I wish you much success. Let me know how it turned out.
1 Like
Try to look for the Russian variety “Vostorg”. It is top with us - Aurora, Blizzard, Honeybee pollinator and from Russian Vostorg. This year I multiplied with green cuttings about 30 pieces from the “Vostorg” variety from the only shrub I have. It is a very fertile variety and the fruits are delicious.
Nearby in Poland, they gradually reoriented more to the Canadian.
They try to keep the twigs vertically for harvesting. The buckles give 4 x 0.5 m:
8 Likes
is that your field? looks great and like a ton of work!
I gave a link to the Kushibab farm in Krakow, Poland. They do not even mention the Polish variety Wojtek and older varieties. On the contrary, this planting is done in 2015 - 2016 from new varieties - Aurora, Borear Beast, Boreal Blizzard, Honeybee, Boreal Beaunty and from the newer Russian variety Vostorg. The planting method was done so that the twigs grew vertically. It’s for machine collection. Interesting with this method of clamps is only - 0.5 m. For these new varieties, the production was higher than 10 t / ha for the fourth year after planting, which is a high yield potential.
It turned out that the highest yields were provided by shoots aged 2-3 years, which is important information, as it suggests that regular pruning and rejuvenation of plants will be necessary for a good harvest.
There is a link to the conference Jagoda kamczacka – WIEMY JUŻ CO DALEJ - Jagodnik, where Dr. Bob Bors pointed out how important the selection of suitable pollinators is to achieve high yields of Haskap. It is also important to place them on the plantation. A ratio of pollinators to the basic variety of 1:10 will be sufficient, or it should be 1: 4, or it will pay to grow berries in two rows, from two different varieties.
4 Likes
has anyone tried placing beehives close to assist pollination? i just started keeping bees this spring. hopefully they survive winter… anyone have vostorg that’s willing to send a few hardwood cuttings?
took a bunch of hardwood cuttings yesterday, no hormone, coir and watered them in well for the winter… not sure if i will get any to root but it was nice outside so wanted to do something…
4 Likes
My neighbor has a lot of hives. They are not far from my bushes. When they bloom, the temperatures are low enough for the bees to want to fly. then I see bumblebees flying. But when the warm sun comes up, it’s a pleasure to watch. Good pollination is very important.
At the end of November, it snowed, but it didn’t last long.
We have a very inverse and temperature stable December. Temperatures are kept stable around 2 ° C.
That’s why I planted about 30 pieces of Aurora and about 30 pieces of Vostorg. I managed to reproduce Vostorg from only one shrub.
Good pollination is the most important factor. As I have observed, bees, bumblebees, wild bees tend to pollinate and thus fly along the line when the plants are closer together and there are more of them. They fly from bush to bush in one row and less from row to row if the spacing between the rows is very large. Therefore, I think it is better to rotate plants of unrelated varieties in one row with smaller spacing when planting. I am doing this when planting new varieties.
6 Likes
this is my oldest haskap, maybe 6 years old and was getting too large for its location between two apple trees so i cut it back to about 1ft tall. cut a trash can in half and put top over it and filled it with topsoil. not sure if i will keep filling it as it grows this summer or just leave the old growth covered with soil…
6 Likes
There is quite a lot of experimentation above. What is the most successful / time efficient method of propagation?
Did the hardwood cuttings in coir work well? Maybe you could just link to your earlier post where your experiment worked well.
softwood in coir works best for me, but ive read that hardwood will work also, I just havent tried hardwood much yet, I do have some going, but its been cold here so I dont have any results yet. I have hopes for hardwood, just havent done nearly as much experimentation with it so far.
1 Like
Did you ever try to graft the invasive rootstock again?
I take hardwood cuttings in late fall/early winter and stick them in an outdoor prop bed. Works great for me. I have about 20 from winter '19-'20 that I let stay in the prop bed instead of transplanting last fall. If I have time, I will transplant them within the next month, if not, I need to get them out this fall so that I can get new cuttings in that space.
I have never experimented with softwood cuttings, but I suspect that that might be too time consuming for me personally. The hardwood cuttings have been no fuss/no must, just stick them in the bed and leave them alone (well, I did mulch them and I try to keep the bed weeded but that’s it). That said, when I get a little more time I’d like to try softwood cuttings to compare the two.
4 Likes
is your prop bed dirt or sand? Do you irrigate at all or just leave them alone, for the hardwood cuttings?
Compost. I mulch with leaves in the fall and try to water if we hit a drought during the summer months, but I’m not real careful about it.
I did try a few times but I’m cutting my scions when they are waking up. I need to get them sooner. I keep forgetting and try by just cutting and grafting on the same day. Haskaps wake up before anything it seems. That graft in the picture I wiped out with the lawn sweeper not even thinking about the graft when fall came around.
Here’s a few pics of one of my prop beds where some of them are growing.
And just for fun, I’ll throw this pic of the black current cuttings that you sent me @TheDerek … thanks again! 
Editing to say I have a bunch of different types of cuttings. What you see in the front in the first picture are several types of basket willow cuttings and currents mainly.
5 Likes
Yes, I have 4 hives in my yard. I’ve never seen a honey bee actually touch a honeyberry. I don’t know why. I imagine they have a more interesting nectar flow somewhere else that they are more interested in.
Right now when I watch the honeyberries in bloom, I see a few bumble bees flying around and hitting all the flowers.
The European honeyberry cultivars- is there any way to get those in the US? The Vostorg looks great.
4 Likes
Bees are funny; once they key on an specific nectar source they will ignore all others until that source is exhausted. Chances are there is something else blooming in quantity at the same time as your haskaps. I do get honey bees in mine, but it seems like bumblebees do most of the heavy lifting.
4 Likes
I only ever saw my caucasian bees on my honeyberries i think the flowers are too deep for regular honeybees and more for bumblebees or mason bees which always cover them.
1 Like
If you have honeybees long enough you learn there are exceptions to every rule you thought you knew.
Today I saw them on honeysuckle vines (native) and ignoring blackberries.
At temps below about 60 most fruiting plants don’t produce nectar…and tht could be the issue with the honeyberries.
Typically, bees look for pollen first, then for nectar as the day warms and wears on.
And as already said, a hive usually is faithful to one source of nectar.
(But, if you have lots of beehives and are observant, you
eventully find one visiting a different kind of blossom entirely than the other hives.)
*That’s how i got to for certain taste honey from poison ivy and it’s pollen once.
2 Likes