Can You Really Grow Your Own Goji Plants?
Picture your own horde of goji plants doing your bidding: Producing mass quantities of super healthy goji berries! Muahhahah… Ok so that may be taking it a little far… You walk out your back door and behold, goji berry plants. Or maybe ultimately you want to grow a goji berry selling empire right from your backyard! Any way you want it, you need to know a few things in order to grow goji berry plants.
Cold weather doesn’t scare the goji berry plant. A strong upbringing has made the goji berry plant pretty sturdy. That doesn’t mean you can just toss some seeds out and forget about it. If it’s the actual berries your after, as I suspect you are, then you will need to have a lot of patience. You see, unfortunately goji berry plants don’t actually grow the fruit until THREE YEARS into their growth cycle. Something to keep in mind before attempting to grow goji fields as far as the eye can see.
First step is to decide where to grow your goji plants, outdoors or inside somewhere. Growing them inside will generally lead to fewer goji berries and smaller plants. They do look lovely inside though, if properly groomed of course! Also if you live in absolutely frigid weather, below -15 F (-26 C), then the indoor option is the way to go.
Next up, goji berry seeds. Goji seeds can be bought off the internet, but these sources aren’t always reliable. I would just buy some dried goji berries and extract the seeds from them. I would plant a handful of these types of seeds because they won’t all grow. The good news is each dried berry will have 10 or so seeds in each.
For a greater number of berries indoors, purchase several pots. Big pots can be expensive but it’s needed if you want to have a fair amount of berries to eat. If you’re going to plant outside choose an area that gets a lot of sunlight and that has soil with decent drainage. When planting the seeds, plant them an inch or so down into the soil (outside and potted).
Maintain a pretty regular watering schedule until the goji plant germinates then you can ease off. After the seeds sprout continue to care for them as you would any normal plant and you should be fine. Using this straightforward method you’ll be enjoying your own home made goji berry products a few years down the line. Adding goji berries to your diet can really increase your energy levels and give you a super antioxidant boost.