Some apple blooms and flowers. Northern Spy has first flowers coming at year 4/5.
Some random tropicals…
The Cherry of the Rio Grande has been in the ground now for one winter. Seems to have done fine. The Cattley guavas have been the ground for a couple years now, one strawberry and one yellow. The strawberry is pretty old (5+ years), previously in a pot and fruited too much. The Pitangatuba is about 5 years old now and seems to do fine in a pot. Cherimoya is from seed. Flowered for the first time this past fall. Looking a little rough due to being outside during some cold weather, but it typically rebounds well. The Jabuticaba fruited last year for the first time. The bananas are just for fun, but I’m hopeful that the dwarf finally flowers this year.
Citrus…spent the winter indoors. Bears air layer has been in the ground the last few months as an experiment, with no protection. Did a few rangpur grafts on the Troyer this morning.
Welcome, From Olympia!
I’m approaching 250 trees myself! We’ll have to trade notes!
Your citrus seem to be fairing much better than mine!
@Ulflander Definitely. Most of the citrus handled the winter far better than expected, even without supplemental lighting. The larger lime trees benefited from being positioned right next to the sliding glass door. I have a New Zealand lemonade that stayed in the grow tent so its fruit could finish ripening and the flavor turned out exceptionally good (one of my favorites).
I’m hopeful that the satsumas do well with minimal intervention, which would let me shift away from some of the varieties that require too much winter care.
Ah, see, I’ve got about 20 trees, and no room inside the house. So they spent most of winter in the garage, hovering in the 40’s. Every time it warms up enough, I dolly out all 20+ of them out of the garage and into the drive for some sun, leave them for a few days, then when it gets below 35 at night, wheel them all back into the garage again. Hoping they really perk up and grow this summer. I think this rain we’re getting next week will probably be the last of it.
@Ulflander That’s some dedication for sure. What varieties are you growing?
Curious–some folks say they got rid of their jujube due to the thorns. Do yours have thorns? I have a young Coco jujube (less than a foot tall) covered in thorns but my older Sugarcane jujube that I got last year has none.
So I’m wondering if they are just like citrus, where the young ones may have thorns as protection until they’re old enough to blossom, and then stop producing thorns when they’re older? Any insights on this?
Ooh, you have the Pakistan White variety!!! I wanted that one, but I think the ones I got from Etsy are a different cultivar, because they’re not long, they produce shorter, pudgy fruits.
Anyway, how does the fruit taste? Is it truly sweet and reminiscent of honeydew melon? ![]()
Beautiful blossoms! ![]()
Ah, another Portlander! Been lurking here for a while, hoping to see what other people here are growing.
Looks like an awesome orchard, I’m very interested in the technique of growing multiple trees in the same hole - our garden is on a standard portland lot with lots of ornamentals, so I don’t have much space for growing.
Do you have any experience with loquats here? That’s my current obsession, I have a small spot on a south-facing wall I plan to grow some in pots. I imagine this last winter would have been the ideal season for loquat, with how warm it was, and so I’m bummed I missed my chance.
Ooh, another loquat lover!
That’s how I found this forum, while I was researching to see if anyone has successfully grown and fruited loquats here in the PNW. I’m not in OR, but I’m your neighbor in WA.
I’m growing a Champagne, Big Jim, Vista White, and Shambhala. They seem to be plenty cold tolerant, because they’ve survived outside in pots in minimal soil for the last few years–but I learned from this forum that they flower during winter and their blooms may freeze below 28 degrees, so that may hamper getting fruits in spring. Now that I know this, I will keep them inside my poly tunnel or winter tent moving forward, to see if I can get fruit in future springs!
This white pakistan was from OGW and has yet to produce any fruit. It is about 8 feet tall at the moment. Would be taller but I trimmed it back a bit last summer.
I haven’t noticed any thorns that stand out on the jujube. Mine are still pretty young. I’ll have to take some closer pics next time I’m over there.
Nothing like the thorns on the Yuzu and Troyer.
I have a large unnamed loquat in the front. It is about 5 years old now. It’s probably been in the ground for 3.5 years. No blooms as of yet.
Also growing strawberry, gold nugget, and orange dream. Those three are still in pots. I’m hopeful that I’ll be able to graft branches from all three of those to the larger one in the front.
Can’t wait for your White mulberry to fruit so you can post how they taste! ![]()
Hmmm, that’s interesting about the jujubes.
Guess I’ll just have to observe and see if my Coco stops growing thorns as it ages. Thanks for answering!
Yep, those thorns on citrus can be quite lethal. I literally almost left my Bearss lime outside to die or was going to give it away because I thought it had been mislabelled by the nursery, lol. I specifically got a Bearss lime for the larger fruit size and reputation of being thornless, so when it grew nearly two inch thorns all over I thought I’d been scammed! (No, really I just thought the nursery had made an innocent mislabelling mistake.
) So I was about to purchase a new Bearss lime, when I did some research and learned about how some citrus have thorns as protection in their juvenile years (3-5) then stop growing them as they are ready to flower and fruit.
Yeah. Definitely. I recall my other Pakistan taking a while to fruit too, so hopefully white isn’t too far behind.
I looked at a young autumn beauty that is about 1.5 years old and it has tiny thorns where the branches are forming. It was hard to get a picture. They are very similar to thorns on the rangpur.
My two bears limes, one 7 years old and one 8 years old have thorns that have never been larger than this, so that’s interesting to hear about the variation in thorn size.
That’s crazy. It has fruited? Confirmed limes?
Not yet, but I just saw the first flower bud this last weekend. So we will find out this season for sure! ![]()
Will be interesting to see what it produces. Hopefully it will be a lime!






































