hey Ed, what fruits are you growing in Texas?
being arid, i would imagine more in line with Australia Tropical fruit growing.

i would like to grow kiwi, wish there was a low chill cultivar that was prolific here.

It is not arid at all here in the Houston area!

I am growing the following in the ground without any protection:

Jaboticaba
Cherry of the Rio Grande
Starfruit
White Sapote
Any citrus grafted onto Trifolata
Lychee - on the Southside of house and greenhouse
Paasionfruit
Cherimoya

Some hardy fruits:

Che
pawpaw
pears
muscadines
peaches- Tropic Snow 100 chill hours

A lot of stuff in the greenhouse! I will try to list later.

Also trying some low chill kiwis that I got from Southern CA this year.

hi Ed,

wish I could come, but Enchanted Gardens is a little too far for me.

how did your cherimoya, lychee and white sapote fare this past winter. It was pretty bad in houston. But if yours made it, I will try planting those in the ground too.

June

Ed-

Which low chill kiwi cv are you growing? I was considering Kens Red here in C Fla. And did u get them from Roger Meyer?

Thx,

Marcus

Marcus,

I am trying A. arguta var. Cordifolia and 2 others. I will check the labels and let you know. Roger Meyers highly recommended the A. arguta var. Cordifolia. He said it was a good tasting fruit and was reliable in Southern Ca.
Thanks,
Ed

Hi June!

Not sure where you are in Texas but yes the winter was really terrible for me in Katy! I have been gardening here since 2001. This was the worst year! My smallest lychees were killed all the way back to the ground. The one larger tree that I have lost every single leaf and any branch with less than 3/4 inch calipher was killed. The same with the White Sapote and Cherimoya. My Sugar Apples were completely killed! I had harvested Sugar Apples 3 years in a row! Oh well I had a back up in the greenhouse! The jaboticaba and cherry of the rio grande really done well this winter! The cherry of rio grande did not hardly lose a leaf! My jaboticaba was about 9 feet tall and it got killed back to about 6 feet!

Ed
Katy, Texas

I agree that Jaboticaba is unusually resilient to cold, i thought i even noticed new growth during our coldest spell of sub 40 degree weather.
Another tropical i noticed to be unusually cold hardy is Sapodilla. Im always interested to hear about people growing these where they push zone limits.

Ed, I'm actually not too far away from Katy, but having two young kids, I can't be away for more than a couple hours. I hope that will change soon! I'm in Cypress, NW. I have a new garden, so not much growing yet, most trees are still in pots.

Have you noticed that here the trees planted on a western or northern exposure do better than those planted on S and East?

Seems backward from all the info i've read. I had a whole row of trees die that were planted against a southern stone wall at my old house, and I even covered them too.

this time I'm planting on the west, my reasoning is that after a frosty night, the plants will have time to slowly thaw before the sun hits their leaves.

If I'm right, I'll have some fruit to share in a few years!