Seed preparation
Each fruit holds one large seed. Remove the pulp by rubbing the fruit in water, and sow clean seed: mice readily eat sown Elaeagnus seed with pulp on it.
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Fruit growing guide
Goumi is a hardy, nitrogen-fixing shrub with tart red berries that ripen in early summer. Its seed is dormant and needs a warm then cold period, so sow in autumn or stratify before a spring sowing.
Each fruit holds one large seed. Remove the pulp by rubbing the fruit in water, and sow clean seed: mice readily eat sown Elaeagnus seed with pulp on it.
Not usually needed. Stratification, not nicking the seed, is the standard way to break goumi dormancy.
Essential for spring sowing. Keep the seed in moist sand or compost for about 4 weeks at room temperature, then about 12 weeks in the fridge at 1-5 °C (34-41 °F). For the genus, chilling for less than 60 days works noticeably less well.
Optional. Soaking for 24 hours before cold treatment broke dormancy in autumn olive, a close relative, but it does not replace stratification.
After chilling, keep the seed cool rather than warm. Autumn olive, a close relative, germinated best at about 20 °C (68 °F) by day and 10 °C (50 °F) at night.
About 13-25 mm (1/2-1 in), the depth used for Elaeagnus seed in nurseries. Mulch the surface lightly to stop soil splashing.
A gritty, free-draining compost. Goumi does not need rich soil.
Keep pots evenly moist through the cold period and germination, and never let them dry out over the summer if seed has not come up yet.
No light is needed under the soil cover. A cold frame or sheltered spot outdoors suits autumn sowings.
Seed sown fresh in autumn usually comes up in late winter or early spring. Stored or unstratified seed can take up to 18 months, so keep pots at least until the second spring.
Move seedlings into individual pots as soon as they are large enough to handle.
Plant out once they are at least 15 cm (6 in) tall, in spring or autumn. Allow room: shrubs usually reach 1.8-3 m (6-10 ft) tall and about as wide.
Water in the first summer until roots establish. Goumi then tolerates drought and wind and feeds itself with nitrogen from its root nodules, so skip nitrogen fertilizer.
Goumi is hardy in USDA zones 4-9 and suits temperate gardens. In India grow it in the temperate hills rather than on the tropical plains.
Any well-drained soil, ideally a light sandy loam, in sun or half-day sun. It tolerates poor, dry, salty and alkaline sites and makes a good windbreak or hedge.
Because it fixes nitrogen, goumi is often planted among other fruit trees as a companion shrub.
Seedlings take 3-10 years to fruit and vary in fruit quality; named varieties are propagated from cuttings.
Stratify goumi seed or sow it in autumn for hardy, early-fruiting shrubs.
The seed is dormant. It needs a warm then cold period, or an outdoor winter after autumn sowing, and some seeds wait until the second spring.
In early summer, from late May to July depending on the climate, making it one of the first fruits of the year.
Goumi is not on invasive species lists and is considered the least invasive of the edible Elaeagnus species, but check local rules before planting.