Tzimbalo Melon Pear

This is a very robust, attractive, and easy to grow plant. The fruit are extremely plentiful and pretty--looking like little watermelons. I found the flavor of the unripe fruit sort of pleasant--a little bitter, cucumber, with faint tropical undertones. I suspect that I would like the ripe fruit--but never got to taste them. I tried to ripen them inside--but it didn't work--and when the weather cooled beyond what tomatoes would happily tolerate it started to die off without the fruit ripening. Since it was a big plant I took it out to plant fall crops. I think that it would likely prosper in zone 7 or 8.

These spent two years in a pot, flowering ( hot dry climate), finally produced three fruits and died. Fruits are mediocre, nothing special. Nice curiosity, but really not worth the trouble for real fruit production...

I grew a couple of these in 2 gallon pots in full sun. They did very well and produced a substantial crop. Fruit did not drop: it was easy to allow the fruit to fully ripen until they were quite sweet. Fruit was also very rot resistant on the vine: I was able to pick firm, unblemished fruit even after the vines had died. My problem was the aftertaste, which was worse than artificial sweeteners. I ate a total of about 4 fruit. Various visitors liked the fruit: maybe most people aren't as picy about sweetener aftertastes as I am. That's the reason I won't grow it again.

tried this to add another fruit to our menagerie. this was the worst fruit I have ever eaten. I tried it in all stages and thought it was awful. The plant gets quite large, easy to germinate and grow in zone 7.

Not much can take direct Texas summer sun... but this plant can. I think it's an attractove plant. And it got hail and abhurricane, pruning, irregular watering schedules, nothing slows it down. If i didnt know what to grow and needed a sunny. 3x3 area covered, id happily grow this again. It does get pests, but ... i dont consider the fruit edible, so i dont really fight them much. Oh- you need to pick how big youll allow the tzimbalo to gr8w, them mercilessly cut it when it steps outside. This thing grows and grows, it's amazing ? Oh, yeah, and about the fruits... That fruit is, uh. Not edible. Like, i tried it green and white, white, and white and green/purple. Im pretty sure it's poison at all color stages. It's beautiful anyway. In a famine maybe id eat it. I dunno, i think id starve instead. Im pretty sure im gonna have 50,000 of these all over my yard next year from the fruits. But i would just grow it for the plant.