I have eaten Jujube a few times over this past year. They are kind of similar to a apple with a crispy texture and mild taste. Honestly, its kind of plain tasting for me personally but its an easy fruit to eat if your a fussy type of eater.

Jene is having her tropical fruit tasting on July 17-18th, and I see jujube listed on her website, so you might call and see if she will have any to taste then.
(If you live not too far from St Pete, that is.)

Here is a link that might be useful: Jene's Tropicals

I have grown 2 cold hardy varieties of jujube in the past. After tasting the fruits I removed the trees. There are some more tropical varieties that are supposed to have a better taste. I tried to grow one of those but it died from the cold. Jujubes are off my long list of fruits to grow.

Christine

I plan on going to the fruit-tasting at Jene's in July, with my DIL.... we are looking to buy several different kinds of fruits, and Jujube is on the List, if it is good-tasting... also a Kiwi, also Avocado ( my other one died years ago), and maybe a Condo-size orange and other stuff... if she has them for tasting, I don't want to get stuck taking up the space with a 'sour fruit' ! see ya' there ! ... sally

brute,
Which jujube are you growing? The chinese jujube(Z. jujuba) or the Indian jujube(Z. mauritiana)? Since you're in zone 10 I'm assuming you're growing a grafted thornless Indian jujube. They are meant to be eaten when not fully ripe. They are one of my top 5 favorite fruit. The thornless Indian jujube is sweet and it is crisp like an apple.

The chinese jujube on the other hand is meant to be eaten when its fully ripe. I tried eating one at the same stage I would the indian jujube and it was horrible. They are supposed to be pretty good when fully ripe but there are also many different varieties of the Chinese jujube and the taste varies between the varieties.

Here is a pic of some Indian jujubes.
{{gwi:887369}}

Murahilin,
My jujube definitely has thorns on it. I think it's a Thai variety. I may be confused about which zone I live in. I seem to be right on the border of zones 9b and 10, near the town of Englewood.

I just won the bid on eBay for a three year old 'Silverthorn' jujube in a 2 gallon pot, for $15.50 from a Nursery in JAX. S&H+Tax is $7.60 which comes to Total $24.03

I'm Happy!!

Lou

Brute,
Is your jujube tree grafted? Do you have a pic of the thorns? The 'thornless' variety still has some thorns but not nearly as bad as the seedlings. If you have many thorns your tree might not be grafted. The Thai variety is a variety of the Indian jujube species(Z. mauritiana).

It sounds as tho' one needs to be certain of the variety when getting one of these, what do you do if the Nursery doesn't know ? should they be tagged? what specifically should one ask for? Thornless Indian grafted ? that pic of it looks just like apple.... and it sounds like the taste is like apple....guess when I go to the Nursery I'll take this as a print-out and not get one unless.............sally

saldut,
Well there aren't really any different grafted varieties of the Indian jujube available at nurseries in FL. There are different varieties around the world but the fruit tree nurseries here pretty much only sell one variety. There might be one that has a different type but I have not seen it. It's called many different name but its pretty much the same variety. I've seen it called "Thai giant", "Thornless", "Green thornless" etc.

The Chinese jujube on the other hand has many different varieties available in FL. The nurseries that sell the Chinese jujube should have the trees tagged with the correct variety names. The Chinese jujube grows even into zone 7.

Treehouse nursery in Bokeelia should have the grafted Indian jujube available.

People often mix up the scientific names of the Indian and Chinese jujube. Pine Island Nursery's website is a perfect example of the mistake. They have their jujube labeled as "Z. jujuba" when it is clearly "Z. mauritiana". You can tell the difference in the species of the jujubes easily by the flower, leaves, and fruit.

Here is a link that might be useful: Treehouse Nursery

Thank you murahilin, I didn't know abt. Treehouse Nursery and find it very informative, a lot of good information... it's kinda far for me to drive and get trees but maybe I can find the same varieties here now that I know what to look and ask for.... I appreciate your posting the Link, also the information you have posted...... Thank you...... sally

Murahilin,
Yes, my tree is grafted, and by the way, I bought it (and most of my other trees) from Treehouse Nursery in Bokeelia. They've got an enormous selection of tropical fruit trees to choose from.

Sorry I'm late to this thread.

The Sherwood jujube is said to have good flavor, and as a Chinese jujube cultivar found in Louisiana, may do well in humid/low chill FL.

Sadly, the most common varieties of jujube are Li and Lang, neither of which is as gratifying as your average apple. The Lang in particular is ill suited for fresh eating (but just fine for cooking). If you are growing jujube for fresh eating, all else equal, go for Honeyjar or Sugarcane varieties. Just don't know how they'd do in FL.

I have a grafted variety, that I got from a Taiwan agriculture research center, but have no idea what kind it is.

as a previous person mentioned, regarding the Indian variety, you do not eat them fully ripe, ( they ferment ) mine came out really small, but they did taste good like an apple, crispy etc.

I have one plant from seed, and yes thats one thorny sucker, in permaculture circles, Jujube seedlings are used for making live borders, if you cut them down they spring right up.

the grafted plants have some very small thorns, on some leaves. the seedlings are covered with them.

by the way, if your into bee keeping, bees love the flowers, and the smell so good when the perfume comes, I had flowers for months on my plants with no aroma, then bam they turned on the perfume. Bees went nuts.

That three year old 'Silverthorn' jujube I bought online last year from a nursery in Jax had nine fruit on it and they were delicious. It tasted somewhat like an apple sauce flavor. I bought some other jujube plants when I had to go to the Tampa area to pick up an A/C unit for my barn (I can't remember where I was exactly) but they were not the same kind of tree and the fruit tasted lousy. If they don't turn out better tasting in a year or two I will do my own grafting from the Silverthorn.

Lou

I planted two a couple years ago. One is dead and one is a sucker from the root, the original plant is dead. I think they didn't get enough water - they got watered for the first 2-3 months after february planting and that was it.

Supposed to be one of the very best fruits for central and north florida according to the fl fruit book.

Well, I am dumbfounded... so many responses to this post, and nobody mentioned the most important thing about eating Chinese jujubes...

They are meant to be eaten DRIED!!

Yes, they are good fresh, and some people prefer them that way, but they can hardly compare with the best apples. The beautiful thing is that they get much better as they dry out, approaching the sweet taste of dates, and can then be stored indefinitely. They are probably the easiest things to dry, just let them sit around awhile, on or off the tree.

I'm sure all the poster's here knew this already, but I sincerely hope that nobody, in Florida or elsewhere would rip out their jujube trees without trying the fruit the proper way -- dried.

I envy your success in growing them. I've planted 2 or 3 and lost them all. My weekend place is in a very harsh part of zone 9, with extreme heat and extreme cold. Or maybe they didn't like the acid sand that we loosely call soil.

I thought I'd resurrect this old thread to mention that my jujube produced a load of fruit in January, and they were delicious!
I found that the green ones were tasteless, and the ones that turned brown and began to wrinkle tasted "fermented".
The sweetest jujubes were the ones that were still mostly green, but had turned about 1/3 brown.
All in all, there's a lot to like about this tree!

I will definitely give them another go next year.

I just bought one on Sunday..... Tigertooth variety.

Brute,
Good to hear you liked the fruit. I like them when they are still green with a slight yellowish color, before any of the brown.

I live in West Palm Beach. I love this fruit. Can you please tell me where I can get this.

Thanks.

I planted the Thornless Indian Jujube last year and you were right on target it grew so quickly and better than any other fruit I have in my yard. Then it flowered and everyone who came out to my backyard asked what that horrible smell was...yep it was the jujube, I kept looking for a dead animal everywhere but it was the flowers in bloom, my neighbor however didn't mind the smell (she calls this fruit a downs fruit). It bloomed profusely for at least 2 months and set at about 200-300 fruit, sadly by the time they were just about ripe, the damn squirrels took all but 20 of them, I did manage to taste a few and they were pleasant but nothing to wow about. After it fruited it ended up getting a really bad case of fungus on the leaves that spread onto every leaf. I chopped it all down right now and have yet to dig it out of the ground. My neighbor is trying to convince me to keep it but I really want to get rid of it. As much as I like the fruit and my kids too, the fast growth, smell, squirrels and fungus are a negative that outweigh the positive of this fruit.

Just my 2 cents....by the way I'm in Brandon (Tampa area of Florida)

Anybody know a place I could buy these in the Deland/Ocala/Tavares region?

jujubes are definitely better tasting than apples in my opinion. One could eat an apple or two, but can't eat anymore as the strong smell could be cloying.. The best tasting jujube varieties like sugar cane/sihong/honey jar tend to be gobbled in rapid succession--i often realize(too late) have already eaten >than two lbs in just a few hours, and still want more, lol!

I heard that the Chinese jujube is better than the Indian jujube, but I don't know in what ways. Does anyone here have the Chinese jujube? If so, what kind and how big do they grow? I don't have a lot of space, but I'd like to get one. Any pictures of a mature tree would be helpful.

@bananafan,

check this out, it has some nice pix of fruiting jujubes, as well as important horticultural details. Like mulberries, jujube flowers and fruits on new growth, so you could literally carve it up as you see fit. As the two last links show, you could grow them close together, simply by cutting off lateral branches to about 6 inches long, and they will grow like columnar italian cypress trees, which grow elegantly slender and upwards. The 6-inch long lateral branches will then thicken, and form fruiting spurs. Most jujube growers would let their columnar jujubes grow to a manageable 10 feet tall, then chop off any vertical shoots, and just let the lateral shoots send out fruiting branches for easy access. This practice also maximizes the trunk strength to height ratio. Not that it is much needed, since a 10" diameter jujube trunk will easily support one end of a hammock(jujube wood provides one of the world's strongest lumbers)

http://www.wildlifegrowers.com/QDMA_Jujube_article.pdf

http://www.papayatreenursery.com/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=1157&g2_GALLERYSID=8c777c1f662328237ae4db83f8c0d1c6

http://www.papayatreenursery.com/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=1682

I am SO happy to read this, I recently bought strawberry guava trees, passion flower trees, and jujube trees, live in Texas now but might be moving to Florida. All of my research, including this, is making me pretty happy about my purchases haha

I live on the Treadure Coast of Florida and have recently read about Jujube and want to plant one now, but I cannot locate one locally. Does anyone have a lead, please.

Excalibur in Lake Worth usually has them:

http://www.excaliburfruittrees.com

This fruit sounds interesting. I'm going to look somewhere to try one. I think I'd prefer the sweetest variety if possible. When asking about the fruit, where would I ask and would they know if it was Chinese or Indian variety?

Also, if I am looking for the tree. Which variety would grow best in Orlando's 9b zone that tastes the sweetest?

https://youtu.be/BFXNnlxRDp8