Do you have a flowering quince?

Do you have a flowering ornamental quince, and if you do can I come by to steal some pollen from you?

Or do you not own a ornamental quince but know where I can find one on public property?

I have an ornamental quince, but there must be another one somewhere in the area because twice in the last decade it has produced fruit.  Rather than wait for the honey bees to find the other quince by chance I thought I might try to take matters into my own hands and attempt to pollinate a few of the flowers this year.

We have several in our front garden (in Maplewood). I'll add a picture so you can see the color. We have a mix of light pink and a darker salmon-pink (almost red). Ours flower and produce fruit (but I had been told they are ornamental only, that the fruit wasn't edible). I'll message you our address if you want to try to take some pollen (just please don't stand on the little stone wall in front of them, because we just put it in last year and I don't think it's meant for standing on - you'll be able to reach the flowers easily without using the wall).

They are so pretty when they are flowering!

Yes, that is what mine looks like.  Thank you so much.  I've never done this before, I'm guessing I just take a Q-tip and rub it on a bunch of the flowers, and then take it home and rub it again on a bunch of mine.  

Yours probably fruits because you have several together.  I just have the one so it is hit or miss if any visiting bees will have been to another quince before visiting mine.

Mine was planted years before I bought the house, and its location sucks from the outside.  It is right up against the foundation.  From the inside it is beautiful though, when I look out the window in the spring all I see are pink flowers.  And even after the flowers are gone I still have a pretty "shade" of little green leaves so I can have the window open for air but still have some privacy.

The fruit aren't as tasty as real quince, but they are edible.  They just need to be cooked to be palatable.

Hope it works out and you get lots of quince this year!

Thought this site could be handy!

http://nami-nami.blogspot.com.au/2007/09/beautiful-flowers-fragrant-fruit.html

This site, below, is more about the japonica variety (even smaller sprays and fruit)

https://eattheroses.wordpress.com/2011/09/30/flowering-quince-jam/

There's a quince that fruits in the kitchen garden at the Tempe Wicke house in the Jockey Hollow park near Morristown.  

@cody I stopped by today with some q-tips.  I hope this works.  Thank you for letting my use your quince.

Glad it worked out (and sorry I missed you!)  If it turns out you need a few flowers to dust yours with, feel free to come back and take a few.

eta: if you cut a branch with some flowers on it, that might be the easiest way to try to pollinate your bush, wouldn't it? I'm sure there are enough branches with flowers by now that taking one out wouldn't even be visible.

I would just grab a bunch of flowers (since Cody gave permission!) and take them home and dust them across as many of your flowers as you can reach, flower face to flower face. Probably a better bet than the q-tip, but I'll be very curious to hear about the results! Good luck, and I hope it works!

Good luck with your pollination. Today I drove by my favorite local quince bush and it was beautiful!  I want one (but have no room for it :-(  ) 

OMG. We were at a nursery yesterday looking at plants to replace some of the ones at the new house that didn't make it through the winter (shrubs, really) and I saw a bunch of flowering quince for the first time in person. GORGEOUS! So now, because of this thread, we are going to buy two or maybe even three quinces and hope they do well in the yard and bear fruit.

Enjoy them, Peggy! We got ours because I'd always wanted a flowering cherry tree, but the back yard was too shady and we didn't want to shade the front lawn. So we planted several quince plants in the spot that we'd thought of putting the cherry tree in (we mixed the darker salmony-red color and the paler pink varieties). They've done fine for about 10 years now, through the harsh winters. They seem very hardy and I enjoy seeing them flower each year. I haven't tried to use the fruit (I'd read it wasn't edible for humans, but that animals like it). The squirrels seem to like the fruit....haven't seen any deer browsing at the bushes, but who knows?

Really? It's not edible? That's disappointing. I recently came across quince jams, chutneys and other products from a local company in New England, and loved it. So I guess there's more than one kind of quince?? I will have to look this up now.

Mine are called "ornamental quince" - but I've cut some open for school projects and it looks like regular quince to me. I haven't tried to use the fruit, though.

So, there's tree quince and shrub quince, and some are only ornamental. But the sites I've visited so far say the fruit from any of them can be used to make jams and so forth, but I suspect what grows on shrubs is quite different from what grows on the tree. This is very confusing. Well, I didn't have my heart set on the fruit, although it's a nice idea, and the flowers are stunning. So I might just do it anyway!

I've just been looking it up too, Peggy! Here's what one site said:

"Both Japanese and common ornamental species produce fruit as well as flowers. Able to tolerate partial shade, they fruit and bear best in full sun. Fruits range in size between 1.5 and 2.5 inches in diameter, and they share the hard, sour character of tree quince. Like tree quince fruit, they also soften and develop fruity sweetness when cooked. Depending on location, plants flower in early spring, and fruit can be picked in late fall. Many varieties are thorny, making picking difficult. These combined qualities suggest that, for most gardeners, fruit from ornamental quince will remain a minor treat rather than a major harvest."

The shrubs are thorny, for certain! But it sounds as if the fruit can be cooked and eaten. Maybe this fall I will try to use some of it (they don't fruit until mid-autumn, at least the ones in the yard don't!)

eta: don't know why the italics for the quote isn't working....

I would love to try my hand at making quince jam or chutney. I will have to get a few bushes and give this a shot.