I haven’t seen “Prunus Mume” aka “Ume Plum” aka “Flowering Apricot” discussed here and mostly just want to share with you all and also curious if I am the only one on here growing it? It’s a very pretty tree that wakes up very early in the season when it’s still cold and it gets covered in flowers when all the other trees are still bare. It’s also the blossoming tree you can find in some East Asian calligraphy / art.
Probably one of the most vigorous trees I’ve grown. The amount of growth it puts up is ridiculous and it doesn’t care about being in the pot (although it will outgrow it extremely fast). Below is the photo of a several year old tree that I planted a few months ago bareroot, it only had trunk at that time with all branches cut. All this new growth happened in something like 1 month.
Next year I am hoping to gather some actual fruit from it. They are usually picked green and then you can pickle or ferment the fruit into a very tasty syrup or keep fermenting it into alcohol.
I’m growing a clone called ‘Matsubara Red’. So far I love it aesthetically, but haven’t had fruit yet. It appeared to try setting fruit the last couple years, but then they’d abort so I’m not sure if it was due to late freezes or just stress from aphids which were bothering it enough to cause leaf deformities. I’ve got the aphids under control now and am hoping to find out one way or the other in the next year or two if I’ll be able to get fruit from it.
The aphids are interesting. I have 4 trees of 3 different varieties. 2 of them were completely unaffected but 1 specific kind started strong this year but then got completely munched up by aphids.
As for fruit, I just haven’t had a “normal” year yet so don’t know the results. Last last year, they were too tiny to produce. Last year I failed to negotiate with my 2 year old daughter who couldn’t resist the temptation to “harvest” them when they were tiny. This year I miscalculated due to their super early wake up time and transferred them into soil (from pots) when they were already heavily blooming. They dropped all the blossom after that.
I have a small one I’m growing as an ornamental. They are uncommonly grown in my area for their early blooms. I doubt they ever set and keep much fruit in my climate, if any.
Mine has been plagued by deer and got hit hard by aphids during the “aphid window” we have in spring when the weather is right for them and the predator insects haven’t shown up in force yet. I suspect it’ll be years before I see any blooms.
Just curious - have you tried ladybugs? A nursery next to me has a fridge full of ladybugs. Allegedly you can buy them, put them under the trees and in the morning they will wake up, and will be very hungry. I am a little sceptical if it’s an effective solution but I am also super curious to try just to see what happens.
We have ladybugs already. And plenty of other predators like assassin bugs and stuff. Once those populations wake up and are active with warmer weather, the aphid problem goes away. It’s just during a window of warm weather before that when aphids are a big issue.
Granted, I could release captive-reared ladybugs to get a population going early, but that strikes me as more effort and money than I’d rather put into something that’s being grown as an ornamental and that is supposed to be relatively care-free, especially since ladybugs would for sure be hit-and-miss.
I have the pink and white ume planted from Trees of Antiquity, I’m not technically an apricot region but I do have success with some of the newer apricot cultivars for the east coast. My ume trees flower profusely but the fruit set is about as poor as a bad apricot, just a few fruit per tree. I haven’t been able to taste any yet as I’m always out of town during their ripening season.
Oh man I am worried if I get a crop now. I do see this fruit sold in grocery stores sometimes and it’s usually from CA so I am hoping they will produce here in WA too. Will report next year if I manage to harvest anything!
If it’s not raining too heavily and you don’t get a late freeze you’ll probably get some fruit. Once you’ve got the aphid predators established, from growing something that attracts them the year before, they probably won’t be a problem except on very young plants. You can spray with water (or soap water) to knock them down or pick them off for a week or two and then the predators swoop in and drop their population to insignificant levels the rest of the year.
I’ve never heard of people netting for aphids, but if you’re establishing a new plant it might help. Possibly spray just that plant with insecticide before netting.
The cultivar I’d seen mentioned here before was Shiro Kaga or Shaa-Kar-Pareh or some other (probably) misspelling from the nursery trade.
I saw the green fruits at an Asian grocery store for the first time this Spring, but didn’t buy any. They were small and green as you’d expect for processing use.
Never heard about Shaa-Kar-Pareh, it probably is some sort of misspelling but I do have two Shiro Kaga-s and they are probably the most vigorous out of them all. It’s also the one that attempted to set fruit until my toddler intervened the other year.
Hey there! How are you?
I’m new here and i made this account hoping I could get some advice on how to properly care for a prunus mume. I was gonna make a new topic for a post but i came across yours and it mentioned it being grown in a pot, which is what I’m at least starting off doing. I’m growing one to honor someone and she was an avid gardener. This type of tree is my favorite, but I knew that this would be a bit of big territory to work on since I don’t garden much even though I’d love to. Totally fine if you dont answer, I appreciate this post either way.
I’m almost done with the stratifying the seeds, so I was wondering what type of soil was best used and what type of pot? And how often should it be watered?. I tried looking all of this up from time to time but came across some broad answers.
Hello! That’s a beautiful idea, I hope I can help. My experience with the tree has been the following so far:
Doesn’t care about the pot but grows ridiculously fast. I have 3 of them in the ground and 1 in the pot that I want to give away. I procrastinated on this for a year and now have a big tree stuck in a pot, that still somehow thrives.
For pruning, watering, etc, I don’t really do anything special because with the vigor it grows, it’s very forgiving. If the soil looks very dry in summer, I water it.
Had a few disease and pest issues but nothing major. Aphids love it. Also some branches got sick and I cut them; the trees shrugged it off.
Still struggling to get fruit out of it which is another story lol. Otherwise, it’s a beautiful tree!
The issue with giving any more detailed info is that it usually goes something like this: I go to my wife and ask her “hey, what is going on here”, she digs something deep in the Korean internet, and then gives me the answer. I’ll ask her for sources in the evening, hopefully google translate can handle it. But otherwise, it’s been a super easy tree.
I have an ume and this is it’s final chance before I move it. It has hardy grown in three years.
I tried some different things this year. Made sure all grass is away from it. Compost and woodchip mulch.
Moved some wheelbarrows I had as flower planters nearby.
Previously I was unable to do many of these things due to having surgeries, but I’m healed up now.
I have two Ume and I finally got a small crop from it. It’s not a heavy cropper by any means, and the fruit is not desirable fresh, even though I like very tart fruit. I don’t find the blooms more attractive than my other apricot trees. I’ll keep them until they die because they’ve gotten quite large, but I won’t replace them if something happens.
As far as I know Ume fruit is not meant to be consumed fresh - it’s picked green and then there are various ways you can process it, with the strong Ume flavor being the unique sought after feature.
Admittedly, I don’t have an apricot to compare to but as far as the bloom goes, the value is in the combination of a very heavy and very early bloom. Basically when everything still looks dead, this tree will be blooming hard.
