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  • From: "MARIE ASHTON" <bwoodtx@verizon.net>
  • To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Plums
  • Date: Sat, 26 Aug 2006 20:02:03 -0500

There is a wide variation in the native plums in this country, although they all sucker and form thickets. Somebody should try to identify all the different varieties. There are red, orange, blue/red, and yellow varieties that I know of; Southeast plums are different from north central plums and southern plains plums are different from west coast plums. They all will produce longer and better than the introduced varieties in the area that they are native too, although the size is usually smaller than the improved plums and all that I know of are clingstone types. You can let them form a small thicket and thin out some of the suckers so there is more light between the plants so they will produce better with more light. The suckering is very easy to control if they are planted in an area that is cultivated. There seems to be little demand for commercialization of native plums for fresh fruit because most people want the freestone European plums (prunes) but they sure do make great plum jam and jelly, it tastes much better than from the improved varieties. The plums native in our area is a small bright yellow plum with a very sweet taste when they are fully ripe but just 50 miles away to the east (more rainfall) the native plums are blue/red and not quite as sweet. These two different plums are growing in very different soil types (sand versus heavy clay loam) and different rainfall.
Regards,
Richard Ashton
Oak Creek Orchard
www.oakcreekorchard.com
bwoodtx@verizon.net
West Central Texas zone 7b/8a

----- Original Message ----- From: <list@ginda.us>
To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Saturday, August 26, 2006 6:27 PM
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Plums


Okay, I'll stand up for purchased cultivars. My uncle, in upstate Ny
(the catskills, zone 4/5) grew plums for several years. All of his
were purchased, and most did well, a few did very well. He gave away
plums to all of his neighbors for years. He didn't treat with
anything, just let the brown-rot-infected and curlicue plums drop and
tossed them into a nearby (non plum) hedge. They all eventually
succumbed to black knot, which had been a minor disease until a bad
drought, after which most of the trees were severely infected, and
the rest died a few years later. I suspect it was the stress of the
drought, but it could also be a coincidence.

Ginda

On Aug 25, 2006, at 11:46 PM, tanis grif wrote:

I add another testamonial for the local wild plums! List recently
had a string
about trying to ID the species, and I'm ashamed to say I don't
recall what we have
here in south-central WI, z4-5. But so tastey they are in the "Is
this legal?!"
group. Fairly reliable bearing & versatile-- jelly, jam, wine.
BUT, also reliably
spreading via root suckering.


--- Lucky Pittman <> wrote:

Same here in KY. I've given up anticipating any
edible fruits from the half-dozen or so European
& Japanese hybrid plums I planted when we first
started our home orchard, 12 years ago.
I've got a number of native P.angustifolia -
Chickasaw plums - that I 'rescued' out of the
cowpasture, and just sort of plunked 'em down in
a spot in the orchard - originally to use as
rootstocks - which I later learned was a mistake,
as they sucker like crazy; but, they're very
reliable with regard to fruit production -
they're not large fruits, but at least they
produce a good crop, almost every year. Yes,
they do get brown rot, but not to the extent that
it hits the cultivated varieties - there's
usually more than I can/will eat out-of-hand, and
even curculio damage rarely amounts to anything
much more than a little spot, with a bit of clear
goo excreted to seal the defect.
Subsequently, I've received scionwood and grafted
several copies of the 'Guthrie' selection of
P.angustifolia from a fellow NAFEXer, and have
collected and grafted selections from local productive Chickasaw
plum thickets.




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