Recommended with Darrow Mandarin Melonberry Tree
- Product Description
- Planting & Care
- Shipping Info
Tastes Like Papaya
Going under several names Che, Chinese Che, Chinese Mulberry, Cudrang, Mandarin Melon Berry, Silkworm Thorn. Cudrania tricuspidata is a little know tree that needs to get more attention.
We have found it to be completely disease and insect free and to fruit heavily. The Darrow Female variety has fat raspberry like fruit that are up to 1 inch in size.
Fruit have a beautiful purple blush over a pale red background. Sweet and juicy with a nice chewy texture. Distinct cantaloupe to papaya flavor. Even though it will drop its fruit when young, we’ve found it does best without a male and produces seedless fruits after a few years. Fruit ripens July-September.
Cold Hardy | (20°)-(15°) |
---|---|
Container Plant | No |
Grafted | Yes, on Osage Orange Rootstock |
Growing Zone | 5A, 5B, 6A, 6B, 7A, 7B, 8A, 8B, 9A, 9B, 10A, 10B |
Mature Height | 12-15FT |
Mature Width | 8-10FT |
Pollinator | Self Fertile |
Spacing | 8-10FT |
Sunlight | Full Sun |
Fruitscaping with Melon Berry Trees
Known by many names including Che, Chinese Che, Chinese Mulberry, Cudrang, and Mandarin Melon Berry. This Silkworm Thorn is a beautiful, small, rounded tree with broad olive-green leaves. The tree hangs heavy with red raspberry-like fruit in the late summer. The fruit has a sweet, cantaloupe melon flavor. Our trees are grafted on Osage Orange to ensure early heavy fruit production without troublesome thorns or root suckers. Che aka Manderine Melon Berry were thought at one time to need a pollinator, when pollinated by a male tree the fruit tend to be seedy and hard to eat. Our female trees will bear with out a pollinator and are seedless. The fruit is good in fruit salads or made into home made ice cream. Mandarin Melon Berries are Self Fertile.
Mandarin Melon Berry grows to be a big shade tree, if its size is not controlled by pruning (an option for smaller yards). Make it a centerpiece, surrounded by flower beds. They are an organic gardener’s dream, absolutely no spraying required and it’s tough as nails once established.
Recommended Fertilizers for Planting and Maintenance
- Starter Fertilizer:  Plant with Espoma Organic Bio-tone® Starter Plus. This will increase root mass and help avoid transplant loss in difficult planting conditions.
- Fertilizer to Maintain:Â Â Our varieties of Melon Berry Trees work great with Espoma Organic Citrus-tone Fertilizer.
Growing Guide
Click here to find our Full Melon Berry Trees Planting and Growing Guide
Shipping Restrictions
We’re so sorry… but due to agricultural restrictions we cannot ship any plants outside of the United States, or to the states of California, Hawaii and Alaska. Also, citrus trees cannot be shipped outside of the state of Florida.
Here are some important things to know about your shipments
Unpacking Your Plants Guide:  Prior to receiving our plants, please click this link to read our Unpacking Your Plants Guide to get to know the steps to keeping your plant healthy after receiving it.
We do NOT ship bare root:  Our trees are shipped in the same exact containers they are grown in, for the most healthy transition. The plants are watered well before they are packed and wrapped in a shipping bag to ensure they stay moist during transit. It’s as if you came and picked them up right from our nursery yourself!
Why do we not offer free shipping? At Just Fruits, we price all of our plants online exactly as we do in the nursery. Therefore, the shipping cost is simply what it costs for us to get your order from the nursery to you. Many competitors may increase the plants’ prices in order to hide shipping costs… we do not do that. We want our customers to see exactly what the plant costs are, separate from what the shipping costs are. That way if you decided to come visit the nursery to pick up your plants instead, you would know how much you save in shipping.
Weather Watching:  We now ship all year round! However, we do watch for extreme weather. If there is extremely cold or hot weather expected around your shipment date and on your path of shipment, we will contact you and notify you that we plan to hold the shipment for the next possible shipping date with better conditions. If you ask us to still ship it, through the conditions, we will not be responsible for any damage caused to the plant & UPS will not refund any claims. We love our plants, and do not want to see them die, so we would rather wait until it’s the right time to ship it, than risk losing a plant in transit.
Growing Calendar
- Planting
- Pruning
- Harvest