HARRIET HOWARD HEITHAUS

The fruit has a dimple skin that must be peeled off.

HARRIET HOWARD HEITHAUS

The lychee tree in fruit has a fairy tale quality to it, with its hot pink cherrylike fruit.

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Lychees are a wonderfully perfumed, sweet, slippery fruit that can’t be taken for granted; when the trees decide to take a year or so off fruiting there’s not much you can do about it.

But when lychee trees decide to fruit, they’re a multisensory treat; they are the fragrance of Chanel, the tantalizing drape of slot-machine cherries and a flavor that is anywhere from wickedly sweet to mild, depending on whether your tree is an Emperor or a Brewster or one of the other 18 varieties that grow here. Lychees are much happier on this coast than on Florida’s east coast because it’s easier to find well-drained sites in the sandy soil here.

The trees will grow 20 feet to 40 feet and have a bushy canopy with graceful, point-tip leaves reminiscent of those on a mango tree. Like mangoes, they’re not wild about fertilizer and too much water, so it’s best to plant them at a good distance from sprinkler heads and avoid fertilizing the lawn in their root area, which extends out at least five to 10 feet from the canopy. They don’t take shade well, requiring a full day’s sun to set fruit.

If you want to consider health benefits, lychees are a great source of potassium. If you’d rather consider something else, they make a wonderfully exotic martini. There’s no end to the virtues; lychee trees even flower in white lilac-style panicles in the spring.

Here is information on them from both the University of Florida and Purdue University School of Agriculture:

• Common name: Lychee

• Botanical name: Litchi chinensis Sonn.

• Family: Sapindaceae

• Origin: Southern China and southeastern Asia

• Growing zones: Subtropical to tropical

• Height: 20 to 40 feet with a canopy in similar radius

• Physical: Rounded drooping canopy, narrow, pointed oval leaves; white panicle flowers in spring and red or green to purple bumpy skinned fruits in late June

• Growth rate: Slow to medium

• Uses: Specimen tree in sunny spots away from power lines; reliability as a fruit tree is random

• Type: Evergreen

• Where to buy: Tree House Nursery, Pine Island, (941) 283-3688; Lychee Tree Nursery, Stuart, (772) 283-4054, visit lycheetreenursery.com/lychee.htm

• For more information: edis.ifas.ufl.edu/MG051