More jujube varieties have been ripening.
Sugar Cane seems fairly large. The tree was labeled as Honey Jar but it obviously isn’t. It’s also my most productive tree. Here are a couple branches completely weighed down with its crop. There are hundreds on this tree.
The first one does not look like sugar cane to me but the fruit on the tree does. Also I don’t have any pictures but the graft that I have labeled as Coco is a rather large fruit. The ones that I’m seeing posted are small like Honey Jar. Do I have a mislabeled graft?
I think maybe it’s the angle of the fruit? They are elongated but not even on all sides if that makes sense. I honestly don’t know if it’s truly Sugar Cane. It was labeled as Honey Jar as I stated above but I think we can all see that isn’t. Maybe you can graft it onto your Sugar Cane and see?
My Coco was purchased from One Green World. They aren’t so large right now but that could change in the future.
Another tree I got as Winter Delight (honestly looks very similar to Sugar Cane), Bok Jo, and a couple branches of Hetian Jade also have very heavy crops. Honey Jar has a decent crop but it might not look substantial because the fruit are small.
I’m thinking my graft may be labeled wrong but then I have no clue what it is and I don’t remember where I got it. 
Whatever it is I have a couple grafted as small trees. Oops……
In the left to right photo, the fruit on the left is not Sugar Cane. It might be Li.
In the tree photo, a few of the fruit have the Sugar Cane shape but many do not. I doubt it’s Sugar Cane. How many thorns on the alleged Sugar Cane tree?
I had looked that picture up. Soooo I’m guessing that what I have as a “Coco” graft may be ??? Li??? But it was smaller than my Li this year although it did ripen about the same time.
I don’t think it’s Li. I can’t figure out what it is. Do you have any new photos of the fruit?
Nope. Will have to wait until next year. It was good. Sweet. I really can’t remember who I got the scion from.
Larger than Sugar Cane and different.
The tree doesn’t have very many thorns at all and they are fairly small if present. It was labeled as Honey Jar which it clearly isn’t. Here are more pictures of the branches ans fruit. It had a very spreading growth form even before being weighed down by fruit. Can we say it’s Li? @castanea For some reason, I was expecting Li to be rounder.
When they are ripe crack on of the pits and see if there are seeds. Li does not have seeds……well rarely but they are usually dried up and non viable if present.
I think it could be @jujubemulberry who has said that jujubes may be one of the most mislabeled fruit.
A big part of it could be because it is most varieties have been imported from China or Korea. Lost in translation is likely a culprit.
I figure I should just be happy if my jujubes taste good even if I don’t know their real names.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that it is Li because several do not have seeds in the pits. It kinda looks like Li to me though.
yeah, winter d, qiyue xian, shanxi li, jin are some that are undergoing some kind of identity crisis…
i actually just noticed that the ‘self-rooted hj’ received from jfae isn’t the same as the hj from Roger M.
that is my approach too, as it can only be frustrating telling which from which. Ended up collecting them from different nurseries and isolate the “winter d” that has the best qualities. 
I’ve been noticing the same thing with Sugar Cane this year. The quality is very inconsistent.
Two different issues:
1.) Soft texture
2.) Not sweet enough
The texture issue is pretty random. It can affect one fruit on a branch and not another. It is also impacting my largest So tree. Note that some of the wrinkled fruit isn’t even fully colored.
Wrinkled So:
In terms of sweetness, most of the Sugar Canes on the 2 trees in my yard are at least moderately sweet, though sometimes I’ll get one that is colored and not as good. But, I have a Sugar Cane at a rental that has gotten pretty large and has a heavy crop. It doesn’t have as many soft fruit, but many of the fruit is only mildly sweet.
I’ve also noticed a slight aftertaste from Sugar Cane. Others have reported it, but I had never seen it before. It isn’t bad, and doesn’t stop me from enjoying the ones which are crisp and relatively sweet.
In contrast, I’ve been picking fruit from 3-4 Honey Jar trees and all are sweet and crunchy. With both fruits at their best the texture of HJ is a bit firmer and denser than Sugar Cane, which has a light-crisp texture. But, HJ seems to be very consistent in it’s texture. I don’t remember eating any duds from it, while SC seems to have a lot this year.
Contorted/So is also having a rough year. Some of the fruit is as good as ever. But there are a lot of fruit with soft texture. I sorted through ~3 quarts of fruit from the other day and half or more of it was soft/wrinkled.
I’m thinking about planting jujube but I’m getting mixed messages on how invasive the roots are…
When I search on this site for keywords there aren’t many comments at all about it but when I read the comments here, I get nervous…
Can anyone help bridge the divide?
They do sucker a lot. This year mine have suckered profusely maybe because we have had more rain than normal. I protect some of mine so I can dig them up this fall to propagate and share those on own roots however all the others we just mow over or even weed eat away.
Bob,
Do your jujubes cracked this year? I say 80% of mine esp. HJ and SC have cracked.
Fortunately, they don’t immediately rot like plums so they are all edible.
Through the rain, HJ is still sweet and crunchy. Sugar Cane is less sweet than usual. It still has some crunch but not as much as previous years.
I am surprised by Shanxi Li. It has been denser (instead of spongy) and sweeter, compared to previous years. I am encouraged by its improved eating quality. Although it is no where near HJ in taste comparison, it makes up with its size.
I was about to reply that I was mostly fine, then looked closely at 10 Honey Jar which I picked earlier tonight. They came from a young tree that I hadn’t gotten fruit from before. 10 out of 10 are cracked, though 9 of the cracks are cosmetic, with only the one closest to my wrist affecting the taste/texture.
I checked another 6 HJ from another tree (there are piles and containers of jujubes everywhere…). 4 of the 6 had cracks, but they were even smaller. All completely insignificant, at least for immediate use- maybe they would impact storage, though I don’t need to worry about that for HJ yet as they will get eaten by tomorrow.
I don’t think I have much cracking on the others, but will take a look.
