For the love of Prunus mume...

[SeanS]

Ume layer separated. It had started to yellow quite a bit so I decided it was time to separate. Once separated I realised the yellowing was probably due to the pot being filled with roots and sucking almost all of the moisture out of the soil! I was watering the layer every day, sometimes twice, and the soil was pretty dry when I separated this afternoon.



The mother tree. I’ll be digging it up this coming winter.

 

[Pitoon]

Ume layer separated. It had started to yellow quite a bit so I decided it was time to separate. Once separated I realised the yellowing was probably due to the pot being filled with roots and sucking almost all of the moisture out of the soil! I was watering the layer every day, sometimes twice, and the soil was pretty dry when I separated this afternoon.

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The mother tree. I’ll be digging it up this coming winter.

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You may need to trim that tree down some, now being seperated from the mother tree do you think you have enough roots to sustain the top.

 

[SeanS]

You may need to trim that tree down some, now being seperated from the mother tree do you think you have enough roots to sustain the top.

I already did, it was close to 2m (6’) tall while on the tree! I basically filled a garbage bag with what I lopped off

 

[JoeR]

Ume layer separated. It had started to yellow quite a bit so I decided it was time to separate. Once separated I realised the yellowing was probably due to the pot being filled with roots and sucking almost all of the moisture out of the soil! I was watering the layer every day, sometimes twice, and the soil was pretty dry when I separated this afternoon.

View attachment 581212View attachment 581213View attachment 581214View attachment 581215

The mother tree. I’ll be digging it up this coming winter.

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I was reading on evergreengardenworks about how he, despite the common practice of avoiding this, will immediately start fertilizing cuttings (and likely airlayers) even with freshly grown roots. No direct experience here, but it would interesting to see if it helps it recover from yellowing leaves.

Fertilizing your Bonsai

I look forward to seeing the mother tree progress

 

[SeanS]

I was reading on evergreengardenworks about how he, despite the common practice of avoiding this, will immediately start fertilizing cuttings (and likely airlayers) even with freshly grown roots. No direct experience here, but it would interesting to see if it helps it recover from yellowing leaves.

Fertilizing your Bonsai

I look forward to seeing the mother tree progress

I’ll post updates in my dedicated Ume thread when I have anything to share

 

[SeanS]

You may need to trim that tree down some, now being seperated from the mother tree do you think you have enough roots to sustain the top.

@Pitoon this Ume layer seems to have dropped all of the leaves it felt it needed to and is growing new roots like crazy. It’s been raining almost non-stop for the past 6 days and there are loads of adventurous little roots growing up into the wet debris on the soil surface

 

[SeanS]

@Pitoon this Ume layer seems to have dropped all of the leaves it felt it needed to and is growing new roots like crazy. It’s been raining almost non-stop for the past 6 days and there are loads of adventurous little roots growing up into the wet debris on the soil surface

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Layer doing just fine. Not super green but looking good. Flower buds plumping up all over the tree for next spring, and a single random blossom. I’ve had JM layers also produce a few flowers after separation likely as a survival response

 

[SeanS]

Couple of full size Ume in my local botanical garden. Studied the branching for bonsai inspiration. I enjoyed the random downward growing branches that sporadically break the convention of the rest of the branching and then exhibit strongly upward growing twigs on the ends.

 

[Pitoon]

Repotted and wired up some mume seedlings today.....

 

[SeanS]

 

[SeanS]

Layer doing just fine. Not super green but looking good. Flower buds plumping up all over the tree for next spring, and a single random blossom. I’ve had JM layers also produce a few flowers after separation likely as a survival response

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Ume layer absolutely laden with flower buds! It’s slowly losing its leaves but just wants to flower! All of the Umes in my garden are keen to flower early, most of them still holding on to the last of their leaves.

 

[SeanS]

Abundance of flowers on this ume air layer

 

[Pitoon]

Here's +30lbs of ripe mume apricots. I should have a lot of seedlings next year!

 

[jal777]

Let's see if this is gonna work...

I wanted to give you guys an update on this...

So spring / summer 2022, I took two containers of umeboshi (pickled umes) from Amazon.com and stripped the flesh and planted the seeds in the hopes that I could get something to germinate as Prunue Mume seed is pretty much nonexistent in the US. I got zero germination.

I left the seedling tray in the garage and kind of ignored it.

Fall of 2023 I was doing a clean out and I saw one tiny little speck of green popping out from one of the cells. I thought it was a weed and was about to chuck out but the better of me dug around a little bit (literally) and yes in fact - one of the mume seeds had sprouted. I took that seedling and potted it up in a 4" container which grew indoors 2023-2024. I then took the seedling and upotted it to a 1 gallon in Spring 2024 and then again a 3 gallon in Spring 2025. Anyway here it is today in a #7 where it'll live for a couple years.

Admittedly not much to look at but I'm going to let it grow out to a fully grown tree. I have named it Prunus Mume "Amazon.com."

 

[Bonds Guy]

I wanted to give you guys an update on this...

So spring / summer 2022, I took two containers of umeboshi (pickled umes) from Amazon.com and stripped the flesh and planted the seeds in the hopes that I could get something to germinate as Prunue Mume seed is pretty much nonexistent in the US. I got zero germination.

I left the seedling tray in the garage and kind of ignored it.

Fall of 2023 I was doing a clean out and I saw one tiny little speck of green popping out from one of the cells. I thought it was a weed and was about to chuck out but the better of me dug around a little bit (literally) and yes in fact - one of the mume seeds had sprouted. I took that seedling and potted it up in a 4" container which grew indoors 2023-2024. I then took the seedling and upotted it to a 1 gallon in Spring 2024 and then again a 3 gallon in Spring 2025. Anyway here it is today in a #7 where it'll live for a couple years.

Admittedly not much to look at but I'm going to let it grow out to a fully grown tree. I have named it Prunus Mume "Amazon.com."

Very fitting name lol. Happy for your success. This reminded me I have a bit of a secret that I learned this summer. I visited the national bonsai & penjing museum in DC mid June. They have a full grown Kobai ume and it dropped hundreds of fruit around that time. I spoke with the groundskeeper and he said they’re up for grabs if you want them because they’re just gonna throw them out. So if anyone is nearby or willing to make the trip, you could get a bunch for the price of admission (which isn’t much).

Here’s a picture of the mume. If you zoom in on the ground you can see quite a few fruit



Sorry not sure why the image is rotated

 

[KWag]

I feel it's a waste to toss the tops of the rootstock when it's time to cut back. Here I air layered the top so I can repurpose it for another graft. The graft below is 'Tama ume'.


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I wondered if you might do that! I do that often. Why waste good stock.

 

[KWag]

I wanted to give you guys an update on this...

So spring / summer 2022, I took two containers of umeboshi (pickled umes) from Amazon.com and stripped the flesh and planted the seeds in the hopes that I could get something to germinate as Prunue Mume seed is pretty much nonexistent in the US. I got zero germination.

I left the seedling tray in the garage and kind of ignored it.

Fall of 2023 I was doing a clean out and I saw one tiny little speck of green popping out from one of the cells. I thought it was a weed and was about to chuck out but the better of me dug around a little bit (literally) and yes in fact - one of the mume seeds had sprouted. I took that seedling and potted it up in a 4" container which grew indoors 2023-2024. I then took the seedling and upotted it to a 1 gallon in Spring 2024 and then again a 3 gallon in Spring 2025. Anyway here it is today in a #7 where it'll live for a couple years.

Admittedly not much to look at but I'm going to let it grow out to a fully grown tree. I have named it Prunus Mume "Amazon.com."

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?The tree in the back or the tree on the right? Also is thetree on the left a Hollywood prunus?

 

[KateM]

Hey, Mume experts, are these flower buds?

 

[leatherback]

they are

 

[blackadam]

I waiting to see your mume in full bloom