Fall Foraging

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I don't know if it is a result of the drought, or climate change, but the pineapple guavas that grow near my workplace are ripening two months earlier than usual. 

I adore these fruit. They grow on silvery evergreen bushes (small trees, really) that produce lovely edible flowers in the winter. Apparently these fruit (which have a slightly gritty pear-like texture, and taste like a kiwi that's been misted with kerosene) aren't true guavas, but members of the myrtle family.  The fruit are smaller than a hen's egg. I have a tiny pineapple guava, growing in my garden. It is a painfully slow grower, but some day I hope to harvest my own crop. Until then, I scrounge them off the sidewalks.

These fruit fall to the ground when they're ripe, and once they do, only the local squirrels and I are willing to risk eating them. (I wash them very thoroughly.) 

I work around the corner from the family housing for UC Berkeley's graduate students, and last year I didn't get a single fruit. The grad students' grannies harvested the entire crop in one night. 

I'm sure the squirrels weren't pleased.