[Arid_gardener] Pomegranates from seed

[Marcia Lincoln]

Dick,

Just so you know, pomegranates will sprout from seed, although if you
deliberately tried, probably they wouldn't! Years ago I had some strange
"weeds" sprouting in my outdoor parrot cage, which has a dirt floor. I
puzzled over them for quite some time until I figured out they were
pomegranates from dropped seeds that I fed to my bird. They grew a few feet
tall until I cut them out for fear the roots would destroy the 1/2" mesh
wire underneath that kept wild rodents from digging up and getting into the
cage, plus the bird liked to tear the plants apart anyway.

Marcia (Tucson)

-----Original Message-----
From: arid_gardener-bounces at CALS.arizona.edu
[mailto:arid_gardener-bounces at CALS.arizona.edu] On Behalf Of
arid_gardener-request at CALS.arizona.edu
Sent: Friday, May 02, 2008 12:00 PM
To: arid_gardener at CALS.arizona.edu
Subject: Arid_gardener Digest, Vol 52, Issue 2


Pomegranites are easily and readily sprouted from cuttungs that always run 
true. Don't waste your time with seeds but I have never heard of them 
sprouting anyway. In the Desert Museum in Tuscon is a Golden variety of 
Pomegranate from which I collected a cutting 20 years ago. It grew but 
somewhere along the way I lost track of it. That Golden variety is, to the 
best of my knowledge, a novelty. I have a vigorous Wonderful in a 20 gallon 
pot but the species does well in this climate. In fact, I believe it is a 
desert or low water use plant and evergreen but, if in the ground, benefits 
from deep watering at the drip line no oftener than every two weeks after it

is established but almost never in the cool months when the highs are rarely

over 75F. You can train this plant, that wants to be a bush, to a small 
single trunk tree if you really work at it,  or a multi-stem bush. My 
wonderful is multi-stem, eight feet tall.

Dick Gross, Master Gardener Volunteer/Sec/Ed Arizona Rare Fruit Growers, 
Inc.
U of A Maricopa County Cooperative Extension