Custard Apple (Annona squamosa L.)

Abstract

Custard apple (Annona squamosa L.) is a delicious and important minor fruit crop which is cultivated in tropical and subtropical climate. It comes under family Annonaceae and native of the West Indies, but it was cultivated since early times throughout Central America to Southern Mexico.

Custard apple is an important dry land fruit of India. It is popular by virtue of its spontaneous spread in forests, wastelands, rocky slopes, and other uncultivated places. Its plants come up unattended in parts of Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, and Tamil Nadu as a scrub or hedge plant. Bullock’s heart is more commonly found in south India than in north India. Cherimoya is mostly restricted to Assam and hills of south India. Atemoya and soursop are cultivated in some gardens as miscellaneous fruits. Atemoya, cherimoya, and ilama also provided excellent opportunities for a large-scale exploitation in India. Softwood grafting in the month of March gives best results in propagation of custard apple. Identification of superior varieties like Balanagar and hybrids like Arka Sahan and APK-Ca-1 has resulted in regular plantation on large scale. An eight-year-old plantation yielded 22–25 q fruits/ha under semiarid rain-fed condition.