Guava fruit is primarily grown by propagating guava trees, most commonly through specific vegetative methods to ensure desired traits and quicker fruiting.
Methods for Growing Guava Trees
While it's possible to grow guava trees from seed, this method has limitations. Commercially, and for reliable fruit production, vegetative propagation is preferred.
- Seed Propagation: Guava trees may be propagated by seed. However, this method does not guarantee that the new tree will have the same characteristics as the parent tree (they do not come true from seed). Furthermore, fruit production may not begin for 3 to 8 years when grown from seed.
- Vegetative Propagation (Commercial Methods): For consistent quality and earlier fruiting, commercially, cultivars are vegetatively propagated using several techniques:
- Air Layering (Marcottage): This involves rooting a part of the stem while it is still attached to the parent plant.
- Stem Cuttings: Taking a section of stem and rooting it in a suitable medium.
- Grafting: Joining a part of a desirable guava variety (scion) onto the root system of another plant (rootstock).
- Budding: A type of grafting where a single bud from a desired variety is inserted onto the rootstock.
These vegetative methods ensure that the new tree is genetically identical to the parent plant, preserving desirable fruit qualities and often leading to fruit production much sooner than growing from seed.
