Home Gardening

Trees and shrubs that produce edible fruit
Mississippi Gardens Newspaper and Web Column - July 11, 2005

A time or two in this column, I have mentioned my goal of filling my small fruit garden with trees and shrubs that produce edible fruit. That is, those that require minimal pesticides and management. Unfortunately, many of our traditional tree fruits require way too much effort in the form of pruning and spraying for disease and insect pests. Even with the best management, successful harvest of peaches, plums or apples is never guaranteed.

So far, I've planted blueberries, blackberries, persimmon, pineapple guava, quince, loquat, pomegranate, chestnut and banana. Eventually, I plan to add muscadine. Currently, we are also rooting some goumi berry (Eleagnus multiflora). It's a woody shrub that produces small fruit about the size of large blueberries and picked at about the same time...great for jellies.

One of my most recent additions to the fruit garden is the Chinese Date (Ziziphus jujube). This plant is relatively new to me but has actually been in cultivation in China for about 4,000 years with over 400 cultivars! Seedlings inferior to the Chinese cultivars were brought to the U.S. prior to 1840. It wasn't until the early 1900's that USDA brought in some of the improved Chinese cultivars that we have today.

The Chinese Date, or Jujube, is a small shrub or deciduous tree that may reach 40 feet in Florida, smaller in California. It has small oval leaves of one or two-inch length and glossy green. Branches grow in zigzag form, often with thorns. Some cultivars are thornless. Flowers are small, inconspicuous, white to greenish-yellow and slightly fragrant. Fruit shape varies from round to elongate and similar in size to kumquat.

Chinese Date tolerates many soil types but prefers well-drained sandy soils and is reported to grow in areas of high salinity or alkalinity. Heavy clay soils that are poorly drained should be avoided. Little or no fertilizer is required and pruning is not essential for plant performance. The plant root suckers extensively, but can be controlled by mowing.

My jujube tree was a root sucker from a tree that is several years old. It's about 12 feet tall and bears loads of fruit without any disease or insect pressure whatsoever. The fruit starts out green (immature). As it ripens it turns yellow green with mahogany-colored spots, then fully red at maturity in mid to late summer. The best time to eat the fruit fresh is between the yellow green and red stage while it is still crisp and sweet. The fruit can be dried as well for making tea. Recipes are available for jujube cake, candied jujubes and jujube syrup.

There are a number of cultivars for early, mid or late season ripening. Examples include 'Li' (early), GA-866 (mid) and GI-1183 (late). Plants are suitable for USDA hardiness zones 6-9 and produce fruit without cross-pollination. Happy gardening!

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These archived columns were written by Kerry Johnson, a hobby gardener, former weekly newspaper columnist and an Area Extension Horticulture Agent for 11 coastal counties in Mississippi.