Jujubes- Our New Adventure

Interesting Bok Jo bark graft. The 2 branches grew right by the cut with no dormant buds. The dormant bud usually located under the lateral branch.

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Me neither, but I downloaded about 30 of the videos and will see if my wife is willing to translate some of them for me.

Some interesting stuff, both about the varieties, but also about the techniques used, such as branch/trunk girdling.

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My Chinese friends (who are not into growing fruit at all) helped me with some info.

These jujubes are grown in the southwest region of China including Yunnan region. A friend who was from Yunnan said this variety was called Hua Hong in her area.

Panzao is a nickname. Pan means a donut shape. Panzao is a donut shape jujube. Itā€™s like we call Tango, Flat Wonderful, Saturn peaches, donut peaches.

They have not seen this donut jujubes sold in the US. They promised they will tell me if they come across this variety in Chinese supermarkets.

Please let us know what your wife will find out.

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I think I bought 2 wax jambu trees from this nursery (as etsy shop). Both were not true to variety label.

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Maybe, I went there myself and some varieties they donā€™t have it.

This is the first time in 10 years that this Li jujube tree from edible landscaping eat-it.com are loaded from the consistent hot temp in the upper 95s. Good harvest season for sure.

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Iā€™ve got Li at at least 5 sites and a couple of them have quite a few fruit, though I donā€™t think they match yours. At the other three though the set is much lighter. Iā€™ve never been impressed with Li (quality or productivity- at best middle-of-the-road in both). The fruit is large, but is about it.

Now that I think about it, I generally try to have at least one (tree or graft) of every cultivar at my house. I donā€™t think I have any Li though and probably wonā€™t change it.

Edit: Overnight I remembered one that I have at home. Planted in 2018 and it only has a few fruit. Iā€™ve got a couple grafts on it and will add more in the future.

Bok Jo on the other hand has continued to hold a heavy set. Even the young tree I transplanted has more than I expected. Hereā€™s an updated pic of a Bok Jo graft at a rental where the fruit has started to size upā€¦

Iā€™m also excited to taste Dong (Winter) jujube. Iā€™ve heard good reports on it and am looking forward to it.

And yes, I took that pic looking straight up and will need a ladder to pick itā€¦

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Great report there Bob. I grafted a total of 6 Bok Jo because you said they are real productive and have super large leaf.

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I ate some brown Li for the first time,I think they are just like store bought. In fact you canā€™t buy them now. I donā€™t see them at local groceries store at all. Pretty tasty. I might give some of these away to people at the senior center. My trees from Home Depot are more prolific than the ones from Raintree nursery, actually even tastier, maybe they are more mature.

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Here are the baby fruits on the Bok Jo graft from 6 weeks ago.

Same for Honey Jar

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Yes, but what do they look like now? Not all jujube fruit hangs on. Itā€™s good in that they seem to self-thin, unlike Asian pears which expect you to do it for themā€¦

Hereā€™s a current pic of the Bok Jo that I transplanted this spring. Itā€™s about 8ā€™ tall. The tall trees in the background across the street are actually on the North side, so it has good sun exposure

Closer pic of the fruit:

Hereā€™s a pic of an older So (not the oldest So from 2011, this one is from 2018) which is close by. The rootstock which became the above Bok Jo was planted at the same time (Jin Chang from Englands, but scion died and BJ was grafted on in 2020).

Note how bush-like the So is. I have some other Soā€™s which are similar in form, though eventually they can get tall if you donā€™t prune them.

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I like your stone wall, very nice.

Nice looking jujube trees Bob. Yes ,there are more baby fruits now but I am hoping they will ripen in time before Winter. I know Honey still taste great at the green stage. Btw. I got a few So grafts the source is from JFE that take. Hopefully they look like your and taste good in a few years at my new home next Spring.

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Hereā€™s the one planted in fall 2011. I should really bring the ladder and extension loppers over and cut the top back a bit. From the ground, Iā€™d estimate it is 15+ feet tall now. Iā€™m hesitant to cut it back too much, as there is a ton of fruit on it. If I have trouble reaching the top from the ladder, maybe Iā€™ll just cut the top as part of harvesting the fruitā€¦

But, even with the excessive height, you can see the wide bush-like form that it tends to take. This one is taking up a big area- last I checked, something like 12ā€™x12ā€™ of ground, not something you would expect if you just hear that So is a ā€œdwarfā€ jujube.

Are you going to be moving a lot of mature in-ground trees? If you do, Iā€™d suggest the hose method (gradually washing the dirt away from the roots). It can take a while- donā€™t plan on having the time/patience for more than 2 trees per day (at least I wouldnā€™t want to spend more than 3-4 hours that way), but the results have been very good.

My stone wall in the pics is more a stone pile which is close behind the Bok Jo. The ā€œniceā€ one is the neighborā€™s retaining wall across the street (which is why there are shade trees on it- I got rid of all of those from my yard). There are some nicer walls in other parts of the property though (a lot of elevation change).

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Bob, great idea about using the hose to wash away the dirt. My original idea is to wet the dirt around the tree the night before sometime in late October then dig a good size hole until I get the majority of the roots then hook up a tow rope around the base of the larger tree and gently pull it out with my large Toyota Sequoia. :grinning:. Btw, The So taste is not too far from HJ and Bok Jo is that right?

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Are they dormant by late October for you? We donā€™t have our first frost until around November 1st, so Iā€™d want to wait a bit more. But, it may get cold for you a bit earlier.

Honey Jar is hard to beat. The first So to ripen each year usually have a few duds. The rest of the So have some juice and a crunch. Honey Jar is a
lighter crisp, while So is a denser crunch. To use an apple analogy, Honey Jar is Honeycrisp (or maybe Zestar would be more accurate) and So is Fuji. So also has a hint of acid.

I would put So and Bok Jo on the same level, without the early duds. At the end of the season last year, some of the So grown on a very healthy tree at a rental were among the best jujubes Iā€™ve ever had. But, normally Iā€™d rate them a ā€œvery goodā€ vs ā€œexcellentā€ for Honey Jar.

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Usually the first frost here is toward the end of October or the first week of November. I got so many trees inground that I want a head start of moving them this year to avoid frozen ground in early March 2023. My total jujube trees count for the new house is around 30. I think your are around :100:. Great Vitamin C source for sure.

Tony I dug up a couple older jujubes and it was a huge amount of work and I lost most of the roots. I would look into the price of getting someone with a backhoe to do itā€¦ if they had a per hour rate it might not be so bad. You get a lot more roots with a backhoe.

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Great idea Scott. I will check it out.

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My house has around 50. The other 50 are at other locations (rentals), with none having >10. Moving 30 trees will take a bit of time. Hopefully some of them are a bit smaller. Youā€™ll have the technique down by the end and can give hints. One (perhaps obvious) thing I learned early on was to wash in such a way that the tilt of the ground would let the water-dirt flow awayā€¦ie donā€™t try to push the dirt uphill with the hose :slight_smile:

Of course, after you are done, there is a pile of dirt to shovel back into the hole. You may have a bit of fixing to do in your lawn for the new buyer and probably need to list the trees as excluded when you sell.

One other thought- any roots you do lose (and a few always get broken, no matter how you do it) can be used to make new trees. I grafted scions directly to roots and it seems to work relatively well. Best with the bigger ones, though it does make for a large pot (maybe that is part of why it worked better).

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