We live on an old cacao plantation, so pretty much if I'm home then I'm within 100 feet of cacao trees. See the pods from almost every room of the house and the squirrels that eat them. And the boas that eat the squirrels.

For the lat several days I have lived among the cacao tress along with the Monos in Ecuadorian Amazon.

grow them all the time here - keep it in a bright (indirect sunlight seems to work the best), very warm (85+ F), very humid place. Unfortunately, where I live, there's winter, and the only place in the house that meets those requirements is the bathroom usually. Water every 2-3 days (watering frequency/amount is the trickiest part for me, as it's very easy to overwater). In the summers, the trees thrive outside, but watch the night time drops in temperature. Japanese beetles also see cocoa as a special treat.

If you manage to keep it alive for a few years, you can hand pollinate. The largest one i've managed to eek out has been about 6' tall (and i've got a very, very black thumb..)

Growing a Cocoa tree indoor seems quite a cool thing to do, does any one have any link/direction on "how to grow a cocoa tree at home"? ... Thanks

NIno

Davy:

If you can grow cacao in New York City, you can grow it in Belgium. Indoors, under a daylight grow lamp (12 hours/day, regular cycles). You will probably want to start out on top of a heating mat, too. This will keep the tree warm and if you put a tray on top of the mat and put water in the tray the warmthwill help keep the moisture level up, too.

One reason you won't get pods is no pollinating insects, not just climate. I have seen pods on the trees at the NY Botanical gardens - never more than one or two. But they keep the ground under the tree completely clean of leaf litter and don't like many kinds of insect in the greenhouses, so no pollinators.

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@DiscoverChoc

Where do you live?

I know you'll need a good climate for producing the pods, but the tree on its own, any chanse it will grow in Belgium? :)

Great idea. I will try that.

I've got a couple potted cacao trees on my kitchen table. I guess I could move them into my bedroom, but I don't think that's what you're going for.

I like that

how about 1m from a cocoa tree 8-)

I was just thinking about life in the campo. Just wondering how many of us have slept within a 100m from a cacao tree? I am getting pretty close to 1000 days. How about you?

updated by @thomas-forbes: 04/10/15 18:47:27