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Produce => Under Glass => Topic started by: ajb on January 17, 2005, 21:48:57
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Hi guys,
In addition to my usual greenhouse toms and chillies I'm having a go at growing a fruiting banana, some dwarf pink bananas (yes the bananas are supposed to be pink!) and a passion fruit vine. I've also got some Solanum Muricatum (Pepino Melon Tree) and Guava seedlings sprouting in the spare room. No signs of the Naranjilla (lost fruit of the Incas) yet, though.
What unusual plants are you trying?
Any tips on the above gratefully received too!
A.
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probably not unusual-but a first for me this year will be melons.
also toms, chillis, peppers and.......cape gooseberries. grew them outside last year so hoping for a better harvest under cover.
pink banana? now that i would like to see!
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I grow my narnars in my conservatory but no fruit....yet! Same with pineapples and am pleased to report they fruit easily and the taste, well you will never buy a shop brought piney again. I also have a small guava tree but this is only year 2 so will have to wait and see what happens, and I have a pepino melon tree which, funnily enough, I watered just this morning. It is still healthy looking, altho it is in my currently un heated greenhouse and has lost all of its leaves, but, grandad has one also and his stays out year round and after the frost got it, it came back twice as big ans strong, so I am not worried. I have an olive overwintering in the greenhouse along with a fig tree and a selection of small seed grown palms. I am trying to overwinter a pot of cape gooseberrys to try and achieve a slightly bigger and earlier crop than last year. My overwintering chillis are in the conservatory and are doing well. The aubs sucumbed to aphids...grrrr >:(. I have pomegranite bushes growing but they stay out all year and don't seem to mind the weather at all, I would love to get fruit, but I fear I will be a grandma before that happens. Flowers in the greenhouse, I have a permanent planter full of chinese foxgloves which are gorgeous, attract the bees and ladybirds and keep my moral up when I am in the greenhouse. My problem is room, by the time the chillis, aubs, cuces and toms are in there, and all of my seeds, I have no room left! The floor is normally covered and to get into my greenhouse I have to lift trays out and move into the garden! Thank goodness for my conservatory as that acts like my tropical house. I have a passionflower in there, but no idea of variety as was given it from a lady in Ireland. I keep trying pawpaws and lychees but they need incredibly high humidity, which everything else hates! Have 2 year old kiwi plants in pots which I must plant out! They may well end up on the allotment over my permanent pergolla thingy. Have tried citrus of all types but they always get attacked by scale insect and then aphids so they end up on the compost heap. I may invest one year and buy a mature plant to see if that does any better.
Right, rambled on long enough, as you can probably tell, love my greenhouse and conservatory and all the interesting things you can grow in them! ;D
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Emma - wow you grow pineapple? Did you start it with a pineapple top? when did you plant it? How did you grow it? when did it start fruiting? How big is it? I'd love to grow one (can you tell by all the questions?!).
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crikey EJ, there can be no more room left at your house! ;)
please tell all about the pineapple, i'd love to grow one, it's been on my dream list ever since heligan (sigh!).
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Ooo they are easy peasy but will take about 2 years to fruit and one plant equals one fruit.
Buy yourself a good pineapple with a really good top, plenty of leaves, no yellowing and fresh looking. Avoid any limp pineapples. Twist the top off and it comes out kinda like a cork leaving a pointed core. I generally leave this on the side in the kitchen for a day or two. Then peel of a couple of rows of the bottom leaves and you should be able to see some tiny white root. You want to pull off enough leaves to give you a stalk that will hold itself in the ground, as I said, a couple of layers will probably do. Then plant in compost in a pot and water well to start, then sparingly until they start to grow, which could be a couple of months. Some pineapples will grow side shoots and the main plant will die, others the main plant will grow, guess it depends on variety and stress. Once the plant is established and growing, and they can get huge and they are very sharp and spikey so they need plenty of house room, then water from above into the top of the plant creating a resevoir of water. I do however water a little from below also, as they are growing in pots and not the ground. Keep them warm, fed and watered, and within 2 years a little baby pineapple will show itself. They take anywhere up to 3 months to mature and the scent, wow! If you have the room and the patience, go for it! I now have 7 pineapple plants on the go trying to time one or 2 a year really.....if only I could get bananas!
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right - that's it. i'm doing it. Does it matter what time of year you start? should i wait for spring? or can i get one now?
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just got back from shopping at morrisons, having bought a pineapple, anticipating your answer, EJ. so now i am excited, i am definately giving this a go!
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Don't think it matters when you do it Aqui, do mine whenever I buy one. Good luck! ;D
Later addition....just found some pics I took of my first pineapple in all its stages.
As you can see when it first develops it has purple flowers in all the 'scales', then it turns green and looks more like a pineapple.
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From green it soons colours up.
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Fantastic pics. Unfortunately they didn't have any at the shop yesterday, but I'll keep my eye out for one. Very excited about this!
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EJ, those pictures look fabulous! the colour on the baby pineapple! i will grow my own, i will, i will!
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You definitely have the magic touch EJ those pineapples look divine. 8)
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Wow :D I'm off to see if I can find some pineapples tomorrow! I vaguely remember growing a pineapple top when I was a child but can't recall what happened to it...
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Did you see the article in Kitchen Garden mag with Bob Flowerdew, can't remember which issue it was in now, perhaps Jan 05? He was growing pineapples.
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EJ, you keep amazing me.
This must be one of the most interesting things of all times that I've seen on this forum!
Oh if only I had the indoor space, I would grow pineapples for sure.
Mr. C. put a seed from a pomegranate in a pot several years ago, it grew and we planted it in a corner of the greenhouse and it grew and grew. Just last month we dug it out, it had reached the roof, and planted it outside. We knew it could stand cold because we remove the windows from the greenhouse every winter and it survived. Last summer it had two flowers but we don't really expect any fruit, how would it get fertilized? Boy, does it have long and nasty thorns, spikes really.
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Got a pineapple from the shops at the weekend, so am hoping the top, which is now sitting in my fruit bowl, hopefully rooting away!
And I also bought a mango (farm shop 25p each, not sainsburys at reduced to £1.09 each!) can I grow from the stone?
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Only just starting out with my greenhouse, so only intend to grow cucumbers, tomatoes and sweet peppers this year.
EJ - thanks for the info on the pineapple - I'm also going to buy one and try it, it'll be fun to get the kids involved in this one!!
Linda. :D
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Mum has had good success with Mangos Aqui, but they never seem to last terribly long. I had 2 in the conservatory last year but one got scale insect, and do you know, for the life of me I don't know if the other one is still there or no! Bad plant keeper!! Mum cleaned the hairy stone up completely and planted the entire stone and pretty much..........forgot about it. It sprouted after a few weeks and away it went. I don't like mango's at all, so will have to get her to have another go on my behalf.
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hmm. Well. My pineapple top went moldy. :-\ I'll have to try again when it's less chilly in the kitchen.
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well, here goes, as i planted my pineapple top today, following EJ's advice! will wait and see (impatiently!)
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I planted mine yesterday too :)
If no-one complains, it is destined for the photocopier room at work - very warm and light in there ;D
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Cool! Good luck pineapplers! Don't over water, they rot very quickly. They will sit in their pots looking glum for some time, but then, if they are growing, one of two things will happen. Either new leaves will start developing in the centre of the crown or a new baby pineapple plant will sprout close to the parent crown. I don't know if it depends on variety or if the crown was damaged in some way. I have had both things occur, the down side with the little baby plantlets is they are small so take longer to develop, but they do grow rapidly. YUM!
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growing Pienapples - how cool!!
How tall do they grow? are they just tall thin plants or are they bushy too.
Thanks
Viks
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The idea of growing pineapples sounds cool, I am going to try this.
Thanks for all your help and advice (and great pictures too).
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The pineapple plant can get pretty big before fruiting. Think of the top of the fruit, double it and add 10. Mine was a monster or long spikey rigid leaves before fruiting so watch your eyes, mine got me daily! 8)
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Emma Janes pineapples
those pineapple flowers are amazing!
i definately want to try this but surely EJ , your greenhouse is a conservatory with a minimum 15 c ,even at night?
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Yup, my pineapple is in my conservatory, suppose it shouldn't be in the greenhouse thread, but I do treat my conservatory as a greenhouse of sorts as it is packed with plants, cuttings, seeds and seedlings! ;D I couldn't tell you the temperature, but it certainly isn't constant. The conservatory has central heating and runs on the same program as the house. Whatever the weather, 11pm at night the heating goes off and it doesn't come on again until 6am. Some mornings it is very chilly in there, but I have never known it be frosty. In the summer it bakes hot as hot can be as it is south facing and only receives shade from about 4pm from the neighbours house which is set at an angle from ours.
I am glad you all liked the pics. It was thrilling to successfully grow the pineapple and I am hoping for a repeat performance this year. Just wish I could get my bananas to set fruit!
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Have just eaten some very juicy pineappple following planting up the top of the pineapple. Had intended to do this following the article in kitchen garden magazine, but was inspired again after reading about everyone elses efforts.
The only problem was when I removed the top of the pineapple there was not much of the pineapple part below the leaves, I just hope there is enough to generate a root system.
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So how are the pineapples going? Here is my mummy, she is huge and mean! (not like me at all!!!) Hoping she will reproduce this year.
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here's wishing, EJ! i have 2 pineapple tops in the propagator. one looks good and healthy, not so sure of the other one. time will tell!
let us know what yours does....
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Emma is that the tiny little thing you shown us not long back? ??? if so it's a corker now ;D what a shrewd way to buy exotic plants 8)