Description

Goji is a shrub that produces bright red berries that resembling very small chili peppers or roma tomatoes. The fruit, its flesh and seeds will all be vaguely familiar to many gardeners, because the goji berry is in the nightshade family.

Unlike other tomatoes and peppers, goji is cold hardy and can withstand sub freezing temperatures, meaning goji can grow as a perennial in cold climates.

Goji flowers and fruits late in the season. In our zone 7 garden goji often starts fruiting in late fall and flowers continue to set fruit and ripen well past our first frosts. It’s only when the prolonged freezes set in that goji stops making new fruit. Warmer climates will enjoy earlier goji production and perhaps even fruiting all winter long.

Goji berries taste sweet with a bitter aftertaste. Goji berries become sweeter and less bitter after a few frosts for fresh eating. However we prefer to dry our goji berries to use throughout the year. Dried goji berries, or goji raisins as we sometimes like to call them, lose most of their bitterness after drying and become more palatable.

Goji berries are not the sweetest berries in the garden. In fact they lend themselves to being used in cooking.

We personally like to add goji berries into eastern hot pot inspired soups for a splash of color and adding more complexity to the flavor profile and they would be good in any number of soups, stir fries, rices, granola, cookies and more. Dried goji berries are also good snacked on out of hand.

Goji leaves are also edible and taste mild and nice. They are delicious dried and brewed as a tea.

We have a variety of forms of goji bushes. Some are more upright in growth and send taller branches skyward before branching. Other bushes grow closer to the ground and tend to have more of a low mounded growth habit with leaves closer together. Our seeds are a mixture of several varieties and may resemble different growth habits and fruit shape or size in your garden.

Details

Lifecycle: Perennial
Lifespan: 15+ years
Hardiness zones: 6-9 (USDA)
Habitats: Disturbed soils
Plant size: 8-10 feet tall
Light: Full sun to part shade
Soil: All soils, can grow in marginal soils
Water: Moist soils preferred
Seeds per packet: 50+ seeds

Seed Starting

Start seeds in pots or flats in spring, or protected in late winter. Cover seeds 1/8″ with soil and keep moist. Goji berries can be started at the same time and in the same manner as tomatoes or peppers. Grow them in pots for their first year and plant in their final location in fall or the following spring.

Cultivation

Goji tends to make tall sweeping canes that arch over with weight. Taller plants can use support, a wall or a trellis, but it is not required.

Early on goji’s thin branches and small leaves it only casts sparse shade so weeds can often easily grow under and sometimes through goji plants, so in initial years more weeding is required. As goji establishes it will make many branches and root suckers, but you can prune goji to a single branch so that it can become a single trunked shrub or tree. After one or two seasons establishing it’s roots, choose the strongest, longest branch to become the trunk and prune the rest. While the trunk is young and thin, it can benefit from some support until it becomes stouter and sturdier. Then prune for tree form, hedge form, or whatever shape you desire.

Harvest

Harvest the berries only after they are fully ripe and bright red. If the birds let you, harvesting after one or multiple frosts is best for the sweetest berries.

Propagation

Established goji plants can easily be divided and layered. In fact, goji self layers readily in our garden.

Seed Saving

Save seeds just like you would save tomato or pepper seeds. Wet process the goji berries and seeds by mashing or blending them followed by fermentation. After fermenting, decant the seeds then dry them immediately.