A Detailed Guide to Black Goji Berry Planting Methods and Technical Key Points

Black goji berry, namely Lycium ruthenicum, is known in Mongolian as "Qiaonuoying-Harmag" and in Tibetan medicine as "Pangma"; it belongs to the genus Lycium in the Solanaceae family. It is a multi-thorned shrub with many branches and hard, often zigzag-curved branches that are white.

Black Goji Berry Propagation Methods

Cuttage propagation:

Cuttings can also be taken before budbreak in spring and in autumn.

Select one-year-old water shoots or thick branches with plump buds from superior individual plants, cut them into 15-18 cm long cuttings, insert the cuttings obliquely into the prepared seedbed, then press and firm the soil.

Note that watering should be done frequently to keep the soil moist; the survival rate is generally around 85%.

Seed seedling propagation:

Use 5-10 grams of dried fruit seeds per square meter of seedling bed. Seedling raising is mostly done in spring, and the seedling site should be chosen on flat terrain with good drainage, sufficient water sources and deep sandy loam soil.

Apply 4-5 kg of decomposed farmyard manure per square meter, along with 30-40 grams of nitrogen-phosphorus-potassium compound fertilizer; after fertilizing, promptly deep-plow and then rake the ground level.

Make seedling beds with a width of 100 cm and a height of more than 10 cm, and dig 40-50 cm wide furrows between the seedling beds as drainage ditches and working paths, which helps with summer drainage and field management.

Before sowing, take the prepared dried black goji berry seeds and soak them in clean water for 5-10 hours; after the seed coats become soft, rub the berries with your hands to crack the fruit skins and wash out the seeds, then routinely disinfect the seeds with potassium permanganate water, mix them into screened fine sandy soil (the amount of sandy soil used is more than 10 times the volume of the seeds), and then evenly sow them on the seedling bed, covering with 0.8-1.2 cm of fine sandy soil.

Finally, press lightly and firm the soil. After sowing, water thoroughly in time to prevent the seedling bed from losing water, until seedlings emerge.

After emergence, the frequency of spraying water should be appropriately reduced to prevent root rot or plant diseases. Black goji berry propagation can also use drilling or hole sowing for seedling raising.

Be sure to carefully distinguish small weeds from goji berry seedlings (black goji berry seedlings first grow two pointed leaves, and both the light-facing and back-facing sides of the leaves are green); weed about once every 5-7 days, and seedlings can be transplanted and planted out when they are more than 15 cm tall.

Black Goji Berry Management Techniques

Throughout the year, combine hoeing and weeding with timely loosening of the soil, water moderately according to soil conditions, and apply sufficient base fertilizer every year in March.

Carry out scientific topdressing at the end of June and August.

In the early stage, mainly use nitrogen fertilizer; in the later stage, apply more phosphorus and potassium fertilizers.

Shaping and pruning:

Black goji berry can bear fruit in the second year, heavily bear fruit in the third year, and enter the full fruiting period; its shaping must be completed in the first three years after planting.

In the year of planting, cut back all branches at a height of about 25-35 cm, leaving 4-5 well-developed main branches as the first layer, then leave one layer about every 30-40 cm, with 3-5 main branches per layer, and finally prune the entire tree form into a three- to four-layer umbrella shape; on this basis, carry out appropriate re-pruning and reshaping each year.

The aim is to cultivate more fruiting branches. When pruning, follow the pruning principle of removing three and keeping three, namely remove old and keep new, remove diseased and keep healthy, remove weak and keep strong, so that the fruiting branches are evenly distributed within the crown.

Each black goji berry tree can have dozens of fruiting skeletal branches, maintaining a stable fruit-bearing quantity.

Pest and disease control:

Black goji berry originates from the harsh natural conditions of the gobi saline-alkali zone of the Qaidam Basin and has very strong disease resistance.

If pests and diseases occur severely, high-efficiency, low-toxicity, low-residue pesticides such as kelthane, dichlorvos, zineb, Bordeaux mixture and other agents can be selected for control.