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Viburnum fruit set

15 years ago

I would be curious about other people's experience regarding how many viburnums of a given species you need to have them set berries. I have read/heard contradictory things. I recently planted 1 arrowwood, 2 cranberrybush, and 2 blackhaw. All quite small right now, so it will be a while before I see the answer for myself.

Will I need to plant one or more additional arrowwoods in order to get fruit set?

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Comments (4)

Iris GW
15 years ago
With native viburnums, the important aspect is overlapping bloom time. I have had (and continue to have) viburnums of different species help each other with cross-pollination. The most obvious of these events has been Viburnum acerifolium (mapleleaf viburnum) mixing with Viburnum dentatum 'Blue Muffin'. Even this year, the V. acerifolium branches that bloomed before the 'Blue Muffin' blooms opened got poor to zero fruit set. The later branches (which happen to be the upper ones) were in bloom when the 'Blue Muffin' blooms opened and they have excellent fruit set.

Therefore, you can consider increasing your potential by adding some other natives and even some cultivars. For me, Viburnum nudum is one the later ones to bloom and so may not be a good pair for what you have (not sure when blackhaw blooms, mine is also too young).

There are several helpful threads about viburnums on the shrubs forum. Here is a link to one of them.

Here is a link that might be useful: Helpful thread on the shrubs forum
kelp
15 years ago
To be on the safe side, I'd get 2 different cultivars,(a 'named'variety) or 1 cultivar and 1 straight species. (Because cultivars are vegetatively propagated, they are all clones of each other.) A straight species will pollinate a straight species IF they were grown as seedlings, and not propagated from cuttings. Here's a good thread. http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/shrubs/msg021358308743.html?34
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As I noted above, I've not seen any beetle damage, though I generally am not viewing this shrub up close, so I can't guarantee that it has absolutely no damage. I ripped out my Blue Muffin because it looked so damaged from the beetles and wasn't much to look at regardless, with no fall color, just an ungainly blob with a short bloom season. Since I don't have space limits, a plant has to be pretty ugly for me to shovel prune it. The beetles overwinter as eggs in branch tips, and you can see which branches have them, so pruning those tips (I burned them in the wood stove) can reduce the problem. But I have two species of wild Viburnum in th woods, so removing all beetle eggs isn't reasonable here. I just choose resistant varieties. I currently have three types of plicatum, and all are quite beetle resistant and far more ornamental than Blue Muffin, which is a far overrated plant IMO. In my garden all the plicatum have a nice structure, good bloom, and striking fall color.
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jasonkay
Original Author
15 years ago
Thanks, esh ga and kelp. I have the straight species, I guess I'll try a cultivar. Now if only I can figure out a place to squeeze it in.

I'll also check out the shrub forum.
maxcol
14 years ago
I have a "Winterthur" viburnum. I will probably be purchasing "Brandywine" very soon. How close together do the two need to be in order to produce proper pollination for maximum fruit?

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