It appears that justfruitsandexotics is your fastest option. Kanko is my slowest growing in-ground tree. This is mainly because the tree is so productive with flowers/fruits that it just doesn’t want to grow.
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That is interesting. I see more growth in Winter than I do any other time in zone 10b so far.
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Californicus may he referring to no growth of grafted scionwood, which I agree with on most fruit tree grafts in winter. I did not notice how much growth the loquat branches have in winter. It may have good growth since most branches are starting to have flowers with new growth before the fruits forms. Once the fruits cluster forms and start to size up, most of the energy may got into the fruits.
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I personally like AKME, and the guy who runs the company, I have placed 3 orders for seeds with him, and they were seeds that arrived in great conditions, they were not old, they were Loquat seeds, and one of the seeds had two plants pop out of it.
He did not choose the best place for a nursery, and he’s getting hit by a lot of storms, some of those storms have destroyed the plants that he custom makes for people, then he got too many e-mails to respond to them as fast as people would have liked him to, after him taking way too many custom graft orders, more than anyone should take on.
The way that I understand it is that he did not expect so much custom orders, and he would have sent everything out in time if the weather did not destroy the new plants. As far as I know all the old plants are okay, as far as I know scion orders should be sent out.
I will be ordering loquat Scion wood from him, most likely in Spring of 2024, I have to wait until the root stock is big enough, nature moves at it’s own pace.
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I agree with you. I like Adam, have been trading with him for a few years. I think he may have taken more orders than he can handle. I hope he can recover and catch up on his outstanding orders.
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I got Viking, sunset, sugarcane and harvest from Adam. And sent him a seedling discovery of mine.
His varieties are all in bloom this season and I hopefully will have fruit to try out.
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Yes, he knew approximately how many orders he could handle, yet that would be if nothing went wrong. There are more storms down there than there used to be. He’s trying hard, he quit his job to try and catch up, even though he was already losing money at the prices he was charging for custom trees, before the storm damage happened. I could not think of anyone else who would have charged so little for the trees, he lost money due to the cost of shipping for the trees being too high for him to make a profit.
I have sort of known him for years, no matter how busy he is he usually finds time to respond to me even it it’s a question that he could not make any money from, these days it usually takes way longer to get a response from him because of the outstanding orders, plus a few personal things have happened in his life, like a new baby, and so on.
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I ordered a few grafted and air layered loquats from him last year, hadn’t heard back from him in quite some time and so I reached out to him a few months back via email - he pretty much responded with exactly as you stated. He’s very knowledgeable and passionate about what he does, I really respect that.
I’m sure eventually he’ll be able to fulfill my order once he gets his nursery lined out, I’m in no rush and I can appreciate how much work it would take to fulfill that many orders
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Yeah, that is correct. I have a hoop cold frame type thing that they are in right now. But I will take your advice and wait until may to graft them. It’s probable that the person who said that he liked to graft them in winter was in a warmer climate.
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Does it usually take a long time to get cuttings or seed, or is he just backed up on grafts?
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Hey, that sounds like the right kind of problem to have. I’m mainly interested in it it because I thought that the late bearing nature of that variety would lead to more consistent harvests here in zone 8 Fort Worth.
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Viking, Sunset and Sugarcane are the 3 I got from him as well. I’m eagerly looking forward to your report on how they bear. How far along are they at this point? Are your on quince, in the ground, and out in the open?
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@murky, I have multiple grafts, some in-ground and some on potted trees. All are in full bloom. I saw humming birds and bees in the last few days.
Last year also they bloomed but were destroyed by heavy snow and cold in Jan. We had a whole week of sub zero (degreesC) temps.
This year I am using frost blankets and Christmas lights on all loquats.they will come on on extremely cold nights. With an expected 100+ fruits, it is a small expense.
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I’m late but very nice everyone! I can’t find these in Canada. They would do so well in the zone 10 greenhouse! Might go check my local guy see what he has.
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I have the Sunset, fruits last year was just ok, but this year should provide a good idea of the real taste. China White is very sweet and probably one of the best tasting. My Sugarcane grafts are small so no fruits yet.
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I don’t have much frame of reference for loquat fruit. I’ve only had it once. End of season fruits from a local seedling in an area that isn’t ideal for loquat. They were delicious to my palate, but odds are they weren’t the best.
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Well, I grow a lot of different varieties, most of the named ones and many seedling trees which have fruited for me. I do agree that any ripe loquat is sweet, and it’s difficult to choose between the excellent tasting and the good tasting, I like them all. I like loquats a lot so it’s just fun to get a collection going to see if there are much difference in tastes between them. I have more than 50 varieties that are holding fruits now so I will do one last taste comparison this year and then just keep maybe the best 10 for fruit production. I’m done with adding any more new varieties, I have 84 varieties so that’s enough for me.
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Really? Can you please ask him how long it will take for my trees I ordered from him about 2 years ago? He’s taken my money and had ghosted me. I’ve called, emailed, messaged on Whatsapp and Facebook and nothing. I’m out almost $300. If anyone’s thinking about ordering anything from AKME think again. Unless you want to be ripped off!
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I had a negative experience with AKME as well. I made payment through Zelle and eventually had to open a dispute with my bank to get my money back. Not even a confirmation or email reply six weeks after I paid. I consider myself a patient, longsuffering customer when it comes to niche products like this but AKME is beyond the pale. Simply the worst online shopping experience I’ve had in years. Avoid.
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I placed an order with AKME and it was crickets for over six weeks. They didn’t respond to any of my (polite) inquiries and I finally had to open a dispute with my bank to get the zelle payment back. I’m done with grafting this season but next time I’ll go with garden crochet or some other alternative.
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