They look cold hardy so far!
A friend of mine asked me to work on a project with him. He's new enough to the area that he still doesn't have any land, but he knows some of what he wants when he does get land. One thing that he certainly wants to grow on his future property is pomegranates, so he came up with an idea. He asked me if I'd be willing to take care of some and test them out for a while if he bought some. Naturally I agreed, and soon eight "Russian 26" Pomegranates arrived at my homestead.
The video above shows them off earlier in the year, but basically six of the eight have already been planted, and two are still in pots. The "Russian 26" variety was supposedly the 26th plant in a row in an orchard in Russia, and is far more cold hardy than pomegranates usually are. My friend and I were both excited to see how they'd do here in the Ozarks, and so far we are impressed.
Unlike some of the ornamental or "wild" pomegranates found in Texas and other areas, these make an impressive-sized fruit. The ones I planted here vary in plant size, but the two biggest ones each fruited. Also, we decided to just let the fruit hang on them this year, so as the snow moved in, I was able to get some photos of the fruit covered in snow.
I'll see how these plants propagate from layering (which another friend has already had success in doing) and now that we have fully formed fruit, we'll see how they grow out from seed too. It's exciting to be able to see bushes like these produce and we are optimistic for the future of pomegranates here in our area.
Below are a small pile of photos from the snow days for y'all to enjoy. Have any of y'all ever grown your own pomegranates? If so, what growing zone are you in. Do you think these plants will make it through the winter? Let us know below, and enjoy the photos!
