Plant · P-429

Jujube

Ziziphus jujuba

Jujube fruit tastes like a date once dried, and works just as well cooked into puddings, breads and jellies. The tree is exceptionally tolerant of heat and drought - trials found it outlasts both drought and excess moisture better than almost any other fruit crop - and it blooms late enough to dodge spring frost. Every leaf carries a pair of sharp spines, which makes an unpruned hedge of it a genuinely stock-proof barrier, and its heavy root suckering will build a thicket on its own if the sprouts are not pulled.