I was thinking about this as I walked through my young back yard orchard this morning. My place ( I bought from my grandfathers estate when he died in 1994 ) still has a couple old peaches (canning type) a mulberry, a few Concord grapes ( planted in the early 60’s I’d guess, as the were full size when I was a little kid) and an old seedling plum. I’ve never watered any of those, and yet every year they seem healthy and still produce every year…Now with my oldest trees, planted 5 years ago- I find I have to water them less than trees planted 1 or 2 years ago.
Those plants that don’t need watering have found underground resources of moisture that lasts year-round. The same is true for the native plants from which they were derived in their original environment.
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That depends on your soil, climate, competing vegetation, and the characteristics of your trees/fruits. I know you are in northern CA. Is that about 20 inches rainfall per yr? If so and you have deep soil then you may get to the point that irrigation isn’t needed for drought tolerant fruits.
Having the trees spaced out and the total surface mulched and vegetation free would be a big help. I’d certainly try it in your area. That’s a great way to grow ultra high quality fruit with max brix.
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I basically live in a forest, I’m surrounded by 100ft tall pine and oak trees…FN it’s funny you should mention soil. Last month I bought a yard of soil from a local soil place for my raised bed veggie garden. Just for the fun of it, I also planted a few pumpkins in just regular dirt…So far the pumpkins planted in just dirt have far out preformed the fancy expensive topsoil in my raised garden boxes.
Mostly, my 70+ trees are in a densely planted 50’x100’ area. I do have a 3-4" layer of mulch around each tree and each tree has a basin/berm of dirt around them. Some weeds still grow through the mulch, but they mostly die late spring/early summer…I weed whack/ mow/ pull weeds religiously this time of year.
Steve I would never use topsoil in veggie beds. It’s crappy dirt used to fill holes. I know it’s sold as good soil, but most is not even close to decent soil (hence your observations). Bagged garden soil, compost, peat, those I would use.
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I’m beginning to think you’re right! …In my teen’s/early 20’s I built garden boxes for my aunt, mother and grandmother…I have no idea what soil they put in them, but the veggies were always great.
I built a couple boxes this year…my plans were/are to have pumpkins/ cornstalks for my younger nieces and nephews to have for Halloween
Our water table on my property in Kansas is roughly 20 ’ down so it takes most trees 3-5 years to hit the water. The last drought we are still coming out of dropped the water table in my area another 10’ + so I then needed to water trees 10+ years old because their roots were never the 30+ feet down. We had 30’ tall wild trees die for lack of water. I pruned the tops off many pears, grapes, blackberries etc. to survive the drought and even then many old trees didn’t. We used heavy wood chip mulch and built buckets around the trees in the dirt to hold the water we gave them. If you water to much for short periods the trees will wind up with shallow roots so if you can turn the hose on them and leave it on for a long time if you can. The last drought killed hundreds of blackberries etc and the old dry canes will wind up as mulch for the next generation of fruit. We could not get enough water at the time to save everything so we picked what was most important. I learned a lot from that drought and feel fortunate to have experienced it. The drought taught me to focus more on hardy plants and less on novelties such as hardy kiwi. Kiwi require far more water than we have or can get. Things like prickly pear cactus I would have never grown prior to the drought but I now see their value.
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On your raised beds, i would just add compost every year. I cover mine with shredded leaves in the fall, and whatever is left in the spring I use as mulch. I move leaves away, plant/seed and eventually move it back. I recycle old potting soil to the beds too, I add coffee grounds. I drink a lot of coffee, and in one year managed to add some to every one of my beds. I have 12 raised beds.
I also plant in ground. Well right now only blackberries. I plan to plant some beans in the ground this year too.
