Acca sellowiana (O.Berg) Burret

Feijoa sellowiana (O.Berg) O.Berg

feijoa

South America: indigenous to the highlands of southern Brazil, eastern Paraguay, Uruguay, northern Argentina, and Colombia.

Widely cultivated in New Zealand as an ornamental tree and for its edible fruit. Many cultivars have been developed, including A. sellowiana ‘Apollo’, ‘Mammoth’, ‘Opal Star’, ‘Triumph’, ‘Unique’ and ‘Wiki Tu’.

Almost exclusively in cultivation; predominantly in the North Island but is cold tolerant so also reasonably common in the South Island of New Zealand.

• A much-branched shrub or small tree with grey to reddish-brown bark that peels off in flakes.
• Younger stems are slightly four-angled and hairy.
• Leaves opposite.
• Petals 4, reddish-pink to purple above.
• Fruit large, green and edible when mature.

Much branched small tree or shrub, growing (1–)2–4(–7) m tall.

Main stems or trunk rough-barked, grey to reddish-brown, ribbons absent, adventitious roots absent. Younger stems are greenish in colour, silvery hairy and slightly four-angled.

Leaves opposite, elliptic, 20–60(–106) mm long, 10–30(–46) mm wide, leathery, glossy green above, silvery below; leaf blade flat and surfaces not puckered; margins entire or slightly wavy, may be revolute; tips rounded; leaf stalks 3–12 mm long.

Flowers solitary or in clusters, terminal on branches, flower stalks present; petals 4, often reddish-pink to purple above, white below, margins curled upward, slightly fleshy; sepals 4, free, persistent; stamens red or purple, longer than petals. Main flowering period: spring to summer.

Fruit a fleshy berry, fruits free, obovate, (3–)4–5-locular, mature fruit variable in shape from round to elongated, 50–80 mm long, 30–70 mm wide, crowned by persistent sepals; skin waxy, dull blue-green or greyish green, texture varies from smooth to rough and pebbly; pale creamy edible flesh inside.

Pomaderris kumeraho, a New Zealand indigenous shrub that is present in shrubland from the wider Auckland region northwards, especially on clay soils, has similar foliage, but the flowers are pale yellow in a much-branched cluster.

Acca sellowiana is susceptible to myrtle rust (caused by Austropuccinia psidii).

Acca is a genus of three species, two in the southern Central Andes (Bolivia and Peru) and A. sellowiana which is from eastern temperate South America.

• Agroforestry Database
• Flora of New Zealand Online
• GBIF
• iNaturalist NZ