Jujube cultivars grown in the US

Did you your planted bare-root trees? How big/small they are? I replanted two jujubes (dug while dormant from a friend’s yard and planted in my yard last month). They are about 4-5 ft tall. They have leafed out since last week.

Jujubes break dormancy later than most fruit trees. Newly planted may make them come out even later. My smaller jujubes broke dormancy a few days later than older trees.

However, you and I are in the same zone 6. KS’s spring tends to be warmer and faster. They should show some green fuzz by now. You may want to scratch the trunks to see if they are green or brown.

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Yes they were bare root. Some of the others that I planted are already leafing out, but just barely. I guess I should probably do a scratch test like you are suggesting… I do that all the time, but I haven’t with these because I don’t want to get bad news! lol

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I just added another cultivar to the list of those being grown in the US. The source of this one is odd. It is growing in my collection of potted trees. I don’t recall ever buying it and don’t recall even seeing the name before, but I have it and it is tagged. The name appears to be “Bang”. There is also a Chinese name for anyone who can read it. It did have some freeze damage at -12 last winter and is very small, but still looks like it might have some fruit this year.

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Abacus has an unusual growth pattern so far. I have not tried the fruit yet but may have some this year. Has anyone grown Abacus?

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All five of my newly planted Jujube leafed out. One has flowers. Has anyone ever let a newly planted Jujube fruit the first year?

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Yes. I let my very small Li bear 8 fruits the first year and it had none the next year. No stunting that I can see. Others have had small amounts of fruit on first year and were fine the next year. I think 8 large fruits were just hard on the tree the first year and it didn’t grow much. Year two that tree grew like crazy but didn’t fruit.

And just because they flower doesn’t mean they will set fruit. They are usually self governing about fruiting.

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Yes, I know… I think this is pretty much the case for any fruiting tree. Thanks for sharing your experience, I appreciate it. :slight_smile:

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Yeah, I think I’m just still in shock by how little fruit I have on some of my trees that had thousands of blooms!!! :grimacing::rage::face_with_symbols_over_mouth:

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I planted two Sihongs from Englands in 2018. I think there was one fruit on one of them last year, but don’t recall eating it (squirrels?).

So Sihong hasn’t been particularly precocious/productive for me. But, until last year they were both pretty small. I should have a better idea this year, now that one has sized up (the other is growing, but still a bit small for production).

Trees you plant bare root have probably been stored in frefrigerated conditions, so they could be a bit further off from leafing out than trees which have seen warming weather in your yard during Feb/March. That said, everything should be leafing out by now :slight_smile:

One in a while, but not that often. I had 2 trees do it last year- Redlands and Russian #2 (both from ChineseRedDate nursery). Redlands made 2 fruits, one quite large and Russin #2 made 3, all of which were very tasty. But, 90%+ of the time I don’t get anything the first year. Sometimes is is year 3 or 4 before I get anything. Other times, I’ve gotten a decent amount in year #2. The above is with decent sized (1/2" or greater caliper) trees. Tiny ones (like the ones shipped in 1 gallon pots) have taken me 4-5 years.

I’ve never heard of Bang or Abacus- I’ll be interested in how they do for you!

I wonder if this is more a matter of how many trees they have planted already. With 1000’s (or more) of acres of jujubes planted, there are lots of chances for a limb sport.

On the other hand planting crosses takes a dedicated effort. Even selecting seedlings requires space for them and leaving the seedlings to grow.

Any idea if the bud mutations are all that different from the parent variety? I know there are a bunch of mutations for popular US apples (earlier ripening Fuji, redder, but more flavorless Red Delicious, etc).

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I’ve done some limited research on the differences found in bud mutations, very limited, because it’s difficult to find any information about many Chinese cultivars at all, but that information suggests that some bud mutations produce very similar fruit, and some bud mutations produce very different fruit with differing levels of productivity. I do have a photo of a very different fruit from a bud mutation next to the original, but am having trouble locating it. Basically the fruit has a different shape. You would never guess they came from the same tree.

I found a bud sprout on a Chinese chestnut tree and it was surprising how different they were. The new growth was nothing like the original at all. The original tree had large irregularly shaped nuts with different sizes, odd flavor, low productivity, and low flowering. The new sprout had regularly shaped nuts, mostly the same size, with excellent flavor, heavier productivity and much heavier flowering. The new sprout also had a very erect growth pattern instead of the orchard type growth pattern of the original tree.

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Yeah, I only have one cultivar from that entire page (Dongzao), which hasn’t produced yet for me, though it is getting big enough that I think it could this year.

Prof Yao has several from the Jinsi series, but AFAIK, none have been release. From her descriptions on the NMSU site, their fruit sounds similar except for size (Jinsi 2 and 4 are smaller). The notes indicate that they are all recent imports and probably need more evaluation here.

Yeah, if I found a bud mutation like that I would just assume I forgot to label a graft :slight_smile: But I suppose most farmers have rows of the same cultivar, so something different would really stand out.

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This is what I see on my SC. 7 foot tree, many blooms with just a handful of fruit set. I think it was the month of rain driving pollinators away.

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Yep. Me too. And I don’t see any fruit on my 7 foot sugar cane. Spotty fruit set on Li. Poor fruit set on SiHong. XuZhou is absolutely covered in fruit. Redlands#4 has good fruit set. Another Li has good fruit set and the others have very little to NONE. Like you said it rained EVERY DAY!!

And what goes on with them that some trees are loaded with fruit and others have none. My Redlands has been stingy…more last year than the year before. Lots of fruit this year.

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Katy, I’ll have to seek out Redlands #4 then. Interestingly, my large in-ground HJ set many fruit. My smaller HJ (2 yr old in container) finally woke up this past week. Go figure.

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My large Honey Jar has set a few. Not sure yet how many. I’m sure some of the Redlands may drop but there is enough to allow for that.

I got Redlands in 2018. It put on a few fruit in 2019 that were unimpressive. 2020 it had 20 or so fruit that tasted so much better that I grafted a couple of them this year. I’m anxious to taste them this year and looks like there will be plenty of them.

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Some of my jujubes have definitely been alternate year bearers in the sense that they would alternate heavy production with light production from year to year. Sherwood definitely alternated heavy and light years. GA 866 seemed to as well but I’m not 100% sure because I didn’t pay as much attention to it. Shanxi Li seemed to alternate also. Autumn Beauty didn’t and seemed to be the same every year. It’s more noticeable when they do this when they are older but I wouldn’t be surprised if that do it at a young age as well.

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I think my Sihong may be doing this too. Last year was a good fruiting year but much lighter load this year.

I have been unable to get R4T3 to fruit. Is it a stingy bearer? I think this year I may finally taste an Orange Beauty. I grafted a piece of it into an older tree last year and there are a few fruitlets. :crossed_fingers:

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I’ve never grown R4T3

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My R4T3 has been an alternate bearing tree since it started fruiting. Mine is in an absolutely awful place (against a wooden fence between my house and a neighbor’s house.

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I have a grafted branch of R4T3 (from a scion that you sent me a few years back). It always seems to set well and then drop a lot of immature fruit at various stages and sizes before they can fully ripen. I’ve only ever had a couple fruit that managed to ripen completely, and they were good tasting but not great.

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