Hello!

Just a few minutes ago, I have tasted some fruits of a Poncirus tree in the botanical garden of Mainz (central Germany). The smell of the fruit was orangelike with only a hint if any of the typical pine smell that Poncirus usually has. When I tasted the fruits they were relatively juicy (for a Poncirus) not too sour and not bitter at all! That was a surprise for me. I did my best to find the bitter taste but there was none, only in the hard peel like in an orange. That I tasted no bitterness is certainly not the fault of my tongue since I have tasted Sorbus aucuparia an hour earlier and it was bitter. The Poncirus fruits did contain a kind of glue that I still feel on my tooth. But again that was not bitter as I was used to from the other tree of the same botanical garden. The fruits were sour, as I said, but so less that I could easily drink the juice. There was however something in the juice that I did not like. But I cannot tell what, maybe the glue, maybe something that let my brain remember the normal Poncirus taste. At any rate, something interesting this Poncirus tree. I am going to taste more fruits of it and see how they are.

I shall add that this tree is most certainly not a citrange or the like. It drops its leaves and looks in any regard like a Poncirus tree. Its flowers are not flagrant. And it has survived many years unprotected.

I am interested if some of you have found similar "good" tasting Poncirus trees or if you know of variances of taste of one and the some tree.

Even greater would be if some of you had the courage to test fruits of different trees this autumn that we can find more of such trees. You know I am searching for the ideal tree for cross breeding.

Yours,

Till

Till, if you can get some seeds to send to Maine, USA I'll be gratefull. So far every P.t. I've tasted has bitterness. I'll PM you.

The gum cells should breed out pretty quickly.

Till,
Tasting all the poncirus I can find in the area of northern Georgia is my goal also. It is not too common so I am always on the lookout.

Three Poncirus trees. One of them is from fruit that came from Boston. The other two are seedlings from a tree planted in front of a house many years ago in North Georgia. The fruit from the trees in Georgia are distinctly different on each tree. That indicates that at least one is from a sexual cross. They all taste about the same.

Hi folks, PT fruit is perfect as is, medicine that is.
While I have PT tea I do not need even aspirin.
PT tea = hot water extract.
What I (and #followers increasing, locally) do:
Cut fresh fruit to half, each half to 4 pieces. Result is 8 pieces. (not written in stone )
That is enough for 1 liter of water, which is heated on 60..80 deg C (no boiling) for a 20 minutes or so.
Actually, we use 3 fruits & 3 l of water, and we use the same 3 fruits 2..3 times - what gives 6 .. 9 liter of 'tea'.
#the ways to use it is numberless.
Try it:
eating apple pie
with apricot syrup
more diluted and with lemon juice added
experiment ...

A few additional effects of the tea, from top of my head:
improves appetite,
increases blood circulation,
increase the pH in the mouth, (edited)
lower blood pressure? (my wife & one friend say that, I don't know)

In short, PT fruit is medicine, that is.

EDIT: PT tea makes pH in mouth less acidic.

Ivica, very interesting, and will try some tonight.

A great summary of some medical uses at the bottom of this blog, plus the famous Hardy Orange marmalade

http://www.eattheweeds.com/hardy-orange/

Thank you for all the interest and your replies!
I have made a little travel the last days in order to test other Poncirus trees. I could taste
- three trees from Cologne
- one from Frankfurt
- two trees from Mainz again
The fruits showed some differences. One was quite dry or let me better say: of firm pulp. The others were quite juicy but all with many seeds. The smell of the fruits was always quite fruity and good but some had a little bit resinous smell. The opened fruit showed more differences in smell. Some had a quite mild and fruity odor others a strong resinous smell. And so was the taste different. All were sour to about the some level but with slighter differences. Yet some were more bitter than others and also more disgusting than others. The stronger the resin smell the worse the taste. The good news was: The mild tree from Mainz that I mentioned was not the only one with a relatively good taste. There were others fruits not bitter or hardly bitter.

By the way, the grade of deciduousness seems to be quite different. One tree in Bonn was loosing its leaves but started blooming again while all others only dropped their leaves.

Now, my conclusions and questions:
- Since all trees except one stood in full sun and in the warmer regions of Germany but had different taste and smell, there are indeed greater differences from tree to tree which seem to be genetic.
- However, one tree that I had the "pleasure" to taste last year already is more mild this year. And the praised tree from Mainz botanical garden stands in half shadow. That gives me the suspicion that the degree of bitterness is somewhat dependent on the amount of sun a tree gets. The last year was quite hot even in the spring. This year, we had a hot summer but a very cold spring and a cool autumn, so a shorter year. It might be that the better the growing conditions for Poncirus are the more ingredients the fruits contain and thus the worse the taste. That would also explain why most of you in hot US know only of really bitter Poncirus.
- This reasoning might, however, be wrong: First, it may be that the duration of the vegetative period is not that important since the fruits ripened about the same time this year and the last year. Second, it might be that the gen pool in the US is different than in Europe. I have at least red that almost all trees in the US go back to a very few imported ones.
- We should ask Chinese citrus growers from the home region of Poncirus what experiences they have made. I heard that they have much more varieties than we, at least what regards the adaption to different soils (PH-level and other). So I would not wonder if they also know of different fruits.

It is somewhat sad that the really good Poncirus has not yet been found, only a better one.

If you want seeds send me an email!

For the very good lemonade that you can make of the better tasting Mainz-Poncirus see also my post here: link

In Athens Ga I found a larger size Poncirus. It had the apparently typical resin
that has been discussed. It was seedier than usual and had very little juice. Nevertheless, a lemonade was made from the juice. A taster who is familiar with Guava said it smelled like that fruit. The 'ade' taste was fruity, not particularly citrusy, but it got a thumbs up

Cool. It looks as if the pulp is unusually soft. Is that true?

It could be a hybrid because the skin doesn't look very "leathery" (like velvet), the rind is thick and the flesh is "melting".