All of my Tsao and many of my Honey Jars split this year. When they split the ants then show up. Bass, I think yours come in later in your climate and thats good because it is drier by now. Usually I get maybe 10% splitting but this was a bad year; I also got low pollination due to the cold weather during the pollination period. That can be a big problem in some climates. So, while they are almost no maintenance they do have a few issues.

I would agree that apple/date is a good estimate of the flavor. I find Honey Jar by far the best of mine, but I still have several that have not fruited yet. The Tsao is bigger but less sweet and more dry than Honey Jar.

Scott

I did have a very few that split, but they were still sweet and edible.
Honey jar is diffinitely a winner along with sugar cane. Abbeville was the most productive, I mean it was so productive that the branches were about to break, I hate to use support. Abbeville lacks the sweetness the others have.
Here's the branch with the Abbeville variety:
{{gwi:124872}}

Bass

I'm up to three varieties, none of which are yet bearing. I ordered So to replace Honey Jar that I thought had died, but when I dug it up, the roots still looked fine. I planted it and it sprouted out above the graft!

I'll protect honey jar this winter, but So and Shangxi Li are both on their own (Shanxi Li did fine last winter with no protection)

~Chills (in SE Michigan, closer to the water than Denninmi)

Well, I'm thinking that I need to try again, and just really protect them for a few years. It sounds like, once they get past their infancy, they become a lot more tolerant of winter conditions.

I want these. Do you think it would help if I planted a couple of them right up against the house in a sunny and sheltered corner? It's a big enough space that size wouldn't be a real problem, and I assume they could always be pruned to size if necessary.

Dennis
SE Michigan

Dennis,
I'm not sure how they'll grow if they're right against a wall. I think they'll do fine, make sure it's a south facing wall where they'll get enough sun. Some varieties will grow upright, some are wide and zigzag.
Michael mckonky of edible landscaping told me that he knew of 2 Jujube trees near Montreal canada which I believe it's zone 4 there, but I'm not sure if they produce any fruit there.

Good luck.

Hi,
Any chance of a trade? Would you consider trading Li cuttings for highbush cranberry cuttings? It's a spectacular bush, about ten feet tall, reddish-green tri-lobed leaves, large whorls of white flowers that become clusters of white berries that turn yellow and finally red. Very hardy. And the berries make good sauce and jam.

If interested, I could send seed now or cuttings in the spring. Please let me know by email to BC08@localnet.com (that's a zero as the third alphanum not O).

Thanks - Bill

bill,
you'll need to graft the Jujube cuttings. You can't just root them. Do you have any Jujube trees?

Bass

Hello everyone, Im new at this site.
twenty years ago my dad planted a jujube tree in the back yard,I don't know what variety I have but the fruit are round, sweet and about 3/4". Its a wonderfull tree.
Two years ago I tried airlayering a few branches and it worked,they have fruit now and are doing fine in pots.
This spring I tried seven branches and they all rooted, So now I'm in the process of cutting off airlayered branches and putting them into pots. Has any one else tried airlayering? Also I have suckers I have dug up from four, five and six years ago in pots and they all produce a lot of round sweet fruit about 1" dia when watered well.these trees are now six, seven and eight feet tall.
these trees are fun to grow and the kids and I love the fruit. I also tried airlayering fig wich took about fourty days, (very fast) and asian pear wich did not root.
If anyone would like to talk about any of this please contact me at rgwwhw@sbcglobal.net

Thanks

I want to plant the following jujube in Tampa FL: Li, Lang, Sherwood, Sugarcane, Honeyjar, and Ga866. Since it warm in Tampa, I wonder if they produce any fruits.

For you experts out there,
I have few jujube trees at my backyard. The 3 yrs old Li turns out to be very productive (see photo). However, the fruit appear to be very dried (not juicy at all). Is this normal for Li variety? If it is, them I may consider get rid of it and replace with other varieties (more juicy, I hope).

Thanks in advance for your comments,

JIMMY

I have never heard the Li described as juicy, but it is supposed to taste good fresh, if picked before it begins to wrinkle.

Sugarcane and Honey Jar are smaller fruits but crunchier and more juice then Li.

Tony

Lee, the Tigertooth (ie Silverthorn?) is supposed to do well in warm humid climates, you might consider giving that one a try.

Jimmy, my young jujube trees need extra water or they seem dry to me. Do your give them any? Also, my Li's taste better when they're 75% brown, & mine are still green here.

Get another fruit if you want juicy. I watered a lot last year. Honey Jar and Sugar Cane were still very dry compared to almost any other fruit. No juice at all. You'd need a hydraulic press to get any juice for a brix reading.

Sorry, i should have said "crunchy" instead of "juicy"!!. I apologize for the mistake. Jimmy

Here is my Li jujube. The photo taken on Aug 26, 2013. I am not impressed with the taste (no sweet). Should I wait a little while, or it is as good as it is going to be? I am thinking of getting rid of it an replace with Sugarcane

They're not ripe yet. Wait until half brown. My Li's are just starting to turn now. I'm actually having better luck with sugarcane than li, li hasn't been as productive; but wait a bit on the li's.

Dear bhawkins, here is a photo of my Li as of 8/31/2013. As you see, I have waited until it turned brown as you suggested. It appears to be a little sweet, but now the inside texture becomes soft/dry/ foamy (no crunchy) at all. Is this typical for Li's? I have a small sugarcane three in a pot, and fortunately, it produces several fruits this year, and I have to say that the fruit quality is a lot better than my Li's.

Perhaps, My Li tree is still lack of water, despite I water almost daily?

Yes they appear ripe now. My Li's seem to get a little better each year, so yours would probably taste better next year. But I agree, the sugar canes always seem to taste better than my Li's. If I had to choose 1 jujube amongst the 12 or so I grow, sugar cane or winter delight would be my choice--considering taste, size, and productivity.

Jimmy:

You are expecting too much from jujube. Sugar Cane is as sweet as anything I grow. But they have little flavor and poor texture.

Actually I've had a few jujube that were OK, even fair to good. Maybe you are watering too much. Most fruit is better with less water and jujube are very drought tolerant. More mature trees watered less, they don't need it, will probably produce the best fruit.

This post was edited by fruitnut on Sat, Aug 31, 13 at 12:42

Dear fruitnut, the reason I have been so picky about which jujube trees to keep is because I have very limited area on my backyard to plant them. I have the Li tree in ground 3 yrs ago (big mistake !), and have one sugarcane and one honey jar still in a pot because I did not have room to put them all in ground. Now if the Li's does not live up to the expectation, I would want to replace by the one that does -- due to space limitation.

Jimmy

Jimmy:

Jujube are easy to graft. You can graft the Sugar Cane onto the Li next spring. Or just rip out the Li and plant Sugar Cane. Honey Jar is too small. Mine froze out and I won't miss it.

But I I were you I'd graft all onto one tree and then prune out what you don't like. The trees are very malleable via pruning and grafting.

Dear fruitnut, grafting is an excellent idea, and I would like to consider that. However, I am quite a newbie in term of gardening. Could you point me to a source where I can obtain information regarding tree grafting? I heard that
a success rate is quite low.

Thanks in advance,

Jimmy

Jimmy:

I used cleft grafts with scion and rootstock the same size, half inch or less. Split the rootstock branch open and cut the scion to fit as well as possible. Also used whip and tongue and simple splice graft which is W&T without the tongue. The unions were wrapped tightly with rubber budding strips. Then cover the union and all the scion with parafilm. Collect the scion wood in March or April before growth begins and store in fridge. Graft 4-6 weeks later after the tree starts growing.

My grafts grew 4ft this year despite freezes and severe hail.

There are plenty of grafting tutorials on U Tube.

This post was edited by fruitnut on Sun, Sep 1, 13 at 15:00

Will do.
Excellent advise !

Thank you very much.

Jimmy

Has anyone tried coco jujube? :-) it sounds great but I can not find any info other than burnt ridge nursery and one other site of which I cannot remember. They both say nearly the same thing which isn't much? Tastes like coconut! :-)

Also... Are like and sugar cane good for Washington state zone 6?
William

This winter, I purchased one Coco and one Black sea from onegreenworld.com.
They describe Coco as follows:
"We brought this unique variety from the Nikita Botanic Garden in Yalta, Ukraine. It is prized for its abundant crops of golden brown fruit with a unique, coconut-like flavor."
When I asked they said that Coco and Black Sea are two different varieties with different flavors.

Hi,
I live in south part of Chicago. Last spring I planted two barefoot jujube trees, GA866 and Sherwood, ordered from TyTy nursery. After a month I saw 2-3 leaves out from the truck and was happy for the second try (I failed in 2012).
However both of them didnâÂÂt survive zone 5 harsh winter, the truck parts were completely dried out. In middle of June I saw some shoots coming out from the rootstock, but Tyty told me to dig them out and order new one.
I love jujube tree and wish to have one in my backyard. ItâÂÂs worth to try third time?
I'd appreciate any suggestions/advice.
Thanks,
Lavender

You can let the rootstocks grow big this season and buy the scion wood from Roger Meyer for $2 per variety and bark graft them next may. You can learn the bark graft method on Youtube. Good luck.

Tony

Hi Tony,
Thank you for your advice. Gardening is a new area to me and I hope to learn more from you. At the same time IâÂÂll do my homework on grafting.
Should I leave the rootstocks in their places or transfer them into containers?
Why did you choose scion wood not jujube shoots for grafting?
Please donâÂÂt laugh at my question. I already feel silly asking but thatâÂÂs what I thought after reading your notes. Do you mind I contact you with email?
Lavender

Lav,

If you like the spot where they were then keep them there. On You tube you can search Jujube bark graft by Dr. Yao. When grafting, the scionwood has to be in a dormant state and graft in May when the rootstock leafed out so the sap flow from the rootstock to feed the scionwood of the variety that taste good like Sugarcane, Honey Jar, So, Sihong, Winter Delight, and Shanxi Li (largest fruit of this group). jUST make sure you rub off all the new shoot below the graft union on a regular basis because you want all the sap to feed the scionwood only. You can shoot me an email if you have questions.

Tony

Here is a link that might be useful: Roger Meyer Scionwoods list

I cut down two of my Tigertooth in the field and grafted them this spring with Redlands#4 from Roger. (They are on their own roots. That is a whole different discussion not related here).

This was my first attempt at field grafting Jujube. I heard they were difficult, but got lucky. I watched the video Tony recommends above and found it very useful. The only thing I did differently was to dip my scions in rooting hormone to encourage callusing. I used a grafting rubber on one and just electrical tape on the other. I also wrapped my scions with parafilm before I did the graft. I did one bark graft and one Whip and Tongue graft. Both took! I was a bit chicken with the Whip and Tongue graft and I left a couple small feeder branches below the graft union in case the grafted failed. Once I saw the buds break, I removed them.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:124868}}

Jack,

That was a major operation you've got going there in VA. Those wildlife in your area going to be very happy in about 3-5 years with all those fruits. Good luck my friend.

Tony

Tony,

Just to give you a broad brush update, my persimmon grafting went great this year. Except for 3 trees that had special issues, every tree I bark grafted (21 of them) had at least one, and usually more scions take.

It looks like I was only able to get 2 new Jujubes started from my Tigertooth root cuttings this year.

I planted 180 Dunstan chestnuts this spring to add to the 150 we planted last year.

Grafting Pecan to Hickory seems to be a moderate success so far. The best discriminator I can find for success or failure with them has been canopy. Trees that get good early morning sun seem to have a higher success rate and trees under canopy seem to have a low success rate. So far I have 14 that have taken and 22 that have not so I'm over 50% with that. Here is a pic:

I have sugar cane, honey jar, contorted, Indian, Li and GA 866 jujube plants.

Amoung all these, honey jar , Li and GA866 is fruiting.
honey jar is small plant with 2 fruits on it, Li and GA866 are big plant, they also have 2-3 fruits on each. Finally, I see them fruiting. I am very exicted. I will post pictures soon.

Hey Tony,

I may have done the impossible...May....

They tell me you can't start Jujube from dormant scion cuttings. For the most part they are right. I tried to start a bunch of them from the same cuttings I sent you last winter.

Like all cuttings, they used the energy in the cutting and leafed out and looked great. After the scions ran out of energy, the leaves withered and died. When I dug them up there were no signs of rooting.

One cutting seemed to stay green much longer than the rest and I was hopeful that it was actually taking. I was disappointed when it seemingly finally exhausted its energy and withered in mid-August.

I was lazy and didn't bother digging it up to examine it. Instead it just sat on my deck. Since it was next to some persimmon seedlings, it got watered from time to time by default.

Yesterday I was checking out my seedlings a bit closer and sure enough it has a new leaf starting. I can't imagine this is happening without some rooting.

Is it possible I actually got one to start from a dormant scion? I guess time will tell.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:124870}}

Forest...I enjoyed all your pics. Is the aluminum foil just for reflectivity? If so, does it provide noticeable results?
I've got this thing where I try to identify an area in photographs based on soil, flora/fauna, topography etc. After looking at all your photos, are you by any chance in North Carolina? I notice the reddish soil in one of your photos, I've seen a lot of that in NC...there is a place where that also exists here in Maryland also though (I've heard it called "dog dirt"). Lots of pine and even deciduous trees are growing quite straight. If so, you are probably inland from the coast some distance, I see some hills/valleys in your photos.
Am I even close?

Appleseed,

This was my first year trying to graft pecan to hickory. I presume that is the pic you are referring to. When I studied up on bark grafting hickory, it seems all the hickory grafters use it and then cover it with a plastic bag. I believe the reflectivity reduces heat.

You're not too far off...Central VA. That red dirt is good ole Virginia Clay!

Jack,

Nice going. That green bud looks very promising. I hope there are some roots under the dirt. please keep us inform of the final result.

Tony

This post was edited by tonytran on Sat, Dec 20, 14 at 22:57

Ok, I got home tonight and took another look. These are leaves and they are growing. However, it is September and my trees will soon be going dormant. A few of the persimmons have already started to turn.

With these leaves just starting, should I bring this inside and put it under lights to get a bit more growth before letting it go dormant or should I just let it go dormant naturally?

Jack

I would Let it goes dormant naturally but over winter it in an un heated garage. Just make sure you keep the soil moist until Spring. The tiny shoot is very cold sensitive.

Tony

My LI jujube died back after -20 f to the ground and came back with no protection (rootstock came back) so they can be grown in this zone with protection much like a fig.

Tony,

That makes sense, I'll do that. I learned last year that I lost many of the young persimmons that just were not mature enough to handle the cold winter. I plan to overwinter both this and some young persimmons in the garage this year.

Just wondering if anyone has some known good Jujube cultivar cuttings they want to trade?? Have seedlings of both the glossy & fuzzy leaf types to graft them to. Extensive collection of other types of fruit trees. Thanks

Anyone has experience from root grown jujube plant? Do I need to graft to another kind of scion to get better fruits?

Thank you!

Li jujube is the most popular, lang jujube is good too and acts as a helpful pollinator

Right now Honey Jar is the overall in taste. Very sweet, crunchy, juicy, productive, and early ripening.

Tony

Tony, how juicy was the honey jar compared to the Thai and Indian jujube?