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Monday, March 9, 2009

Everything You Need to Know About a Pomegranate

By Edgar Williamson

In the some of the southern states such as Florida, California and Arizona, you will find pomegranate bushes cultivated. They originated in areas such as Iran and the Himalayas. They were common to areas in Malaysia, East Indies, Pakistan, Turkey and Africa. This bush with its sweet, tasty fruit grows to between 16 and 26 feet high. This fruit bush is very popular in the Mediterranean area.

This fruit grows in climates that have cooler winters and very hot summers like Florida, California and Arizona. In fact the fruit of the Pomegranate seems to thrive if the winter has been a cold one in the native area it is acclimated to.

The original pomegranate bushes had glossy, green long leaves and bright red fruit and flowers. The octagonal shaped fruit comes in a variety of sizes, depending on where it is grown and how well the crop did. The inside of the fruit is usually white with red seeds although they can at times be purple.

Just like and garden fruit or vegetable, this plant can be plagued by insects and pests. Termites can actually infest the trunk and kill the tree from below. Then you have the pomegranate butterfly, given its name because it mainly thrives on pomegranate trees, whose cater pillars hatch and infest the fruit before you know what has happened. There are many other pests that are attracted to the pomegranate. Thrips, whitflies, and scale insects are included in this group. If you cover your plants, especially the fruit part, you can avoid large infestations of these insects.

Pomegranate are a very healthy fruit. They contain an abundance of vitamins, probably more than any other fruit or vegetable. You will find acceptable amounts of zinc, phosphorus, niacin, potassium , and Vitamin C, just to name a few in this fruit.

When you open a pomegranate, what you will see inside is a bunch of seeds covered with what looks like a dark red or purple membrane. This membrane is the fruit. You can eat the seeds, but it is the fruit around them that contains all the flavor. The seeds are also ground and used for spicing dishes in some countries. Some countries such as Iraq make soups containing the whole seed, fruit and juice of the Pomegranate.

Since the pomegranate became a cultivated crop, many variations, colors and types have been established. Some of them even have green fruit inside, like the Green Globe. Others are just named for the flavor they have like the Early Wonderful, Granada, Sweet and Wonderful. - 17273

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