The Herbarium
Part IV · Fruit & vegetable
Herb. No. 234
Guava
Psidium guajava
Myrtaceae
A tropical myrtle fruit that smells like someone opened a perfume in a fruit stand — pink or white flesh, seedy, and a jelly classic.
Ripe fruit is food. Leaf tea is a traditional gut folklore on some plates — this one is the fruit. Seeds are crunchy, not a choke.
- Parts used
- Ripe fruit
- Traditional notes
- Kitchen fruit · Jelly and juice · Traditional tropical backyard fruit
- Grow · USDA 6b
- Tropical shrub-tree, USDA 9–11. A pot you can roll. Seed or a cutting. Fruits young for a tree. In work: Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct
- Harvest
- When it yields and the perfume is unmistakable. Green is astringent.
- Bag fruit against flies if you can.
- Two trees stagger a glut.
Safety
Known guava allergy (rare)
Lore
Arawak guayabo. Spanish took the word and the tree. Guava paste with cheese is a Latin pantry marriage. Hawaiian guava is often a wild roadside thicket more than an orchard. The perfume in a closed car is how you know the bag was ripe.
The Herbarium — a teaching catalog, not a clinic. Traditional use is history, not a prescription. USDA 6b dates are a week either way, not a promise. Do not eat, drink, or harvest a plant you cannot name.