Powell Gammill

John Preece is in charge of the Davis NCGR. You made a good friend today, and BTW John Preece knows a lot about a lot of things. I listened to a talk of his a couple of months ago on grafting failures and learned a couple of things I did not know. I was looking at the collection and realized that Kara Gul is really the darkest fruit they have (purple), not black so Victor Vasquez's fruit is really something.

I am glad. The FPA is fairly new. If they allow you to join it can help in getting accession to the NCGR's cuttings.

While looking for some cuttings of some of the obscure ones I ran across this University of Florida site that has been pretty active the past 5 years trying to develop pomegranates as a commercial crop. Very interesting reading on this and associated links:

http://www.crec.ifas.ufl.edu/extension/pomegranates/propagation.shtml

If you look at the taste test results remember they are a slice in time; some are ripe others not yet or not quite sure plus fruit harvested that year. Different years can produce different outcomes and young fruit can produce better tasting over the years or vice versa. Plus different people have different tastes and tastes change as we age. Still some exciting cultivar results. None I am afraid are black however.

shane jennings wrote:I am wondering if anybody has a black pomegranate? I looked up and found the variety called "Nana pomegranate", but it is considered an ornamental pomegranate. I would like to see if someone knows of a black pomegranate that taste great. ...

Do not have cuttings yet, but "Ink" is very tasty (hard seed), perhaps the best tasting pom I've ever tried. "Purple Heart" is supposed to be as well but I have not tried one. More purple on the inside than out I suspect. DPUN's are ref numbers for the USDA ARS Davis, National Clonal Germplasm Repository, Wolfskil repository from which you can obtain cuttings if in the USA for free, but you need a UPS or FedEx account (easy to obtain). The annual deadline however is either about to expire or just past. Poms need appropriate weather to color up, flavor up.
From "The Incredible Pomegranate" by Richard Ashton (2006):

Asmar (black) – Dark purple almost black fruit. White hard
seeds. [Israel]

Romman Chouall – Medium dark almost black fruit. Sweet-tart
flavor also grown in IRAQ. [Arabian Peninsula]

Aswar (black) [Arabian Peninsula] no info

Kandahar Large Black – Dark purple (looks black) extra large
fruit with sweet-tart flavor. Also these make very large plants. [Afghanistan]

DPUN 154 Chernaya Roza – Name means ‘black rose.’ Fruit small, tart with normal seed. The skin is very dark. Very high in Vitamin C. This would be a good variety for hybrid efforts.

DPUN 154 Chernaya Roza – Very tart. High seed volume.
Hard seed. Very tart. Sweet/Sour. 5/10 too sour. I like. A little
seedy. A little tart.
First place –1 Honorable mention – 2 = 5
This is one that we got because the name was evocative. It means “Black Rose”. We had no taste data. Fruit was small but very dark. Even the spongy tissue inside was purple. Flavor was okay. But seeds were harder than Wonderful.
However they were a crunchy hard as opposed to woody/fiberous hardness in some varieties. Extra high vitamin C content, but I won’t grow it. [Silverstein eval]

DPUN 155 Kara Gul – Purple nearly Black. Kara means black.

DPUN 167 Ink – A very dark purple nearly black fruit.

DPUN 056 Purple Heart – Good sweet-tart taste. Normal seed. [Marketed by DWN as "Sharp Velvet"]

PI 599119 Purple Heart – Very good taste. Hard seed though. [Silverstein eval]