MANAGEMENT OF GUAVAS.

Northern Advocate, 7 May 1887, Page 3

MANAGEMENT OF GUAVAS.

Concerning these fruits, scarcely any information can be gleaned from any work hitherto published. The trees thrive so well and yield such, abundant crops of fruit, that they are worthy of being well represented in every fruit garden. One of the largest kinds introduced to the colonies was the Psidium Cattlajanuin, or the Strawberry Guava. It is about the size of a walnut, with thin skin and purple-crimson flesh, piling towards the centre, which is white. It is juicy, and in consistence and flavour much like the strawberry, but with an aroma peculiarly its own. It is one of the best of the guavos, and is a native of China, whence it was introduced to the Brazils and South America. It is used as a dessert and for making jellies. The seeds, which are very hard, should be taken away by straining from the pulp on boiling. What experience I have had with the different varieties, I always found the Psidium Cattlajanum the most prolific and easy to manage ; but for all that I should recommend planting different varieties. The Psidium. Pyriferum or white guava is not quite so hardy as the above. It grows to the height of ten or fifteen feet, yields an abundance of clear amber coloured russety fruit, and gives the famed guava jelly of the West Indies. The fruit is as large as au ordinary tennis ball, the pulp is sweet, aromatic, and of an agreabfe flavour, and its flesh is interpersed with very small hard seeds. The fruit is very extensively eaten in the islands of the West Indies by all classes either raw or as jelly and marmalade ; but it has very astringent properties and induces a costive habit of body in man> people. The yellow guava is the largest of the guavas, but it is tender in cool districts, and its foliage is apt to be damaged by late frosts or cold damp weather. There is another kind called Parker's Hfhrid. This is an enormous fruit nearly double the size of the yellow guava, and a very superior flavour. It should only be planted in warm localities and with a sunny aspect, but it will thrive in any ordinary rich loamy soil. The Psidium Pommiferum, or apple guava, is a large red fleshed fruit of great acidity, unfitting it for dessert but eminently qualifiing it for preserving and for mixing with chutney in place of tamarinds. Any soil of good garden quality is suitable for growing the guayas. They maybe propagated by cuttings, which, root freely in sharp silver sand, or from layers pegged down around the tree into the sandy soil. They form naturally round-topped bushes, and rarely require the knife. Their chief enemy is thelocußtor scale. The best thing to clean the tree is to thoroughly syringe with strong soap-suds and scrape off the mildew from the stem, and dress well with lime and sulpher. With regard to the layers, the shoots of the season are pegged down firmly into the freshly-dug* ground around the plant, and a few inches of soil is placed over the branch When so pegged down, leaving the encl of tho shoot just out of the ground, sometimes a twist or wound is made at the spot where the peg seoures it, but if the ground be kept moist and. the surface mulched, the layer will soon take root. Early autumn-layed shoots will be ready to plant the following spring, and the spring layers will be ready to plant in the autumn. Each settler should count his wealth by the size of his manure heap, for it is after all the real gold of the earth. — PBACTiCAii.