Growing Tropical Fruits in Your Backyard Greenhouse

Homeowners can grow more than just vegetables and flowers in greenhouses. These days, people have successfully created their home orchards in these controlled environments. Many exotic fruit trees can be challenging to grow outdoors in certain climates but will thrive in a greenhouse. They often make for a good investment, especially if you live in a region that relies heavily on expensive imports to bring such fruit to the local market. Here are some great options to consider.

Best Tropical Fruit Varieties for Greenhouses

Apricots and Peaches

These fruit trees do well in a warm and sheltered environment. Keeping them in greenhouses can help prevent them from suffering fungus problems. They do need plenty of water and fertile soils. Some varieties can even be kept in containers.

Lemons and Limes

Being citrus fruits, these are often considered tropical though they can also do well in milder climates. You can easily grow dwarf varieties in containers, allowing you to keep them outdoors during warmer months and bring them into the greenhouse for winter.

Pomegranates

Pomegranates thrive in hot and dry climates. This makes them ideally suited to greenhouse cultivations, and the seedlings can be kept in individual containers. After a couple of years, you can opt to transplant them outdoors.

Kiwis

Kiwis do well in sunny sheltered environments. They require regular watering and pruning to allow the fruits to absorb enough sunlight. Your best option is hard kiwi varieties that come from Western Europe. They are smaller and lack the fuzz on Australia and New Zealand varieties but have a similar delicious taste.

Avocadoes

Avocado trees can do well even as household plants but thrive in a heated greenhouse as the hot and humid conditions can be more consistently maintained. While you can grow a tree from a seed, opt for a seedling of a dwarf variety to ensure it bears fruit.

Pineapples

Pineapples are the easiest and most affordable tropical fruits to grow indoors. You can buy seedlings or cut the top off a bought pineapple and plant it. More of a plant than a tree, it can easily be transplanted from one container to a bigger one as it grows. It requires regular watering. Once you harvest the fruit, a younger plant that started growing alongside it will take over.

What You Need to Grow Fruit Trees in a Greenhouse

The size and height of your greenhouse will need to be customized to accommodate the trees you want to grow. Many fruit trees have dwarf varieties that can do well in such conditions and make it easier during harvesting and pruning. Alternatively, you can choose fruit varieties whose trees or bushes are naturally shorter.

The structure will also need to be equipped with air vents, an irrigation system, and the necessary heat system during winter. You may also want to figure out what method of pollination to use if needed and fertilization. Where possible, choose trees that can be kept in containers. This makes watering them more efficient and the ability to transfer them outdoors when the weather is suitable.