Toka Plum

Overview

Toka is the classic “bubblegum plum,” a cold-climate hybrid plum known for its unusually aromatic, candy-sweet flavor and its value as a strong pollenizer in hardy plum plantings. It’s one of the most talked-about dessert-quality plums for colder regions because it brings standout flavor while still fitting into northern orchard systems.

Origin & History

Toka was released in 1911 through the cold-climate breeding work associated with N.E. Hansen and the South Dakota program. It is a hybrid between the rugged native American plum and the highly aromatic Chinese “apricot plum” species Prunus simonii, bred specifically to combine hardiness with distinctive flavor.

Fruit & Uses

Toka fruits are typically small to medium and ripen in late summer, with a reputation for an intensely sweet, perfumed flavor that many growers describe as bubblegum-like. At peak ripeness it’s excellent for fresh eating, and it also performs well in jam, sauce, and preserves where that concentrated aroma carries through.

Growth Habit

Toka is described as forming a vase-shaped tree with a medium growth rate. Like many hardy hybrid plums, it can be quite productive when well pollinated, and good structure and occasional thinning help keep crops consistent and limbs healthy over time.

Spacing

We currently offer Toka on Native Plum and Prairie Red Plum Semi-Dwarf rootstock. On both of these semi-dwarf plum-type root system, a practical spacing is generally about 12–16 ft between trees depending on soil vigor, irrigation, and how much you plan to manage canopy size through pruning. The overall size of the trees will be less uniform for the native plum rootstocks, which is why we are also offering Prairie Red, which tend to be more uniform and max out closer to 15 ft. at maturity. Use wider spacing when you want simpler long-term maintenance and better airflow, and tighter spacing only when you are committed to regular size control.

Pollination

Toka is widely used as a pollenizer in hardy plum plantings and is commonly recommended as a partner that improves fruit set in other plums. Toka is effectively a universal pollenizer for all of the Asian x american hardy hybrid plums that we offer including Black Ice, Pipestone, Underwood, Superior, and others.

Cold hardiness

Toka is a solid Zone 3 plum. It has survived and done well with minimal winter injury at Montana State's Lodgepole location, which has seen -40F temps. 

Other Notes

A key reason Toka has stayed famous for more than a century is that it combines real dessert appeal with utility: it’s repeatedly highlighted as a standout-flavor plum and also as a pollenizer workhorse in hardy plum orchards. On disease, Cummins Nursery reports strong resistance to black knot for Toka.