Anyone got a goji bush?

[Vince G]

Mine arrived today, approx a foot in size, pretty healthy looking. How di I care for it, prune it etc, and what sort of yield can I expect? Any this year?

[Moo's Mum]

I've had one or just over 3 years Vince. Must admit I knew nothing of what to do with it, in fact I still dont! I bought it from Aldi or Lidl's for about £3.
It is about 4 feet high now and is covered in lots of leaves and each year produces pretty little purple flowers. I've never had any berries off it.
Last autumn I pruned it right back and has grown back bigger and stronger, so will just wait and see i any berries appear.

[Vince G]

MM, can't find much on the interweb about growing them at all, hence I thought I'd throw it to the forum. Sure there will be someone along soon to advise us. I've found some pics of the flowers and they look very decorative, so it will be an attractive addition to the garden....but we'd like some fruit wouldn't we!!

[Moo's Mum]

I've never been able to find any info either Vince. 'Tis a tad annoying as I love the berries and they cost a bomb in the health food shops! On the plus side, when the flowers are out they really attract the bees

[Vince G]

What do the berries taste like MM? Not really found a proper description on the interweb, so might as well hear it from the horse's mouth....er, no offence

[Moo's Mum]

I've only ever had them dried. They are quite small, about the size of a currant and are orangey red in colour. They are quite chewy and taste quite sweet. I cant really describe their taste Vince as they dont really have a distinctive taste as such. In fact I'd go as far to say that they dont really taste of anything! They are really nutritous though....full of antioxidants and carotenoids. My mother has age related macular degeneration, so I take them to try and keep my eyes tip top. I just sprinkle them on my cereals/porridge.

[yekim_4321]

Hi i dont have one but have you tried doing an interweb search on the chinese wolfberry or just wolfberry, that should provide some starting points

or try this bit basic

How to Grow Wolfberry | Garden Guides

[Moo's Mum]

Thanks yekim. It seems from the link that it can take 3 years for berries to appear. This year maybe the year

[T8Ter]

Thanks yekim. It seems from the link that it can take 3 years for berries to appear. This year maybe the year

Hope so MM my bushes will be three this year

[FB.]

My experience of Goji's is that they grow incredibly fast - easily able to send out shoots 2metres (7ft) long in their second year if the soil is reasonably good.
Goji's will grow at least as fast, if not faster, than a medium to high-vigour fruit tree in the same soil. My Goji's can match the shoot growth of my apple trees on the very vigorous "heavy standard" apple M25 or vigorous "light standard/half-standard" MM111 rootstocks.

They seem to resemble the growth habit of brambles, with long, arching stems and may produce thorns as they age.
Where soil is deep, fertile and holds moisture adequately in summer, Goji's will grow very rapidly - putting all of their energy into growth and not fruit.

My advice is treat them very rough to keep their growth under control and encourage fruiting.
Give them dry infertile shallow soil - like a fig pit, or where the soil is shallow and contains builders rubble.
Alternatively, keep their roots restricted by a pot (they will grow huge root systems if allowed to spread their roots).
Or prune them hard in July-August to calm down their growth rate and control shoots which are growing too fast.

[DuncanM]

I tried growing some goji's from seed last year. I cut open a dried pack from tesco, scraped a small number of seeds out and planted them. Low and behold 6 sprouted. I looked after them for a few months over last summer but I forgot about them over winter. In March I discovered them again (my garden is a building site at the minute) and low and behold 3 had survived the winter (I've read that they are best to buy as 2 year old and above as they can withstand frosts from then on).

They have been neglected and the state of them does differ drastically (all in small pots):
1) one very long, spindly and slightly woody stem, about 60cm long. Has leaves along it but only the leaves towards the last 10cm look healthy. requires support.
2)had one long woody stem similar to the above, but growth seems to have stopped from most of this stem. Growth is a few leaves at the bottom of the stem.
3) one very green stem, that is so thin it's barely possible to support it's self but has lots of growth and leaves.

I'll upload pictures either this evening or tomorrow, but what's the best approach, plant them out and give them a good feed? Note the compost hasn't been changed since they were originally potted up just under a year ago and only ever received rainfall watering.

Cheers,
Duncan

[FB.]

Although Goji's will grow in very poor soil, they can't grow in soil which has no nutrients left.
Potted plants don't benefit from small amounts of nutrients leaching into their soil, unlike plants in the ground, so it is very common for potted plants to literally starve - with vigour, productivity and ultimately health in severe decline.

[DuncanM]

Here are the photos:

I forgot I actually have 4, not 3.

#2


(similar to #3)


#1


#3

[Moo's Mum]

I must admit I do neglet my goji quite a bit! It's in a large pot and mainly gets just rainwater. I do give it the occaisional feed. I think because it's never produced any fruit I'd kind of given up on the poor thing and just left it in the corner of the garden to provide a bit of greenery. I've got fingers crossed that it'll produce some friut this year.

[zazen999]

Mine grown from seed is about 3 this year - I stuck it in the fruit patch in the lottie and if it ever fruits, or flowers, I'll post about it. Until then...