From Northwest Florida
 

i joined to seek specialized information on fruit bearing plants in my local northern gulf coast area.
I have tried a banana plant, but apparently an occasional spell of 20-25 F degree weather is not compatible with the cultivars I have come across so far.

I have all sort questions about other fruit bearing plants, grafting, and other strategies fir obtaining a fruit harvest. The worst one for me are the depredations by my local wild life. I found out that coyotes will eat pears.

I have a lot of wild persimmons that I am trying to graft over to Japanese cultivars. I did 10 this morning prior to a rain driving inside. I started to digout a planting area for asparagus that probably will not make it in my clime. I have finally found an apple cultivar that does well here. It is the Joy apple that was found IIRC on an old homestead that I got from Just Fruits and Exotics a little south of Tallahassee. My peaches and nectarines are being killed by borers and I may try grafting on to plume rootstock. I will ask questions on that later.
I am a few miles north of Escambia Bay and a few more miles north of Pensacola Florida. We have hot raining weather from may to july and then often drought for a few months and then the winter. Low chill pears often bloom in late December. Citrus needs to be protected from the cold to avoid damage. My soil is acidic and poor with a hardpan underneath. I am on a hill grading down to a creek.
Elevation goes from 78 to 100 plus feet about mean sealevel. My 8 acres was a planted pine forest that I am still cutting down.

Well the previous should give a concept of my circumstances. I look forward to gleaming useful information from this forum.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Orinoco is a really cold hardy cultivar. You can find them everywhere here in the San Fernando valley. I know that the p-stem can survive down to the mid twenties without freezing down to the ground. Other ones to check out are Musa Basjoo and Namwah.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Thanks for the response.
I looked up Orinoco and found I forgot to add I am looking for fruit yield. My banana plant comes up each year, but is killed off each year prior to it being able to produce fruit. I think it takes over a year for most bananas to yield fruit. I have very little use for "ornamentals" and if the plant will not yield me shelter, land cover, or produce for me or wildlife, I will not grow it.
The musa bananas fruit and I will find out if they will yield in my area. The San fernando valley is in southern CA andI am not sure but probably the valley extreme low temp is warmer than my locale in winter. It is different for sure since we average 60 inches of precipitation a yr and tropical storms, but no severe earthquake.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

C.A.S.T.- Our Seed
We bought and grew seed from them and they did good until our attle decided to dine on them. Good luck.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Welcome to a fellow fruit explorer in the region!

My search has shown Raja Puri to be the best fruiting banana for cooler climates. I'm on my second winter with it. Last winter, I tried to protect it outside, but it still froze to the ground. This year, I dug it up and brought it in for the winter. It tends to be stocky, so that isn't too hard to do. I have a couple of offsets and bulbs, in case you're interested in a trade of some kind.

I also have the (unidentified) passaround banana that is common here. I don't know its name, but I do know that, in protected areas, established stands will start to form fruit before the freeze gets them. I've dug up three and brought them in this winter. (They're promised, but I believe I have offsets, if they survive the winter. I suspect they're the same as yours, though.)

Raja Puri has far more roots than the other, which has hardly any in comparison.

Perhaps we can learn something from each other by comparing notes.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Hey, and welcome. You'll like it here. Hit the "search" button up near the top of the page. Find the thread "Roll Call for Gros Michel". Search through that thread and you'll find a long list of bananas and their zones. Pick out the ones in zones 8 and 9 and see if you can find some that will fruit for you.

There are bananas that will fruit here. I worked for a nursery over on Old Palafox and we grew grew some there that had fruit. Some years we had to cut the fruit and take it inside before a freez hit.

Don't you just hate our winters. Some years it will only freeze one or two times but just thos few times that it does freeze ruins it for so many things. In my life there we a few years that it never froze.

There are several of us in the area, I know of one other member in Pensacola and several of us over in Alabama, so perhaps you'll hear from them. I'm in Bayou La Batre, Alabama.

Anyway, welcome and you'll find the right ones. I go more for the foliage than the banana, but I am hoping to fruit one of the Gros Michels in a year or so.

Terry

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

It's really great to have you here. :08:

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Welcome to the forum. There are several fruit growers near you.

Use the "Find me on the map!" so we can see where you live. Living in Northern Escambia Co you have colder winters than me but you still have many fruits you can grow.

Orinoco will fruit in Pensacola. I know I fruited and ate them in the summer of 2011. I have several P-stems I expect to fruit this summer and due to our lack of winter I have one fruiting right now however the mat may not make enough leaves to support the stalk. I did not offer my bananas any protection this year but we had an unusally mild winter. I had planned a substantial protection but a family situation stopped me. I only lost my leaves when we had a frost in January. There are citrus that will grow here. I have about thirtry trees that are young but I expect all of them to produce and live IF I can get them to year five which shouldn't be too hard. Blueberrys do exceptionally well here. I will be able to give you some Orinoco and blueberries if you want. I am trialing some other bananas that may work here. I'll know more in a few years. Either way I'll have pups. We have a banana friend that lives near us and he will certainly have pups from various bananas that he will give you. Figs also do well here. To get rid of Coyote find something that eats them. A 30-06 should do the trick!

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Thanks to all for the kind felicitations:
Any banana that will grow in central Alabama should certainly relative to temperature fare better in my region. I am considerably warmer than are sites just 20 miles to north near the Alabama border. Significant frost strikes about the middle to late November here. By march frost is generally not occurring.
i would certainly be most willing to share notes or anything else that is related. Major thing at the moment for trade is a good supply of heirloom pear cultivars for our region along with some other materials.

Here is a general question for all. Today I was planting some asparagus as a trial and in preparing the bed I dug up a lot of green brier tubers. I put them near some commercial blueberry cultivars, an australian raspberry and japanese berry bush.
Apparently sarsaparilla and other things are commonly extracted from them. Does anyone have any knowledge of what to do with such tubers? I read that people also stew them, but due to the fact people extract substances that in some cases are medicinal I am not going to do anything on my own with them for now.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

QUOTE: My soil is acidic and poor with a hardpan underneath. I am on a hill grading down to a creek.

With acid soil, slope planting drainage and your loc in N Fla go for Blueberries - lots of em. Rabbiteye Southern highbush for you.

Where I am in S Fla I think I can get a first planting of low chill to work but keeping the pH low may be tough. Will have to bark much heavily and keep it that way.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

I tried to enter coordinates but apparently something is not right. I live in Santa Rosa county 1.5 miles from Pace Highschool. i am colder than you in part because I live in the bottom of valley where cold air accumulates. I am also just a little bit north of you that makes a difference.
Thanks for all of the information on bananas and we will have to talk more about them. I protected my citrus this year, but it was not necessary. We only got down to 25 F for a short time.
At least two kinds of blueberrys grow wild on my place as do wild persimmons.
Relative to coyotes I have a 30-06 some where in my vault and a lot other smoke poles, but coyotes tend to come out late at night (These were around about 1-2 AM). Hard to shoot what you cannot see. Since I am planning on free ranging chickens I will be looking into the for eating coyotes thing. I have my eye on some old time farm bulldogs (really should be called Shepherd's mastiffs) that are being rescued from extinction in Mississippi from the few remaining non-cross bred traditional Carr White English stock that came from Georgia. They are stealthy and attack silently and have longer jaws that open very wide with long front teeth. They arrived in the americas during early colonial times. May have arrived here first with the spanish and latter the french and english. They have not existed in England probably since the 18th century. No need for them there with the extinction of the wolf. I may also get night vision goggles, but that is an investment as would be a suppressor.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Thanks for the youtube link. Those are not the specific strain that I am interested in. Pups are generally very cute, but it is the adults that are most important and need to be observed. The major thing is how obedient they are relative to stopping an attack instantly upon the command of their master and if they can be left to range the property without leaving its boundaries. A chained or penned up dog is not too useful for fighting coyotes. They should be highly territorial, but not aggressive to other dogs without good reason. They must be completely sub-dominant to all family members and never ever snap at a child. If they do they should be culled. Many of todays mastiff-bulldog types breeds will challenge the members of the household for dominance and that just will not do.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

In the west, some ranchers will raise a pack of Queensland Healers for this task. The dogs are smart, territorial, and quick. Being half dingo, they will fight off predators with a passion. A couple of months of walking the younger dogs on the property line is all they need. They keep grazing animals within the property line and animals that are not part of "your pack" out. Many times I have seen them chase deer, fox, etc. full speed to the property line and stop right there.

As a humorous downside, they will also be compelled to herd the chickens into "their" part of the yard, the cats to some area near the house ... !! I love those dogs. In the northwest they are often employed on roundups of range cattle.

Not a good dog for a homeowner with under an acre of property unless you are going to run the dog 2-3 times a day for several miles.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Richard,

That sounds like an awesome companion dog too. I currently have a pack of Toy Poodles. Don't laugh. I promise you will not enter my back yard without an immediate and unpleasant response from them. They will surround and quarter anything entering the property and if it climbs they will campout and wait under the tree.

BUT

you'd need about thirty of them to take on a pack of coyotes! LOL

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

When I told you that there was a member in Pensacola, Darkman was who I had in mind. Glad to see that you'll connected. That 30-06 got a chuckle out of me.

You mentioned that you were 20 or so miles south of the Alabama line. Well, I'm in Alabama, but to your west. I'm at the very bottom of Alabama sw of Mobile, between Grand Bay and Dauphin Island. Any chance of getting some of your persimmon trees? I didn't realize that they grew here.

When I was a kid we always played a joke on our cousins from the city when they came to visit. We'd tell them how good green persimmons were and then offer them a handful to taste. You ever tasted a green one? They make your mouth pucker and draw up so much you can hardly talk. We thought that was so funny!

Now should be a good time to dig and ship them bare root. If you'll ship me some I'll trade you something. I've got bananas, one very small, real small now, blackberry. Maybe a division of kiwi. I've got passion vine - maypops and I'll have to look around to see what else I'v got that you might want to trade for. Or, I'll outright buy the persimmons from you. Oh, if you think you would ever use it, I've got eatable gingers and later on I'll have some gourds.

The passion vine is a food source, maybe the sole food source, of the Gulf Friterilly butterfly.

Terry

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

:ha:

Yes, poodles are under-rated and over-groomed in the general public. They need space, exercise, and attention or they will become nervous and irritable.

Same is true of the Queensland Healers, perhaps even more so. Great companion, but they need a couple of jobs all day long or they'll go stir-crazy.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Yes you can have some wild persimmons and wild blueberrys too. Any member here is welcome to any grafting wood that I have also.
I calculate from what you said that you are an hour and half from me if you are able to drive. If you can not drive then I will see what I can do. First, for now the persimmons are leafless. With out leaves identification is not positive and I would wait a month for them to leaf out. They appear to be very hardy and should survive. I was cutting them down as a weed tree until I figured out what they were (they had persimmons on them) and they always grew back. You can come on a weekend when I am here and I will direct you to the woods where they grow and point out the smallones for digging up and potting.
This year I am some what over loaded so do not have the time to ship them. Next yr I will have all of the time in world. Next year I would like to take you up on some of the cultivars that you have.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Quite seriously attacks on fruit by birds and mammals have caused more losses than anything else. And if I want to harvest fruit I will have to come up with some sort of pest management program for vertebrates. This includes diverse birds.
The bird eat small berries, crush the larger berries, and peck holes in the fruit.

Squirrels eat everything. And then there are the raccoons and possums and I sure did not expect coyotes to eat up my pears.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Squirrels----Eat them
Racoons----You could eat them
Possums----I wouldn't eat them but some will
Coyotes----Live trap the possums, stake them out for Coyote bait and then Bang Bang

After you retire you'll be able to get your pest management program going!

Maybe when Terry comes over we can all get together.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Squirrels----Eat them
That is doable, can also use snare poles to catch them
Racoons----You could eat them
Raccoons carry rabies, do not touch them and sanitize the trap afterwards with bleach and sunlight
Possums----I wouldn't eat them but some will
I have never tried to eat a possum but it is an old southern dish
Coyotes----Live trap the possums, stake them out for Coyote bait and then Bang Bang
Electron recordings of animal calls to bring them in if you want to shoot them. Probably need to use a shotgun with smaller shot like bbs instead of buckshot because of the neighbors.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Around here I leave the opossums alone. As I learned from my father, they are very territorial with respect to rats and keep them at bay. They also eat few if any fruits but do a great job of reducing the number of beetle larvae in the soil. If they want to hang out in one of my citrus trees during the day its fine with me.

I also don't shoot the coyotes because we have way to many rabbits and rats in the brush that come down from the nearby open space. On the otherhand, a crackbarrel air rifle with a laser sight will nail any of these critters.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Most interesting observations.
A question about citrus, are there any common animals in northamerica that eat citrus fruit? I have only limited experience so far with citrus, but have noted no bird pecks or squirrel bites on them. What ever is on the trees says on till picked, even for months.
There are some small rodents in my region that are mainly nocturnal. In the winter we have owls that show up and year round there are foxes and hawks along with cats that are about along with snakes. I try not to kill the black snakes since their removal can leave a niche for the more dangerous water moccasin and various rattlesnakes. Possums are slow and probably destroy the nests of rats and perhaps rabbits getting the young. I have on occasion observed them on wild growing plum trees eating fruit. The local armadillos burrow a lot around here for insects. I am sure that the raccoons will take fruit also.
In a study of Chicago-Cook County coyotes fruit was a significant part of their diet. Guard dogs are the best alternative, especially if I want to have chickens since we also have foxes. I suspect that the coyotes will just stay away most of the time. The eastern coyotes are often larger than the western variety. I have seen two dead ones on the road that were certainly at least 40 lbs. There may be some dog and wolf (red wolf and eastern canadian wolf) genes involved. So they present more of a threat to dogs.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Many varieties of Citrus have a long "hold factor" on the tree: that is, after ripening they can hang there for a few months and not loose quality. So we pick our Citrus incrementally instead of all at once as a commercial grower would. Towards the end harvest on my oranges, I'll notice one or two fruits down low that have been munched and by the looks of it I'd say by rats. My father's side of the family were involved in the development of the Citrus industry in southern CA. Most of the control of animal pests were targeted at gophers and squirrels digging up the root systems. My uncle would say that an opossum might eat one orange a month in the dry season but it seemed reasonable "payment" for the benefits of having them around. Curiously, the farm cats and the opossums seemed to co-exist.

Oh yes, I'd forgotten you are in the land of poisonous snakes. We only have rattlesnakes and they are rare in my area.

I have seen opossums in southern CA on the run out pace a medium size dog in pursuit. They are typically slow and docile -- but wow can they move when the time comes.

40-lbs is large by comparison. The coyotes I see here are in the 20-30 lb range. The environment is drier than yours so that is also probably a factor.

It turns out that foxes play a huge role in controlling small rodent populations in southern CA -- more so than the coyotes. Any place the foxes have been displaced experiences an explosion in the rat population.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

If your looking for the ultimate protector that's also a great family pet check out the Great Pyrenees. These dogs are used as border patrol on ranches.

Great Pyrenees - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

I am familiar with the Great Pyrenees and it would be a second choice after the Giant Schnauzer.
The Carr White English is not a great pet and while they dislike being petted will tolerate it. They are extremely serious and want to guard your property including livestock and your family. The major breeder of them did use the Great Pyrenees at one time and prefers the Carr White English. People locally in my area have been the using the Great Pyrenees to guard new born lambs against bald eagles with success so they certainly are a viable choice. One major concern of mine is now that the G Py breed is becoming popular one must take care with the QC exercised by the breeder in maintaining their line. Many good breeds get ruined as they become popular as unethical breeders breed as many as they can sell. It gets worse when they get bred for show.

Another choice for the south are the various cur breeds that are about.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Did you see Russell's post about his ornata? He's in Mobile and has some that he's giving away and he's gonna drop some off for Darkman in Pensacola. If you're interested get in touch.

Terry

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Thanks for the information. I will pass this year until I findout a lot more about bananas. I have had one failure already and prior to trying again I will need time to research it thoroughly.

thanks again.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Chance I think he is sticking strickly with edibles.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

But, don't the ornata produce?

On another subject. I noticed today that my grapefruit is budding up and it brought to mind those worms that burrow into the leaf. Is there any solution to that? I have a big problem with them, like they cover the entire tree and disfigure it . I usually get a few of those big fat ugly worms that eat the leaf but they're not too much of a problem and besides they're the larva stage of one of the swallow tail butterfly's so I leave them alone. The worm I'm talking about burrows into the back side of the leaf and sometimes there's 6-8 worms on one leaf.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Definately CLM. Not a big problem for mature trees but a serious issue with young trees. With the warm Winter we had they may show up early this year. The link Sunfish gave is a good one.

from Musa ornata - Flowering Banana, Ornamental Banana - Hawaiian Plants and Tropical Flowers

Ornata Special Characteristics

Edible – The flesh of the ripe fruits is edible, but these bananas are very seedy and not worth the trouble to eat.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Different subject but this reminds me that two of my neighbors have catawba shrubs for the respective moths to lay their eggs on. They get stripped several times a year by the catawba larva, but apparently these larva make good fish bait. One passerby tried to steal some and one neighbor chased him off with a pistol. Do not know how a judge would decide about someone shooting a thief over stealing insect larvae for fishing. Maybe next year I will get some cuttings and start one myself.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Just a little protective of their fish bait! Are you into fishing?

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Well, I can tell you from experience that they do make good fish bait. When I was a boy my brothers and I would climb the neighbor's big tree and get those worms and head off to the creek. I liked the smell of the bloom, too. Fortunately for us our neighbor wasn't protective of their worms. Is it "catawba" or "catalpa"? I think we called it catawba, but seems like I've seen it spelled catalpa. We use to hide in the sagebrush and smoke the seed pod from that tree. I'll bet you could start it from seed and it's probably a fast grower.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

It is:
Catalpa - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalpa
Catalpa, commonly called catalpa or catawba

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

When I was younger I was. I may try out fishing with a seagoing kayak. I found out that right off front seawall of the new pensacola baseball stadium that there is a ton of rubble from a former wharf that includes railroad cars. Divers found lots of redfish in the boxcars. Can not be fished from motor boat; a shallow draft kayak should be fine.
That neighbor now has an old shotgun that I traded him for an outboard motor that he had. So worm thieves beware.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

:eek:

Well let us know how it goes if you get a yak and go out.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Lots of Stone Crabs there too!

Best I recall after you grow your Catalpa tree you should hijack some of your neighbors worms and infect or is it infest your tree. Reason being if I remember correctly they overwinter in the ground under the tree and then come out lay eggs and die. Then the cycle starts over.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

Since the adult is a flying moth I had hoped they could fly over to my trees. First I need to the cuttings going which is yet to be done.
I had not thought of stone crabs, yes they should be there in all of that rubble.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

With the close proximity to your or where your trees will be that may happen. My brother had some many years ago and we had to "stock" the tree before he had a returning "crop".

I knew a crabber and he got loads of them there. No reason they shouldn't still be there and yes there were a lot of fish there. I would think that it will be a good place to loose tackle though! Maybe a top water lure might work good. You could kayak out, set crab traps, fish and then pick them up on the way in. Don't forget to take pictrures!

Was there a map of the bottom made back then and is it available?

Years ago I used to fish the municipal auditorium (fairly clean bottom) and had good luck there. That was when I had plenty of time, my how the priorities change as you get older! LOL Maybe next weekend I could come over if your available.

Re: From Northwest Florida
 

My comments in bolded blue