I’d be happy to repay all the help that people here have given me over the years by “paying it forward” by giving scionwood of this interesting and delicious fruit to those who want it. It seems somewhat distasteful to charge people for the postage it cost me to send it out, but if the list becomes really long I may have to ask for a little help with postage only. Of course no one charged me for all the great advice I’ve been given and while I haven’t received scionwood from anyone, I know many people don’t charge for helping each other out…and I won’t either if its a managable number or if you’ve helped me a lot in the past. But I suspect I may get a really large number of requests and if I do I hope you’ll forgive me if I ask for a little postage help. I’ll gladly donate the wood, the time, the packaging material, etc. And if its a managable number of requests I’ll pay the postage for everyone. But I hope its not seen as tacky, selfish, or ungrateful if I have to ask for a little help with postage if I get overwhelmed by requests. But I haven’t had many chances to repay the help I’ve been given, so I want to help repay it without charging and I’ll try. I’m open to comments on how people feel about charging postage when sending a large number of wood requests. I want to do what’s right and what is customary in this case. I’v only sent a few packages in the past (never charged) and never received any, so I really don’t know what’s appropriate in cases like this. Thanks.
I think it’s really your choice and in my opinion,being up front about it at first is the best thing to do.Then,there are no questions about what people expect.
I haven’t charged,but some have asked me to give them my address and they sent some money.
Trades are another way to go. Brady
thecityman,
I think it would be ethical for me to pay the shipping, just let me know the cost when the time comes. If you want to trade, let me know then the shipping will be a wash.
To me they look more like Flavor Supreme than dapple. However, FS is one of the earliest ripening pluots so it would’ve already been harvested most likely. I think it ripens close to or shortly after the real Methley. Actually, since you’re in Kentucky maybe you are in the window. Adams has Methley ripening the second half of July
Your quote about them staying firm and crunchy lends a bit of credence to it being a pluot.
I highly doubt it’s a watermelon plum or anything of the such. I searched for that plum and could not find a single US supplier. I highly doubt Wal Mart of all places would end up with a tree that not even the big nurseries are selling.
Whatever it is sounds like you have yourself a winner. Enjoy them!
Quote about firm and crunchy makes it certain it’s not Methley!
With my experience limited to my local Walmarts I agree. I’ve never seen them carry anything but high volume common varieties.
That is a perfectly reasonable assumption and one I would have also thought were true, but as an admitted walmart tree shopper for years, I can say with great confidence that its not true! Surprisingly, at least where I live, Wal-mart constantly has strange trees I’ve never seen anywhere else, so this fits. Let me give 3 examples I have bought from our walmart::
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BRADLEY PLUM - I’ve even asked on this forum if anyone could tell me more about what this might be, but the label definately said “Bradley”. Some have suggested it might be a variety known as “Bradley, King of Damsons” but no one is sure. It hasn’t fruited yet but should next year (I have both Japanese and Euro plums near it so it should pollinate either way)
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Sweet Rush Plum - The photo shows it as a yellow plum. I asked about it here as well and of course people guessed it is just a Shiro or close relative/sport but of course no one knows. I think the tag even showed it as trademarked/ patented. It will be 4 years old next year and is a decent size so I should get first fruit. Here it is: http://www.mygardenlife.com/plant-library/6061/prunus/domestica/sweet-rush
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Red Honey Plum - I like the name of this one, but never found a single mention of it anywhere on the internet. I think I bought it the same year is the subject of this thread. Sadly, this one was killed by my neighbor’s spray drift so we’ll never know what it would have produced.
SO, as you can see, the walmart here gets all kinds of strange things. They’ve also had apples and pears I haven’t heard of (though that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t have- I don’t pay much attention to apples and pears I’m afraid).
Many of their strange fruits come from the “Park Hills” nursery but to my frustration there is no web page for them and all I can find is a listing that shows they exist (yellow pages, google business, etc) but little else. I suppose the easy answer as that they are just making up names and applying them to known varieties, but that’s hard to believe, especially in view of what I see hanging on my tree right now.
I honestly didn’t realize until I write this post that all the strange/unknown fruits from my walmart have been plums. That makes this fruit even more likely to be something strange, it would seem. So, I have no idea where they are getting these unusual fruits, but it sure looks like this one is an oddball and perhaps quite exciting. BTW…I’ve shared it with more co-workers this morning and it just goes to confirm that just because I don’t love firm, almost crunchy, plums doesn’t mean others don’t. Everyone has gone wild for these things.
Make sure to let some of them hang a long time. In my experience crunchy nearly always means I am picking them too early. Plums that color up early are really tempting to think they are completely ripe when they are not. There are a few plums that are crunchy when completely ripe but not many.
I’m soooooo glad you said that, Scott. Really…soooo glad. I’ve always suspected that what you just said was true in general, and have been especially curious about it in this tree. And as proof that you are correct, I offer the following: You know how when fruits on a tree get some kind of bad spot (such as a bug or bird bite that gets infected) the rest of the fruit- especially close to the bad spot- will start to ripen really quickly right before it turns to rot. On this tree, when that has happened and I’ve picked the fruit and ate around the bad spot, it is a whole new world of deliciousness. OMG!!! Best fruit EVER. Those bites DO have the level of sweetness that I have previously ascribed to the more apricot-like plumcots. BUT HOLD ON…THERE IS A PROBLEM.
In 99% of the cases, what is happening is that these fruits are hanging on the tree (almost 4 months now!) for a very long time, then they basically go from the firm, almost crunchy stage to the rotten stage without passing through the “Very ripe” stage where they are much softer and much sweeter. In many cases, it starts at some bad point on the fruit (like a bug bite) and just starts to rot and then it spreads from there. In other cases, it will be a perfect looking fruit with no blemishes, and then very quickly it is almost covered in some kind of mold-looking rot and is completely rotten.
The above is my usual long-winded, meandering way of saying I think you are right, the firmer fruits I’m describing from this tree are not completely ripe. But they just won’t get that level of ripeness on the tree- they rot first. I’ve wondered if I could spray some kind of anti-fungus/antibiotic/etc spray to get them to hang longer without rotting. Any thoughts any of this?
My thought: because of pest or disease pressure I’ve often picked plums before peak ripeness and let them ripen on the counter - which they do, softening and sweetening
They may not be ideally ripe, plum-contest-winning ripe, but they’re ripe to eat and taste good, better than rotting on the tree
I’ve got a basket of Hollywoods that I’m enjoying right now
Great minds think alike, Lois. I picked 6 this morning and put them on my table to see how they ripen be themselves! Fingers crossed.
I’ve done some more research on my plum and I’m pretty excited about my find. I ended up just calling the nursery that supplies walmart and explained my situation. I got a super nice lady who didn’t think she could help but did. She explained that they source trees from other nurseries as well as grow their own - all to supply Walmart. SO she said there was not much telling where my tree came from even if it had their tag. HOWEVER, when I told her it tasted a lot more like a plumcot than a plum, she sort of changed her tune. She said that they do not even sell plumcots to walmart, HOWEVER, one of the companies that they (her company) gets trees from ALSO grows plumcot trees for commercial plumcot growers. SHe said she had heard reports before that this company had acidently sold plumcots as plums and they ended up mislabled at plums. Here is the fun part: She said if that is what happened-and she bet it was- that I was very lucky because most of the plumcots they sell are protected/ patented and only available to commercial growers. So she said if I did get one of those I was lucky and they were usually good. SHe either couldn’t or wouldn’t tell me who their supplier is that grows these plumcot trees for commercial fruit producers, BUT she told me the name of one of the fruit producers who gets their trees from the company and told me they have a website for grocery store buyers that show all of their plumcots so I might could identify mine on it. AND I THINK I HAVE!!! Furthermore, that site leads me to believe all this is true and that lightening has even struck twice (ie this mistake was made before and I bought one) because they have one of the fruits I talked about in a post above as evidence that my walmart has odd balls occasionally. That one was called Honey Red (or Red Honey). The only place I have ever seen this anywhere else is on the commercial fruit growing site that buys their trees from the same company that might have accidentally sold a commercial-only plot to walmart that I also got. Sadly, my honey red was killed by neighbor.
I am sure I have completely and total confused everyone by now and I’ve done an awful job explaining this. I also acknowledge there is a lot of guessing going on here and it’s more than a little possible that I’m wrong. But the condensed version of all this is that it looks like there is a good chance I got a pluot that was not supposed to be released to the public. If so that’s really neat. And darned if one of the photos doesn’t look absolutely identical in every way- inside and out- to my mystery plum.
The name of the one that matches mine is called DRAGON TEAR (gotta love that name!) I guess that since I didn’t pay a royalty for it, some of you may say I should go outside and destroy it. But I bought it in good faith, paid for it, Cared for it and waited 4 years, and am not 100% certain it is a patented tree, and I’m not selling the fruit, so I’ll let you guess whether or not I’m going to cut it down.
Even if mine isn’t a Dragon Tear, some of you may enjoy seeing all the varieties that- apparently- only commercial growers get to buy. Here is a list of photos and names from the site that wholesales fruit to retail stores: Remeber, they are an orchard, not a fruit tree seller.
Good sleuthing Kevin! I am getting more convinced its a plumcot. Its up to the grower/seller to deal with the royalty, I wouldn’t worry about that.
The Costco by me regularly carries plums, plouts, and aprium from Kingsbury. As mentioned Kingsbury has a long list of commercial only fruit. I’ve had a pluot from them I didn’t like but most of it is good. I’m enjoying some Ruby Velvet apriums from them today.
That’s really cool Kevin. And if someone tells you to destroy the tree because of royalty issues tell them to stick it where the sun dont shine. You did zero wrong. And even though you think you’ve figured out what you have there is no way to be 100% sure. So just enjoy your tree!
And yes, Dragon Tear is a really cool name. I’d probably refer to it ”Kevincot” just to keep the patent police away.
I was looking on the Kingsburg Orchard site. The picture they have of Honey Punch is nothing like what I’m growing. Their HP has a very pronounced tip. Mine is round. Strange since I got mine straight from DWN.
Also noted their pictures are of half green fruit. I guess that’s commercial ripe.
Don’t know about the honey punch, but I bet anything you are right about why the other fruit looks unripe!!! If they put up photos of tree ripe fruit, then when they send grocery stores the half-green junk they pick so it can ship better, the stores might think they got the wrong thing! ha
Its not completely clear if its that one from the list, or if it is another one not on that list, or its a seedling. Since its just guesswork I’d go with Kevincot 
Kevin,
If you like the fruit, consider yourself fortunate, and sit back and
enjoy the fruit of your labor. No pun intended. You certainly did nothing
wrong, and you shouldn’t worry about anyone coming after you for one
tree. Mistakes like this happen all of the time, and it’s just a cost of doing
business on a large scale.
As a key to ripeness, just about all plums will develop a filmy coating, when
they’re ripe. Congratulations, you will now probably be deluged with requests
for scion wood.