Why no Yangmei? Chinese Bayberry Questionable rant

I see most of your videos don’t know how I missed that one. If I seen it would have saved me some questions. Thanks Marta you’re the best!

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Thanks for that video @Marta ! It looks like that area is partially shaded. What has been your experience growing the trees in full sun vs part sun? Some of the Chinese texts recommend some shade or shade cloth, at least in the first year, but it looks like Harvey has his out in full sun so I’m unsure of the best practice.

Do you know if anyone has tried some experimentation—growing the yangmei in different pH soils to observe results?

When I plant yangmei trees, I plants them in full sun. This is a volunteer seedling which germinated under other trees

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I don’t know, but I’m sure someone has. I think stateside people know so little compared to mainland China. So likely some is lost in translation. I know how expensive my tree was so I will try to give it optimal conditions at least to begin with. I mulch super heavy to combat our dry beach sand, otherwise I’m constantly fighting dry hydrophobic soil. I’d imagine that makes it acidic enough for feeder roots to be happy. I haven’t done any soil tests but maybe I will this weekend with my home test kit just to see a general area that it is in. I’m sure it’s not exact, but a good estimate.

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I recently found dried yangmei candy at an Asian grocer in my area. I bought some to try and honestly I don’t like the taste.

I’m happy to send you some of you want to try it too.

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I’m confused by that nutrient label.

90g of fruit has 74g of carbs, and yet only 3g of sugars including 3g of added sugars? There’s no way that’s right, unless these berries were picked completely unripe, but even then I’d expect some sugars.

Also, 480mg of salt puts it at exactly 0.5% sodium or 1.25% salt, which is pretty high, a lot of cured meats are around 2%.

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You’ll have to look at info from growers outside China. There’s not much need for Chinese farmers to test yangmei in high pH soils:
image
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969718345868
Most (all?) yangmei cultivation is in the southeast quadrant of the country where soil pH is much less than 6. There’s some karst formations in the south, but even there the soil is fairly acidic.

The oldest tree I know of in California is a single tree in the UC Berkeley botanical garden. Soil pH there ranges from 5.5-6.5, so that high should be fine, which is consistent with the performance of my seedlings in regular potting soil.

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I dunno. I just wanted to give it a try. I’ll send you some if you reimburse the shipping. Shouldn’t be much.

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The offer is appreciated, but I’m going to be tactical and decline. Not because I don’t want to taste it, but because my wife might also want to try it, and if they’re not great she might be a little (a lot) less willing to tolerate my getting the actual plants. :wink:

On the flip side, I’m getting pretty close to being able to negotiate for a greenhouse now that she’s a big fan of sumo mandarins. Haha

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That’s some good strategic thinking!

Laura @a_Vivaldi with that high sodium could be more for cooking dishes with.

I have been looking at yangmei too but the fruit just didn’t look very appetizing. Now they’re sounding pretty good, and my soil is already acid so it seems promising. Great, I’ve found another plant to struggle for decent varieties and rootstock.

Hehe. Since I’m in the area right now, I may also head over to the Rocklin Green Acres to really make them wonder about the sudden demand for myrica californica.

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@CAvocado i had Tony order more they won’t be in until around Thursday. Just a heads up. Save me one please lol

Also Harvey just grafted some I believe over 300 trees now. He has pretty good taste.

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So i just removed and dot rid of the old heavy mix the tree came in. All went well and looked good besides a few grubs and the first picture here had me thinking it’s got RKN. What say you? Root knot nematodes?? @Marta



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Yes, could be or could be not. When we imported yangmei plants from China a few years back, one cultivar was heavily infested with RKN. APHIS did look at them and was fine with letting them in, as these are very common in the CA soils too

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Thanks Marta. It’s too bad the other roots looked so good. I just repotted it and was wondering if I should cut that part off and treat for nematodes but decided to just leave it and put in better soil for now. In a 15g. I’ll just keep it isolated and graft it onto different roots.

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Be careful about ordering from that website, some people have very negative things to say about their experience (didn’t get it, or wrong thing).

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@CAvocado there’s 4 left over there. They all look the same nice and healthy.

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