That makes sense because I had more wood of Big Melon than I did of Porterville. I had very little Porterville wood. But that one fruit does look like Porterville!
I have only sampled Big Melon fruits one year and here was what I thought-
The fruit is very dense, maybe the densest jujube I have ever eaten, but it is still very tasty with a very nice flavor.
I’m sure I mixed them up but don’t know how. If I knew how I guess I wouldn’t have mixed them up! At least the Porterville fruits are recognizable. The largest one of them that looked even more typical has disappeared from my tree along with several other juju fruit (including the Baby Red) and leaves and a few peaches and plums. Never had much problem with critters before but my outside dog didn’t make it very long past her 17th birthday and then this year everything is hungrier because of the heat and drought. I am sooooooo ready for winter.
The largest Porterville fruit I ever grew was stolen before I could even take a photo of it. It was bigger than this one -
I checked it today. It’s over 3’ tall now, but the fruit isn’t sizing up. Well, at least it should be big enough to survive and produce next year.
The fruit on my Porterville graft may not be sizing up, but it looks like the Texas Tart graft at a different rental is. This graft has only put on 1.5-2’ of growth (vs Porterville’s 3’+), but it’s not a bad tradeoff for 8-10 fruit.
The Texas Tart graft is on a very productive Sugar Cane. Lots of fruit on it and it is still flowering- 2nd crop?
On a different tree (a Li) at this site, there is a Norris #1 graft from this spring. Today, I removed a large branch (which didn’t have much fruit on it yet, so I didn’t feel too bad…) which was shading it, so hopefully it continues to size up. I didn’t get too close of a pic, but you can see a curved pepper shaped fruit in the pic. Both Norris #1 and Texas Tart came from Fruitwood nursery. After adding them, I’ve now got all the jujubes they offer, other than Jin (I’ve heard it is more for drying).
The pepper looking fruit of Norris #1 looks neat. Hopefully, it tastes good like Masandra.
Here’s another new variety (Hetian Jade) which is already fruiting. This one is at my house, which makes it pretty uncommon (most 1st year fruiting grafts are at a 2 or 3 of the rentals).
Usually when a graft fruits, it only does so from the old bud on the scionwood. One of the two Hetian Jade grafts actually has a couple fruit on the new growth- the other Hetian Jade graft also has fruit, but only from the bud on the graft wood (still pretty good).
Hetian Jade and Bok Jo are very precocious.
Coincidentally, I have a tree (a So planted last year) at a rental where the two grafts are Heitian Jade and Bok Jo. It will be a race to see which produces first and wins the “most precocious” award.
Edit- I checked and there were no fruit on either graft. But, but had put on good growth, so it is only a matter of time…
I grafted Honey Jar on my Sugarcane back in early May, dormant on green. Scion was a little bigger than the shoot, but it didn’t seem to matter. The scion didn’t wake up until early June, but has now grown 2+ ft and has set fruit!
Updated pic on Sugar Cane at rental…
Closeup:
The Li next to it has a lot of fruit on a few branches (mostly horizontal to 45 degrees) and almost no fruit (maybe 1 per branch) on vertical areas:
The Sherwood has a surprising amount:
Honey Jar at home:
Honey Jar branch with Confetti graft at the end. Normally I’d get annoyed at this branch growing across the middle of the row where I need to walk to mow. But, given how much fruit is on it, I can move it to the side when I mow…
In past years, I used to be impressed with the abundant fruitset on Xu Zhou. But, this year’s weather has been so good that a bunch of other jujus have made XZ seem pretty normal.
Xu Zhou:
Bob you may be able to freeze or dry some jujube fruits this year for later use.
Here is the 3 yrs old Honey Jar green wood cutting that rooted and produced fruits the last 2 years.
Same for Orange Beauty that rooted 3 yrs ago. The fruits formed a little late.
Does Texas Sawmill set fruit in clusters? Bunches of jujubes like grapes would be pretty cool.
I don’t know. This is the first year I’ve had flowers.
Okay. This will be interesting to see how many fruits it wants to set per “cluster”.
Looks similar to the clusters in my post from 2 days ago in the Sherwood pic.
Even though I’ve been watering, I’m getting plenty of fruit drop. For example, here are some of the Shanxi Li are turning dark and dropping:
Some still have decent sets. September Late has produced very little over the years. In fact, I only recall 1 fruit from the 2017 graft. But, this year it still has a decent set.
Two others which have decent (but not great) sets are Autumn Beauty and Alcalde #1. I planted them right next to each other before I knew that they were likely the same tree. But there are 3 other trees (one with half a dozen+ varieties) within 12-15’ of both, so they should get pollination.
Autumn Beauty:
Alcalde #1
The Mature (11+ yr old) So has plenty of fruit. But many of the younger So have lighter sets. Even the old So isn’t quite as heavily loaded as Bok Jo or Honey Jar.
Old So:
Given the choice, Frozen sounds better. Though if I get enough, maybe I’ll try both. Most of the dried jujubes I’ve seen around are from China and I am hesitant to consume them. Not only is there the suspect health record in general, but jujubes have many more pests in China that need to be sprayed for.
why do you think shanxi li is dropping prematurely?
is think the flavors of so, coco, HJ, confetti was similiar did you notice difference in their productivity?
Shanxi Li does that every year. Each time I get excited about how much fruit it has, then it drops a large portion of it. But, last year (year #6 for it) it held onto some fruit, not a heavy set, but a light-moderate one. Prior to that it was usually just 0-3 fruit. Maybe this year will be even more, as it matures.
There are differences in flavor/texture/size from those, though all 4 are pretty good. Of course, the only time I ever got to try Confetti was the few that were on the 2 foot tall potted tree that was shipped to me.
So, I would say that Confetti is pretty precocious, but it may be less productive than Honey Jar. This is based on a small sample size of 2 (2nd year) grafts on a Honey Jar tree. Both have fruit, but HJ has more (maybe 1.5-2X). But, it’s a bit early.
Of the others, it would be Honey Jar, then So, then Coco for both precocity and productivity. My oldest Coco is in year 7 and was just transplanted this spring, so it could be a while before I really know. But, it didn’t produce more than a handful last year and neither did the other Coco of similar age. In a few years maybe I’ll bump up Coco’s productivity, but leave it’s precocity at low (similar to Shanxi Li). But Honey Jar is the hands down winner to getting lots of good fruit quickly. At least in those 4 (Bok Jo is worth considering too).
Standard disclaimer that all of the above is in my particular climate/conditions…
thank you so much! my trees are young and i didnt get to compare them side by side same time so im comparing based on memory. Please keep us updates on their progress.
