My seedlings have most fruit about that small. And they drop between November and December. 1 year Christmas came and they were still hanging. So if you think that most of the NZ research was to get earlier varieties, that sounds ok. A November/December ripening time means the fruit should be fairly small right now.
Some comparisons. I just picked the last Celeste fig this afternoon. Here’s a conparison between the Takaka, the Apollos which are the same size, and my seedling which is the latest ripening and the smallest now…
Takaka gets very large here. Around 100+g is common.
I do agree that they are not sweet right off the ground. Usually waiting a few days helps bring the sweetness out. 13brix seems about right.
Update on my pineapple guavas. They are looking good and more fruits than last year. Between kakariki and anatoki there is about a couple dozen. I am wondering how much I like the spacing, I see lots of recommendations. I put mine between 6-7ft apart, I am hoping that is enough for productive fruiting later on. I was trying to find the middle ground of filling in this area and still allowing enough space per tree. How far do you all place your trees?
Mine are much closer together. About 2-3 feet apart. I did that before I got good at grafting. If I had to do it again with the choices now, I would just plant 1 seedling and multigraft.
These are my largest takakas this season. We’ll see if the smaller ones hang till they’re larger or just drop smaller than normal.
Tried one that was sitting and 16 brix was hit! Much better than last year. Not sure if the plant getting older, or me learning to let them age properly…
Those are looking great! My Takaka looks like it’ll be the first to drop once again this year. It also has the largest fruit. I think these trees will really start showing out in the next couple of years. Perhaps my spacing isn’t bad, I have read some orchards as close as 8-10ft and mine isn’t too much smaller than that.
Very nice! The NZ literature says that high clay soils dwarf both the trees and the fruit. So with our clay in the SE, we may not see as many of the over 100g fruit that develop in lighter soils.
I had a few of my last ones hit 16 brix…the sweetness improves, but the tartness also goes away…so if you let it sit, It’ll get sweeter.
I am going to try to let them sit a day or two before eating them this time. The last one tasted good but more tartness than I’d like which was strange because last year I recall it being incredibly sweet right after it dropped. The texture is overall great, skin thin with a bit of bite if you like the combination of flavor.
i tried my first feijoa yesterday. one came off the tree easily, pretty much fell off when i touched it, but it was still hard. i left it on the kitchen counter for 2 days, not sure if that was enough time but it got a little softer so i tried it. it has a mealy guava texture and the taste was more tart than sweet, it did not taste like pineapple to me, it tasted similar to strawberry/lemon guava. i like that the seeds are edible, but you can only eat the soft middle portion because the closer you get to the skin, the more bitter it was. this was from my seedling tree. overall, i think it tasted good but was small (barely 2 inches). i am waiting for my grafted NZ varieties to flower, and hope those are much bigger and taste better. i was really hoping it would have a more pineapple taste, pineapple is one of my favorite fruits.
I’ve never tasted pineapple on any of mine. Makes me wonder if there are varieties that taste like that at all? All of my seedlings have the bitter skin. The thinner and sweeter skin is probably the best improvement of the new varieties.
I have improved fruit size of my seedlings with thinning, but that skin and graininess can’t be improved no matter what you do.
I’m noticing that my feijoa really love being watered and having moist soil overall. Maybe extra watering might help with the bitterness? I know with some fruits and veggies, they need extra water to get rid of the bitterness. My plants are first year too but the 2 fruit I’ve gotten from them so far have been nonbitter and really good. I say they might like a lot of water because the ones i over water seem to react better than the ones i under water in terms of growth.
I think whoever named it pineapple guava must’ve though the tart to sweet part reminds them of pineapple and the texture is like an unripe Guava I’ve realized a lot of people have never had an actual fully ripe Guava before and i too, think some of the texture of feijoa remind me of unripe Guava.
have you tried hand pollinating your seedlings with the pollen from your grafted varieties? i’m going to try that when i get flowers from my NZ varieties. thinning also seems like a good idea but i don’t have that many, of my two bushes that had the most flowers, i only had complete fertilization on one bush which has about a dozen or so fruit. a few other bushes i hand pollinated but the fruit isn’t growing/not fully fertilized. i need to do a better job at hand pollinating. do you have any suggestions?
You can cut off one of the pollen sticks/anthers on the flower and touch it to the stigma of another plant. That’s what i did. Realized i too, had no pollinators the first time mine flowered on me. Mine only set fruit if i hand pollinate like this. I do the same with Passionfruit as well since i don’t seem to have pollinators for those as well.
I saw maybe 5 total in all of the 4 years that i lived in Colorado
I’ve seen 1 in my yard so far here in Olympia but the wasps chased them away. The wasps love my Raspberry flowers.
Also i found out this rental community sprays weed killer and they sprayed it in my backyard/ it got on some of my strawberries as well so i gotta be careful … I’m putting down a greenhouse where they like to spray in the back so I’m hoping they’ll leave me alone in regards to that. We have landscaping come by every week but none of them speak English and they just do what they’re told by property management.
Yeah that sucks I have two neighbors that spray their driveway, I am likely going to ask my neighbors adjacent to us who we are friends with to not spray and I will gladly weed their driveway myself. They use it as a vacation home and are only here every couple weekends. I already mow their yard most of the time. I just don’t want a bad wind to be at the time (it’s always windy here) and it cost me a tree or something.
I did seedling to seedling, then named varieties to seedling. Last year I didn’t do anything and still got pollination. Since I’m thinning the fruit, I don’t see the point in pollinating them to discard the results. The less fruit, the bigger fruit.
But i just used my fingers on one flower then touched every open flower I saw. The only reason to use named variety pollen is if you’re going to try growing out the seedlings. Otherwise any feijoa pollen will work. They will even work with their own pollen in my experience…
and the texture is like an unripe Guava 
I’ve realized a lot of people have never had an actual fully ripe Guava before and i too, think some of the texture of feijoa remind me of unripe Guava.
so i gotta be careful … I’m putting down a greenhouse where they like to spray in the back so I’m hoping they’ll leave me alone in regards to that. We have landscaping come by every week but none of them speak English and they just do what they’re told by property management.