There is a picture a few post up, it is about 6’ or 7’ tall. Mine grows more horizontal than vertical and has been pruned back some. Pour the fertilizer to it and it will take off.
Here is the tree. Looking more closely I am not seeing the thorns I recall from before. It is easily 20 feet tall, it also sits in full sun most of the day. It is the one in the center of the picture and appears to have 2 trunks (it does actually)
The clove currants and forsythia are not as close as they appear. Its still dormant and hasn’t started growth for this year yet.
Scott
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See it now. That is pretty wide. I will try to train my tree as a standard tree. Hope it will work.
I see that I made a mistake referring to the picture I added: the male branch is actually on the lower left in the picture… not that it matters much…
Here is another picture of another seedless/thornless che grafted as a standard at 200cm high on a Maclura rootstock. You can clearly see the effect of pollination. This tree is planted behind the one in the previous picture. The pollen from the male branch that was grafted onto the bush type che in the previous picture reaches the part of this larger tree that is close to it but the rest of the branches of this standard tree are just to far away and the pollen cannot reach them…hence no fruit on the rest of this tree…
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ok, so the Cudrania (Che)…
Once again it has fruit hanging and they’ve started changing color, but now some of them are dropping and I’ve got questions…
Does the fruit start coloring up before ripening? How much larger does the fruit get after it starts coloring up? This last picture leaves me thinking that the fruit ripens up until the leaves drop, is that accurate?
Our temperatures have dropped precipitously. We had a frost warning last weekend (though my yard never got cold enough I could, however see my breath). Next week is predicted to once again drop in temperatures. Does this early cold-snap also mean these fruit are doomed to failure once again?
Right now the fruit are dime sized or slightly larger. This is the biggest I’ve ever seen them. How large does the fruit get when fully ripe? Half-dollar sized? Ping-pong sized?
Scott
They generally grow larger first and then start to color up and then ripen. They can get a little bigger than this -
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Does anyone have any Che fruit they would be willing to sell to get a taste of the fruit?
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@castanea
Wow ,those are big ,!
What variety , are those.( source ?)
Mine are not even half that size, from E.L.
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Nice!!!
Do you take online orders? 
I planted a tiny one from EL last year. It is 2ft tall now. Probably another 5 years before I can taste any fruit.
I don’t remember what variety that is. I had 5 or 6 different varieties at one time and they’re all pretty much the same anyway so there was no point in keeping more than one. The fruit gets bigger as the tree gets larger. These were from a 25 year old tree that was about 25 feet tall.
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I don’t have that tree anymore. I moved and left it behind. Don’t get too excited about the fruit though. It’s not in my top 100 fruits. The fruit is insipid to the extreme, has odd tough segments that are hard to chew, and there is a mucilaginous gunk that helps hold it together. Most people I know refuse to eat it. Most critters also refuse to eat it. Raccoons, possums, squirrels, birds, skunks, coyotes, turkeys, pheasants, dogs cats, nothing will eat it. The Chinese refer to it as “unwholesome”, and most animals agree with them.
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Thanks!
I will lower my expectation. But at least it’s low maintenance… LOL…
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Your fruit looks nice and clean. Mine always have dark spots on them that makes them unsightly. Being in the SE with high humidity mine would probably benefit from a fungicide spray. I don’t eat enough fruit to justify the effort.
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Anyone growing these varieties of Che:
Hwang Kum #3
California
David Lavergne
Thanks,
Ed
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Che is very low maintenance. It is a very tough tree and a nice ornamental.
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My tree is that size and probably approproaching 15 years old and I still haven’t sampled a ripe fruit… They are still hanging this year, though (and we are expecting mid-30’s this weekend, so it looks like this might not be the year either).
Honestly, though it is a nice tree and I’ve never had an issue with it regarding disease or anything else.
Scott
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If they are unripe
(like)Hawthorns can taste bland try a tea boil for 30 to 45 minutes in a large pot
with water barley covering boil down not on high or a rolling boil medium.
With hawthorn no flavor unless you add sugar, then is better then apple juice
(taste of vanilla)
Worth a shot
Could always dry in a toaster oven , or since it is going to be cold
a oven for 8 hours at only 200 degrees (or 150)
People make jams, but trying to show the least effort method to encourage you to try just throw some in a pot, and forget about it for a hour, and add sugar.
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In zone 9 my fruit did not ripen until late September and October. With fewer heat units it might have trouble ripening in some parts of zones 6 or 7.
Not sure , but Isn’t there a People that add BLACK lava rocks to make more heat units under there trees / vines
I know White rocks would reflect light I forgot how that works with the tree’s though.
wonder if something simple like epson salts (magnesium calcium) would help it’s cheap, and can be used in a bath anyways if not. – or Gypsum it’s cheap as well.
Not sure what do che taste like unripe could you explain?
I know you can kill the grape vines, and eat the “dried sour grapes” A nice treat
I found by myself with my Neighbors concords when the city cut them very early, but
(also some people prepare in the middle east raisin vert moulu for stews )
ghooreh
Not this, but something similar I am not certain, (do not cook Middle east food)
but worth a try to see what they taste like
Some fruits like Indian strawberry have no flavor,
but your supposed to pick early when they have acid I’ve heard.
so you never know may be better (I like Che Taste like a water melon flavor)
some say grafting a male maybe you could ask for some pollen see if those fruits do anything next year , and have a better flavor just idea’s I think sometimes we want fruit out of hand, but doing some easy preparing we find it is better that way as a dried snack, or in a blender with some sugar added (or cooked )
Che tastes like watermelon juice left out for a few days so that most of the flavor has disappeared. “Insipid” is the term most often used to describe che fruit. But the flavor is not the main problem. The larger problems are the tough segments between the fruit and the mucilaginous gunk between the fruit and the segments. And the latex that gets on the fruit if you pick it too early. Meanwhile, in the back of your mind you recall that almost no other animal will eat che fruit, and you start to understand why…
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