Gadenin日本語Get the appKnow what you are planting before you dig the hole
Japanese apricot is widely sold and widely written about as a plum, but it is botanically an apricot, and it behaves like one in the garden: early flowers, spur-bearing wood, a stone that clings, and a strong dislike of wet roots. If you plant it expecting plum behavior you will prune it at the wrong time of year and lose the fruiting wood.
The other thing to settle at the outset is what the fruit is for. The raw fruit is never eaten fresh. It stays hard and intensely sour even when fully colored, and both the flesh and the stone of an unripe fruit carry cyanogenic compounds that make eating it raw unpleasant and unwise. Every use of this crop goes through processing of some kind, so you are planting a tree for its blossom and for a preserving harvest, not for something to pick and bite.
That combination explains why the tree is worth garden space at all. It opens its flowers in the depths of winter, before a single leaf appears, on bare dark wood, at a time when nothing else in the garden is doing anything. Many gardeners grow it entirely for that and treat the fruit as a bonus.
| What to check before you dig | What good looks like | What to do if it does not |
|---|---|---|
| Drainage | A hole 18 inches (45 cm) deep filled with water empties within two hours | Plant on a raised mound 12 inches (30 cm) high and 4 feet (1.2 m) across |
| Cold air | The site is not at the bottom of a slope, and cold air drains away past it | Move upslope; a frost pocket costs the crop nearly every year |
| Sun | Six hours or more of direct sun through the growing season | Accept fewer flower buds and a lighter crop, or find a brighter aspect |
| Wind | No hard wind crossing the site while the tree is in flower | Put a hedge or fence upwind, set back far enough not to shade the tree |
| Soil pH | Roughly 6.0 to 7.0 | Lime an acid soil the season before planting, never on planting day |
| A second tree | Another Japanese apricot of a different kind within 50 feet (15 m) | Plan space for one now, or graft a second kind into the tree later |
Many kinds will not set fruit alone
A large share of Japanese apricots are self-incompatible: their own pollen will not fertilize their own flowers, and a solitary tree flowers magnificently and sets nothing at all, year after year, with no other symptom to tell you what is wrong. A few kinds are self-fertile, but you cannot tell by looking, and a tree bought purely for blossom is very often one of the sterile-to-itself ones.
The safe assumption when you are planting is that you need two different kinds that flower at the same time. Two trees propagated from the same parent plant are genetically identical and will not pollinate each other however far apart you put them, so what matters is that they are genuinely different, not that there are two trunks.
If you only have room for one tree, graft a second kind onto one limb. A single grafted branch carrying a few dozen flowers is enough to pollinate a small tree, and it costs no ground space at all. Space the two trees within about 50 feet (15 m) of each other; closer is better, because the insects that carry pollen at this time of year fly short distances and only on the mildest days.
If you inherit a mature tree that has flowered for years without ever fruiting, and there has been no frost damage to the open flowers, lack of a pollen partner is the most likely cause by a wide margin. Look for another Japanese apricot in neighboring gardens before you blame the soil or the pruning.
Plant while dormant, and keep the graft union clear
Bare-root trees go in while the tree is leafless and the soil is neither frozen nor sodden. In practice this is a narrow window here, because the tree breaks into flower so early: aim for late autumn or the very start of winter rather than late winter, when you may find yourself planting a tree that is already in bud. A container-grown tree can go in during the growing season, but then you own the watering for the whole of the first summer.
- Soak the roots, briefly Stand a bare-root tree in a bucket of water for one to two hours before planting, and no longer than that. Roots that dried out in transit will not take up water again once they are buried, and the tree sulks for a full season.
- Dig wide rather than deep Make the hole two to three times the width of the root spread, but no deeper than the roots themselves need. Fork the sides and the base so new roots can escape into the surrounding soil instead of circling.
- Set the depth against a cane Lay a cane across the hole and set the tree so the old soil mark on the trunk sits level with it. Leave 2 to 4 inches (5 to 10 cm) of clear trunk between the graft union and the soil surface after settling.
- Backfill with the soil you dug out Use native soil, not bought compost, and firm it in layers as you go so there are no air pockets. Water in with two full cans to settle the soil against the roots rather than relying on treading alone.
- Stake low, mulch wide Drive the stake in before the tree and angled away from the roots, and tie low so the head can flex. Mulch 2 to 3 inches (5 to 8 cm) deep across the root area, kept a hand's width clear of the trunk.
Spacing and the shape you are committing to
Japanese apricot is vigorous and will make a wide-headed tree 15 to 25 feet (4.5 to 7.5 m) across if you let it. Because the fruit is picked all at once and the tree is pruned in summer, a shape you can reach the whole of is worth more than raw size. Decide now, because the framework you build in the first four years is what you will live with.
| Form | Spacing | What it suits |
|---|---|---|
| Open-center bush | 15 to 20 feet (4.5 to 6 m) apart | The usual garden choice; light reaches the spurs and picking stays on a low ladder |
| Fan against a wall | 12 to 15 feet (3.5 to 4.5 m) apart | Cold gardens, where the wall's warmth and easy fleecing protect the winter blossom |
| Half standard | 20 to 25 feet (6 to 7.5 m) apart | Space to spare and blossom viewed from a distance; picking needs a tall ladder |
| Large container | One tree per pot of 18 inches (45 cm) or more | Gardens where the tree is moved into shelter for the flowering weeks |
The first two years, and what to write down
For the first two growing seasons the only thing likely to kill the tree is water, in either direction. Give one long soak a week in dry weather that wets the soil to 12 inches (30 cm), rather than a daily splash that keeps the roots at the surface. Keep a 3 foot (1 m) circle around the trunk clear of grass, because grass competes for water at exactly the depth a young tree needs it.
Take off any fruit that sets in the first two years. A young tree that carries a crop builds less frame and less root and pays for it for a decade. From the third year, let it crop as heavily as it wants.
Write four things down while you still remember them: the date you planted, the exact position of each tree and what it faces, which kind is which if you planted two, and the height of the graft union above the soil. When you are trying to work out five years from now why one tree fruits and the other does not, or whether the union has sunk, those four lines are the only evidence you will have.