yodiana:

I have a potted Beauty. Last year was the first crop. This year it didn't set a single fruit. Not sure what was up there. If it doesn't improve next year will be the last crop.

I haven't tried Santa Rosa since leaving CA. And don't plan to. The newer pluot are better fruit and set good crops. My best pluot that are available retail are Geo Pride, Emerald Drop, Flavor Grenade, Flavor King, and Flavor Finale. My best plums are Laroda, Burgundy, and Emerald Beaut.

I think either plum will be a fine pollinator, I prefer Beauty over Santa Rosa, Burgundy is even better. Just be patient to get consistent crops from them.

@fruitnut: how was your first crop of beauty plums (size and taste)? i've looked for those pluots and 3-in-1 (or 4-in-1?) dwarf trees but haven't came across any here in san diego. thanks for your list of top pluots. i'll keep my eye out for one, although the selection of fruit trees are starting to dwindle down now.

@rasputinj: thank you for responding. you're right on. patience is what i lack; and patience is what i need. gardening is certainly a great place to learn it!

i prefer beauty over santa rosa too but was wondering if having two pollinators would increase my chances of fruits? although it may be awhile since none of the plum trees even have buds on them yet. :)

I have Splash, Flavor King, Emerald Drop, Flavor Grenade and Dapple Dandy. Emerald Drop for me starts to flower before all of the other plums so it cuts down on my quantity of fruit, I have added a burgundy to see if it flowers earlier then my beauty, methley, Santa Rosa. I think Flavor King is excellent and also like Flavor Grenade. I would go with 2 pollinators if you decide to get a pluot also which I would suggest, Flavor King and Flavor Grenade would give you fruit after the rest of your plums, pluots also hold on the tree longer then plums do. I started with one tree and now I have 60 fruit trees and looking to add more. Just remember pluots and satsuma to me are a bigger pain then peaches, since my peaches don't need cross pollination to fruit and I can still get a lot more fruit on my Desert Delight Nectarine as it flowers in January while it is raining with no bees out, then I can with Emerald drop pluot when it is flowering in February two weeks before my plums or other pluots start to flower. My Flavor King is right next to it and it does not seem to pollinate the Emerald drop, and hand pollination for me has had very limited success. I purchased 4 tubes of Mason bees, which seemed to just fly away from my Mason Bee house full of reeds to lay larvae in, they did not seem to help my pollination this year.

rasputinj:

I had the same problem with Emerald Drop and Elephant Heart this year. They flowered after my Burgundy plum and other pluots flowered, so I only got 3 polollenized fruits on Emerald Drop, and not a single pollenized plum on Elephant heart. It may have been caused by the very long rainy and spring we had in Coastsl central California I am in. It just rained almost everyday in February and March. Our normal flowering season is late Feb to early March. The Elephant Heart and Emerald Drop did not come into full bloom until late March to early July in my zone this spring. This is the second year I've had the trees.