Is anyone growing this variety? How does it taste? How is it's cold hardiness?

I don't grow Keraji, but I find it interesting that UCR's CCPP does not even offer this variety as budwood. Must not have much of a call for it. - Millet 312 BO-)

I grow it, it is a good yellow mandarin. It is said hardy but I didn't try it myself.

I believe Keith also grows it & has a fruiting tree. I have never tried it.

Keraji is a great fruit. It tastes like a mandarin/sweet lemonade cross similar to Sambokan. It makes a small greenish yellow fruit that isn't very seedy and peels super easy. Each of the fruit sections burst with juice as you bite into them. Everyone that I've given Keraji fruit to try has liked them. I have multigrafts of Keraji throughout my yard and it ranks in the top five as far as taste in my 'hardy' citrus collection. In addition to producing nice fruit it make a pretty tree that has rounded leaves and limited thorns even as juvenile seedlings.

Seedlings of this tree do not handle my zone 8a very well and usually end up dying off. I do think that seedlings would grow well in zone 8b and above. When grafted on poncirus it gains more cold tolerance and grows/fruits well here in Virginia Beach.

Remind me this fall/winter Laaz and I'll send you some fruit

Thanks eyeckr for the great information. Now I'm definitely interested in growing this variety.

My Zn8a/8b property is mostly exposed to the North and West wind. I have some seedling cedar trees planted to block the wind, but right now I don't have room for anymore tender trees. I would like to acquire a few more varieties, like Keraji, that would be less demanding.

eyeckr, what are your top 5?

No prob. Just quickly off the top of my head my favorite sweetish fruits that I have growing in the ground are:

1. Seedless Kishu
2. Nuclem
3. Satsumas (I have a few varieties but they all taste good)
4. Keraji
5. Changsha -I have a particular seedling that I selected that produces awesome fruit

Eyeckr, how would you rate Keraji against Sanbokan??

Keraji fruit are fairly small, somewhere in the three inch range. As I mentioned before they kind of burst with juice each time you bite into the sections. To me they taste like sweet lemonade with satsuma flavor mixed in.

Sanbokan/Sambo lemon are much larger, usually in the four to six inch range and taste like an expertly mixed sweet lemonade. They take a tad more work to peel and eat like a typical citrus fruit without the burst of juice like Keraji. In addition they have a decent amount of seeds per fruit.

I like them both but my wife prefers Keraji because they are a little more complex in flavor without too much lemon zing. I haven't been able to keep Sanbokan growing in my yard since it keeps freezing back. I do plan on grafting it out again this year on a more vigorous rootstock and see if that does the trick. Keraji handles the cold better and has established itself well here.

Last winter my one year old seedlings of Keraji in the ground survived a frost to -6,1C(21F) no damaged, but Sanbokan has been damaged on the top. Now all seedlings are OK.

There really isn't much info out there on Nuclem. I believe I read somewhere that it is polyembryonic. I have a friend that has one too but from a different source than mine. He says his is kind of bland and wasn't too impressed with the fruit. Mine is always flavorful and tastes like a very sweet commercial clementine. Before I grafted mine out I was pretty skeptical on what NuClem actually was and if it would survive here but it has. I think the coldest mine has seen is around 14 degrees.

Here is a recent short discussion on NuClem. Ned has some good information about it in his post.

link

Thank you Eyeckr,
When it is ripe at your place? Have you grown the original stock from the seed?

My fruit ripen around mid December. I grafted my tree from a mature scion and not a seedling.

Damn it G ! Now I'm going to need budwood of both the Keraji & NuClem.