Jack - Can you summarize your experience with Jujube's and how and where they might fit into a wildlife planting and deer?
I need something to think about on the deerstand this year. Been thinking about hybrid hazelnuts and direct seeded chinkapins. I don't know enough about Jujube to decide whether to add a handful or not. I'd be planting zone 6 in central PA.
Sure. I consider Jujube an experimental wildlife tree, but I'm coming to think of it as useful long-term tree for some wildlife applications. I got the idea from an article David Osborne published in Quality Whitetail magazine. You can look that up for general information on Jujube. I selected Tigertooth because of the later in-season drop as well as the fact that it was supposed to be self-fertile. With some varieties, you need to have have multiple varieties that bloom at the same time.
It took quite a few years for mine to produce fruit, but now that they are producing, they are pretty consistent. With the late cold snap this spring, I got no chestnut production and OK persimmon production. My tigertooths produced pretty well. I started with a half dozen trees. A couple got stunted. I think it was gly drift so I replanted them the following year. I eventually regrafted these over to other varieties, but they did not do well. They are still alive, but not growing or producing like the Tigertooth.
I've taking root cuttings and successfully propagated trees, I've also dug up suckers. In both cases, I found trees will produce fruit on my deck if grown in rootmakers. I'm told it is because of the root restriction. It took my bare root trees many years to produce. When I plant them in the field, they don't grow well. I have not protected them, so I'm thinking it is browse pressure. I will protect the next few I plant. I have not tried to grow trees from seed, but I plan to do so this year.
Deer love the fruit and browse the tree which surprised me because they are a bit thorny which I thought might provide protection. Turkey eat it as well. I've seen them fly up to grab fruit or knock it down and then fight over it on the ground.
I bought mine from JustFruitAndExotics in Florida before they changed hands. They were grown on their own roots. This is important in a wildlife setting as they tend to put up suckers and the roots can sucker quite some distance from the tree. Most grafted jujube are grafted to wild (or sour) rootstock. It evidently does not produce the quality or quantity of fruit that the grafted variety produces. It tends to sucker. This is not a problem if you keep the area mowed, but in a wildlife setting a field could get abandoned and not mowed. You would end up with a thicket of thorny trees with little if any fruit. By buying tigertooth grown on their own roots, I avoid having thickets of wild jujube. They still sucker, but the suckers will produce the same fruit as the parent.
I made the mistake of amending the holes when I planted these bare root trees. My soil is heavy clay. When the trees got larger, some blew over. I found the roots had not infiltrated the clay and stayed in the amended hole. I ended up righting the trees that blew to an angle, staking them, and then mounding native soil over the roots. This seemed to work. I had a couple that did not blow askew, and I mounded native soil so they don't. They are my best producers although some that were righted are now producing.
I can't speak to zone 6b. They do seem to leaf out later than most trees in my area, so I doubt a zone or two would have a major affect, but I can't speak to zone hardiness from personal experience beyond 7A.
I'm glad I planted them, and I'm beginning to consider Tigertooth a successful long-term wildlife planting for my area. They are not quick to fruit. I'd classify them along with persimmon seedlings in that aspect.
Thanks,
jack