I might be wrong, but if I had to make an educated guess, that Df in the first picture is a white variety as well. Almost all whites (and a very few pinks) have that brown stripe on the edges of the branch "blades". Its uncommon in most other varieties. Do you know what type of pollen you used on your first attempt, where none of the flowers set fruit? What is that one supposed to be?
That first photo is from a plant I bought at Lowes,
almost 2 years ago. It's supposedly a Pink, grown by La Verne, though it hasn't borne fruit yet, so the jury's out.
The pollen I collected a few weeks ago is from a good-sized vine in Lomita, which itself is from a cutting from a
very large vine also in Lomita. The donor says the fruit is white-fleshed, which is why I'm calling it Lomita White. I don't have any other info on its pedigree.
The fruit that set is on a vine in
Manhattan Beach that's climbing over its wall so that I can get to it from the public sidewalk. I haven't made any contact with the owner yet. I knocked one night, but they didn't answer. Maybe they got freaked out by the large man holding a stepladder, a flashlight, and a cut-up Perrier bottle
.
As for the other plant showing flower buds, that is common in cuttings. It just means it was a good strong section of the plant, fully mature, and would have set fruit if it were still attached to its mother plant. If you have a solid root system on that one, you should be able to bring them to maturity, weather and other factors permitting.
Interesting. So mature cuttings are definitely preferred to juvenile cuttings then? This is also Lomita White. I probably won't let it set fruit this year, so as to encourage vine growth. But I'll let it flower so I can use it as a pollen donor.I've never inspected the root system of a DF. I have some extra La Verne pink plants that I currently have no use for. If no one wants them I might shake them out to inspect the roots. I'll put them back in the dirt, so I'm not planning on sacrificing them, but I don't really need them, so the risk is acceptable. Or maybe I'll turn them into bare root plants for donation to someone.
