Garden Blog - Top Tropicals

Date: 6 Nov 2024

What is your favorite Pineapple variety?

Pineapple Florida Special

Pineapple Florida Special

🌞 What is your favorite Pineapple variety? A Sunshine State Delight: Florida Special!

  • 🍍 One of our favorites here in Sunshine State is Pineapple Florida Special
  • 🍍 Bred by the Libby fruit company for Florida's unique climate, the Florida Special Pineapple once thrived across 240 acres in Immokalee before Libby sold to Nestle.
  • 🍍 This variety produces medium to large, golden-yellow fruits with a perfect balance of sweetness and tang. Known for its resilience, it can withstand temperatures down to the mid-30s without internal damage, making it a great choice for subtropical gardeners.
  • 🍍The plant's compact size, reaching 2-3 feet, makes it perfect for containers, patios, or garden beds. Its spiny green leaves form a striking rosette, adding tropical flair to any space. Whether grown for its juicy fruit or ornamental appeal, the Florida Special brings a slice of paradise to your garden!
  • 🍍 Enjoy it fresh, in smoothies, or as a tasty addition to tropical dishes.


📚 Learn more about pineapples from previous posts:


Three must-have fruit for every tropical garden
The most luscious Hospitality Fruit

🛒 Order Pineapple Florida Special

#Food_Forest

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Date: 4 Nov 2024

Why Hog Plum is the most popular fruit tree after mango?

Spondias purpurea - Hog Plum, Mombin, Jocote, Ciruela - fruit

Spondias purpurea - Hog Plum, Mombin, Jocote, Ciruela - fruit

Spondias purpurea - Hog Plum, Mombin, Jocote, Ciruela - fruit on a tree

Spondias purpurea - Hog Plum, Mombin, Jocote, Ciruela - fruit on a tree

Spondias purpurea - Hog Plum, Mombin, Jocote, Ciruela - fruit

Spondias purpurea - Hog Plum, Mombin, Jocote, Ciruela - fruit

Why Hog Plum is the most popular fruit tree after mango?

  • 🍑 Spondias purpurea - Hog Plum, Mombin, Jocote, Ciruela... This fast-growing, spreading tree with thick branches is a favorite of tropical fruit lovers!
  • 🍑 In spring, its showy, fragrant flowers bloom from bare, leafless branches in shades of red, purple, or yellow, hinting at the color of the fruit to come. The tree produces oval to round mildly sweet fruits, 1 to 2 ½ inches long, with waxy skin, juicy flesh, and a strong plum-like flavor.
  • 🍑 Highly productive, the pleasant aroma of the ripe fruit can be smelled from many feet away!
  • 🍑 The fruits are enjoyed fresh, stewed with sugar, or pickled while green for East Indian dishes. Mombin butter, made like apple butter, is especially delicious.
  • 🍑 Even the young leaves can be cooked, though they carry a tangy, sour taste.
  • 🍑 Deciduous and quick-growing, this tree can bear fruit before sprouting new leaves in spring. It thrives in many soil types and propagates easily from large cuttings, making it perfect for a living fence.
  • 🍑 Very fast growing, and fruiting right away. Fruiting from May through July, the Hog Plum brings beauty, fragrance, and flavor to your edible landscape.


🛒 Plant Mombin Hog Plum

#Food_Forest

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Date: 2 Nov 2024

What plant is a vine, a cactus, a tasty fruit, and a pretty flower at the same time?

🐰 What plant is a vine, a cactus, a tasty fruit, and a pretty flower at the same time? Barbados Gooseberry!



Perescia aculeata - Barbados Gooseberry is in full bloom all Fall through Winter, these flowers are so pretty!

📚 Learn more about this fruiting Cactus vine with pretty flowers and tasty fruit:


What is Barbados Gooseberry?

🛒 Plant Barbados Gooseberry

#Food_Forest #Hedges_with_benefits

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Date: 2 Nov 2024

What plant is a vine, a cactus, a tasty fruit, and a pretty flower at the same time?

Perescia aculeata - Barbados Gooseberry

🐰 What plant is a vine, a cactus, a tasty fruit, and a pretty flower at the same time? Barbados Gooseberry!



Perescia aculeata - Barbados Gooseberry is in full bloom all Fall through Winter, these flowers are so pretty!

📚 Learn more about this fruiting Cactus vine with pretty flowers and tasty fruit:


What is Barbados Gooseberry?

🛒 Plant Barbados Gooseberry

#Food_Forest #Hedges_with_benefits

🔴 Join 👉 TopTropicals

Date: 1 Nov 2024

What fruit smells like roses?

What fruit smells like roses? What fruit smells like roses? What fruit smells like roses?

😏 What fruit smells like roses? Rose apple!


  • 🌹 If you liked the Java Plum (Jambolan) from our earlier post, its close relative is even more exciting, because the fruit smells like roses!

  • 🌹 Syzygium jambos - Rose Apple - is a fragrant delight fruit! Also known as Malabar Plum or Pomme Rosa, the Rose Apple produces crisp, juicy fruits with a distinct rose scent, highly prized for jellies and confections.

  • 🌹 This easy-to-grow plant is moderately cold-hardy and can tolerate poor soils.

  • 🌹 Rose Apple trees are versatile – they make attractive, wide-spreading shade trees and can also thrive as compact, bushy fruiting plants in containers. Whether in the ground or a pot, this charming tree brings beauty and fragrance to any space!


🛒 Order Rose Apple

#Food_Forest #Remedies

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