Our lying freeloaders plum trees are putting on a big show.
This is one of the best flower sets but it was really striking to see that the left tree, (supposed to be a pipestone) was pulling in tons of honeybees and other insects. You could actually hear a hum from them all while standing below it.
On the other hand, the right tree, ( should be Toka) had hardly any action going on.
I’ve consistently had issues with these trees not setting fruit and have added a couple of new, other plums to try and get working pollination but now I wonder if there some sort of insurmountable attractiveness gap between them.
Any ideas on how to fix this?
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My gosh, that is an amazing amount of flowers and little fruit set? Wow, I would want to really know the problem. Pollinators? They are beautiful and should be filled with fruit.
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Ive noticed this same occurrence. I have two plum trees with a significant amount of flowers on each. However, most pollinators seem to prefer one tree over the other. Though, they are not within as close proximity as your trees. I have tried placing flowering branches from each tree among the other, but the pollinators actively ignored the bouquets at either tree… maybe grafting different varieties will help.
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Grafting is the next step. I had maybe thought to start trying this year but wasn’t organized enough. It goes on the list for next year!
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I noticed the same. Between bavays gage and Mount Royal, Mount Royal won by far. Wonder what the deal is?
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Still no good fruit set. There is a bit on the Toka, but you are right, it might be self fertile.
Not sure if any of the thin set will make it since there is curc pressure and we might have drought again this summer.
I’m leaning towards taking out those freeloaders. ( we have to have a spruce removed so they may come out at the same time)
I had an extreme amount of flowers on my plums yet had little fruit set, most of them. Some set ok not great. Lavina set heavy. I feel it is environmental. But no matter what caused it for some reason my pluots set super heavy. I have been thinning for two weeks and discovered more fruit I didn’t thin the other day. Almost every pluot that sets here did so in large numbers. Except for those known for low setting like flavor supreme in the east. They just do not work here. Flavor queen sets poorly too. So those Southern California fruits just creamed the local plums like Toka. Knocked them out in the first round. Extremely impressive
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Was this just for this year or are you taking more generally? I haven’t seen pluots I our local nurseries and assumed z6 was too cold for them looks like maybe not. What are your reliable stone fruit producers? I just planted a methly given that it seems to be a productive tree.
Honeybees are extremely picky, which is what makes them such great pollinators. when one is set on going after a particular nectar such as apple, it will forego all other flowers until that particular nectar is exhausted. This works great as it ensures that a given species will get the attention it needs across trees. My guess is that your trees are different enough that the bees are not registering them to be close enough to their palates
You could encourage other pollinators such as mason and carpenter bees. You could plant haskaps that flower well before your plums, it will attract a lot of bumble bees that would be happy to jump into plums right after. You could aways cut a flowering branch and gently dust your other trees with it.
I have been growing 4 pluots for 8 years. In recent years I added more. Dapple Dandy produced its 3rd year and produced every year except one when all fruit buds on everything were frozen. Very reliable. Geo Pride is new but has produced well. Both of these are excellent fruit. On plums I don’t have a lot I like. Superior and Lavina produce well. None of the others do. Maybe Inca. My favorite is Santa Rosa, low production though. I’m all in on the pluots. Dapple Supreme is fantastic. I have had three or four people taste Dapple Dandy and tell me it the best plum they ever had. Dapple Supreme is sweeter I can’t wait to try more. Fall Fiesta and Flavor Finale needed to be thinned heavily. I have found out the hard way if you let them overset the fruit is mediocre at best and the tree will produce zero to few fruits the next year. If you thin hard the fruits are fantastic. Fiesta and Finale ripen super late. I leave them on to just before the first hard freeze in late October or November. Finale was amazing last year. First time it fruited. It had 4 fruit only. I picked two when it looked ripe. It was somewhat ripe but very boring. I decided to leave the other two. I forgot about them. I was doing winter prep and noticed them. Wow they were so delicious. . . .
I control fungal and insect problems here. Pest pressure is moderate here. If you grow under other conditions my experience tells you little. Maybe at what to look at. But success may not be there. Like I don’t have to worry about brown rot prone fruit. It’s easily 100% controllable here. Not so in most places. I’m in southeast Michigan zone 5b/6a.
I’ll try and post results and ratings at the end of this season.
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We have a pretty big range of pollinators. I’ve had a large run of haskap for nearly 10 years. Strawberries, sour cherry, Saskatoon, kiwi, apricots, pears and lots of perennial flowers and herbs. The daffs and haskap are a bit before these plums. They tend to go in sync with the apricots and strawberries.
Strangely enough, the Italian plum has set a ton on its own. 
A friends father had a matching pair, about a 1/2 hour drive from here, and wanting to have my own set mostly got me into the serious fruit growing so they are extra disappointing.