Tropical and Subtropical Fruits - Horticulture: Plants for People and Places - page 124

from the durian and the banana. Different dips can also be prepared from tropical
and subtropical fruits, the most known being guacamole made from the avocado.
Guava paste is generally consumed as part of the daily diet in many Latin-American
countries as well as in the Canary Islands (Spain).
Beside the fruits, other plant parts such the stem, leaves, flowers, roots, seeds and
even pollen have been described as useful for humans in different texts (Popenoe 1976 ;
Chandler 1958 ; Singh 1960 ; Purseglove 1968 ; Ochse et al. 1972 ; Nagy and Shaw 1980 ;
Coronel 1986 ; Morton 1987 ), but the potential of leaves or even flower extracts as
biological products for use against pests and diseases is an open field of research. The
leaves of banana and breadfruit, dried fruit and the seeds of dates and mango have also
been found useful for animal feeding. The wood of different tropical and subtropical
tree fruits, such as breadfruit, guava, longan ( Dimocarpous longan Lourr .) , mango and
mangosteen, has regularly been used mainly for interior partitioning or for furniture.
The potential of tropical fruits does not only rely on human consumption, but such
plants have also been used in agroforestry and urban horticulture. Many tropical fruit
trees are capable of improving air quality as well as contributing to ecological stabil-
ity. They are easy to manage in gardens or in industrial or community building sites
and are adequate for planting along country roads and may constitute new lines of
research particularly when searching for cultivars which could be orientated towards
wood (or flower) production. Lastly, some fruits can constitute an important part of
the cultural and religious life of different countries with the mango in India and in
many African countries being the most outstanding example (Galán Saúco 2009 ).
Botanical and Horticultural Aspects
Although most tropical and subtropical fruits are woody plants, they also include
herbaceous crops, like the banana, or vine crops, like the passion fruit ( Passiflora
edulis Sims). Different botanical types of fruits can be found ranging from single
fruits such as berries (avocado), drupes (mango), capsules (durian), nutlets (litchi
or longan), to compound fruits such as the typical syncarpium of the pineapple, or
even a bunch of individual berries as in the banana. To differentiate such fruit crops
from perennial vegetables eaten as a fruit it is necessary to keep in mind that in a
horticultural sense a fruit is something eaten fresh, the exception being the plan-
tains and the bread fruit which need to be cooked, and many nuts which need to be
roasted or candied before consumption.
Tropical and subtropical fruits can be found in most botanical families of the
plant kingdom. Martin et al. ( 1987 ) lists more than 1,000 tropical and subtropical
fruits, all within 137 families. The better-known tropical and subtropical fruits are
listed in Table 5.1 .
When classifying tropical fruit crops, Verheij ( 1986 ) has grouped them into 2
main categories based on their branching habit and growth type:
A) Single-stemmed (monoaxial) species in which:
1) Growth and floral development are concurrent (e.g. Papaya, Coconut).