adding fruit trees

Hi to all. I want to add a couple of fruit trees. I want to add a fuji apple and a pomegranate. anyone in the so cal have any luck with these.

I'm thinking of a couple of dwarf fruit trees in the next few years. Since my yard is so small, and because I've loved them in Europe, I will grow them in espalier form.

http://www.google.com/images?client=safari&rls=en&q=photos+of+espalier&oe=UTF-8&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&ei=nBA-TfPAJcP0gAfqodibCA&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CB8QsAQwAA&biw=1192&bih=625

Kim

I didn't have room in my garden area so I planted mine along the driveway where the sun shines the most, 3 dwarf apples and 1 dwarf cherry so far. I hope to add a dwarf peach and a plum this year.

There's an old crab apple tree far right barely seen, then 3 apples, Granny Smith, Honey Crisp (both planted spring 2009) and Fuji (just planted in the spring) and at the end is the Amalden Duke Cherry (planted spring 2009). At only 2 yrs old the Honey Crisp gave me 3 nice apples this year.

This is Sept 3rd with Honey Crisp apples, small delicious Matt's Wild Cherry and Green Zebra tomatoes.

ksroman wrote:I'm thinking of a couple of dwarf fruit trees in the next few years. Since my yard is so small, and because I've loved them in Europe, I will grow them in espalier form.

That's really cool! I haven't seen that before.

There is a 'movement/method' called the backyard orchard or something like that. They are simpatico with SGF in that they take fruit and nut trees and grow them in a very small space and keep them trimmed to heights that are manageable and grow a few close together. It might be useful to read up on that a bit.

Chopper, do you mean this?

http://www.crfg.org/tidbits/backyardorchard.html

miinva wrote:Chopper, do you mean this?

http://www.crfg.org/tidbits/backyardorchard.html

Yes. That is it exactly. There are lots of different web pages that mention it and I think there is a book. It seemed to have the same practical and small space usefulness that SFG has. When I start looking at adding more fruit trees I will look at this as a model.

We have begun the backyard/urban orchard in our yard. 2 weeks ago we added 6 trees to our yard. We now have 3 different types of orange, 2 peach, 1 apple, 1 pecan, 1 lime, 1 lemon, 1 fig, and 1 Grapefruit. We had a guava, but I thunk the frost got it. The others were planted last year. So far so good. We planted most in a hedgegrove in the backyard and a few up front. I can't wait till they begin producing!

duhh......Sounds like a terrific little orchard. I hope they all do well for you.
We can only try our best.
Lucky you with citrus.

My husband and I are (sub)urban farmers. We started our fruit orchard last year but since our area is not large enough for lots of cross pollination from multiple trees, we have started with "multi's". Across the back we have an espaliered "6 way" apple tree that we chose for the yellow transparents that my grandmother used to make summer pie with. There are 5 other types grafted to this tree. It should take care of our pollination issues if we add other apples.

First fruit late July 2010

For all the pictures I take for my blog, this was the best I could come up with for the start of our mini orchard.

There is a poorly placed 2x8 along the picket fence. About 5 feet in front of the 2x8 is the structure that our apple tree is being trained on. Three wires strung between two posts. Ray tied orange plastic ribbon/tape along the bottom wire after he realized that the wire is about neck high to the puppies. Since this is a bad picture and the tree is so young you can use the orange tape to find the tree. Next to the posts on either end are potted dwarf fruit trees. To the left is a pie cherry which does not need cross pollination. To the right is a dwarf Orcas Pear. There is a small aisle between the right post of the apple tree and the left post of the raspberries. Next to the raspberry post is another potted tree, a five way pear. We do not intend to leave the trees in the pots but until we decide where they are going to live they stay in pots (poor things).

Next week we hope to pick up a multi grafted dwarf sweet cherry tree and another dwarf pie cherry, as well as yellow and purple raspberries, a Tae or logan and a marian berry. Adding fruit and keeping some of them in pots is a huge expense for us.

Dreaming: We also have large pots of blueberries. The plan is to terrace the slope on the far right and give the blues a permanent home there someday. For now we just want to add at least two more veggie boxes and a box for cutting flowers (which will probably include a column apple or two. The guys have been talking about putting a clear corrugated rain cover over the deck so that I can have a couple of dwarf peach trees. Leaf curl is a huge problem for peaches in western Washington State. Some blogging friends have reported success by finding enough light and keeping the rain off the trees.

Deborah...that’s kewl about the pomegranate tree. The things you California gardeners can grow amazes me!

We have a wonderful resource in Edible Landscaping, a company run by a man who believes in growing fruit without chemicals as much as possible, so he's a wealth of knowledge about what will successfully grow in this region without having to use sprays and extensive fertilization to amend the soil. We won't be adding fruit for a few years because of the expense, but when we do we'll get it from him.

model a man wrote:Hi to all. I want to add a couple of fruit trees. I want to add a fuji apple and a pomegranate. anyone in the so cal have any luck with these.

Howdy: Also check out North American Fruit Explorers (NAFEX.ORG). If it is a fruit or nut they have a section on it.

God Bless, Ward and Mary.

I have planted a pomegranate tree. I also bought a semi dwarf fuji Apple and was wondering if I can plant it in a pot and not the ground sense it is a semi and not a full dwarf ? Thanks

Wow, a pomegranate tree? That's pretty exotic

ModelMan....You got the wrong end of the stick.

Semi-Dwarf trees are larger than Dwarf trees.

Dwarf are around 25% the size of a normal tree.
Semi's are 40-75% normal size, somewhat bigger.

Thanks for these wonderful links, everyone.

We started our orchard about five years ago, buying at least one new dwarf or semi-dwarf tree each spring and fall. Last fall we added our latest fruit planting inside the garden fence with four blueberries and three red raspberry bushes. We plan to move two old gooseberries to inside the fence, too. They are from the same gooseberries I picked with my grandmother in her garden 50 years ago. I reset new growth from them every now and then and they just keep going. Our son is now growing some at his house, too, making the fourth generation growing from those original plants.

We plan to add a few hazelnut bushes next to go along with the pecan, hickory, and black walnut trees that grow wild here. We also have wild persimmons and blackberries.

Fruit trees and berry canes may not be a part of SFG, but they can certainly enhance the landscape surrounding one's garden and increase our enjoyment of the total environment.

It is so exciting to find these links and also find out your experiences with adding fruit trees. Those pictures of various espalier styles are fantastic. And the link on how to grow several fruit trees in a small space is fantastic. Most of you are in much warmer gardening zones than I am but with some research, I have been able to find varieties that I can grow in mine. I also have a son in law who is an arbourist and a huge source of information and encouragement.

We have two driveways at our place and are considering ripping up half of the one and turning it into fruit tree space. It gets lots of sun so it seems a shame to waste it with asphalt and it would make for a lot less snow shovelling in winter!! This is more long range planning since we still have to work for a living. Dang!

Gwynn

model a man wrote:I have planted a pomegranate tree. I also bought a semi dwarf fuji Apple and was wondering if I can plant it in a pot and not the ground sense it is a semi and not a full dwarf ? Thanks

By now you have probably taken care of this tree but here is my $0.02 worth.

I am NOT an expert by any standard, just a dumb-luck gardener, so take ANYONES advice over mine. What I know about fruit trees in pots I have learned in the chilly PNW with meyer lemons. It is as important to prune the roots as it is to prune the tops. I like to encourage feeder roots. Your semi dwarf should be fine in a pot for a few years but you might want to have a permanent home in mind before the tree develops much trunk girth. While it is young it should be fine. Root pruning and being in a pot will help slow down the growth.

I like mm in stone pots for my trees. I get the biggest stone pot I can possibly afford. I choose stone because it is not as fragile as terra cotta and not as light in a wind storm as plastic. MM settles so plan to have more of it ready in fall and or spring. Since I grow my determinant tomatoes in big pots it has been easy for me to just scoop some of the tomato soil into the tree pot to bring it back to the level of the graft (after the tomatoes die back).

Every spring I make up a batch of tonic for all of my potted plants which includes my trees. It is just a mix (equal parts) Peat, Alfalfa meal and bagged cow dung with a handful of complete organic fertilizer (my hand holds somewhere between 1/4 and 1/3 of a cup). This mix was suggested in a book by Anne Lovejoy so I call it lovejoy. I spread a layer of it over the surface of the soil (almost 1/2 inch deep). Any leaves that fall from the tree go right back on the surface of the pot. When I am weeding other gardens, if an earth worm pops up I drop it into the pot. Earthworms make plant food of the leaves and alfalfa and prevent soil from compacting. Sometimes I sprinkle a little bit of cornmeal on the surface of a pot just to feed the earthworms. My thought is that if I can make a good environment for the worms (not too wet or dry, simple foods) then they will in turn make a good environment for my trees.

This is important for the long life of a potted tree. Once every three years, either in spring or late fall when the tree is dormant, you should tip the pot over and as gently as possible, pull it out of the pot. Let any old soil that clings to the root ball stay on. Put fresh soil in the bottom of the pot, re-prune the roots and replant back into the pot.

Deborah... who lost all her meyer lemons to a late freeze (even though they survived a cold winter, once they put out spring growth they could not handle the cold) but does currently have 2 pear trees and a pie cherry in pots AND came home just today with a 4-way combo sweet cherry tree that will get its very own pot within the hour.

I'm certainly no expert.

I've been watching Tom Spellman from Dave Wilson Nursery on youtube. He said in one of his many videos that I watched that you can determine the size of the tree by pruning. I think he said to disregard the semi dwarf or dwarf and just prune it to the size that you can handle or need. Oh, here, I found a quote:

Most semi-dwarfing rootstocks do not control fruit tree size as much as
people expect. Rootstocks are for soil and climate adaptation, pest and
disease resistance, precocity (early heavy bearing), tree longevity and ease
of propagation. To date, no rootstocks have been developed which do all these
things in addition to fully dwarfing the scion.
The only way to keep most fruit trees under twelve feet tall is by pruning,
and the most practical method of pruning is summer pruning. In Backyard
Orchard Culture tree size is the grower's responsibility. Choose a size and
don't let the tree get any bigger. A good height is the height you can reach
for thinning and picking while standing on the ground or on a low stool.

Two other important influences on tree size are irrigation and fertilization
practices. Fruit trees should not be grown with lots of nitrogen and lots of
water. Some people grow their fruit trees the way they do their lawn, then
wonder why the trees are so big and don't have any fruit!

http://www.crfg.org/tidbits/backyardorchard.html

His last bit about not growing with lots of nitrogen means that I should rule out planting any dwarf trees in my beds. I had played with the thought of putting a tree in the middle of a bed for some shade. It totally makes sense now that I think about it...when a plant is stressed a little it hurries up to produce seed.

I know this is an old thread

wanted to check to see how every ones fruit trees are doing

we just brought home two new fruit trees and made the mistake of buying a 5 way semi dwarf apple tree ....we meant to buy a dwarf or smaller..... because we are wanting to plant it in a wine barrel....

the other fruit tree is called an EZ pick Frost Peach tree and it too we are wanting to plant in a wine barrel....

the sun was out when we left to go pick the trees.....and we thought we had an hour before they closed....well...we got there at closing time and it started to rain like crazy.....since we had to travel a bit to get to the place to purchase the trees...they let us hurry up and get the tress we wanted.....we knew we wanted a multi apple tree and my daughter really wanted a peach tree....and i had read the Frost peach tree was the best to get for our PNW weather.....so that was all i heard when we asked about the trees....i heard dwarf and EZ pick both i new should be ok in a container like the wine barrel....but...the apple is a semi dwarf and now we are wondering if it will still be ok as long as we take care in pruning it so it doesnt get to large....and i also read about giving the roots a trim every few years....

so i wanted to check in to see how everyones trees are doing and if anyone else here on the forum has planted in a container and what you all think about what we bought....

happy gardening
rose

If I was in this predicament I would take the tree back and get the dwarf. Semi-dwarf get to be about 15 feet, a true tree.
http://www.ehow.com/how_7680152_care-semidwarf-apple-trees.html

not sure they will take it back.... we could call and see...i also dont think they carry dwarf size multi apple tree's there....these are older bare root tree's also...so they will get fruit this year....every place else we have looked have younger bare root.....ugg

hubby said we can plant them in the ground in our front yard instead of in the wine barrels....and we may just do that....its so hard to decide....there are too many pro's and con's to each way....

im curious if anyone has planted a semi dwarf and has been able to keep them trim and small

happy gardening
rose

Rose,

Like you, I'm planning to start some fruit trees this year. I may first check out local offerings, but while perusing the Jung catalog, I spied a great many cold-hardy dwarf apple tree varieties, most of which I'd never heard of.

In fact, I can't seem to put the Jung catalog down! Overall, it's the most enticing one I've ever received.

Actually a semi-dwarf tree, I found out by attending a couple of classes, by definition is a tree that can be maintained at 15 feet. It will grow larger if not properly pruned and maintained each year. Rose, nurseries typically have excellent customer service and I'm sure they'll take it back.

I was also taught the frost peach was the best for our area at one of those same classes - nice to know the information is consistent. I haven't found it available on true dwarf stock.