Hand Pollination Guide

Hand Pollination Guide

Ever wonder why your healthy and mature fruit hasn’t produced much fruit even when you think you’re fertilizing, watering, and doing everything you believe to be right? Well, there is secret to getting more fruits on your tree! Flowers must be pollinated in order to produce seeds and fruit. Today, we are going to focus on the Cherimoya fruit tree and how to get them to produce the most amount of fruit as possible using HAND-POLLINATION!

Cherimoyas are a fruit tree that put out vigorous annual growth and, when mature, require annual pruning at the beginning of April to keep trees at a reasonable height. If you don’t prune your tree, it may grow 30 feet tall, making hand-pollination a near impossible task.

How do we produce so many cherimoya fruits at Ricardo’s Nursery? Beginning in June, pollen should be removed with a small paintbrush from the male portion of the flowers and brushed onto the cone-like pistil of the partially open female part of the flowers. It is important to continue to hand-pollinate flowers each week so that your fruit will mature from November through March. Here is an easy step-by-step guide:

1. Look for male flowers that are fully open in late afternoon with the petals flaring about half-way open. Hold a small plastic container beneath the flower.

2. Tap the base of the flower to knock loose some of the anthers and their pollen, and using the paintbrush, brush them into the container.

3. Look into the container to identify the pollen. It is the fine dust-like material rather than the larger grainy-looking pieces, which are the anthers. Save and refrigerate overnight to pollinate the female flowers in the morning when closed. Use the pollen the next day and discard any remaining pollen, since it is not effective after about 24 hours.

4. In the morning, Locate a female flower with the petals only slightly open. Take some pollen from the vial on the tip of the paint brush and press + twirl it into the flower until it touches the cone shaped stigma at the base of the flower.

5. Continue harvesting pollen and fertilizing flowers throughout the flowering season, usually from June through August and watch your fruit production increase when November rolls around!

The biggest obstacle to growing cherimoya fruit is inadequate number of pollinators, but with the use of hand-pollination, we can help increase fruit production with just a bit of effort. We host many workshops and classes throughout the year – if you are interested in learning more or taking a workshop that can help you in your backyard gardening, call us at (562)428-7252 for more info! 

Ricardo's Nursery

6850 Atlantic Ave. Long Beach 90805

(562) 428 - 7252