Carambola - Starfruit Frost limit ?

Farouk starts with ...
Hello All,

Anyone have any experience with growing a Carambola Starfruit tree in Sydney/Melbourne and surviving the winter outside ?

Do you know what's the lowest cold temp it can handle & survive through to spring in ?

Thank you

Pictures - Click to enlarge
Picture: 1

Fruitylicious1 says...
Yes, you can grow carambola in Melbourne in the open. They can take light frost especially the Kary variety. But getting them to fruit is extremely difficult in the open because they need a long warm growing season to set fruit. Even in Sydney if the autumn is cooler than usual the fruit wont ripen. It will just stay on the tree and eventually and sadly drop off. So if you are aiming for starfruit production in Melbourne in the open forget about it. If you are happy with just a non fruiting carambola specimen in Melb go for it . You will have more fruiting success in Sydney if all the conducive weather elements for carambola fruit set and ripening lines up like a warmer than usual autumn weather. Many have miserably tried and failed with carambola in the open in Melbourne. It is up to you if you want to buck the trend.
Happy Gardening :-)

Farouk says...
Hello Fruitylicious, thanks for all the details very experienced sounds like, I usually am pretty keen to find it out by giving it a go also. Unfortunately I have sort of run out of ground space to plant it at my parents place where my tiny little fruit forest is in. I may have to grow it in a large pot at my place.

The season is set for Carambola & other tropical fruits this year quite nice & warm, god knows what sort of weather is coming our way as I have just read on the weather report & can see it brewing up outside its been thinking about it, it looks like.

Thanks for your reply, keep us updated on your garden.

Maverick2003357 says...
Hello I have a starfruut plant that I have had roughly a year but having issues with keeping leaves on. I have attached a picture of some leaves to see if someone here could possibly help with fixing the problem. I live in southern Ontario Canada and it is grown inside. If someone could help that would be great

Farouk says...
Hi Maverick,

Hope someone gets back to you with some help, thanks for sharing the photos always good to see the plant we are talking about. My General guess would be that it needs more sun/heat & keep up on the watering. I think it must be winter or at least cold right now on your side of the world so that's normal for it to drop it's leaves if you are not in the tropics like the other people here on this page have described planting it outside in Aus temperate zones.

denise1 says...
Hi Maverick, There are many variables that it is hard to say. It may be lacking in sufficient light intensity or duration, heat or moisture. It could be that your air conditioning is too dry. If the leaf drop is from a rapid decline or shock it is important to cut the leaf stalks close to the stem immediately. What can happen if the bare leaf stalks remain is that it will draw moisture away from the buds and kill them. Your plant would then probably die.I have also noticed this with a relocated java plum and saved the tree by trimming promptly.. Your leaf drop may be just a normal growth cycle event but it doesnt hurt to do the leafstalk trim just in case. If your leafstalks are indeed dropping off by themselves then you have not got a rapid decline.