Check out the latest episode where we talk about breeding Chinese yams and the art of mentor grafting
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It was a great pleasure speaking with you Shane !
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Cool projects. I didnāt quite understand your thread on ficifolia by lundelliana until listening to this. Iāll be following that.
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Enjoying the podcast. Iād like to grow any passionfruit selections in the black gumbo clay here, get it some the Texas heat but needing the root survival for winter die back here. Always been a passionfruit fan since eating my first pavlova. Took me years but finally got my passionfruit seed germination working, though working with blue passionfruit as the first success here.
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Hey @LeeAngold from this topicā¦
Great podcast as usual!
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I like that you tied in the mentor grafting on your Substack as well, @ShaneS. Giving a bit more info on it was helpful to get a fuller picture of what you guys were talking about on the podcast.
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Absolutely loved this and am super interested in the goji breeding! Iād love to know where you sourced your seeds to get that much variety! (Iām pretty new to breeding the more obscure stuff)
If anyone knows of a particular source for fruity/sweet strains of goji Iād love to hear it!
Hello Pete! Where are you located ? A guy in the US bred Stardust goji (barbarum āamber sweetā x ruthenium), which I crossed last year with leaf goji which is L. chinense āLarge leaf.ā I got the large leaf goji seed from JLHudson. Europe has some better fresh eating selections than we do here in the US, as more breeding work has been for that there. The Chinese market is for dried berries so fresh eating quality isnāt a typical trait they select for. I can harvest some hybrid seed for you this year.
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Oh ok I see that youāre in Michigan. Stardust plants are available online, or I could get you cuttings when its dormant. I think Stardust is the only fresh eating goji that tastes good in the US besides Amber Sweet (one of its parents). Amber sweet doesnāt have very good vigor though. I think for climates like ours its good the have at least a little of the L. chinense genetics. Anything you can cross to Stardust though is a great starting point.
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That would be fantastic! Iād love to try crossing and playing around with as many genetics as possible!
Right now all I have are the basic Crimson Star which are young (just started them from seed this year) so anything better to start with would be much appreciated!
Are there other genetics that you recommend throwing in the mix? Maybe L. ruthenicum or something? Iām curious how you got to the interesting flavor you mentioned on the podcast!
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Do you have good sources for Stardust or other varieties online? It can be difficult to know whoās reputable out thereā¦ I also didnāt realize there was a golden goji berry!
It looks like all the black goji seeds I planted germinated well this year (very excited). Two varieties were planted: Big Black and Black Pearls. They say the common name is Lycium ruthenicum, but they also mention theyāre from China.
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Oh you found named black goji cultivars, nice ! Keep us updated on them.
I want to support the breeder of Stardust, so I will link to his eBay store for it (he sells Amber sweet cuttings too sometimes): Goji Berry "Stardust" Unique Fruit *Novel Variety*4-inch pot* | eBay
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Since barbarum already grows pretty well for you, I wouldnāt hesitate to recommend Amber sweet. Itās one of the few cultivars that are better for fresh eating. Iād say give ruthenicum a shot and see how the seedlings do, but in general its the harder to grow outside of desert regions than barbarum is, as its super susceptible to fungi. This is the defect it gives to Stardust, but the hybrid vigor is so strong it can still outrun the disease. I didnāt breed Stardust, but the flavor comes in large part from the yellow goji as a parent which is sweet and non bitter. Then it gets some āpurpleā flavor from the black goji which somehow combines to make a blueberry-grape flavor. The juiciness of the berry comes from black goji I believe. Black goji flavor on its own is apparently very āmedicinalā and less suitable for fresh eating.
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This is where I got these two varieties. I had previously gotten some unnamed variety of black from EFN, but they didnāt germinate nor grow nearly as vigorously. Of 25 seeds, only one plant survived out of maybe 10 who germinated. Most of the PWS seeds have germinated and are growing.
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I can get you some diverse seed to grow out. Passionfruit pavlova sounds amazing. Thereās a guy a couple hours from me selecting from maypop x blue passionflower selections. Heās interested in the evergreen habit for super early flowering. Heās doing crossed from Elizabeth also which is incarnata x phoenecia. Iāve been told by the person whoās probably made the most progress with hardy passionfruit that you can get up to 70% of the edulis flavor in hardy hybrids. There are other species with different qualities but I believe many of them can tolerate heat. Does incarnata grow well there ?
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Looking good. I wonder, if those were produced by PWS if they could be more tolerant of humidity. Stardust has some succulence to the leafs from black goji, which is kind of nice when eating.
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I just repotted some seedlings a little older than those. These are 1/4 ruthenicum. Theyāre the most vigorous seedlings Iāve grown. Just from a productivity standpoint vigor of these bushes makes them a useful leaf/shoot veg.
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I didnāt realize theyāre a leaf veg plant as well! Very cool. Is that the large leaf variety?
The above are stardust x large leaf goji so they are 50% chinense 25% barbarum 25% ruthenicum.
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That would be a fun plant to grow. 
Is this your first year with that hybrid?