We would like to plant some feijoa trees. I believe it would be a year or 2 unfortunately to get fruit. I've done some research but keen to know what others have planted, what produces well, is hardy and tastes great. Any other tips would be welcome. we are not gardeners.
hezwez,
Feb 22, 11:29pm
I don't know the name of our varieties Molly, but our trees are close to 50 years old and the clever former owners planted varieties that fruited consecutively, so we have produce over about 7 or 8 weeks.
mrsvonflik,
Feb 23, 2:20am
I paid a bit more & bought a bigger tree. It’s now in its 3rd year of fruiting.
My best feijoa tree is a Kawatiri but you may not be able to get it easily - new varieties seem to come out all the time. Tagan is also good, though you're best to get both Tagan 1 and Tagan 2.
Oh, and yes, get the biggest tree you can. When I bought a Nashi pear tree, the garden centre folk advised me to get thee bigger one, and it was only a year or two before it fruited. Now the only trouble is that the wretched birds are beating me to the pears. That's one problem we don't have with feijoas.
cinderellagowns,
Feb 23, 7:27am
I chose three different varieties from the garden centre - early, middle and later fruiting to extend the season. More than one tree (even if the same variety) means better fertilization/fruiting. Keep up the watering/mulch during the summer. Yes year 1 will be minimal fruit, year 2 you will get more than just a taste - by year 3 you should have something you could call a "harvest". Main thing is to just make sure you get a fruiting variety, not the kind that are more just hedging plants. Any commercial retailer will have it very well labelled/differentiated so you should be fine.
junkx,
Feb 23, 10:29am
I planted Feijoa Unique last year. It is self-fertile and apparently a good pollinator for other varieties The first year I got about 30 feijoas, this year there's about 50 little ones ripening. I fed & watered and the taste was 'good'. I have tasted sweeter ones, but happy with it and have a couple of different varieties which haven't done much yet. One of these is called Den's Choice which was highly recommended by the garden centre.
oh_hunnihunni,
Feb 23, 10:35am
Might not be the birds beating us to our feijoa hedge but the guava moth sure is.
macandrosie,
Feb 23, 8:50pm
Believe it or not the Warehouse have had them for the last few years. Mammoth & Triumph come to mind & there is one other. I have one of each, so long as they're well watered you should get plenty of fruit!
harm_less,
Feb 23, 9:15pm
Den's choice, Unique and Sherbet here. All young trees but our favourite so far is the Sherbet; tastes like its name.
holly-rocks,
Feb 23, 9:36pm
I really wish my feijoa would fruit. Well it does but they are tiny and rock hard. My local veggie stall sells them for $5 each 🤨🤨🤨 it’s day light robbery.
oh_hunnihunni,
Feb 25, 10:22am
Watching Jamie Durie the other day and saw him planting feijoas, calling them 'pineapple guavas'. No wonder the guava moth likes ours.
harm_less,
Feb 25, 10:39am
Yes it is in the guava family and is also a myrtle so potentially affected by myrtle rust disease, though this doesn't seem to have happened in NZ yet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feijoa_sellowiana
lythande1,
Feb 25, 11:15am
Be careful, they are weeds. There was one over back, fruit dropped and next thing section next to it was utterly covered in them, encroaching on ours then too. Luckily owner bulldozed the place and put houses on it now. but the original weed remains. and is spreading on that neighbours property now.
harm_less,
Feb 25, 11:18am
Same can be said for kiwifruit. BOP council had major issues with gullies full of bird spread wild ones overwhelming native bush, and that was before the gold one turned up which grows even faster.
oh_hunnihunni,
Feb 25, 11:32am
And yet we still can't buy kiwifruit plants in our local garden centres.
Life is strange sometimes.
melcraig,
Feb 25, 11:48am
Love feijoa tress. I reckon they're the ultimate plant. they can be a tree, a bush, a hedge, they're nice looking, and they give you fruit.
venna2,
Feb 25, 2:16pm
I love them too. For years I envied relations in the Bay of Plenty who had them growing. And then I moved house and have been able to grow them. During last year's lockdown I went for local walks with bags of them to leave on various friends' doorsteps.
molly37,
Feb 28, 8:49pm
Thanks everyone. Great idea about purchasing bigger trees. Ill look at our local nurseries. And take note of the varieties you've all recommended.
sla11,
Mar 10, 5:18pm
Tree I planted never fruited at all! Googled ? and found out they fruit on new wood; once I'd pruned it along came the fruit! Waiting now to sample some.
owen106,
Mar 10, 5:37pm
That's why they're usually grown as a hedge. Just prune it annually after fruiting.
venna2,
Mar 14, 5:13pm
I've never pruned my feijoa trees, except for an odd branch that stops the clothesline turning around. They give me heaps of lovely feijoas every autumn.
oh_hunnihunni,
Mar 14, 5:17pm
Apple and feijoa crumble.
A marriage made in heaven. With whipped cream.
uli,
Mar 23, 11:03am
Sad that we cannot give recipes now.
geoff_m,
Mar 24, 7:47am
That's it, you have made me hungry now.
We have feijoa trees in the middle of a paddock where a house used to be. The house was demolished for road works in the late 1970s. Still producing fruit and providing shelter for the cows who eat the fruit and keep the manured
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