Yeah, I think he will only send up to the three gallon pots. He had a 7 gal. early golden persimmon for $20. I tried everything to get him to send it.
The Winter Delight from JFaE I planted last June is up to 6’ now. I took some pics today:
The Honey Jar from the same time is a bit shorter- just under 5’ and has about 10 fruit on it as well. I didn’t check the Sugar Cane today, but from what I recall, it is about the same size as the HJ, but only had 1-2 fruit.
Thanks for all the pics. Looking at yours I can see it will be many years before they can stand up to a deer. I have a Li near the house and it looks like they will all need to be near the house. Might be nothing to the average person, but I get about $100 in damage from deer every year. To me the info you are giving me is saving me big money. Thanks.
The Li I bought locally a while back in 7 gal pot. They had Lang to, but you never hear anyone excited about their Lang harvest. If you did not have trees would you buy some Langs to eat?
Yes, at a absolute minimum, I think you’d need to protect it for 2 years. And that is if you give it full sun, good soil, plenty of fertilizer and enough water. In poorer conditions, it could be within deer range indefinitely.
Even having trees, I’d do it at least once. I have a Lang (even after the JFaE one died), but I just planted it last year, so I’ve never eaten them. I’d want see how they are. And when I see fruit for sale the the cultivar name, it makes me more likely to buy it, just to add a datapoint 
Besides, I don’t get enough jujube from my trees yet. Also, my season doesn’t start until mid September, so my wife has been buying (iffy quality) jujus from Chinatown for a few weeks now.
Next time you see a good sized one, you could buy it and graft a different (likely better) variety on top.
I already have a few seedlings that I am experimenting with. If the fruit sucks I will be trying to graft them. The deer not only eat them, but when in the rut they plow them into the ground with their horns often snapping the tree in half. That’s how they get the felt off their horn. Needless to say two or three snapped in half adds up quickly. Even with fence cages they still find ways to get at them.
They were bigger than 3 gal, but I think they were a bit less than 5. I’ll check to see if I still have the pot nearby and and give you a more precise value. The Contorted was good size and had fruit on it, while the Lang was a bit thinner than I would have liked. When I ordered, I think they were the only 2 varieties that were in stock.
They are out of all jujubes. They have some 4-5 foot pears and 3-4 foot persimmons I’m interested in. Was it packaged to take a beating along the way.
Yes, they were well packed. There is a pic of it in the box in this post:
@BobVance Bob well just put a lot of things on sale half off. No advertisement. You have to dig through and find them. I’m scooping up several pears. They have an ayers for $11 and others for $20. Sweet deals.
Thanks for letting me know. I’m not adding many trees right now, so I don’t see anything I really need (just one last try at an apricot, as a good spot opened up for it and of course jujube).
According to their website, they still have Lang and Contorted, though they aren’t cheap at $69.50.
Already know about lang. What is contorted hitting on? They have a goldkist apricot for $20.
I was looking at the Gold Kist, but they say “Excellent backyard apricot for warm winter climates.” and it is zone 7-10. Hardy apricots die pretty quick for me, so I’m not going to try to stretch things. I’ll add either one the Har series or another Tomcot (I’ve lost several, but the fruit was very good…).
I’m not sure what you mean by hitting on? Contorted (also known as So) has a zig-zag branch structure. It makes good fruit and has been productive for me. The Contorted I got from BW actually had fruit already on it in the box. But, Contorted isn’t supposed to get quite as big as the other jujube varieties. But, even with pruning, my oldest So is at least 12’ tall (I’m going to cut it back this winter).
Gold Kist is a very early bloomer, which would be a problem in any location with spring freezes. Also, the fruit quality is subpar, just ok for jam, useless for fresh eating.
1 Like
Hello and good evening,
I just came to this forum searching for jujubes. It seems to be very informative conversation you guys have here.
Just curious, how come you like jujube? I heard they are medicinal.
Could you please suggest if you or anyone credible sells seeds to start jujube trees? Can it be done, growing jujube trees from seeds?
Thank you
Hi Sam. Jujubes, at least the best ones, are like smaller versions of apples, with a pit (like a cherry), instead of a core and have about 2X the sugar/sweetness of apples. They can also be grown (at least in the US) without fungacides and pesticides, which puts them ahead of most common fruits.
I suspect you may be thinking of wild jujubes. The ones that are small and sour. I actually like some of them (like a tart candy), but can see why people might not.
It can most definately be done, but it is a much longer path to fruit. If you get a good sized (5/8-3/4" caliper), you might be able to get some fruit in a couple years. Maybe even the first year in a good (high sun) climate. But a seed takes far longer. Recently, I got the first fruit from a seed I planted in 2016, 6 years for 3 fruit (which were very good). And that is one of the best, of the dozens of seeds I planted. Most died, and the few others that produced fruit had poor/small fruit. So while growing from seed can be interesting, kind of like @SkillCult is doing for apples, it isn’t a good path to take if you just want to get some fruit.
If you aren’t dissuaded by the above, I can send you some pits. You’ll need to use vice-grip pliers (or similar) to crack the pits and get to the small seed.
2 Likes
oh, wow. I didn’t realize it could take 6 yrs. I will think… What about rooting cuttings, does this method have a better chance of success?
Rooting cuttings is a pain and has low success. I’ve tried several times and the best time I had 2 which seemed to take out of 12, using Tony’s method (live softwood cuttings in enclosed containers- dormant wood doesn’t work at all). They both eventually died within about 6 months.
Easiest way (still not easy) to make a new tree is to dig up suckers and graft to them. Another good way is to transplant a mature tree, then search around and dig/pull a bunch of roots that got left in the ground. Those roots can then be directly grafted to. I did this some last spring and had good growth out of some of the resulting trees (the ones with larger roots).
3 Likes
Bob need a quick question. Did Ubileen ever come around for you? Is it worth grafting?
I wouldn’t want to completely disparage Ubileen, as it has some nice qualities (very early, vigorous grower, and pretty productive, with large fruit). But if I had it to do over I wouldn’t plant it. It is early, but very hard to pin down when it is ripe. Even when I get it right, it isn’t really high enough brix for me. I should probably graft over it, but I haven’t really spent a lot of time on Euro pears.
Three that I like are Harrow Sweet (massively productive, good quality, mid September),Glou Morceau, and Passe Crassane. The last two are “winter pears”, large, late keepers with high brix and lots of flavor.
I think Magness was good the year before, but this past year there was very little set. It’s never been that productive.
I’m still not really that focused on pears, but someone asked me recently about them and I’m mostly re-using my answer 
2 Likes