English 
Portuguese 
I really love this fruit. They are easy and delicious to eat and resist attacks by pests. I first saw it in England when my father who liked to try new fruit, showed it to me. It was hard and unripe then. I was absorbed in my own things and completely disinterested. I regret that now. I could have used the internet to find out more and helped him learn about it.
I have several trees and have planted half a dozen more I have grown from seed. If it goes well they should bear fruit in about 4 years, of the Roxo Briliante variety. I think the Fufu variety is a hardier variety. This year all the Fufu persimmon trees fruited even thought it was hot and dry. True, the fruit are smaller and thicker skinned. I have only 1 Roxo Brilliante and it did not produce anything.
Picked all my remaining persimmon last week. They are the only fresh fruit of my own I have until spring. They suffer from a quite a bird of damage by birds, who just peck them to sort of reserve them.
Another thing that remininded me about my father was propping up a blown down cyprus tree. He saved a guava tree this way back in Kenya. He used to take upon himself to look able the communal trees and distribute the fruit to the neighbours. He was a socialist at heart. I should have caught on much earlier by the Paul Robson âCanoe Songâ that he used to sing. đ .
I am making a small cutting board from a decent sized olive trunk.
I have put a bit of polythene sheeting around the mango tree to help protect it from frosts. It as yet has to drop below 6ÂșC.
I have a decent amount of tangerines growing and the nespira (louquats) have had a heavy blossom which promises a good amount of fruit.
The LE 300 wind turbine helps keep the lights on during winter. I really need a small solar P.V array that tracks on the azimuth. During winter my fixed array on the roof becomes ineffective after about three oâclock in winter.
Thatâs about all for now. Managed to take Bonji a couple of times to the Ria Formosa this month on the electric bicycle thing.
I have some self seeded olives whose produce help. My young olive trees that were grown from cuttings are still not producing anything of note. But they are growing well so I am hopeful :).
These produced figs and good ones too! - for the first time this year. So I will plant some more. I have had them in pots and was waiting. Not sure what variety they are.
It is green here but cold. On some days I keep the home fire burning all day. No quite sub zero but we have had morning frosts and it's predicted to get colder next week. I often wonder how people back in the UK are getting on. My gut feeling is that many struggle to keep warm. I donât think electrical heating is an affordable option anymore in Portugal. Trying not to be political here, but it appears to me that some governments are committed to imposing higher energy and food prices on the people so that they can keep the war going in Ukraine.
