Up to and including 1947 Chinese-American merchants in our cities took most of the American fresh fruit production of Lychees. Americans are just as fond of the fruit as are the Chinese and are eager customers.

In 1949 the fresh fruit sold wholesale as high as $1.25 per pound in small cartons, F.O.B. production points. The excellence of the fruit and consequent great and increasing demand for it, the limited areas in the world as well as locations in which the Lychee will fruit, plus the necessarily slow method of propagating the trees should continue to keep the prices high.

The fresh ripe Lychees hold on the tree for ten days to two weeks. Heretofore they had to be marketed within g few days after picking (unless kept under refrigeration) to retain the bright red color. Even under refrigeration it would retain the bright color only about three weeks. Pliofilm has added to the time Lychees can be kept fresh while retaining the red color under refrigeration, thus extending the .marketing season of the fresh fruit. If properly managed, the demand for the fresh fruit at profitable prices, will for many years be greater than can be supplied.


The Ridge district of Florida is a strip of fairly high rolling land running north and south through central Florida. It is in the heart of the citrus belt. The section from about Haines City to Lake Placid is considered to be excellent for commercial Lychee planting. It is the home of a number of fruiting Lychee trees that have gone through the occasional freezes with little or no harm, even though they have had no special care. It is the home of two of the finest Lychee trees in Florida. Each has a spread of more than forty feet and each usually produces up to three hundred pounds or more of fresh Lychees of superior quality. One of these trees, less than 25 years old, and still growing rapidly has produced 400 pounds. That section is fairly free from heavy freezes and yet has sufficient cold weather to provide a dormant period for the Lychee. Most of it has sufficient depth of soil to afford secure root growth. There are also good Lychee locations in Pinellas, Hillsboro, Manatee, Sarasota, Charlotte, Lee and Collier counties on the west coast and from Titusville to Homestead on the east coast. The northern limits of the Lychee in Florida have not been definitely established. This will have to be determined by experience. At present it is considered to be about a line through Leesburg and Sanford. Much of the land on the lower east coast is apparently not as well adapted to the purpose as the ridge and west