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NORTHLAND

Two plants with fruiting trunks make for unusual sights in the subtropical north.

- Two unique trees with spectacular fruiting bark.

Both the Brazilian grape tree (Plinia cauliflora) and the Roxburgh fig (Ficus auriculata) create their curious trunk-laden display when their crops peak in late autumn. The grape tree, also commonly called jaboticaba, produces a double trunk-hugging spectacle: first, a coat of snowflakewhite blossoms bursts straight out of the gnarly wood of the trunk and limbs, then these are bee-pollinated to punctuate the wood with a mass of fruit. In less than a month these mature from green fruitlets into dark purple-black berries that look like they’re magnetised to the trunk. They are delicious plucked straight from the tree to suck out the juicy flesh which has a taste and texture similar to a grape but with a tougher skin that it’s best to discard. The fruiting cycle of the grape tree varies from once or twice a year to almost continuous with flowers and fruit sharing trunk space as has been the case this year.

As the name suggests, it originates from Brazil. This slow-growing evergreen needs plenty of room to grow into its 8-15m potential, but it can be pruned to keep it more compact. The tree is multi-trunked with striking salmon pink new growth that matures into a dark green, and attractive bark that peels and sheds like its cousin the guava. Jaboticaba can tolerate light frosts (to -3°C) and moderately dry conditions but need water in extended droughts especially when the tree is flowering or fruiting, and they can adapt to a range of soils but do best in rich soils covered with mulch to retain moisture.

You have to be patient when waiting for food from this botanical beauty as plants grown from seed take more than 10 years to bear fruit, and even grafted plants can take five years to crop. The fruit have a short shelf life and are best enjoyed fresh from the tree. In fact, they start to ferment at room temperature in a few days after harvest, but like other blue-purple fruit they’re rich in antioxidants and, like other berries, can be made into jam, tarts, wines, and liqueurs.

The Roxburgh fig has equally dramatic trunk-hugging fruit. It originates from the eastern Himalayan foothills and is part of the huge fig family of over 800 species, so they’re a cousin of our eating figs.

Roxburgh figs have another spectacular feature. While they are an evergreen tree, they are semi-deciduous in late spring and look very sick here before bursting into a blaze of huge bronze leaves. A friend and I were about to do a major do-or-die prune in October when we first met a very sad-looking Roxburgh fig tree up here that we thought was on the way out, but before we got back to do the job, the tree educated us as to its seasonal habit: After the bold bronze leaf flush, it went on to clothe itself in fresh foliage and then filled its trunk with clusters of giant red-brown figs.

These are truly an art form. Each rust red fig is twice the size of our domestic figs and decorated with paint-splash yellow markings. They hang in clusters on stalks inside the tree. As striking as these figs are, in New Zealand they remain a feast for the eyes only because we don’t have the fig wasp to pollinate them into fleshy fruit.

However, we still get to enjoy the stunning spectacle of these trees in frost-free spots with sun and free-draining soils. They tolerate some drought once established but need good moisture during their spring-summer growing season.

In India and Nepal, they are the preferred fodder tree for stock during dry periods because the leaves are both nutritious and palatable – something to remember in our increasingly dry summers.

Two subtropical trees up here are sculptural standouts when fruit burst directly out of their woody trunks, a peculiarity known as cauliflory.

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2022-05-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-05-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://stuffmagazines.pressreader.com/article/282913799061349

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