Welcome, Daniel, very glad you’ve joined us! Scott has done a really outstanding job with this forum, I’m sure you’ll enjoy the folks here. We look forward to your posts as a grower.
Patty S.
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Thanks Patty, I look forward to contributing whatever information I can to help other gardeners.I’m also looking forward to learning more myself. There is a lot of great grower reports and interesting topics on here. I agree Scott has done a really outstanding job with this website and the members are very informative and nice.
Lot of familiar names here!
Hello Lois, this place is already starting to feel like the old GW only better!!
Hello everyone, this is Norman. I´m from Germany and interested in growing all kinds of fruit. I already do grow a lot of trees but still trying to get my hands on new things. Really like this forum with all those experienced and kind growers. There are so many informative topics and deep discussions here rarely seen on other forums. Looking forward to get in touch with other growers to share information and maybe some plants too.
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Wilkommen, Norman! Yes, I think you will really like this forum. There are all kinds of expertise and experience on here which is very useful. And it’s all free! I’ve only been on here for 4 months and have already learned so much. A year ago, I didn’t know much about growing fruit, and now thanks to this forum, and other resources, I feel a little bit more confident about what I’m doing.
So, what kind of fruit are you growing now? Apples, pears? Whereabouts in Germany are you? I visited southern Germany about 13 years ago and really enjoyed my trip there. Very beautiful countryside and nice people.
Vielen Dank for the welcome 
I already love this forum from its start. 5 years ago I did know nothing about growing fruit. In 2011 I purchased an abandoned garden and now I grow something around 50 trees, do grafting, pruning and enjoy watching the trees.
I live in northern Germany, near Hamburg. My little orchard is located 2 hours by car east from my living place though.
What fruit, lets see, apples, plums, peaches, apricots, medlar, sour cherries, quince, mulberries, pawpaws (yesss 
), figs, cornelian cherry, nanking cherry, some hybrids (black apricot), eleagnus multiflora (dont know the actual name), serviceberry and probably some more. Those figs are experiments, didnt taste a fruit of them yet, since our winter temperatures are quite challenging for those mediterranian plants. They died to the ground the third winter in a row but came back every summer. Time will tell…
I hope to add some pluots even if my climate proofs to be borderline for them (same goes for apricots). We tend to get late spring frosts and our summers are often quite short and wet.
Can say the same about America. I visited New Mexico 20 years ago. I really like to remember those weeks. Nice country and very nice people. I like my lakes, rivers and trees though 
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Wow, what an interesting assortment of fruit, including the pawpaws. How do your stone fruit do in your climate? We went to an orchard last week, and while they had lots of apples, but their peaches were hit by a late, hard freeze, so no peaches this year. But, peaches in this part of the country are hit and miss sometmes. We supposedly can’t grow sweet cherries here, but the tart varieties should be OK.
When I flew to Germany, I flew into Frankfurt, and spent some time in Wurzburg, Rotenburg, spent 3 nights in Munich, before going into Austria, and then Switzerland, before heading back to Frankfurt. I did the trip solo, and took the trains and did a LOT of walking and hiking. After two weeks I was quite wore out, but it was quite enjoyable. I think my favorite part was spending two nights in Murren in the Swiss Alps. Quite spectacular scenery, und sehr gut Bier und Wurst!
My grandmother’s family immigrated from Germany about 1900, and settled in Arkansas and Oklahoma, where I was born and raised. Her family came from the Gelsenkirchen area, which I think isn’t too far from Hamburg. But, I’ve never been to that part of Germany. My Grossmutter would sometimes scold me in German when I was a child if I got into trouble, but I didn’t know what she meant. I learned a little bit of German before I made my trip, but I usually reverted back to Englisch. Thankfully most of the people know several languages, including English.
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Those late freezes are most dangerous for stonefruit here too. The flowers of European Plums are relatively hardy and therefore plums are a rather save crop here. Those apricots, pluots (dont have them myself) and to some degree peaches are a different story. You have to expect a total loss aproximately every third year due to freezes during flowering time. This spring was especially bad for our stonefruit. There were late freezes plus a cold spell during flowering time, so pollination was bad. Monilia is a serious problem too but thats no special thing for my gardening location.
Gelsenkirchen is located in an area called Ruhrpott. Thats a region former known for its coal mining. Its some driving hours from Hamburg to the southwest.
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Sorry to hear about the late freezes, seems like both sides of the Atlantic had to deal with them this year, then. At least you’ll have some Euro plums, and some apples too, perhaps?
What varieties of apples do you have?
When I lived back in Oklahoma and Texas, they had peaches every year. But, when I moved up here, I found out that you are lucky to get peaches maybe once every three years. My mom came up from OK for a visit last month, so I had her bring me some peaches. My wife made a peach cobbler with them, very tasty. We ate a few more, and put the rest in the freezer.
Interesting about the coal mining. My grandfather, who married my German grandmother, was a coal miner in Oklahoma for a long time. A lot of people didn’t know there was any coal mining at all in that state, but there was many years ago. I don’t think they do it now, though.
Lots of peach growers in TX and OK will be very surprised by this.
According to Texas A&M the risk of moderate to severe freeze damage to peaches declines as one goes from north to south in the state. Risk of damage is 53, 33, and 12% for high, medium, and low chill areas of the state.
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/stonefruit/frostprob.html
Welcome, welcome !!!
We here enjoy helping and sharing our experience and experiences.
Enjoy
Mike
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I will have lots of apples and some plums, had some cherries too and different berries. My apple trees are the only trees which survived the decade of neglection until I purchased the piece of land. I can only list my apple varieties in german, maybe some sound familiar to you. There are 2 Ontario, 1 Altländer Pfannkuchenapfel, 1 Klarapfel, 1 Prinzenapfel and 1 old apple tree I dont know the variety of. Into 1 of the Ontario apple trees in spring I grafted 15 different varieties. Apple = Apfel in german.
Last year I had my first pawpaw fruit, liked it a lot. I better do since I planted quite a lot of them. Most are seedling trees though. The one I got a taste of is the variety Prima 1216.
I think we are getting a little of topic, so thanks everybody for the welcome. Hope to read you in a lot of threads.
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Folks, if we start to stray more into posting about different topics outside of introductions, probably best to take your topic over to the appropriate forum category, so we can leave this category for intros. Feel free to move your discussions over to either General Fruit Growing, Pictures, or General Gardening 
Patty S.
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Welcome Norman. Hope you enjoy yourself here as much as we have. I have three German apples at the moment: Alkmene (which I love), Red Berlepsch and Erwin Bauer which haven’t produced yet but sounded delightful.
Carole
Hello everyone - I’ve been reading this site for over a year and finally joined. Have learned a lot from these posts as well as GW.
I’m building a “farm” in the Hudson River valley; zone 5b. Planted ~ 25 fruit trees on my land this past spring and just ordered another 10 for next spring. I’ve got the feeling already that those will only be the beginning…
Vast majority are apples at this point - heirloom desert and hard cider varieties - on b118 and mm111 at wide spacing. Will add other fruit as I get moved in and probably expand the apple orchard (via grafting $$ 
this time!) once I’ve figured out what does well in my microclimate.
In my mid 40s with two little ones. Wish I had been able to plant an orchard 10 years ago but life got in the way. Beyond my love of gardening and hard cider, providing healthy, nutritious and delicious fruit for my family and friends, and creating a place my kids will always remember, is my motivation.
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Welcome GardenGekko, glad you finally joined up. We look forward to more reports of your fledgling farm, it sounds wonderful! Such a lovely area of the country.
Patty S.
Sounds like you are off to a great start GardenGekko 
Glad you finally joined us and I hope you share your progress with us
Where are you?
I am in Purling about 35 miles south of Albany ( 5 miles off exit 21 on thruway).
I grow ( not necessarily harvest ) 45+ apple cultivars along with stone fruit and pears.
You are welcome to any experience I have which might be helpful.
Mike
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