GROWING FRUIT TREES FROM SEEDS: Will You Reap What You Have Sown?

How many fruit trees have you planted from seed?

  

When the pandemic started and I became engrossed in gardening, I made a resolve to plant fruit-bearing trees and to germinate seeds myself instead of buying from outside seedling providers. 

My thinking was that if I am able to germinate seeds from good quality fruits, then I am assured of harvesting the same quality of fruits in the future.

I also saw the need to optimize the use of my limited garden space where trees do not have much room to spread their roots and branches, much more to accommodate a tree that does not bear good quality fruits.

Not only is it space-consuming to grow a tree. Time, effort and money are involved in growing a tree before it starts bearing fruits. It can be very laborious or expensive if later on you decide to have it cut or uprooted when the fruits are not as good as you expect them to be.

I give credit to my mother for growing an avocado tree in her small yard from the seed of one very good quality avocado fruit that she bought from the market. 

Every fruiting season that peaks about the month of July, she earned extra money from the sale of excellent quality avocados excluding the ones picked by passers-by from overhanging branches on the street and those gifted to neighbors and friends.

From this tree, I now have a three-year old avocado tree and expect to harvest the same fruit quality in a few years. 

Expecting Good Fruits from Good Seeds 

When you grow fruit plants from seeds, the expectation is that they will produce fruits that are exactly the same good quality fruits you took the seed from.

In his article entitled "Growing Fruit Plants from Seed," Dr. Robert Crassweller of Pennsylvania State University Extension wrote that:

1. Seeds from a plant will produce plants that will be a hybrid of two plants. A hybrid is a combination or mixture of two different plants.

The seed is a product of the union of the pollen (male organ) from one plant and the flower (female organ) of the tree that produced the fruit.

The new plant will be the same kind of plant, but its fruit and vegetative portions may not look or taste the same as the parent because the plant is "heterozygous."

2. To produce a tree that will produce the exact same fruit that you enjoyed, the fruit tree must be vegetatively propagated by grafting or budding methods. 

Vegetative propagation is a form of asexual reproduction of a plant where only one plant is involved and the offspring is the result of one parent.

As a result, the new plant is genetically identical to the parent source.

Photo Credits to Dr. Anita Khemka Dhanuka of Tutorix.com

3. A rootstock is needed to graft a bud or shoot onto. The rootstock serves as the base and root portion of grafted plants. 

The plant part grafted on the rootstock is called the scion. The scion is the plant that has the properties which the propagator desires to achieve, including the photosynthetic activity and the fruit or decorative properties.

For the graft to work, the scion and rootstock must be of closely related plant species.

Grown from seed. Palm-size fruit, looks rotten but meat is intact, very sweet; skin is very thin ; with very few small seeds.

Marcotting is another asexual propagation method that focuses on rooting a stem of the same plant. 

In grafting, the scion that is implanted on the rootstock comes from another plant of closely related specie. 

In budding, the bud implanted on the stem of another plant comes from another plant of closely related specie. 

Some quarters say that compared to grafting and budding, marcotting has bigger chances of survival success. 

For basic marcotting procedures, you may refer to my March 2021 blog entitled "Marcotting an African Talisay: A Beginner's Joy."

Environmental Factors Affecting Fruit-bearing Trees and Plants

The quality of the soil is basic and fundamental to a prolific fruiting and successful harvest and every plant has its own soil requirements.

Gleaning from written articles on farming and agriculture, there are also environmental factors that affect the growth (and the process of fruiting) without which plants will not grow the way we want them to grow.

These factors include light, temperature, water and humidity and plant nutrition of which every plant specie or variety have different needs or requirements.

An understanding of these factors can help in diagnosing plant needs and problems. Knowing these can help us decide what action to take to meet our harvest expectations when growing fruit-bearing plants and trees.

Thus, while grafting or budding or marcotting methods are the more scientific ways which can guarantee the same quality of fruits as where the seeds came from, the presence or absence of these environmental factors can make or break the expected result of these reproduction efforts.

Growing Quality Fruit Trees and Plants: Luck or Chance? 

I hesitate to think that my mother was just lucky to have grown an avocado tree with fruits of the same quality as where the seed came from. Because if that is so, then I am not assured of the same fruits for the avocado tree that I planted from the fruit of her tree.

Nonetheless, the biblical parable about the Sower and the Seed makes me feel  optimistic. If we apply the principle  to gardening, it tells us that good seeds (word of God) always grow on good soil (those who believe and proclaim it). Still, the new plant needs to be nurtured continuously in an environment that allows it to grow in the way the sower (God or us) wanted it to become. 

Kung ano ang itinanim, ito ang aanihin. (Whatever you have sown is what you will harvest). It is not just about planting a good seed on proper soil using appropriate propagation method with all the environmental factors present. It is also about the personal time, effort and attention which we put into cultivating, caring and nurturing our plants.

Our summer harvest before the Apple Mango tree was cut to give way to construction. Grown from seed.

Reaping what we have sown is never achieved by luck or chance.

Let the seeds you have sown thrive best in your hands. 

You can reach me at greencraftivist@gmail.com.

Apple Bleza-Morales

About the Author:
Apple (or Maybelle in the corporate setting) is an HR Professional who is passionately immersed in home and community gardening as well as related arts and crafts. She completed post baccalaureate studies in Human Resources and Organization Development at De La Salle College of Saint Benilde and holds a Master's Degree in Industrial Relations from the University of the Philippines with focus in Human Resources Development. 

Photos by Maybelle B. Morales