Thanks @ramv. I know of the location of at least one other fruiting tree grown from seed on Van Island. I’ll try chatting more with Bob. My tree is one of his seedlings. Probably 6-7 years old now and no flowers yet.
Glad you liked the podcast!
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One thing I want to add to this discussion is that I have maybe 2 dozen loquat trees/as many varieties and they all flower and fruit in the Seattle area. There is nothing special about these trees.
I have yellow and white varieties from around the world. All my varieties are grafted except 1, which is also flowering this season.
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Didn’t you mention previously that you sometimes have to protect the flowers in order to get fruit?
The ‘Shambala’ I got from you is actually flowering now (in my greenhouse) and so I’ve been disturbing the flowers a bit to shake pollen around in hopes it’ll set fruit. While there is only one flower cluster blooming right now, I recently noticed a second cluster just starting to form. With its reputation for an extended flowering season, I’ll be very curious to see if any additional clusters form later.
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Do you have it planted in the ground inside your greenhouse or a container?
It’s in a 3gal pot.
Yes, they have to be protected at temperatures below 27-28 F. But they only fruit in spring - not now.
Some people assumed that the Chinatown tree which fruit every year had some genetic uniqueness but the podcast revealed that wasn’t the case. It is just in a very good micro climate.
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Why was the internet telling me they don’t do good here because they fruit in December 
maybe I’ll get a true too…
There is plenty of misinformation on the internet. Our two most cold hardy loquats stayed outdoors last winter, never even lost their leaves, and it must have went down to at least 13 degrees last winter. New leaves formed all winter. The least cold hardy ones, at least the ones I have grown from seed, out of 6 trees only two survived the cold, although by the time that many trees fail to survive, you realize the cold sensitive ones died, and the ones with cold hardiness, basically have the same cold hardiness as each other.
I think that loquat trees are actually amazing in a way, how many non dormant trees could handle so much cold. If a fig tree, or a pear tree ever got hit by as much extreme cold as a loqaut could survive, yet was not dormant just like the loquats are not dormant. Then they would surly die.
loquats form flower buds long before the flower buds actually open in to flowers, and if the buds are closed the buds then can take lots of cold. Just like a pear vegetation bud can, a loquat flower bud waits for warmer weather to open. It’s the flowers themselves and the fruit that can be screwed up by the cold, although some very few varieties bloom a second time in a season, which can make up for damaged first blooms.
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I think loquats are actually hardier than figs as far as cold goes. I’ve had young fig trees in pots get killed in the cold. Loquats get damage but often bounce back.
Biggest danger for loquats is snow - the big leaves get weighed down and can break large branches.
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I was thinking that they were more cold hardy than fig trees, yet I was not sure if they were more cold hardy in very few ways. Clearly in more ways than I was thinking, so that is great to know.
We have only seen one heavy snowfall here in 14 years, so that is not something that I am greatly worried about. Although I am hoping to get loquats growing in NYC, and as you know, they do get heavy snowfalls.
We had one large tree here near University of Washington that was over 30 feet tall. Snow weighed down its branches a few years ago and it broke at the top. They had to do a drastic prune on it to save the tree.
I usually go out and remove the snow that is piled on the branches if there is heavy snow.
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There are also late flowering varieties, such as kanko, tanaka and shambala. Still, you would likely need some kind of protection for consistent fruiting unless you are in a dynamite microclimate. One Green World has all of these varieties growing on their property, and I’ve seen them all flowering abundantly.
I’ve found that growing loquat under an awning against a south facing wall, the same method that I employ for growing avocados, adds just enough protection to keep the temperature above the danger zone for the blooms. My subtropical courtyard has 18 foot ceiling clearance and never drops below 28 F, with 50 gallon rain barrels as heat sinks. It also keeps the rare snowfall off the loquats leaves which, as Ram V points out, is potentially very dangerous for the limbs.
I also have a couple seedlings from the International District tree that Winn sent me. I planted them for a privacy screen, beside various feijoas, along my property’s frontage. The loquat seedlings are now about 6 feet tall with a nice spread. They survived last January’s deep freeze with virtually no damage, convincing me they probably really are hardy to at least 5 F.
I’m in the central Willamette Valley on a southeast facing slope, and we get decent cold air drainage on clear winter nights. Dropping below 26 is not that common, and when it does the temp under a tree’s canopy is often a few degrees warmer than the surrounding atmosphere. Once these seedling loquats start flowering, I expect to get fruit once every few years. If I get it more often than that fine, but I really planted them out front for their aesthetic appeal. Any fruit they end up making I will consider a bonus. For consistent fruit every year I have the one planted under the awning beside the avocados. Plus, I have another specimen planted in the ground inside the citrus greenhouse.
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Kanko and Tanaka are very late flowering and fruiting. Shambala is much earlier by almost one month for fruiting. So it extends the season.
As far as flower buds go, I’ve seen little or no difference between the varieties. There is variation based on micro climate. My in-ground trees were MUCH earlier than potted trees - almost by 1-2 months.
I have over 2 dozen varieties so have a lot of observational experience.
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Yep, you are definitely a deep reservoir of information about growing loquats in the PNW. I had no inkling to grow them up here until I came across your posts on this forum. I just began my journey cultivating them a few years ago. In February I’m getting several plugs and scions from fruitwood nursery: kanko, big Jim and gold nugget.
I’ve found that the awning, which is polycarbonate, adds significant warmth, causing that loquat to grow far faster than the trees without any overhead cover. The tree inside the greenhouse is even more vigorous. It put on 5 or 6 feet during the first summer in the ground. It’s now pushing leaving into the 9 foot ceiling.
Your international tree seedling finally bloomed. Fantastic! How many years did that take?
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Actually the seedling that bloomed is one of another variety called ‘sugar crisp’. It is a white loquat - supposed to be extremely sweet.
It took 8-9 years if I recall. For some reason seedlings look different from grafted trees. They are more vigorous, have a ‘tree’ shape rather than bush shape that grafted varieties seem to have.
I would grow more seedlings if I had room.
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Oh, okay. That podcast about the International district tree was quite informative. The narrator said that tree took a decade to bloom for the Eng family. So it appears I have at least another 3-5 years of waiting before I see blooms on these seedlings. I know of 2 other loquat trees growing close to my place that are doing very well. Much larger than mine, which gives me hope.
All the other loquat specimens I have are either grafted or plugs. Fruitwood calls them ‘seedling plugs.’ Does they mean they are rooted cuttings from a seedling tree? If that mother tree is mature and old enough to already be making fruit when the cuttings are taken, how long will it typically take those plugs to make fruit?
What about the timing of Shambala’s second bloom? Verses other varieties, and including ‘Golden Orb’.
The are actual seedlings, germinated in ‘Plug Trays’, they can take up to about 13 years to fruit, just like other loquat seedlings.
How small do they actually send them out?
Shambala blooms at different times but the bloom buds are set around September of the prior year. So there is no advantage as far as cold tolerance is concerned of this variety. In my experience.
The bloom time also varies for other loquat varieties so there isnt any uniqueness to Shambala. It might be a ‘Florida’ thing. I’ve seen strange things reported in Florida’s climate including very heavy breba production from Col de Dame Noir which doesnt produce a breba anywhere else.
No, Marc told me they are actually from cuttings.
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Sorry to barge in on PNW thread but I have tried to root loquat in the past very unsuccessfully. Have you had success rooting them? Or air layer more likely? I assume the greenwood is what they root, I haven’t tried a ton but I did try pretty rigorous with a few cuttings and all failed pretty quickly.