Cherimoyas are erect trees, 3-10 m tall, often low-branched and somewhat shrubby or spreading. The briefly deciduous to semi-deciduous (just before spring flowering) leaves are ovate to ovate-lanceolate, sometimes obovate or elliptical, 12-20 cm x 8 cm, persistently brownish velvety-tomentose beneath. They are alternate, 2-ranked, with minutely hairy petioles, slightly hairy on the upper surface, velvety on the underside. Flowers are fragrant, extra-axillary, often opposite a leaf at the base of a branchlet, usually solitary but sometimes two or three grouped together on short nodding tomentose peduncles;outer three tepals oblong-linear, up to 3 cm long, greenish to pale yellow, marked with a purple spot at the base within;inner three tepals very small, reddish to purplish;androecium consisting of numerous free fleshy stamens, spirally arranged on the basal part of a conical receptacle;gynoecium comprising numerous free pistils on the upper part of the receptacle. Fruit is a syncarp or pseudocarp formed by the fusion of the carpels and the receptacle into a fleshy mass, variable in shape and appearance, from heart-shaped with surface bearing protuberances to spheroid or ovoid with the surface covered with 'U'-shaped areoles or rather smooth, 10-20 cm long and up to 10 cm in width, weighing on average 150-500 g, but extra large specimens of 2.7 kg or more have been reported;pulp white, edible, easily separable from the seeds. The skin may be smooth with fingerprint-like markings or covered with conical or rounded protuberances. The fruit is easily broken or cut open, exposing the snow-white, juicy flesh of pleasing aroma and delicious, subacid flavour. It contains numerous hard, brown or black, bean-like, glossy seeds, 1.25-2 cm long. The fruit is composed of an exocarp (fruit skin), occupying between 15 and 25% on a weight basis, an edible mesocarp (pulp and thalamus), varying between 65 and 80%, and seeds, ranging from 3 to 10%. Seeds usually obovate, obliquely truncate, somewhat compressed, with a thin, membranous, brown, wrinkled testa.
Related invasive species
- Annona cherimola
Related Farm Practice
- Thinning
- Cuttings
- Groups
- Data collection
A. cherimola is a tree of American origin that has been cultivated in tropical and temperate regions around the world for its edible fruit. It is listed as a “cultivation escape, environmental weed, naturalised, weed” in the Global Compendium of Weeds (Randall, 2012) and is known to be invasive in places both within and beyond its native range including Easter Island, the Galapagos, Hawaii, and New Zealand (PIER, 2014). A risk assessment gave the species a low invasive risk score of -4, but excluded several invasive traits in this score such as its known status as a garden/agricultural/environmental weed and naturalization beyond its native range (PIER, 2014). The species reproduces by seeds but can be propagated by grafting (Janick and Paull, 2008).