What's the verdict on Honeyberries...are they tasty?

I do have a paper map, and you are right, they are very helpful.

I was on vacation when the plants were delivered though. The person taking care of them said they were wrapped up in plastic, and I was worried that wouldn’t be good for them, so I told him to take the plastic off. Unknown to the both of us, the plant labels were wrapped up in the plastic, not in the pot or attached to the plant (except for one). So when I planted them, I didn’t know the variety name, just matched the together by size. So I’ve got a list of what they could be, but it’s going to be a guessing game until I figure out what they were. My choices are : Blue Hokkaido, borealis, Keiko, taka, Strawberry Sensation, and Tana.

Interestingly, two of those plants bloomed alot later than the others.

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Yeah, a paper map won’t help mistakes that can’t be helped like that. I am missing labels from plants that I held over from last year. They were moved around by someone other than me and apparently the labels were falling all over the place in the containers. :person_shrugging:t4: Oh well, nothing I can do about it but try to figure it out once they fruit.

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I’m going to do a “Guess which variety honeyberry this is” thread once the fruit is ripe. :grin:

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I am also grappling with this dilemma. I already have concrete 2.5 m pillars for my vineyard. I would like a net that would work against birds as well as against hail. For now, I scare away the birds, but I don’t stand a chance against larger hail.

I’m considering doing it similarly to this: https://youtube.com/shorts/MCMXXipRR_Q?si=Nxwe7HYJA684CEcU

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This year, the conditions are ideal for the growth and blooming of Haskap. I don’t remember such good conditions. The fruits are abundant. Unless some disaster strikes, which wouldn’t even surprise me at this point, the harvest will be historic. Right now, I’m fighting against an army of slugs, there are thousands of them. It’s an invasion! I hope I manage to handle it, and we won’t repeat the year 2021 when most of my harvest was damaged by slugs.

Aurora hasn’t fully bloomed yet. The flowers are very large this year. There were no strong frosts during budding or flowering, nor was there dry wind. The flowers were full of nectar and lots of bees. Currently, bumblebees are predominaimportant.

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What to do with so many flowers? I’ve started drying them for now. I’ll see what kind of tea they make.


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outstanding! a problem most honeyberry growers wish they had. looks like a bumper crop year for you. good luck!

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Just to dovetail onto @Vault22dweller identification issue as well …

Is anyone growing both tundra and indigo gem, and know which one has fuzzier leaves between the two? I’m about 80% sure I remember which is which … But a confirmation would be most welcome :grin:

Something is eating my honeberries…and it’s not me. Birds? I have slugs but not at damage level.


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It is most likely the slugs. They bore into the berry. It could be a moth larvae, but that would likely damage the leaves too. Slugs are connoisseurs.

Tis the season ! :sob::rage:

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Photos from 4/8/2024



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Which variety? Looks nice :slightly_smiling_face:

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Aurora and Tundra.

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That quote was from last year around this time. How’s it going?

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Last year’s rooted cuttings were planted in the fall, and as always, I put a shovel of ash under the roots. Now they’ve sprouted and look like this:

Rooted cuttings from last year were planted in 90-liter containers in February. The container has 40 cm of sawdust and a 3-5 cm layer of ash. They were planted in compost with the addition of granulated chicken manure fertilizer. Currently, they look like this:

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In young bushes, the fruits are not only on the periphery of the bush. Here is the flowering of a rejuvenated bush and then the fruits on these bushes.

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The neighbor was already pulling honey from the hives, and his wife says they’ve never had such good honey before. And I tell her, do you know what that honey is made from, since for almost two weeks, I had the buzzing of bees on the bushes, like on a linden tree. That honey is incredibly tasty. Tomorrow I’ll ask for more. It seems that for the most part, the honey is from haskap. The flowers had so much nectar that bees were even sucking from fallen flowers on the ground cover. I even stretched out one flower and tasted the glistening sweet nectar. That’s why they’re called Honeyberries. Maybe the name doesn’t have to do with honeyberries, but with the shrub and therefore the flowers that have a lot of nectar. We recently discussed why the name - honeyberry, since the berries are far from as sweet as honey. The weather during the flowering period was without frosts and dry winds. That had an impact on nectar production and a lot of honey.

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Yes that is the current plan. Do them in pots and I now have 4 new ones. I will be bringing them indoors in the summer so they don’t get fried and put them out for fall through spring.

I mentioned what happened in an earlier post. I was able to keep them alive through the high 90’s to 100F summers but last summer we were above 105F as high as 110F and it killed all of them. This is not too surprising as it also killed an established pluerry and one of my peach trees and they are more adapted to this weather. So now I have four more Aurora, Keiko, Tana and Maxine’s Opus in pots. The plan is to bring them indoors in the summer months to keep them from frying and putting them out fall through spring. The question I was not able to answer is if we have enough chill for them in Texas. By next spring I should have an answer as the ones I bought are 4 year old and two year old plants respectively so fruiting age. If I get fruit next spring then we have enough chill which is around 800 hours here. Will post the results next year.

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