees, are not that big yet but this fruit should be edible and hopefully tasty.
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| Little Noel's Big Red sugar apple |
We have June plums (Spondias dulcis). I have two trees; one I bought from Patrick, then another which Sheehan shipped me later. This plant is an easy grower, prolific, with nice habit, and attractive fruit. Unfortunately my fruit are fibrous, bland, and hard a rock. I'm counting June plums this year, but just barely.
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| June plum |
Purple grumichama (Eugenia brasiliensis) has tortured me for years. This darn plant has grown to 8' without so much as a hint of flowering. Until this year. We got half a dozen fruit this year, beautiful, round, purple-black berries. To me it tastes like a cross between a cherry and a grape. Delicious.
Limeberry (
Triphasia trifolia) is a close relative of the citrus. I brought back seeds from the Tropical Agriculture Research Station (TARS) in Mayaguez, PR 4 years ago. Just today, I found ripe fruit. An orange citrus taste is immediately evident, but there is a long, lingering tingle which is interesting. I'm not quite sure what I'll do with these, but I have 3 or 4 little trees. None are taller than 18 inches and they are all still in just 4" pots, so there is not much effort in keeping them around.
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| Limeberry |
Finally for new fruit, sapodilla (
Manilkara zapota). I believe this may be my favorite fruit. It tastes like a pear soaked in brown sugar. And this year, I got 4 ripe fruit from my 'Nispero Mexicano 7,' a variety I got at Jardines Eneida in PR. I've never been able to track this variety down anywhere but it produces long, football shaped fruit which are wonderfully sweet. The flesh is supposed to be light brown throughout, but this variety has delicious, soft, sweet flesh, even when the flesh is still somewhat green. I also have 'Silas Woods' still hanging around, flowering, but it has yet to hold any fruit.
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| Sapodilla |
We also saw the return of some fruit which had stayed away for a time. After several years absence, we'll see the return of dragonfruit (
Pitaya sp.). The pot the old dragonfruit fruited in became rotten. I had to root cuttings, then install a 6x6 post in the ground in the greenhouse and train the dragonfruit up the post. They don't seem as happy in the ground as they were in the pot. The 'Dwarf Namwah' from my good friend Jay in Ohio is producing a bloom that is not so dwarf. We should see a good crop of citrus. The strawberry guava (
Psidium cattleianum), fruited so heavily that it fell over. Once this crop is in the freezer, the tree will meet the saw for some severe pruning.
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| Dragonfruit |
There is more work to do inside the greenhouse. I have raised beds with rotten wood. This could turn out to be a big project, but the pruning of the guava tree will make it more manageable. Hopefully the plants know those improvements are coming as well.
