According to the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the existence of this thornless durian was first recorded in 2007. The gundul durian, as it is called in Indonesia, was discovered growing alongside its brothers. I have its thorns, on a tree belonging to a resident in Lombok. The thornless durian fruit dangling from the tree worried the owners, who feared it was poisonous and left it alone.
However, come the next durian season, the thornless fruit continues to grow. Curious, the garden owner’s son cut open the durian to taste it and discovered that it tasted like any other durian.
Davao City in the Philippines is also a producer of thornless durian. Even the Philippine tourism website proudly proclaims: “The Philippines has the only truly thornless durian, one you won’t find anywhere else!” A durian blog called Year of the Durian describes it as similar to kampung durian with a sweet, sugary taste. However, it seems no one really wants a thornless durian.
Based on a June 2019 article by a local news portal, the Department of Agriculture – Davao actually discourages farmers from large-scale planting of the thornless durian variety because there is simply no market for it – domestic or international.
Despite the failure of thornless durian to launch in Davao, agricultural experts in Indonesia are still working to grow this durian. SCMP reported that local agriculture officials took cuttings from thornless durian trees in Lombok in the hope that they could produce more special fruits.
As it turned out, it took up to 12 years and many grafting efforts to achieve the desired results. Out of 50 trees, one finally bore a thornless durian fruit. Furthermore, the skin of this durian species is a bit thinner than that of regular durians and they have a sweeter taste. This allows the eater to easily peel off the shell without being pricked by thorns like other durian species.
According to the head of the research team, Mr. Maisin, they had to select 23,000 seeds and only 2% of the seeds germinated and grew well. They called this tree Gundul durian.