High value/Novelty fruits for pot culture

I was recently thinking about getting a cactus or something else as a potted patio plant, but of course I thought, why not a fruit :laughing:? It makes sense to me to get something either very low maintenance, or very high value. Iā€™m not very familiar with high value or novelty fruits because i have always concerned myself exclusively with low maintenance fruits.

So any ideas for the high value/novelty side?

My first ideas were miracle berry or kumquat, though I donā€™t have a lot of material to work from in my mind-

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Dragon fruit. You can have a cactus and eat your fruit from it

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It makes a big difference what growing zone you are in. If you are in zone 6 or colder you could try a gooseberry. If you are willing to follow directions very closely you could grow pink lemonade blueberries.

Fig

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Fruits of Prickley Pear cactus are deliciousā€¦so have both!

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I find the big, hard seeds and glochids of Opuntias highly annoying. Hedgehogs (Echinocereus species) are less indestructible, but I think prettier plants. All have inobtrusive seeds and many are said to taste like strawberries. Cereus ā€œperuvianusā€ (actually repandus, I think) of horticulture is hardy to Zone 8b and has large fruit that tastes like honeysuckle nectar. It will form a tree, so you might need to keep chopping off the top for cuttings. Usually you need 2 different clones (seedlings of same species are fine) for pollination, like with apples. Texas horse crippler is a low plant that also has big fruit. Pereskia aculeata, like dragon fruit (of which the best tasting is probably Selenicereus megalanthus; Hylocereus in my experience look cool but lack flavor), is strictly tropical (houseplant) and like a big, thorny, aggressive rambling rose, but it has edible leaves as well as fruit.

If you havenā€™t already, you might enjoy browsing some of the unusual selections offered by Logeeā€™s for inspiration.

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Not sure about high value, but for giggles I ordered a Yellow Jamaican Cherry(strawberry tree/Muntingia calabura, but with the yellow fruits) and Sherbet Berry tree(Grewia asiatica). My Meiwa kumquat does great in a pot(30 gallon) and doesnā€™t mind being rolled into a dark garage during <30F temps for extended periods.

Miracle berry is interesting to have. I grows slowly and doesnā€™t look ornamental. But the altered taste of other foods after eating the berries is truly bizzare. Enough of a novelty for me to keep alive through the winter. Donā€™t plant on having a beer following a miracle berry. It makes beer taste awful.

I also like my jabuticaba. It has never fruited for me three years in. But its a very attractive tree for a pot. It looks like a mini crepe myrtle, which we donā€™t have here. The trunk is pretty and you can prune it to show off the trunk without much effort.

Both of these stay green through the winter. A bit of a PITA for zone 5, but worth it for me.

Yeah high value doesnā€™t fit here. I like growing novelty fruits but very few have worked out for me. Still another is coming tomorrow. Mountain papaya. Apparently fruits easily in containers but only has a life span of about eight years. Fruit is the size of elongated bell peppers. Sure why not? Babaco is the common name. I also grow pomegranates in containers. I had my first harvest last year. Only three fruits I picked the day before our first freeze of the fall. They were excellent.

Define high value/novelty. Mulberries can sell for a very high price at a farmers market because they donā€™t sell them in stores. They are also low value. You could likely grow Girardi Dwarf in a pot. It will get about 6 feet so it will grow to be about the size of a fully grown man. If we are talking high value as in it grows a lot of fruit stone fruit can be grown in a pot. Raintree says cherries on their Gisala 3 rootstock only need 20 gallons and the cherries on Gisala 5 only need 25 gallons.