Honey Jar and Sugar Cane Jujubes just became available!

EL isn’t selling Sugar Cane as a bare root. I imagine the shipping will be much higher if you went with that one.

actually, they are selling it bare root. I talked to her yesterday. I know the website doesn’t show it, and they are actually higher than the $39 potted one shown on their site, but she said the bare roots are bigger and worth it. (we will see).

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That’s just what I was thinking! Shrubs would fill the spots but not intrude too much on the upper workings of the surrounding trees. Worth thinking about.

Also of note: Jujubes are often spiny and usually grafted onto wild root stock, which is pretty much always spiny, and which suckers willingly far and wide, I have read/heard, so even if the variety you have chosen isn’t too spiny, its suckers will be. I put mine into a back patch which is somewhat out of the way, so that in the inevitable times when they send suckers out I can happily graft onto them or trim them without (hopefully!) inadvertent injury. I guess they can get nasty to walk on or around.

When I researched Jujubes, I found this great video from the late, great Roger Meyers. I found it extremely valuable. He also, literally, wrote the book on Jujubes in case you are so ambitious to look so far into it in the future.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2vH-xVN_bk&index=1&list=PLwLO9qoytPZz3MNTCTS0XLVpOx3CTpnsv

https://www.amazon.com/Jujube-primer-source-Roger-Meyer/dp/0967519810
A bit pricey here at around $150, but you can probably find it cheaper if you keep a look out for it.

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Oooooh. How do I get one of those bare rooted sugar cane, haha.

That’s another great idea, and one I’d also given thought to…so once again it proves us geniuses all think alike! ha. What I’d thought about was putting figs between trees, but they spread out so far I didn’t think it would be much benefit. But your suggestion makes me think about other “bushes” and is VERY worthy of further consideration. The heart breaking part is that I actually took off work at noon Monday so I could (and I did) plant a bunch of gooseberries, honey berries, currants, Josta berries, and blue berries. All of those probably would have done well as between-tree bushes! So, Chris, why didn’t you suggest this last week? hahaha. No, its a good idea and I might still do it. My only concern is the same with the one I mentioned above…that I would loose the ability to just zoom in between my trees with my tractor mower. But I’ll have to look…its possible that I could plant the bushes as you describe and STILL squeeze into the 9 ft gap- at least until trees and bushed get a lot bigger. So thanks for great idea

OK funny guy! :slight_smile: I guess $43 would be a high price for an actual stock of sugar cane. haha. But if you mean how do you get a bear root sugarcane Jujube, just give them a call. She said they will probably be out in a day or two since most of them have already been promised and the rest will probably grow fast when word gets out that they have some.

if you let your jujus get taller than other trees(even if they are 18feet away), your jujus should be fruitful in your area. Sugar cane grows more vigorously than hj, so if you are torn between two spots for sc and hj, it would be good to assign hj the sunnier spot/higher ground.

here in the desert, sugar cane can grow 15 feet tall in 4 years. Hj can grow 10-12 feet tall in about the same time.

rapid growth does not always translate to fruiting, especially in regions with shorter growing seasons, rapid growth may be a response to lack of direct sunlight. Probably good to let your specimens grow as tall as they can the first three years(or until they are taller than surrounding trees structures), then every year, destroy all vegetative growth(upright stems in spring as soon as they start showing up) and just allow laterals/fruiting stems leaf out.
best results would be to find the sunniest spot in your yard, and if your yard is crowded, let your jujus grow taller than nearby trees or structures.
if you’re growing jujus in an open field where direct sunlight is maxed, you could literally grow jujus like tomatoes, kept shorter than 3 feet tall for many years with severe pruning of upright growth and just letting laterals thicken.

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That post was so good I cut and pasted it into a file I keep on my desktop labeled “fruit keepers”. Not a lot makes it into there, so you should feel special! ha. As I said, I know almost nothing about jujubes, though I’m going to be reading a lot of your old posts in the coming days since you are one of the resident jujube experts.

Based on what you’ve just said, the best news for me is that most of my orchard is in full sun and won’t have to compete. I was a little unclear on your suggestion to destroy all vegetative growth, but I’ll get you to help me figure it out later. Thanks!

wishing you the best on your endeavor! Juju stems are a bit tricky to differentiate sometimes, but you could always post pictures of your trees. Will gladly chime in on which stems to keep or get rid of, and am sure there will be many others who will have ideas.

btw, have you considered trying the li cultivar? It is a good variety that is quite reliable in various regions.

Thanks. On the li cultivar, I can only say : DANG IT!!! It is one of the easiest to find varieties and therefore one of the least expensive (because some of the lower cost vendors have it) but I had read a quite a few people saying they didn’t think the taste was that good. Another article was saying that the newer varieties that have been developed (like those I got and others) are sweeter than the old varieties like Li and Lang. But apparently you don’t agree, and I respect your opinion more than those I read, So I’ll give it another look! THanks!

you could always graft it to your tree/s later. And no need to buy an actual tree since many in this forum have it and may just graft to your trees. Sugar cane is a vigorous producer of upright stems which you could graft to.
li has better flavor when ripened in cooler weather here(around late oct or even november), so worthy of consideration in regions with relatively cool summers. We actually prefer it over sc and hj when picked at its prime.
li has about the same brix as hj and sc when grown here(attaining 30 to 32)

and the fruits are so much bigger than hj and sc, which is a plus.

While I’ve got your attention, one cultivar I’m both interested in and confused about is the GA-866. Interested because its reported to be one of the sweetest of all jujubes, and as someone who ranks plain 'ole sweetness as the most important flavor in any fruit (I know…how boring!) . Confused because- more than almost any other fruit I can think of- the reviews are so extremely different. Some suggest its just pure sugar and a wonderful fruit. But a roughly equal number have said it is a poor performer, NOT especially sweet, and overall not one of the best jujubes at all. Perhaps local conditions (climate, soil, exposure to sun, etc) have a major impact and cause these differences in opinion- who knows. But I’d sure love to hear your thoughts on this fruit! Thanks.

Sweetness is normally one of the most important factors. Just not with jujubes, at least from what I’ve seen so far. Once you get over 25 brix, I don’t think it matters too much (the 3 points between 27 & 30 matter a lot less than 11 vs 14 peaches or apples). At high brix, texture, taste, and size start to become more important, IMO.

I’ve seen the same concerns about productivity and I think I recall reading that it does better in the heat. So, I put it right at the edge of my driveway, with full sun. It’s only been there a year though, so nothing yet. The graft on my So hasn’t made any fruit either.

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I’m glad to see you also appreciate sweetness. I mean, it is obviously important to everyone to some degree, but I often see comments such as “fruit xyz is sweet but lacks complexity”, “fruit xyz is very sweet but really needs more acid”, “I prefer sour to sweet”, or “sweetness alone doesn’t make a fruit good. If it doesn’t have a flavor profile beyond sugar I don’t like it” and the always shocking to me “Fruit xyz is almost TOO sweet”. WHAT?!?! ha. All these statements are somewhat understandable, but I would never say any of them. By its very nature (to me) no fruit can ever have no flavor beyond sweetness, though some have stronger secondary flavors than others. Acid isn’t at all critical to me, and fruits like pineapple CAN have too much acid for me (though I still enjoy it). And the concept of too much sweetness in a fruit is exactly the same as “too much fun, a girl too pretty with too much class, a guy too lucky, or a car too fast” (a nod to the country music fans. ha). So even though most people say sweetness is very important, clearly a lot of people don’t give it the same weight as I (and apparently you Bob) do in ranking a fruit overall. Interesting.

Your production notes for the first year were interesting. I’m not really expecting it, but @mamuang actually got to taste her 2 jujubes the very same year she planted them! That sure would be fun.

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Friends don’t let friends grow ga866, except maybe in s cal or s fla. it’s a dog.

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All too true, and difficult to assess, as most folks here have agreed: Tastes are local, both to the growing enviroment then to personal taste preferences. The folks at Ed. Land. were helpful for me because, (1) they grow many varieties in here in VA and (2) they’ve sampled all that they’ve grown here and steared me toward HJ. PLUS, once we got A tree, we can graft :blush:

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Bob H, BOb V, Scott Smith, Castanea, and Jujus…

You guys are right about GA866 is a dog. Scott gave me the GA866 scion about 5 years ago and it has not produce a single fruit. I will multi grafts it into HJ, Sugarcane, Sherwood, Golden Beauty, Shanxi Li, CoCo, So, Tigertooth, and Winter Delights in May. So long GA866.

Tony

What’s the easy way to tell the difference between vegetative growth and fruiting stems?

I sometimes like fruit better when it “doesn’t taste as sweet”. For example, a Goldrush apple at 18 brix will taste much less sweet to many than a bland 12 brix apple with no acid in it. The brix is more important than “sweetness”, as you can get a rich flavor from high brix, moderate/high acid.

I don’t think I’ve found any fruit too sweet yet and still appreciate a nice 18 brix, low acid nectarine (high acid ones are good as well, but different). Maybe if I had a steady stream of them, I’d start to have a strong preference for one over the other. But right now I’m happy to find one with high brix of either type.

I think you’ve got a decent chance with Honey Jar. It seems pretty precocious. To maximize your chances, water during any dry spells. They are drought tolerant, but grow better with enough water. I remember seeing a Roger Meyers video where he talks about the tree taking water from the fruit when it runs short, which leaves you with aborted or mushy fruit.

OK, you’ve convinced me- I’m not completely abandoning my experiment, but I’ll probably put a different variety on top, leaving a decent stretch of GA866 closest to the heat (driveway).

I’m not familiar with that one. Do you have any more info on it?

I made a typo. It is a Orange Beauty. I got a small stick from Castanea a few weeks ago. It is a good seedling that he created. He has a photo of it in one of the thread called Orange Beauty.

Tony

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