New miracle fruit plant.
The miracle fruit is a fascinating berry shrouded in controversy and corporate sabotage. The fruit itself is just a small, relatively tasteless red berry. However, once you eat a miracle fruit, anything you eat that is sour will taste sweet. The berries contain a substance called 'miraculin', which coats the tongue and is thought to alter the shape of your 'sweet receptors' so that they respond to acids. For example, if you were to eat miracle fruit and then eat a lemon, the lemon would taste like lemonade.
During the 1970's the miracle fruit was considered such a threat to the sugar industry that they allegedly sabotaged attempts to develop the berry as a commercial sugar replacement and pressured the FDA to reject acceptance of miraculin as a food additive and sweetener.
I tried growing a miracle fruit last year after reading about them on John Panzarella's webpage. I planted it in a 10-gallon pot of peat moss and placed it in a nice semi-sunny spot on the covered porch. It was doing fine until the weather started getting cold. I didn't do much to protect it, other than pulling it up closer to the house, and it died. I was also watering it with Houston tap water, which is very alkaline. I have since learned that they like acid soil, and should probably only be irrigated with rainwater or water treated to be acidic.
Now its time for round 2. I went back to JRN Nursery last week, and picked up another one. Some of the leaves had some tip-burn, most likely from being irrigated with tap water, but overall it looked pretty good. Some of the specimens they had for sale were just downright sad though. I brought it home, re-potted it in a 12-inch plastic pot with Scott's potting soil amended with a little bit of powdered sulfur for acidity, and watered it in with rainwater from my rain tank.
I didn't want to build a greenhouse for it, so I brought it up to my office, and placed it by the window where it should get plenty of indirect sunlight. I'll see how it does there. I'm thinking about getting a cheap seed-sprouting heat mat to place under it and keep it a little bit warmer than the ambient office temperature. I'll also have to pollinate it by hand if I want to get any miracle berries, but I'm very interested to see if the plant can be grown this way.
During the 1970's the miracle fruit was considered such a threat to the sugar industry that they allegedly sabotaged attempts to develop the berry as a commercial sugar replacement and pressured the FDA to reject acceptance of miraculin as a food additive and sweetener.
I tried growing a miracle fruit last year after reading about them on John Panzarella's webpage. I planted it in a 10-gallon pot of peat moss and placed it in a nice semi-sunny spot on the covered porch. It was doing fine until the weather started getting cold. I didn't do much to protect it, other than pulling it up closer to the house, and it died. I was also watering it with Houston tap water, which is very alkaline. I have since learned that they like acid soil, and should probably only be irrigated with rainwater or water treated to be acidic.
Now its time for round 2. I went back to JRN Nursery last week, and picked up another one. Some of the leaves had some tip-burn, most likely from being irrigated with tap water, but overall it looked pretty good. Some of the specimens they had for sale were just downright sad though. I brought it home, re-potted it in a 12-inch plastic pot with Scott's potting soil amended with a little bit of powdered sulfur for acidity, and watered it in with rainwater from my rain tank.
I didn't want to build a greenhouse for it, so I brought it up to my office, and placed it by the window where it should get plenty of indirect sunlight. I'll see how it does there. I'm thinking about getting a cheap seed-sprouting heat mat to place under it and keep it a little bit warmer than the ambient office temperature. I'll also have to pollinate it by hand if I want to get any miracle berries, but I'm very interested to see if the plant can be grown this way.
Close up of the leaves.
Bumped up to a 12' pot.
Miracle fruit's new office home.
Miracle Fruit Tablets
