North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Melissa Kacalanos <mijwiz@yahoo.com>]

Ernest, I'm strongly suspecting that your "Toka" isn't a Toka at all, but a 
mislabeled cherry-plum, with that awful-tasting Western sandcherry in its 
ancestry. The nursery must have been wrong about either the "Toka" or the 
"Cherry Plum" part of the label (or both parts I suppose.) The fact that your 
 tree is still alive in the cold, plus the fact that the plums taste bad, 
both point to the conclusion that it's a cherry-plum.

Maybe I just don't want anyone bad-mouthing 'Toka' since I put a lot of 
thought into choosing this cultivar myself last year, and I'm hoping the 
fruit are good.

I've been reading about some new cherry-plums that supposedly taste better 
than the old cultivars, after some more generations of breeding. Lydecker is 
a new cultivar that's hardy to zone 3b. In taste tests, fresh tree-ripe 
Lydecker plums were preferred to Asian plums that had been picked underripe 
in California, warehoused for a while, shipped across the country, warehoused 
some more, and then fed to taste-testers.

Lydecker is being marketed under the name 'Blackice' which doesn't sound much 
better than 'Bubblegum' to me. Who thinks of these marketing names?

There are so many interesting plums out there, I wish I had more room to grow 
them. I might have to learn how to graft a few more varieties onto the few 
trees I have.

Melissa

--- On Sat, 3/13/10, Ernest Plutko <ernestplutko@wiktel.com> wrote:

> From: Ernest Plutko <ernestplutko@wiktel.com>
> Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Toka plum
> To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
> Date: Saturday, March 13, 2010, 1:45 PM
> Sandcherries are not good to eat out
> of hand.  Really bad.  There
> could be a way of preparing them by cooking to make them at
> least not
> yucky.  I had a few "Toka" plums frozen in
> freezer.  I thawed them
> out and ate them this morning.  Not too good. 
> Toka plums are
> recommended for zone 4 on internet but a Univ of Minnesota
> fruit site
> says they will grow in zone 3.  Nursery probably
> called my Toka cherry
> -plums because they are smaller like cherry-plums.  
> ---- Original Message ----
> From: mijwiz@yahoo.com
> To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
> Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Toka plum
> Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 09:15:00 -0800 (PST)
> 
> >--- On Fri, 3/12/10, Ernest Plutko <ernestplutko@wiktel.com>
> wrote:
> >> They were sold to me as Toka cherry-plum.
> >
> >Toka isn't a cherry plum, and I also don't think it's
> hardy in zone
> >2. Cherry-plums are crosses between big juicy Asian
> plums and scrawny
> >unpleasant tasting sandcherries. (So I hear.) Cherry
> plums are
> >recommended to those poor unfortunates in zone 2 who
> can't grow Toka
> >and other tasty Asian-American hybrids, but I hear that
> they're
> >developing tastier cherry-plums these days.
> >
> >Melissa