Our two beach plum experts @JesseS and @clarkinks. Have either of you noticed any deer resistance on your beach plums? I am about to give them a permanent home today. They did great in pots this year. Deer pressure here in KY/TN is awfully high not sure how bad it is where you guys are at.
Trying to decide whether to put them inside my fenced blueberry orchard that has 8 foot high deer fence or put them near other plum trees exposed to the elements and possibly cage them.
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Not an expert by any means!
My bushes have been lightly tipped by deer browse during the winter, but not as bad as nearby app,e trees.
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Just a guy growing beach plums. Please dont give me more credit than deserved. I have deer pressure on many things but beach plums have not been one of the items they like.
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Thanks fellas @JesseS and @clarkinks , I went ahead and put them in General population of my stone fruit area.
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Excited to be planting out seeds of a new John Meader prunus maritima selection, ‘Ultramarine’. The ortet, a 7 yr old bush has borne heavy annual crops (50-100lbs) the past several years, and is prized by a local preserve maker for the rich flavor. Also hardy- grown in a zone 4 location.
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I put in two beach plums to try last year from Hartmann’s and Hirt’s. I’m originally from Cape Cod and my grandmother used to make beach plum jelly. She gave me her recipe so I decided to give them a try.
I’m interested to see how Ultramarine pans out for you. @JesseS - does your yellow variety seem like a hardy plant? Would you say that is the best tasting one that you have?
My yellow fruited BP seems hardy enough for my z4b location, taste is okay but not my best. It is a bit on the bland side…not as full flavored as some others I grow.
What variety is your favorite thus far?
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The beach plums am surprised is graft compatible with the Japanese plum! Fellow members here sent me scionwood this very late in the season and grafted them to my tree, and now they’re pushing growth. Usually, they would have remained dormant this late in the season. Would be excited on their fruits within a year or two. Maybe I’ll save the seeds. They sure would be open pollinated with the other 150 different kinds of stone fruits on my tree. I have added three beach plums on it last month.
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Glad those worked out for you, Joe!
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Thanks!
A newly grafted beach plum with some selections from Dr Richard Uva in MD. Hope Maine winters arent too cold for them! A couple were labeled as yellow fruited.
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Very impressive!
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just put in 2 mini plum trees i got from hartmanns. zone hardy to z3 so should do well here. wonder if they are a dwarf version of beach plums? doesnt say on their site. supposedly very productive and grows to only 6ft. might have to try grafting some different varieties on them once they get big enough.
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I took a look on their webpage, the tree that they call a “Mini-Sweet Plum Tree” does not look like a Beach Plum to me.
…they also have a tree they call “Plum Berries,” which does look like a Beach Plum. (Also, in the description they say it is “Prunus maratima,” which removes all doubt.)
https://hartmannsplantcompany.com/retail/product/mini-sweet-plum-tree/
https://hartmannsplantcompany.com/retail/product/plum-berries/
I wish companies wouldn’t try to rename fruit trees. Beach Plums are not that rare and the name describes them perfectly already.
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Has anyone here tried adding a little bit of salt as fertilizer for Beach Plums? In the Philippines where we grow coconut in the mountain areas, using a little bit of salt as fertilizer have increased the yield by three folds! Coconuts are coastal species that gets an infusion of salt. The same with Nipa palm. Both can be planted in areas far from their native habitats and so using salt has increased their yields. Perhaps it might be the same with Beach Plums, for those doing their graduate thesis, this might be a good study to try!
I bought nongrafted seedlings of Beach Plums from Oikos and so will be trying to use salt on them perhaps next year when they’ve grown bigger.
Of course using salt for grafted Beach plums is a different matter, as it really depends on the rootstock if they’re salt tolerant or not.
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I think a small amount could help and does help many things. It does of course depend on the salt. You can see a little bit of what I do in this old thread Soil Secrets
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Update on my BP multigraft, hopefully these will prove hardy here and I can try some fruit next season from these selections…
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I am having mixed success with beach plums this year. I have three bushes, two of them were hit very hard by plum curculios and dropped most of their fruit. For some reason the third tree in the row was barely touched and is completely covered in immature fruit. None of the trees received any kind of spray or treatment this year.
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