- As a gardener. I really love growing
funky, unique plants, if only because they're unique. But today's plant that we're talking about is not only unique, but
highly nutritious as well. So this sad plant you see
next to me right here, under-loved and underappreciated, is the humble goji berry plant. Now, I haven't really
found a home for it here at Epic Gardening headquarters, as we're still planning
out that at yard orchard, but Chris, up in Vancouver, BC, a new member on the Epic
Gardening grower squad, she's actually quite good at growing goji. She's quite knowledgeable in this plant. And so in today's video, in her Digging Deeper series, we're gonna show you exactly
how special this plant is and how to grow it in your home. - Hey, it's Chris. And today we are in my back garden, and with me here is one of my favorite
fruiting shrubs to grow. This is goji berry. Now, goji plants are very low
maintenance, easy to grow, and they yield a lot of
highly nutritious berries, and the plants are just
generally pest and disease-free. So I always wonder why this
plant is still kind of unknown or under-loved in edible gardens. So I'm gonna go over what
the plant is all about, and hopefully you'll get
a better understanding of what the plant needs and whether it's a good
fit for your garden. And towards the end of the video, I'm also gonna talk about three ways how people propagate them. One of them, and actually my
favorite is through cuttings. So we will do that later, but first let's get to know the plant that we're looking at right here. Goji, or Lycium Barbarum,
or Lycium Chinense originate from Asia. And they are actually in the same plant family as
potatoes, tomatoes, and peppers. So the Solanaceae family, and what makes them very
interesting is that, you know, those plants that I just
named, they like heat. Now, goji likes heat as well, but these plants are
hearty down to zone 3, which is pretty cold. I think both Fahrenheit and Celsius, that is dipping into the -30s. So these plants can do
well in heat and cold. And that's why I think
it's such great plant for all types of food gardens. My goji plant was planted here, and it's kind of a mystery
what kind of cultivar it is. But if you've seen goji plants in store, you've likely come across
names like Phoenix Tears, Crimson Star, or Life Berry. And most gojis have the
potential to grow quite tall. And even though what we see here is a bunch of like these
weeping scraggly branches, it's quite like loose and
kinda shrubby like this, they do have the potential
to grow quite tall if you train them up,
especially with a trellis, which is actually quite
recommended for these plants. Otherwise they look
kind of messy like this. But we'll talk about pruning
and maintenance in just a sec. Goji plants are actually
quite lovely to have in any garden setting. And although they are deciduous, meaning they drop their leaves, during the growing season, many blueish green leaves appear along the entire thorny stem. And that creates a really
nice full, lush look. And one fun fact about the leaves is that they are also
edible, both raw and cooked. The five peed purple flowers, which bloom from June through September are favorites of both
bumblebees and hummingbirds. Now, if you're wondering if these plants require those pollinators to get fruit, well no, because the plants
are actually self-pollinating, meaning you don't need the insects, and also, you don't need a
buddy plant for the pollination. So you can get away
with getting great fruit with just one plant. And that's really important to know, because some people think that you need like two or more. You don't, so you can
get away with one plant. Okay, let's talk about the fruit. So this is the fruit that
I harvested last summer, from July through October,
or maybe September. I don't really remember. But there's a long harvesting window, depending on where you
live, because remember, those flowers flower
throughout that summer period, which is great. So this is why you get a lot of yields off of established plants. Now, the thing that people
don't like about goji, I find, is that slightly bitter taste. And I get that. Like, it's not the sweetest fruit. It's not like a blueberry, or it's not pleasantly
tart like a raspberry, but I enjoy the flavor. And if you throw them into smoothies, you get the health benefits, like the antioxidants,
without having that taste, if you don't really like it. And if you do grow them fresh, one benefit is that
you'll never get to have fresh goji berries from a grocery store, because when you harvest them, they have this opening that is just, it's just gonna ooze with juice. So you're not gonna find these in health food stores,
or in grocery stores, just because they don't travel well from harvest to the store. So they are highly nutritious. And if you're looking
for a high value crop, this is why I always
recommend growing goji berries in your home. So if right now you're
thinking, Hey Chris, this sounds like a great plant. How do I grow it? How do I keep it happy? Well, this low maintenance plant is not fussy when it comes
to most of the things that you need to provide fruiting shrubs. So for soil, any kind of soil,
it will probably do okay, as long as it's not overly rich
and organic, and overly wet. It wants a well draining spot. As long as it's not soupy
for long periods of time, this plant is going to be just fine. And also, in terms of
light, like right now, some sun is coming down here. So this is a, for the most part, a sunny spot that I have the gojis in. But I find, even though they are a Solanaceae plant, and they do like that heat and sun, mine have done the best
when they get afternoon sun, even for a short period. I find the leaves are happy. The fruit is the best. I do have some plants out front that are exposed in full sun. Those ones, I find, are not
producing as much fruit. That's one observation from
my garden with my plants. But that's something to think about. If you don't have full sun,
like eight-plus hours of sun, you may be able to get good fruit with just six to eight hours, or maybe just a little bit less. These plants are also quite
easy when it comes to watering. And even though they are fruiting plants that should be watered
when they are, you know, trying to pump out a lot of juicy fruit, they will not suffer much if they go through periods
of drought-like conditions. So it doesn't have to
be watered regularly, as long as it's watered deeply
during the growing period. And if you're wondering if
these large plants behind me can be grown in containers, yes they can. The beauty with goji is that they can be pruned quite easily. You don't have to be too precious when it comes to bringing out
your pruners to prune these. So if you want to grow them on a balcony or a smaller garden kind of setting, you can prune them down to size, and I'll show you how to
do that in just a sec. So keeping with the theme of this plant is very
easy and low maintenance, you don't really need
to fertilize it much. It will do its thing with very
little input, which is great. So at the start of the
season, so around springtime, I'll usually apply some organic 4:4:4, like a nice, balanced fertilizer, to the base of each plant, and then top with some compost, water it in, and that's
pretty much all I do for the rest of the season,
and it fruits beautifully. It is a vigorous grower. It really doesn't need much input. I know sometimes when you over-apply, especially for goji, I find, especially fertilizers that
have a very high nitrogen, so that first number in that NPK, the fresh growth that
comes out of the buds, they are very weak, because it's producing a
lot of fresh green growth. And that's actually not ideal. You want the plant to just
grow at its normal rate. The cells are gonna be stronger. It's gonna be able to
withstand any sort of pests or diseases that come its way. Or even if the temperatures drop, the tissues, the young tissues, will be able to withstand
any fluctuations better. So I would not hit it with
overly high fertilizers. Again, it's a very easy plant
that needs very little input. So right now, I'm just
in this tangle of stems. And if you're wondering, Chris, can I cut all of this stuff back? I don't like this scraggly look. Well, yeah, you can. You can cut this plant back hard annually if you want to maintain size. And also if you wanna help
with increasing yields. Now, what I've done over the years is just let the plant grow kind of crazy. I don't mind that look. And then every year, I just take back maybe
a couple of feet or so, lemme move this, couple of feet or so, and toss those, and the plant
just pushes out new growth, and it will fruit on the new wood. So you don't have to worry
about losing this year's fruit, because it's gonna fruit on the new wood. But if you want to take
the plant back in size, all you have to do is trace it
back as far back as you want, cut that section off, and your plant is going
to be in good shape. Now, if you're wondering, Chris, what can I do with all
these branches here? Can we propagate with them? Yep. We can. Let me take you to the greenhouse after a quick pruning session. (lighthearted alternative music) So I did a really light pruning. There's still quite a bit of work to do, but I did collect some really
good parts for propagating. So if you have a neighbor, or if you have an existing goji plant, and you want to grow more of this plant, they are super easy to grow from cuttings before it leaves out. So what you wanna do is take
something around this thick. You don't want anything that is thicker than pencil diameter, I would say. And then you kind of eyeball six inches. Pro tip, if you want to know what six inches is approximately, you open that up, you got
your six inches there. So I like to collect all of my branches, and then bring them inside before trimming everything down in size. Because when you do cuttings, what you don't want are
the cuttings to dry out. So harvest everything, bring them into a controlled environment, and then you trim them down. So what I wanna do, I've got six inches. I wanna trim the bottom,
just under this nice bud. And then I just wanna clean
up this top right here. And then that is a good candidate for sticking into your
growing medium of choice. So you can stick it in there. And for a six inch container,
sorry, a four inch container, you can probably put four
or even more in there, water it in. And because it doesn't have
any leaves growing right now, you can just set it into any
sort of like, well-lit spot, not too hot, too cold. And in about two weeks time, you're likely going to see roots forming at the base of the plant. Now, the reason why I like doing
hardwood or winter cuttings is that there are no
leaves to worry about. If you do cuttings of fresh growth, you have to keep the humidity very high. It's a little bit more babying. You can still get really great cuttings, but this is the reason why I like doing winter cuttings of goji. Earlier, I mentioned three common propagation methods for goji. The first one I just showed
you, which was cuttings. The second one is seeds. Now, you may not be able
to see it on the camera, but they look like small pepper seeds, and you would start them similar to how you would with peppers. So they do appreciate the bottom heat. And it sometimes does
take a little bit longer for them to germinate, but it
could be well worth the wait. Now, do keep in mind that it may take up to two
years starting from seed to get a plant that looks like something, and that would be ready
to go out into the garden and actually flower. And it may take until
roughly the fourth year before you start seeing fruit. Now, if you are impatient like me, then this third method
that I'm going to show you may be more up your alley. Maybe a little hard to see,
but there are two goji plants with really long stems back there. I took those stems,
brought them out front, and now I'm gonna show you
what's under that rock. This totally hands-off
method of propagation, which I love, is called layering. And with the stem pinned
down and contacting soil, we have all of these roots. Now, I can just simply sever this now, and I have this brand new plant. If you've ever wondered if
goji was the right fit for you, hopefully I shared some information to get you thinking about it. So that next time you're out in the nursery, and you
come across a goji plant, you may be more inclined to give it a try. Now, remember, you can
keep it containerized, but with any goji plant, it does have the ability to
get kind of wild looking. So make sure you have some sort of stakes or some vertical support for it. Otherwise it will get a little bit floppy. But as we know, we can prune it hard to keep it healthy and tidy. - Thank you, Chris. You have now saved my goji berry plant, and hopefully all of you watching as well have been inspired to
grab one this season. Really fascinating plant. This one will be rehabilitated and given a home here at Epic Gardening. So there you go. The goji berry plant, fascinating. Go grow it. Good luck in the garden,
and keep on growing.
