The Tropical Fruit Forum
Citrus => Citrus General Discussion => Topic started by: sc4001992 on August 17, 2021, 03:16:19 AM
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Just curious if anyone that is growing Xie Shan has a few photos of their fruits. They may not be ripe yet but I would still like to compare the shape/skin of the green fruits if you can take a photo and post it.
My grafted tree/branches will have some ripe fruits this year and I wanted to know if the Xie Shan fruits grow in clusters like a grape. My fruits seem to be all bunched up and I had to thin out some fruits. All of my grafted branches seem to have the fruits close together and needs to be thinned out.
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Mine might be 2 seasons away from fruiting. It is only 3 feet and really a thin tree at this point. I cannot wait as I've heard great things about its fruit. Right now I have fruiting Miyagawa, Dekopon, Okitsu, Owari, Lee x Nova and another dozen other mandarin varieties.
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Ok, I was hoping someone in CA had a Xie Shan with fruits now. Mine is still green but I will take a few photos today and posted so others can comment on the green fruits. I just wanted to confirm it's the correct variety and it should be since it's from CCPP (UCR). I didn't think it grew in a cluster. There must be a few source trees for this fruit and the one I have does not look like the photo shown in the citrusvariety data (even though I purchased my scions from them).
https://citrusvariety.ucr.edu/citrus/xieshan.html
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In the link is looks like early to mid october is the best time to harvest.
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I grafted 4 last year, but only one survives
and it is not doing good. Still green, but no sign of no grow. The other 3 showed new grow, but they didn't made it.
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Here's some photo of my 1 yr old grafts. The fruits are so heavy for the small branch I need to support it with tape attached to the larger branch.
(https://i.postimg.cc/L6dVG8Hw/Xie-Shan-pic1-8-17-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/cJKgsfhm/Xie-Shan-pic2-8-17-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/fLmVdZ6S/Xie-Shan-pic3-8-17-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/G3PBhLFZ/Xie-Shan-pic4-8-17-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/Jz0tqjfL/Xie-Shan-pic5-8-17-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
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I have three branches grafted two years ago. They look exactly like yours. Big cluster and I thinned them to 4 or 5 fruits per branch. I am in Hacienda Hts.
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Ok, thanks for the feedback. I'm going to leave most of the fruits on this branch and see how big the fruits get compared to other grafts with just a few fruits. If this was a large tree it would be a pain in the B..tt to thin the fruits every year. I don't need to do this to my large Gold Nugget tree and it has many fruits spread over the branches.
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Here's mine; A fairly young tree. I did no thinning, but the 116F weather in June caused fruit drop on many of my citrus. I haven't seen the 'grape-cluster' effect, but maybe as the tree gets older.
(https://i.postimg.cc/zLxfMTkZ/Xie-Shan-August-8-26-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/zLxfMTkZ)
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Mine is also holding too many fruits. My tree is probably a bad example, though, as it has always been rather unhealthy. I have noticed that the corner of the greenhouse it is planted in often has standing water from poor drainage, I am thinking that is the reason.
Anyway, they look pretty ripe so I picked one. It is very tasty, but pretty much identical to Tango in my opinion. Probably not fair to judge a small tree like this.
(https://i.postimg.cc/Y40KtR8P/xieshan1.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/Y40KtR8P)
(https://i.postimg.cc/VJDPyp9M/xieshan2.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/VJDPyp9M)
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First fruits of any cultivar are never an example of the quality of that cultivar.
jb worthless
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(https://i.postimg.cc/Xrnjm9VN/20210826-095736.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/Xrnjm9VN)
Here is mine, after I thinned down the fruit of course. It had more than 10 fruits on this tiny branch.
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Brian and Ckitto, both your fruits look similar to mine fruits in that the skin looks smooth and the fruit shape is similar.
But Jim's fruit seems to have a different shape and the skin doesn't look like the thin skin with smooth look to me.
Millet, since you have an older tree, can you tell if your fruits looks like Jim's or like the others with smooth skin and flat?
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Interesting that you mention that... I was just looking at the UCR page for Xie Shan and the fruit photos there look much different than mine. Mine is almost paper-thin skin and smooth, while the ones in the UCR photos have thicker and bumpier skin, plus a slight neck. Where did you guys get yours? I got mine from Harris Citrus in FL, a couple years ago.
https://citrusvariety.ucr.edu/citrus/xieshan.html
I ate a bunch more from my tree after refrigerating them, they are very good.
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Mine came from CCPP.
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I know I got my budwood from CCPP (UCR) multiple orders so that is why I was also curious why their data sheet of the fruit looks different than mine. I do have another small tree that is grafted with the Xie Shan that I purchased from CCPP at a different date and even though the fruits are much smaller (1/2" diameter) it looks a little different.
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Mine came from Stan Mackenzie. I wonder if age of tree and climate can have an effect.
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I did notice the satsuma fruit shape/skin/size change with tree ages and yields.
In low yield years: get fewer but big fruits. The tend to have thick and rough skin.
In a high yield years: get a lot but small fruits. They tend to have thin and smooth skin.
(This is more common in gold nugget tangerine tree. You can see gold nugget tangerine fruits with very different shape / sinks in CA supermarkets).
In some cases, the very big fruits are dry inside. It is often seen for fruits from small/young trees.
My satsuma tree had the fruits with little neck in early years, but not now.
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Brian,
Will be interested to hear your follow up evaluation of the Xie Shan fruits.
Satsuma fruits change taste during the ripe period. My Satsuma fruits start to ripe with funny taste in November (but one of my Japanese friends believed it was perfect), then gradually get sweeter. By end of Dec and Jan, start baggy and drying but not sweeter.
Mine is also holding too many fruits. My tree is probably a bad example, though, as it has always been rather unhealthy. I have noticed that the corner of the greenhouse it is planted in often has standing water from poor drainage, I am thinking that is the reason.
Anyway, they look pretty ripe so I picked one. It is very tasty, but pretty much identical to Tango in my opinion. Probably not fair to judge a small tree like this.
(https://i.postimg.cc/Y40KtR8P/xieshan1.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/Y40KtR8P)
(https://i.postimg.cc/VJDPyp9M/xieshan2.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/VJDPyp9M)
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Im waiting for the xie shan graft to really take off. Seems sluggish on the tree i budded it to. The shiranui i grafted on the same day has fruit and has grown several feet tall. Last i counted it had 18 fruits.
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Here are the pictures of my Xie Shan fruit. I had grafted Xie Shan in March and has only one fruit. It looks more like jim VH's picture - not sure how representative is it of real Xie Shan fruit given recent graft. Scions were purchased from CCPP.
(https://i.postimg.cc/grS8yFrn/IMG-1725.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/grS8yFrn)
(https://i.postimg.cc/ykD9vQSn/IMG-1728.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/ykD9vQSn)
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Malhar, your plant leaves and fruit looks like Jim's. Your tree looks very healthy you must have given it some good food.
I noticed your leaves are also larger and doesn't look identical to my grafts with the smooth skin fruit. I think I have one of my graft that looks like your fruit but my fruit is still to small to tell for sure. I guess once these all ripens we can compare the flavor and taste to see if they are the same fruit.
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That is interesting. Like Malhar, mine is a regraft from the original Citrange rootstock to a FD rootstock, done mainly to dwarf the tree, since Satsumas here require robust winter protection some years, but also in hopes the FD rootstock would give somewhat earlier ripening, since the original rootstock produced fruit which were large and well colored, but quite sour. It was done three years ago. The first year I knocked the fruit off to enhance growth. Last year one fruit, a bit sour. This year half a dozen.
But I also wonder about cultivar variance. I have four producing early ripening Satsumas. Xie Sahn, LA Early, Early St. Anne and Miho. The LA Early and Early St. Anne have been in the ground for over a decade. The first three are bumpy and thick skinned, with that stem end bulge, but Miho is smooth thin skinned. FWIW, my Changsha, while not a Satsuma, is also smooth thin skinned and early ripening.
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Jim, yes I think there is variation within the cultivar, especially budwood from CCPP. I have seen similar issue with my Thong Dee, Cocktail grapefruit, and Chandler pumello.
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Quite inetresting. My Xie Shan was grafted on Kishu Mandarin interstock when I topworked my Home Depot bought multi-grafted mandarin tree.
My scions were shipped from Northern California (Salinas?). Did your come from Riverside?
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I purchased my Xie Shan from Briteleaf. Their photos of the fruit show a neck. I don't have any fruit yet, the one that I did have fell off but it was tiny. Riverside collection also shows a neck at the top and somewhat bumpy fruit
(https://i.postimg.cc/Z9vXmVqm/xieshan.png) (https://postimg.cc/Z9vXmVqm)
(https://i.postimg.cc/9RGSR0TN/xieshan2.png) (https://postimg.cc/9RGSR0TN)
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vnomonee, I did purchase from UCR, the item VI 621 Xie Shan Satsuma Mandarin. But I did notice recently it shows this item is no longer available. I wonder if they are now selling another variation of this cultivar.
If you look at this link which is there variety database it was last edited on 2006, the photo in the middle shows fruits with rough skin, neck, but photo on the right of their datasheet shows fruits that look closer to my fruits where there is no neck and skin looks smoother. Therefore, I'm thinking they do have two types which are sold under same VI 621.
https://ccpp.ucr.edu/variety/621.html
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Oh yes I see that, interesting! Regardless I hope whichever Xie Shan fruit I end up with is early ripening since my season is short
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For CA, it looks to be ripening from Sept-Dec. My grafts with larger fruits looks to be ready to start turning color in another month. One of their data sheet shows season of ripening as "Sept-Nov" in Riverside CA, the other info shows "Oct-Dec".
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I just googled and came across this thread:
https://www.houzz.com/discussions/5453195/first-ripe-xie-shan-satsuma (https://www.houzz.com/discussions/5453195/first-ripe-xie-shan-satsuma)
Pictures in this thread look similar to Kaz's pictures. So there must be two types.
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Xie Shan fruit from my tree have a smooth peal and no neck.
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Oh good, then I hope my fruits tastes great since it has the same features.
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Apparently Xie Shan fruits can have different shapes in different seasons.
One user (Dave in NoVA) reported that during a year when there were only a few fruit, they were larger and had bumpy, puffy-skin with fairly prominent top knot. During another season when there were many more fruit, they were smaller, had tighter skin and no top knot.
Unfortunately, houzz does not provide a link for individual post but thread is located here:
https://www.houzz.com/discussions/4863491/is-this-xie-shan-fruit-ready-to-pick (https://www.houzz.com/discussions/4863491/is-this-xie-shan-fruit-ready-to-pick)
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Mallhar, All citrus fruit on a tree are smaller when the tree is heavy in fruit. A citrus fruit absorbs its entire energy to grow, enlarge and mature only from the 3 or 4 closest leaves to the fruit, not from the entire tree. When there is more than a single fruit per those leaves then they all will absorb energy from those same 3 or 4 leaves. Therefore they are always smaller, and are always less vigorous in growth.
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Here's my other grafted branch of the Xie Shan which has some smaller fruits, but the fruits do not have the same shape and skin texture as my larger grafted branch fruits. This graft is on a smaller tree in a pot, the other fruits in earlier post is a grafted branch on larger tree in ground.
(https://i.postimg.cc/4NFN6t2f/Xei-Shan-p1-8-28-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/L6zFXPdQ/Xei-Shan-p2-8-28-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/wj752X60/Xei-Shan-p3-8-28-21.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
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Anyone have updates on the taste of Xie Shan fruits on their tree?
There should be some people now with the fruits starting to ripen. My Xie Shan (smooth skin) fruit has stopped getting larger so it is slowly getting a little yellow color. I couldn't wait so I picked a few fruits and did a taste comparison to another satsuma (my unknown-lost tag) fruit that was about the same color (green with a little yellow). Millet was right about the taste. The Xie Shan is so much sweeter than my other satsuma which had no taste. So I'm very happy that this fruit will be excellent tasting when it's fully ripe.
I'll post a photo of the two different fruits I tasted. I'm thinking of grafting a lot more of the Xie Shan budwood now so next year I can have a bunch of fruits to eat. Sumo is bigger and there is more to eat but Xie Shan may be better tasting. It seems to taste better already than my 2yr old Tango fruits I tasted last season that was fully ripe.
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Mine are moderately sweet but I think they need more time. They are still mostly green, with some tinges of yellow.
Again, my tree is small and not in great health so it isn't a good representation
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Just tasted the second Xie Shan fruit I picked. It does not have hardly any acidic/tart flavor, but it is sweet without being bland. My unkown satsuma was just like other satsuma in taste with a little tartness but not as sweet. This Xie Shan is not fully ripe but it tastes better than many ripe satsuma.
(https://i.postimg.cc/GtMz8YGN/Xie-Shan-P1-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/jn7yBD8Q)
(https://i.postimg.cc/3r9tcMVB/Xie-Shan-P2-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/4n7vY0J7)
(https://i.postimg.cc/Gp0KybTc/Xie-Shan-P3-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/FYZ0t5xq)
(https://i.postimg.cc/Pqm4b011/Xie-Shan-P4-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/qtvy4bb7)
(https://i.postimg.cc/sXsJTKJq/Xie-Shan-P5-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/67bR3rgf)
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Here's a few photos of my unknown satsuma above in the taste test. I thought 22 fruits in a cluster last year was a lot, but I was wrong. This year there are 32 fruits in this cluster shown in the photo, other branches also have fruits in 4-6 cluster but this one is my record. Actually has 30 fruits in this photo since I picked 2 of them for tasting.
(https://i.postimg.cc/HLVtRVG4/Unk-Satsuma-p1-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/Y4Bgm2Ch)[(https://i.postimg.cc/d3Kmh6h4/Unk-Satsuma-p2-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/ZBVygrFd)
(https://i.postimg.cc/Nj08250q/Unk-Satsuma-p3-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/8jqfqkWt)
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Most fruits in one cluster then I ever heard of.
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Good God, that's a lot of fruit in one glob.
Here's mine about a month later than the earlier photo. About 50% larger, with about 2-3 weeks left until average night time temperatures drop into the 40's and the growing season ends. Satsumas here in Vancouver Wa. don't even think about getting ripe until late October, with best sweetness about a month later, and even then are generally a bit on the sour side, thanks to the low number of growing degree days here.
(https://i.postimg.cc/ykmXcSZR/Xie-shan-9-24-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/ykmXcSZR)
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Jim, your fruit looks nice and large. My smaller grafted branch with fruits that looked similar to yours will not have any full size fruits since the branch was too small so I had to cut off all the fruits to let the grafted branch grow more.
Millet, yes, I think it's the same variety that I have grafted on my other tree in the back that had the 22 fruit cluster last year. I must have gotten it from UCR at the same time but lost the old tag(2013) so I don't know the variety. It seems to be the only mandarin variety that I have grafted that fruits like this. It's been doing this for the last 3-4yrs and it fruits every year. To bad it doesn't taste as sweet as the Xie Shan, but I do have a tag on it saying keep/good.
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sc4001992,
Are your Xie Shan fully ripe? Did you have change to reevaluate it?
I grafted some on late Aug and looks they are taken this time.
Just tasted the second Xie Shan fruit I picked. It does not have hardly any acidic/tart flavor, but it is sweet without being bland. My unkown satsuma was just like other satsuma in taste with a little tartness but not as sweet. This Xie Shan is not fully ripe but it tastes better than many ripe satsuma.
(https://i.postimg.cc/GtMz8YGN/Xie-Shan-P1-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/jn7yBD8Q)
(https://i.postimg.cc/3r9tcMVB/Xie-Shan-P2-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/4n7vY0J7)
(https://i.postimg.cc/Gp0KybTc/Xie-Shan-P3-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/FYZ0t5xq)
(https://i.postimg.cc/Pqm4b011/Xie-Shan-P4-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/qtvy4bb7)
(https://i.postimg.cc/sXsJTKJq/Xie-Shan-P5-9-23-21.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/67bR3rgf)
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I have been picking a few each week to check on the taste, so far no change, still taste good, no tartness/acid taste at all.
I will probably be eating the last Xie Shan fruits in another week, they should be fully colored by then. I have been eating the fruits now since my fruits (32 fruit cluster) were eaten by fruit mice/rats and japanese beetles (green ones) and they left me only 8 fruits that were not touched. I even covered it with the fruit net but holes were to large.
Good news is, I found 3 Xie Shan fruits today on one of my other trees (Golden Nugget) that I grafted a few budwoods. It has the fruit with the coarser/rougher looking texture so I can taste the smooth skin and rough skin Xie Shan and compare if they taste the same.
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Hi Kaz,
How long for your grafted to bear fruits?
Thanks,
Al
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Al, I grafted all of the Xie Shan that is fruiting now on 6/2019-8/2019. So about 2 years before it had fruits to eat. My Shiranui/sumo took about the same time, 2 yrs before I got my first fruits that ripened.
I grafted up more Xie Shan this month so I can have a lot of fruits that ripens in October/November. Then all my other citrus start to ripen in Dec-April.
After tasting many more of my unknown Satsuma #1, I'm starting to like it a lot, it is very sweet but has some tartness to it. I plan to cut some of my branches from this one and graft it up on my trees as well. I think it might be similar to my unknown Satsuma #2(32 fruits in one cluster) but the Satsuma #2 doesn't have hardly any tartness. Xie Shen has no tartness and is very sweet. Last year my unknown Satsuma#1 had 24 fruits in one cluster so it seems to grow like Satsuma #2 (both get large fruit clusters). Both of these Satsuma grafts are on two different trees, one is grafted on lemon and the other on pomelo.
Here's the old photo of the unknown Satsuma #1 that I like the best so far. This is a photo from 2019 with the 24 fruits on one grafted branch. These unknown satsuma lost its tag and I only have a tag that shows it was grafted on 2016 and I only put down Satsuma. It might be a Dobasi-Beni, VI-366.
(https://i.postimg.cc/VkLRSLXw/Satsuma3.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/HnkxwKzr/Satsuma2.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/P5Wjqyb9/Satsuma6.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
https://citrusvariety.ucr.edu/citrus/dobashi.html
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If anyone else has the Xie Shan fruits that are ripe and have taste it now, please comment of the taste and how you would rate it, best being 10.
-> Jim, Brian, Ckitto, Malhar any feedback on your fruits ?
I will try to evaluate my two different fruits (smooth/rough skin) of the Xie Shan next week since I want them both to be ripe (yellow for a few weeks) before I do my last taste test again.
Off topic subject on same variety with different looking fruits. If anyone grows Shiranui, I noticed there are two different looking fruits on them. The one from UCR/CCPP budwood source in Riverside has the larger fruits with rough bumpy skin and neck. There is another version of Shiranui in Florida where the fruits are smaller, skin is not as rough and thinner. I have not be able to do a side by side taste comparison of the fruit but if I remember the tastes, I think the one from Florida has the sweeter taste, and the one from UCR has a sweet/tart taste and the individual fruit sacks are larger.
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Thanks Kaz.
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Hi Kaz,
The only fruit I have is still very green and no where close to being ripe.
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Hi Kaz,
Like Malhar, mine are still green, though there are hints of color change, possibly triggered by the cool nights we're now getting here (Overnight lows in the 40F's, with an occasional thirty something). I suspect it will be sour for some time, based on results from earlier years.
The only sweet citrus showing true orange are some of the LA Early, and they will still be sourish for a month or so more. The Changsha is also showing some color, though not as much, but they are sweeter, likely due to their low acid level.
I'll post pic's when the Xie Shan is fully orange-perhaps 3 weeks or so?-, along with my subjective impressions of the taste.
Jim
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Ok, thanks for you comments Malhar and Jim. Maybe I better try to cover my last Xie Shan fruits with metal mesh and try to wait until they all turn bright orange. I might be picking them to soon still. I will do this today and wait like you guys until it is fully orange (2-3 wks).
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Looks that you have a lot of fruit lovers in your yard.
For Satsuma fruits, we noticed they have a process like this so picking up times make big differences:
first they change color and get sweet with sour and tartness,
then they become less sour and less tartness (or sweeter),
then they start becoming soft and a little dry but not sweeter,
They start baggy but not sweet.
Ok, thanks for you comments Malhar and Jim. Maybe I better try to cover my last Xie Shan fruits with metal mesh and try to wait until they all turn bright orange. I might be picking them to soon still. I will do this today and wait like you guys until it is fully orange (2-3 wks).
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(https://i.ibb.co/g3h3hdb/20211009-133224.jpg) (https://ibb.co/g3h3hdb) (https://i.ibb.co/7NLLzRW/20211009-133322.jpg) (https://ibb.co/7NLLzRW)
My Xie Shan are turning yellow. Had one more than a week ago and it was not ripen enough. Will wait till late Nov. Picture of my fruit with a cracked dekopon after some rain
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Ckitto, yes my Xie Shan was a little more yellow than yours but I will wait a few more weeks so they are fully ripe before tasting it again. All my dekopon fruits are still green and growing in size. My dekopon does not get ripe here until Jan-March.
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Eric, yes I do know about the regular Owari satsuma fruiting time and when to pick it. Just was not sure if the Xie Shan was different.
I did have one early fruit today from my Murcott Honey (FL) mandarin and it was excellent. It has seeds but the fruit is large so not a big deal, one fruit had 18-20 seeds. This mandarin had the same taste as the orange juice "Simply Orange" (Florida packed) I had in the frigerator. Very sweet taste, no tart/acid taste, right now I would say it tasted better than the Xie Shan fruit and unknown Satuma fruit.
(https://i.postimg.cc/yNVmZbmZ/Murcott-Honey-10-19-21-Pic1.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/xCN3fbGx/Murcott-Honey-10-19-21-Pic2.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/dQRcwWsy/Murcott-Honey-10-19-21-Pic3.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
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There has been a lot of discussion concerning thick peel, thin peel, knobbed necked fruit, no knob fruit, smooth peel and bubbly peel, all seen on they same citrus variety, notably concerning Xie Shan. Yesterday I was looking at my in ground Ponkan mandarin tree. I found on that tree, fruit with smooth peel, bubbly peel, knobbed fruit and completely round fruit, thick and thin peel fruit, but all of the fruit were Ponkan, and all growing on he same tree.. As to the Xie Shan discussion of these traits could be different cultivars of Xie Shan, I don't think so. Just different development of the same fruit. Kind of like humans, not all look the same, but they ae still just human.
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Hi Kaz
These are the pictures of my lone fruit. It is getting pretty big (no wonder as it is the only one) and starting to turn slightly yellow on one side.
(https://i.ibb.co/g4sFrf1/IMG-2020.jpg) (https://ibb.co/g4sFrf1)
(https://i.ibb.co/PxSVJTv/IMG-2022.jpg) (https://ibb.co/PxSVJTv)
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Malhar, nice fruit, it does look pretty big. My fruits are all about the same size, small like a Tango mandarin.
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No fruits but I planted one of these out in my experimental hoop house this year. Gona add an extra layer of protection see if I can get it thru the winter. Anybody have any experience with sub 20 temps?
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I've never had a Satsuma survive extended periods below freezing with lows below 18F, here in the occasionally frozen north, although they have survived very brief exposures to such lows. The Brown's Select nearly made it, and I've never tried the new Arctic or Orange Frost varieties, and there may be some other hardier mandarins or Satsumas. Changsha survives here down to extended periods below freezing with lows down to 8F. I do have a Keraji, reputed to be hardy to 5F, but it hasn't been tested for hardiness yet in the extended freezes at my location.
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(http://<br />[url=https://ibb.co/SRDWVtg][img]https://i.ibb.co/SRDWVtg/Xie-Shan.jpg)[/url]<br />[/img]
My Xie Shan in a container in northern VA. Not many fruits, but they are large with pebbly rind. Haven't tried one yet. It bloomed a bit more over the summer and has some quarter-sized fruit developing as well.
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Dave, how old is your Xie Shan?
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My one Keraji mandarin fell off the tree a couple days ago, so I thought I'd pick one of each of the sweet citrus I grow and line them up side by side, then eat them to see how they compare.
From left to right the fruit are : LA Early, Keraji, Xie Shan and Changsha.
The Xie Shan, third from the left, has the palest skin and a noticeable neck on it.
The LA Early and Xie shan are zipper-skinned when peeling. The Changsha is very seedy and easy peel. The Keraji is not easy to peel at all.
The LA Early, Keraji and Changsha are relatively sweet and have good flavor; comparable to many store Satsumas. The Xie Shan is sour as heck, probably due to a higher acid level; So sour, I cant judge the flavor. Considering I'm about a thousand mile north of you Cali Boyz, It's not surprising my fruit is sourer than yours. Since my tree's are dormant now, it's unlikely the sugar level will rise, so I'd better let the Xie Shan sit on the tree till January to let the acid level drop to a more acceptable level, though I might try one in a month or so.
(https://i.postimg.cc/7J8BjDc5/LA-early-Keraji-Xie-Shan-Changsha.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/7J8BjDc5)
(https://i.postimg.cc/gnKMtCK0/LA-Keraji-Xie-and-Chang-cut.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/gnKMtCK0)
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Hello Jim,
congratulation to your fruit success.
Very interesting and good report.
Hope to get my Kerajiand Changsa next year to flower/fruit.
Had this year 5 Satsumas miagawa which I liked very much.
Best regards Frank
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Jim, thanks for posting your fruit photos. Very interesting about the taste, I have only tried the Xie Shan. Is the LA Early better tasting than the normal Owari satsuma? My in-laws have two large Owari satsuma trees that gets hundreds of fruits from Dec-Jan time frame here in CA. Hope your Xie Shan tastes improves by Jan.
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Thanks Tedburn. It was interesting to make the side by side comparisons.
My Keraji was a bit of a cheat; I'd grafted it last year on Flying Dragon rootstock and it was in a pot. So, I brought it in in March and it bloomed about 4-5 weeks earlier than the mid-May normal bloom time for Citrus up here. Next year, I'll have a better idea how it does under normal PNW growing conditions. The flavor was interesting, though; it seemed to have a bit of lemon mixed in with the Satsuma.
My Changsha bloomed last year for the first time, about 11 years after I started it. It's flavor is best earlier in the ripening season, when it's quite good, actually; it becomes bland and insipid by mid-December, so has to be eaten quickly and early, while the peel is still half green.
I haven't tried Miyagawa, but I do have a Miho, which is derived from it. The Miho is generally somewhat sweeter and a bit better flavored than the rest of mine, but it only set one late fruit this year, so was not included in the comparison.
Hi Kaz. Actually, I've never tasted the Owari Satsuma that I know about, although some of the store Satsumas are likely to be Owari. Owari doesn't attain full size or flavor in the short growing season up here, it's not early-season enough. The golf ball sized fruit were terrible, so I eventually exposed it to the frost gods to see how hardy it was. Only the earliest ripening Satsumas attain full size and reasonable sweetness and flavor.
Based on comparisons to store Satsumas. I'd put LA Early in the middle of the range, when fully sweetened up, normally by late November. This year seemed to be sweeter earlier, probably due to that unusual record breaking 116F heat wave we had this year in late June.
The Xie Shan, I'll just have to wait and see. It is early enough to attain full size, so that's room for hope. Fortunately, Satsumas seem to hang well on the tree for months.
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.
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sc4001992，
How are your Xie Shan, Kiyomi, Sumo, Ponkan, etc all doing? Any new update of taste evaluation?
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None of them are fully ripe yet. I did pick another Xie Shah so I will compare the taste today with my unknown satsuma #1.
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I have a small Okitsu tree which had 5-6 fruits (I stripped about 20 of them in early summer). They are yellow now and taste about same sweet as Satsuma's fruits but much less sour. Most Satsuma fruits still have some sour but many feel that was good.
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Eric, yeah I agree that the owari and okitsu wase satsuma's seem to need to hang longer on the tree, maybe until Dec-Jan for the taste to get sweetest. My satsuma (unk #1) ripens earlier, most are all fully ripe now. I tried to wait to pick this one so I can compare the taste with the Xie Shah fruit. I'll start another post on the Sumo (Shiranui) so we can see how and when the sumo fruits ripen at different areas. Interesting that I see two different ripening groups of sumo on my trees. The earlier purchased budwood (UCR, CCP) in 2017 and the later ones from 2019-2020.
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Hi Eric,
I'm going to wait another 10 days before trying another Xie Shan.
I have been eating the Changshas and they're still good, though rather seedy; seedier than the white trash neighborhood I grew up in. I have enough Changsha fruit to do some measurements of sugar and acid levels of the Changshas at ten day intervals. Since October 25th, the acid level has dropped about 20%, from 1.6% to 1.3%. Hopefully the Xie Shan acid level drops faster than that.
I took a dozen LA Early Satsumas to Thanksgiving meal yesterday and everyone thought they were good, so I have an independent poll of their quality. I still rate them about midrange, compared to store Satsumas.
I'll do a side by side comparison in early December.
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Jim,
I was thinking about the LA Early satsuma, is it the same variety as the "Early St. Ann Satsuma" mandarin that the CCPP has ?
Here's the details of the Early St. Ann:
https://citrusvariety.ucr.edu/citrus/CRC4240.html
say it is Citrus unshiu Marcow, CRC 4240, VI 825
(https://i.postimg.cc/xCCrp1st/VI825.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/06LHbP1w)
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Hi Kaz
They're similar, but not identical. Both developed in Louisiana a couple decades ago, they may be the earliest ripening Satsumas around; late August in Louisiana. I actually have both, but I just grafted my Early St. Anne onto a dwarfing rootstock a couple years ago, so I'm not letting any fruit develop until it achieves a size to it. In my opinion, the Early St Anne is somewhat later and has somewhat better flavor, but there's really not a lot of difference between the two, for all that.
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Jim,
Thanks for the feedback, I may need to add the Early St. Ann to my collection, sounds good. Your fruit comparision and taste photo shows the Xie Shan as a pretty decent size fruit. I picked another Xie Shan the other day to see how it compares to some of my mandarins that are ripe and some that were not (but wind was blowing some off).
I will post a few photos later today since Eric asked about the fruit status to show you how small my Xie Shan fruit is on my grafted branches (about 2").
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sc4001992,
I also notice fruit sizes of Satsuma family vary a lot.
In an on-year, you get a lot of fruits but most of them are small. In an off-year, for the same tree, you will get fewer but much bigger fruits.
Even on a same tree for the same year, you will get some fruits much bigger than others.
The bigger fruits tend to be baggy and a little dryer with tougher inner cell and thick rind.
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Yes Eric I agree they do grow with different size fruits. My Ponkan had lots of fruits last year and they were still nice medium to large fruits. This year I only have average amount of Ponkan fruits and they seem to be medium size. Yup I noticed the same thing that the bigger fruits have more puffy skin.
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Here's the photos showing the Xie Shan and the rest of the fruits that were almost ripe. The ripe fruits were Xie Shan, unk#1 satsuma (with wrinkle skin), and unk#3. These taste numbers are my taste (I like it with a little acid taste). If you like only sweet with no acid/tartness then Xie Shan would be number 1 and unk#1 satsuma would be number 2.
Also note the 3 sumo/shiranui fruits shown in the cutting board, the one on the right which is the flat top (no bump) sumo has a lot of seeds, the other two on the left with the neck/bump has no seeds. So there seems to be something different with the sumo fruits that are flat with no bump.
=> Update on my comments about the sumo fruits with seeds (right side fruit). After picking a few more fruits, it looks like I had grabbed the wrong fruit, this one with seeds is a Kiyomi. I picked more of the flat shaped sumo fruits and they all had no seeds, will update with photo later.
(https://i.postimg.cc/wMK9ySC5/Xie-Shan-Taste-Update-11-28-21-1a.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/wykCnbT3)
(https://i.postimg.cc/FRS44TYY/Xie-Shan-Taste-Update-11-28-21-1b.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/MMz40bbw)
(https://i.postimg.cc/FFfffvLS/Xie-Shan-Taste-Update-11-28-21-1.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/w3pxPSFx)
(https://i.postimg.cc/tC288KBr/Xie-Shan-Taste-Update-11-28-21-2.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/xcNsz4DH)
(https://i.postimg.cc/PJdFRyYs/Xie-Shan-Taste-Update-11-28-21-3.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/0MHf6pVc)
(https://i.postimg.cc/nh9TTgg9/Xie-Shan-Taste-Update-11-28-21-4.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/tsyh4SX9)
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sc4001992,
Very nice pictures and comparison. It is great to hear that your Xie Shan get 1.
It is a surprise that the Kiyomi fruits are so small. On paper, they should be about 200 gm or more.
For the taste and ripe time, Kiyomi is about Feb-Mar, about the same as Sumo. So, if you can do in again in Feb, you may get better numbers.
If you keep Kiyomi flowers off from bees, you might get seedless fruits.
For Sumo, are these tree fruits from the same graft? The fruits usually don't get that much seeds. The seedy one looks more like a Kiyomi fruit.
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Eric, I may have mislabeled the one sumo which might be Kiyomi. I will need to cut it open immediately off the tree next time since I know which grafted branch I took the fruits. I do have another flat sumo that I know is not a Kiyomi so I will cut it open tomorrow and check for seeds. This larger flat sumo was not from the same grafted branch as the ones in the picture. I had a lot more fruits (10) than what I showed in the photos so I may have grabbed the wrong fruit and thought it was a sumo with no neck. As I mentioned these sumos are turning color now so it will not hang up to Feb-Mar but my other grafted sumo branches with the large green fruits will hold until March.
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What a difference a month makes. Now the Xie Shan has much lower acid levels, only slightly sourer than the LA Early. Here's a phot of several fruit currently on the trees:
(https://i.postimg.cc/Hr96P6d1/LA-Early-Xie-Shan-Changsha-Prague.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/Hr96P6d1)
from left to right: LA Early, Xie Shan, Changsha and Prague Citsuma.
I deliberately selected a LA Early with a neck, and a Xie Shan with almost no neck at all as a confirmation of Millet's observation that there is considerable variation in the fruit even in the same tree.
Here are the fruit peeled and separated:
(https://i.postimg.cc/jCDSh9Km/LA-Early-etc-peeled.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/jCDSh9Km)
Top, left to right: LA Early and Xie Shan; Bottom left to right Changsha and Prague Citsuma. LA Early, Xie Shan are zipper skinned, Changsha is very easy to peel, Prague Citsuma is very difficult to peel, although I suspect it will peel easier as it gets riper.
In terms of flavor:
Prague Citsuma is far and away the best, although still somewhat on the sour side. I would rate its flavor as excellent.
Xie Shan is next best, probably upper-mid range compared to store Satsumas, a bit sour.
LA Early is next, about mid range, and well balanced sweet and sour.
Changsha is last; lower mid range and very low acid, though still good enough.
The Prague Citsuma and Changsha are rather small; I suspect that's in part because I barely watered them this past hot summer, whereas the Satsumas got plenty of water due to nearby plants that needed it. Also, the Prague Citsuma is just plain weird, probably because it's a chimera; most of the fruit is sub-golf ball sized, with two branches having larger fruit.
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Very interesting fruit comparison Jim :D, how old are your mandarin trees, and in which age/ size did your Changsha and Citsuma Prague fruit for the first time ? I also have them in ground and so I' m glad to hear that Prague tastes very good.
Best regards Frank
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Hi Frank,
The LA Early I bought from Stan Mackenzie and put in the ground 12 years ago; It bloomed and set fruit right away, though I picked the fruit off the first year. The fruit quality seems to be improving with age. It's on a Flying Dragon (FD) rootstock and is still quite small; I may post a picture in that Mandarin and fruit photo thread Kaz started.
The Xie Shan I grafted onto an FD rootstock from its original Citrange rootstock and put in the ground 3 years ago; this is the first year I let it set fruit. When on the Citrange rootstock, it produced rather sour fruit; the earlier ripening claimed for FD rootstock appears to have resulted in sweeter fruit.
The Changsha was one of 24 I grew from seed in December 2007; it is the sole survivor of a 10F (-12.2C) arctic event in 2009. It subsequently survived an 8F (-13.3C) event in 2017 on an FD rootstock. It first set about 6 lbs. of fruit last year, a bit over 12 years after it was started. I discussed this hardy survivor on another thread last year; I'll probably update that in a week or so.
The Prague Citsuma on unknown rootstock came from Mackenzie farms about five years ago. It bloomed, but didn't fruit, until 3 years ago, when it set about 4 lbs., then bloomed but didn't set fruit last year, then set fruit again this year, again about 3-4 lbs., at a guess. Each time it set fruit, about half a dozen were satsuma sized, the rest sub-golf ball sized. Not what I would call a commercial fruit, but it is good for hours of entertainment. Maybe with lotsa fertilizer and water it will do better.
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thank you very much Jim for your detailed interesting information to your varieties I appreciate this very much.
And for me as a nearly citrus beginner compared to you and other long cultivating citrus experts these informations are very helpful, especially in our challenging climate for in ground planted citrus in middle Europe.
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Jim, thanks for nice photos of all your fruits and the taste comparison. I'm glad to see the Xie Shan is moving up in your ranking. I hope it goes to the top of your list on the next round of tasting. I noticed on my 2yr old grafted branches of the Xie Shan, none had sour fruits, all were sweet when it turned yellow/orange. As I let it hang longer it just got a little more sweeter but I did not taste any acid/tartness on the few fruits I tasted.
I'm thinking of waiting until the end of Dec before I try to taste the last Xie Shan fruits, I may have only 4 left.
I didn't know the Prague Citsuma tasted that good.
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sc4001992，
I have a ten years old unknown Satsuma tree. This years' fruits are flat just like yours. They are all still have sour taste probably due to warm weather.
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Eric,
The unknown flat satsuma #3 in the above photos were actually from my family trees. My dad planted them over 30 yrs ago so this is a pretty mature tree. Here's more photos in the link below.
https://tropicalfruitforum.com/index.php?topic=45836.0
I know what you mean about the bland tasting satsumas. My in-laws have 2 older satsumas(20 yrs) with the bland tasting fruits (no sweet or acid taste) and it only gets sweet if you let it hang until Jan-Feb here in CA. The unknown flat satsuma #3 is much better tasting in the early stage (skin color turns yellow as in my photos above), still tastes sweet but it does have acid taste. As the fruit hangs longer the acid taste disappears and it is only sweet. But the bad thing with these satsuma fruits is that the shelf life is very short, maybe 3-5 days on the counter before it starts to go bad/mold. You can keep it longer in the refrigerator of course but I don't have the space.
For my taste, the unknown #1 (bumpy skin) is my favorite so far. The fully ripe fruit is very sweet with a little tart/acid. This may be a mutation from my grafting on the Chandler pummelo rootstock since it doesn't match any of the CCPP varieties I grafted.
I hope I still have one unk #1 fruit left on the tree when I pick the Xie Shan at the end of December for my final comparision before the fruits fall off.
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(https://i.postimg.cc/K1Xy4H8F/We-Chat-Image-20211207151809.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/K1Xy4H8F)
(https://i.postimg.cc/PCmnDQCD/We-Chat-Image-20211207151412.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/PCmnDQCD)
Photo 1 is the ten years old unknown Satsuma. The fruits are flat and still some sour taste.
Photo 2 is a fruits on a small Owari Frost Satsuma tee. The tree had about ten fruits in early summer but they were removed. The fruits generally are bland. I used it to graft other varieties.
Photo 3 are fruits on a Clementine tree. To get seedless fruits, bees have to be kept off. Without cross pollination, it produce fewer but good fruits. The fruits have somehow richer but different flavors than Satsuma with tender segment.
(https://i.postimg.cc/4mY9Xmmq/We-Chat-Image-20211207151735.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/4mY9Xmmq)
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I like the Fina Clementine (VI-518), seeds are few but the seeds are not in the center of the fruit, only citrus that I have seen such a thing. Fruit tastes a different taste than satsuma as you said, is it richer?
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sc4001992，
The trees I have are Algerian clementine, the original variety. I just grafted some Clemenules on them but don't expect too much difference. I also grafted Pixie and Xie Shan on them.
The fruits ripe at or after Christmas but can hang on tree much longer than Satsuma fruits do. They taste richer (or more tasty) than Satsuma, same or sweeter than Satsuma because they can hang on tree longer without baggy or dry. The skin are thin and easily be peeled. The inner sections are easily separated with tender cell which don't get tough. The people tasted both all prefer clementine.
The drawbacks:
The fruits will have a lot of seeds if bees help pollinations. If cross pollinated, the fruits will have the tastes and seeds from the pollen. (you can use it to develop new varieties)
If not cross pollinated, the tree bears fewer fruits. Commercially, chemicals are sprayed to increase the fruits bearing.
Leaf miner really love this tree.
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Yes, Clementine's are sprayed with Gibberellic Acid for more production.
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Eric,
Yes, I hear Nules Clemintine tastes good from Janet. I might add that one to compare the taste with my Fina Clementine. I have Fallglow which has a lot of fruits and hangs long, many seeds, and it is on the sour side with some sweet taste. I only keep the Fallglow because it ripens earlier than the other mandarins (Oct-Dec) so I can eat some fresh fruits starting in Oct-Nov.
Your Clemenules/Nules is a mutation of the Fina Clementine so it will taste good. I had my Fina Clementine for over 5 yrs and the fruit taste is always consistently very good. I have not seen much leaf minner problem with my Clementine fruit tree but do see some on my other trees but only on the new growth leaves.
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sc4001992 and Millet,
Yes, Gibberellic Acid can be sprayed for more production. It can be purchased from Amazon or Ebay.
I looked web for Nules' info but could not find much. Yes it is a mutation from Fina but not as sweet as Fina. For Nules, I guess the followings may still be needed:
1, provent bees to pollinate
2, manage the alternative bearing (it is one of clementine's problem).
If it shows better quality and performance, will gradually replace all the clementine branches by Nules.
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My last post on this particular thread. The impending arrival of an Arctic front motivated me to pick the last of my Satsumas, which were LA Early, Xie Shan and Prague Citsuma. I also snagged a couple of 'Wonderful' Peels from a Christmas party. In terms of taste comparison, the results are:
LA Early, good. The quality seemed to have peaked in early December, and remained constant since.
Xie Shan, very good. The quality has improved greatly and is almost excellent.
Prague Citsuma, excellent. The quality has also improved greatly. It also peels more easily
'Wonderful' Peels. Verdict: poor.
I finished the last Changshas in early December, the flavor was becoming rather bland at that point and deteriorating.
No pictures of the fruit this time, since there is nothing new to see, but, going with the title of the thread, here's a picture of my Xie Shan tree from early December, nestled in its winter shelter:
(https://i.postimg.cc/06QjJ5Lh/Xie-Shan-dec-4-2021.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/06QjJ5Lh)
For comparison, here's the LA Early:
(https://i.postimg.cc/9rYQ8q2v/LA-Early-in-winter-shelter-2021.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/9rYQ8q2v)
And finally, three of the Satsumas after the snow arrived, after midnight Christmas night:
(https://i.postimg.cc/N2yf5yT0/shelters-dec-28-2021.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/N2yf5yT0)
Temperatures won't be too bad with this stalled out front; highs in the low thirties, lows in the twenties, but it's possible to see a couple nights in the upper teens when the skies clear, at which point I'll turn on the thermostatically controlled C9 Christmas tree lights. Temperatures should moderate back to cold rain in a week. Temperatures are a few degrees colder up around Puget Sound, including Olympia and Seattle.
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Wow, nice photos of your Xie Shan, and I didn't know you need to protect the trees since you get snow where you are. I like the wooden cover you made to protect the trees. I will need to consider grafting a Prague Citsuma on my tree.
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I saw those wooden boxes and I was thinking Beehives
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Yeah, I'm about a thousand miles north of Southern California. In fact, I'm further north than Detroit and Ottawa Canada. The only things that save the PNW from nonstop citrus killing cold is the proximity of the Vancouver-Portland area to the Pacific 0cean 70 miles away, and the Cascade Mountain range, which shunts most of the Arctic air to the east, where it belongs. Occasionally though, every 3-5 years, the cold breaks through and we get an event down to 10F (-12C). The present snow event turned out to be pretty humdrum. Still, the shelters for tender citrus, like Satsumas, are needed for such rare events.
They're made out of the repurposed concrete form boards, which I used to build my raised vegetable beds, one of which can be seen to the right of the snow picture.
I thought of getting a beehive once, but there are plenty of both wild and honeybees around.
The Prague Citsuma is a very strange plant, and not terribly prolific. Below is the entire two pound crop, from a tree twice the size of the LA Early. The LA Early had sixteen pounds of fruit.
(https://i.postimg.cc/ygD8sS1L/Prague-Citsumas-2021.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/ygD8sS1L)
They tend to the rather small, but I didn't really water it much, despite th record heat we had this year. I did water the bleep out of the Satsumas, and they produced huge fruit, so I'll try the same with the Prague Citsuma next summer, and see if their size approaches that of the Xie Shan or not.
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Here's some update on the taste of my Xie Shan fruit. Just picked this fruit over the weekend.
Compared the taste with some other mandarins I that were ripe now.
(https://i.postimg.cc/RV41X7Tn/Mandarin-Fruits-1-3-22-pic40.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
The Unknown#1 Satsuma and Xie Shan were the best tasting. Very sweet with no acid taste.
(https://i.postimg.cc/kXTSsk4k/Mandarin-Fruits-1-3-22-pic41-Rated.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
This second group taste test resulted with Unknown#1 Satsuma as the top tasting so the Xie Shan would also be better tasting than any of these (2-7).
(https://i.postimg.cc/T2NctLpd/Mandarin-Fruits-1-3-22-pic21-Rated.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
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Evidently the Valentine pummelo was not fully mature, as the Valentine in the picture has not colored up to a deep purplish red.
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Millet, yes you are correct about the Valentine. I noticed last year the fruit doesn't get fully ripe (redish blush flesh) until end of Feb here. I don't know what variety my Tony1_Pomelo is but it seems to always have a larger fruit than the Valentine and the flesh colors up about 1 month sooner than Valentine. Both the Tony1_Pomelo and Valentine has similar flesh texture and flavor (juicy, sweet). This year my Valentine fruits were on the smaller side.
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I picked two Valentine Pummelos yesterday. They were almost fully yellow skinned, however the pulp was lightly red and still grainy I am going to wait unil February as SC400 wrote above.
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Got a couple single digit nights coming up in the next few days. Have my tree wrapped a few times next to water barrels in my hoop house. Should be a good test of hardiness.
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I picked the last of my Xie Shan fruits (2) and they were both over ripe so I couldn't eat them really. I guess in my location they will not hold onto the tree until Feb. The remaining mandarins I have that are still not ripe are the Shiranui/sumo, Gold Nugget, Shasta Gold, Honey Murcott, Murcott (FL) & Tango.
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10F this morning. 12F tonight and mine are under 4 layers of glass with an 72 watt heater.
(https://i.postimg.cc/F1fFhccX/IMG-1833-1.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/F1fFhccX)
Mine is however a kumquat.
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I still have:
1, Sumo, mostly yellow but solid hard
2, Clementine, pretty much full orange color but still have some sourness
3, Gold nugget, mostly still green with a hint of orange color.
4, Navel orange, full orange color but solid hard
5, Satsuma, still some left. Not baggy yet.
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Tree made it thru some nights as low as 12F and over 24 hrs in the 20s
(https://i.postimg.cc/zV9vqfC6/IMG-8188.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/zV9vqfC6)
(https://i.postimg.cc/0zDQjqZQ/IMG-8189.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/0zDQjqZQ)
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Update for Sumo fruits take from the graft made in 2020 spring.
I took one of the five Sumo fruits on a graft made in 2020 spring on a mature gold nugget tree. It is complete colored with a slightly soft rind, but the fruit is still solid.
The taste is pertty sweet, with some sourness, but very rich flavor. We all agree it is the best among all the varienties. We will wait for a month to update again to see wehther it can get sweeter.
It didnt have any seeds, with no little neck either. The inside is solid, tender and juicy.
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Eric,
I think the Xie Shan is sweeter than the sumo. I have been growing my grafted sumo since 2017 and have many trees with it grafted. So far I don't have any fruits on my trees that is as sweet as the Xie Shan. The fruits of Xie Shan is much smaller but it is very sweet for a satsuma.
My favorite so far is my Ponkan. It may not be as sweet as a fully ripe Xie Shan but the Ponkan fruit is still sweeter than any of my sumo fruits. Of course my Ponkan tree is a large grafted tree and I had it for over 15 years so it is very mature and probably at its best taste. I have been eating ripe Ponkan since November and just picking the last ripe fruits now.
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sc4001992,
Great to hear. I had both Xie Shan and Ponkan grafted in 2021 so hopefully will be ready to fruit in 2023.
I had a second year grafted Sumo broken below the graft union by the big wind so will have to re-graft it. Good I have another Sumo grafted tree so hope it will be ready in 2023.
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Tree made it thru zone 7a winter unfazed under protection and is pushing new growth with flowers now
(https://i.postimg.cc/vg4SjTVd/IMG-9480.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/vg4SjTVd)
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Malhar, your plant leaves and fruit looks like Jim's. Your tree looks very healthy you must have given it some good food.
I noticed your leaves are also larger and doesn't look identical to my grafts with the smooth skin fruit. I think I have one of my graft that looks like your fruit but my fruit is still to small to tell for sure. I guess once these all ripens we can compare the flavor and taste to see if they are the same fruit.
Curious how every body's Xie Shan fruit are coming along?
My fruit which looked quite different last year are looking similar to Kaz's fruits this year. Grafted branches are loaded with fruit which are fairly decent in size. I had to tie up the branches to prevent them from breaking.
(https://i.postimg.cc/PNJ7bZB2/Xie-Shan-Fruit-2022-09-06-01.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/PNJ7bZB2)
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I have one fruit on my tree but i'll take it since this is my experimental in-ground tree
(https://i.postimg.cc/qgXBZLHX/IMG-2757.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/qgXBZLHX)
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Malhar, an amazing fruit set on your tree.
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I grafted multiple xie shan scions last year. The scions are from CCPP.
This branch has no leaf and give me one fruit. I know I should knock it out to promote the branch to be grow, but I want to try the fruit so badly. Also I have couple more of them, so just let it fruit.
(https://i.ibb.co/PQMM7pf/20220910-100025.jpg) (https://ibb.co/Qdkk2B1)
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Last year, I had only fruit on my grafted branches but this year, branches are loaded. It seems to fruit in bunches.
One of them broke of the branch. I decided to taste it even though it is completely green. Surprisingly it tasted sweet albeit mild but no tart.
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Hi Malhar,
My Xie Shan set very few fruit this year, all but one of them still rather small. But then, it was a very cold wet spring-early summer this year in the Pacific Northwest and many of my citrus bloomed late and set few or no fruit this year, possibly due to poor pollination. On the other hand, a couple of the Satsumas are loaded. Go figure.
Millet is right, the fruit set on your tree is awesome.
Jim
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Malhar, congrats on all your fruits, looks great. I only have a few on each of my grafted branches.
The fruit shape of Pinkturtle's seems different and the skin looks like it will be thicker than yours.
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I had grafted Ponkan and Kinnow at the same time (03/21) as Xie Shan but have zero fruit on them. Grafted Sumo in 10/21 which now has 4-5 fruits. It seems all the tree energy is going to Xie Shan!
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Hi All,
Is my Xie Shan fruit ready to pick?
(https://i.ibb.co/pw0F2FR/20221126-105455.jpg) (https://ibb.co/kBHCKC9)
Thanks,
Al
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To me, it will be the right time when it is tasted right to me, and it turn to a little soft from rock solid.
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Your Xie Shan looks ready. Pick one and test it.
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Thank Millet and EricSC...
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I picked quite a few Xie Shan fruits today off the grafted branch on my multi-grafted tree. They were large, easy peel, completely seedless and excellent tsting.
They looked different that Kaz's pictures in post # 77 and 97 which also shows some seeds
(https://i.postimg.cc/mzSLwWgG/IMG-4569.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/mzSLwWgG)
(https://i.postimg.cc/7fhHgcvp/IMG-4571.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/7fhHgcvp)
(https://i.postimg.cc/xqtjNQZv/IMG-4816.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/xqtjNQZv)