This new year, try doing something new in your own farm. Just what we have done lately in our own little farm. On December 10, we decided to remove all the leaves of our custard apple, a bigger cousin or our local atis, which we introduced from Taiwan in 2005. The tree has been bearing luscious fruits for two years now.

Why did we do that? So that it will bear fruit off-season. As of December 31, the day we are writing this piece, new leaves have started to come out and so are the little flowers. Hopefully, with proper care, we would be harvesting the fruits late March or April instead of the usual fruiting season. Last year, we harvested the fruits in August and September.

This is one experiment that we are immensely enjoying to undertake. The idea came to us when we remembered what the late professor Gregorio Lugod, a good friend we met while we were working at UP Los Banos in the early 1960s. He removed all the leaves of his atis tree in his backyard in December and he harvested his fruits in April.

Aside from the custard apple, we also totally defoliated one atis tree growing nearby. It has also started to produce flowers.

What we did before defoliating the trees was to spread a lot of organic fertilize around the base of the trees but seeing to it that it was far enough from the trunk.

We also applied a balanced formulation of Peters soluble fertilizer (20-20-20) in the ground. From the time the leaves were removed, we have been seeing to it that the tree is adequately watered. We enjoy doing the watering ourselves.

What we plan to do from now on is to protect the leaves and flowers from insect pests. We will spray organic foliar fertilizer every 10 days. And once the fruits are formed, we will bag them with a nonwoven fabric we acquired from an NGO doing its own experiments on fruit trees in Laguna. We have used the fruit bag in the previous fruiting of our custard apple as well as in our pummelos.

We are really enjoying this little experiment. We usually visit the tree first thing in the morning after waking up, checking on the progress of the new leaves and the emerging flowers. We will keep you posted on future developments.

**** **** ****

HORTICULTURE 2010. Watch for the opening of Horticulture 2010, the annual garden show of the Philippine Horticultural Society which will be held at the Manila Seedling Bank in Quezon City on January 29 to February. 8. This is a major gardening event participated in by the country’s leading nursery operators and hobbyists. PHS is headed by Wendy Regalado.