Wacissa

Wacissa is a Morus alba by Morus rubra hybrid found by Just Fruits and Exotics on a roughly seventy-year-old tree in Wacissa, Florida, in the Big Bend region east of Tallahassee. That kind of provenance is worth something in a mulberry: a tree that has cropped for seven decades in North Florida heat, humidity and sand has already passed the only trial that matters. It is an extremely heavy producer of large, deep purple, exceptionally soft and juicy fruit with a pronounced blackberry character. Along with Silk Hope and Shangri-La it is one of the Southern-selected hybrids that give Gulf Coast growers a real alternative to the Midwestern cultivars, and it is tolerant of both poor droughty soil and periodic waterlogging, which is a useful combination on Florida flatwoods sites.