Loquat
Eriobotrya japonica
Flowers as the cold is closing in, which is the trouble — the blossom, not the tree, is what frost takes.
- Type
- Fruit · Perennial
- Botanical family
- Mixed / other
- Foliage color
- Green
- Flower color
- Orange
- Sunlight
- Full sun
- Feeding
- All-purpose balanced
- Frost tolerant
- Yes
- Flowering
- October
- Mar–May Bud Break
- May–Jun Harvest
- Jun–Nov Growing
- Nov–Nov Flowering
- Nov–Dec Fruit Set
- Dec–Dec Leaf Fall
- Jan–Mar Leaf Fall
- Plant spacing
- 16 ft 5 in
- In-row spacing
- 16 ft 5 in
- Between rows
- 16 ft 5 in
- Square-foot density
- Not suited to SFG
- Root system
- Woody, shallow and far-reaching
- Working depth
- 12–24 in
- Can reach
- 4 ft down where the soil allows
- Spread
- 26–39 ft across, about 2–3× the width of the plant
Almost all of a tree’s roots are in the top two feet of soil, where the air is, and they run out well past the branch tips. The deep taproot most people picture belongs to the seedling; the tree grows out of it and spends the rest of its life spreading sideways instead.
The habit is Loquat’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.
- Codling moth Its caterpillars tunnel to the core of apples and pears, leaving frass-filled exit holes. Hang pheromone traps from late spring and pick up windfalls promptly.
- Fire blight A bacterial disease of the apple-pear family: blossoms and shoots look scorched black and hang on. Prune 30 cm below visible damage, sterilizing tools between cuts.
- Scab Pear scab
- Frost damage Frost damage to the flowers
Beneficial predators that hunt this plant's pests — grow their favourite flowers nearby to recruit them. companion plant
- Bats ChiropteraHunts Codling moth
A single bat takes hundreds of moths and mosquitoes in a night, and the moths are the parents of your cutworms, corn earworms and hornworms. Put up a bat box on a warm south wall, leave a night-scented corner unlit, and never spray after dark.
- Parasitic wasps Braconidae & TrichogrammaHunts Codling moth
Tiny, stingless wasps that lay eggs in or on caterpillars, aphids, and moth eggs — the white cocoons riding a hornworm are their calling card, so leave that caterpillar be. Umbel flowers with shallow nectar keep the adults fuelled.
Comfrey, Lavender, Rosemary
Green-leaved fruit, like this one.
The Cottage Garden Companion — the gardener's herbarium at cottagegardencompanion.com