The ‘rare’ heart-shaped feijoa listed for sale by Northlander Anna Wainwright.
An uncommon heart-shaped feijoa found in a Whangārei couple’s backyard has attracted a $100 offer after a Northland woman listed it for sale.
Anna Wainwright, 25, was collecting feijoas off the ground at her grandparents’ place when she looked up and saw something that made her go: “What the heck.”
In front of her, still hanging on the tree, was a heart-shaped feijoa.
“I’d never seen one like that before,” Wainwright said.
The self-confessed feijoa fan decided to save the “weird” fruit from scavengers by placing a mesh bag underneath to catch it when it fell. After which, she took it home and thought why not chuck it on Facebook Marketplace for a bit of a laugh.
“Something like a virus, a bit of damage, or even cold stress - something has happened to the cellular development so two flowers have developed where there should’ve been one.”
Both flowers then produce fruit.
“In the feijoa, that tufty bit at the end is the remnants of where the flower would’ve been. The fruit develops in the ovaries below the flower.”
Lord hadn’t seen a dual feijoa before - mostly because she is Dunedin-based where feijoas don’t thrive as much as in the North.
While a potential sale was pending, Wainwright was waiting for another interesting feijoa to fall from the same tree.