Camos82 orchard review and updates

[Camos82]

Hi everyone,

Being a newbie here, I thought I would share what I am currently growing. I hope to post some pictures here in the future as well.

Some of these varieties I have are experiments that I understand may not do well in my hot, arid climate. I am mostly referring to some of the apple selections I have grafted. Though California’s San Joaquin Valley is very hot and dry, we do get a fair amount of chill hours, our soil is great, and we have a long growing season.

Current grow list—

Peaches: Strawberry Free, Babcock, Scarlet Robe, Saturn Donut, Elberta, Earlitreat, Fairtime, Eva’s Pride, Sweet Bagel, Kit Donnell, Rio Oso, Black Boy

Nectarines: Fantasia, Nectar Babe, Liz’s Late, Arctic Glo, Speckled Egg

Cherries: Stella, Lapins, Bing, Royal Rainer, Black Tartarian, Montmorency, Carmine Jewel

Asian Plums: Beauty, Laroda, Emerald Beaut, Elephant Heart, Weeping Santa Rosa, Shiro, Inca

Euro plums: Purple Gage, Golden Transparent Gage, Green Gage (Reine Claude Doree), American Mirabelle, Coe’s Golden Drop

Pluot/Plumcot: Flavorella, Splash, Geo Pride, Emerald Drop, Flavor Supreme, Dapple Dandy, Flavor Queen

Pluerry: Sugar Twist, Candy Heart

Apricot/Aprium: Robada, Tomcot, Flavor Delight, Summer Delight, Cot N’ Candy, Blenheim

Apples: Anna, Gravenstein, Fuji, Braeburn, Honeycrisp, Granny Smith, Arkansas Black, Hudson’s Golden Gem, Cripp’s Pink, Gold Rush, Whitney Crab, William’s Pride, Egremont Russett, Roxbury Russett, Brown Russett, Yellow Delicious, Macintosh, Summered

Pear: Bartlett, Harrow Sweet, Harrow Delight, Magness, Blake’s Pride, Warren, Keiffer, D’Anjou, Fondante de Moulins Lille

Citrus: Meyer Lemon, Washington Navel Orange, Minneola Tangelo, Algerian Clementine, Gold Nugget Mandarin, Cara Cara Orange, Valencia Orange, Moro Blood Orange, Owari Satsuma Mandarin, Cocktail Grapefruit, Bearss Lime

Figs: RdB, VdB, Strawberry Verte, Peter’s Honey, Desert King, Celeste, Panache, I-258, Black Madeira

Berries: Loganberry, Boysenberry, PAF BlackBerry, Quachita BlackBerry, Sunshine Blueberry, Misty Blueberry, O’Neal Blueberry, Sweetcrisp Blueberry, Caroline Raspberry, Anne Raspberry

Grapes: Summer Muscat, Thompson, Crimson

Mulberry: Pakistan

Nuts: Carpathian Walnut

Pomegranate: Eversweet

[Drew51]

Welcome! Nice! A lot of great cultivars in there. A nice unreal selection of fruits. I’m looking at snow today. Although I had raspberry juice reconstituted from raw syrup from my garden. The smell was amazing, I could drink that stuff all day. Trying to make the best of it!
Baba raspberry is said to work in warmer zones. Bay Laurel sells it.

[Ahmad]

Impressive list of trees! I hope we get to learn from your growing experiences…

[Camos82]

Espalier Anna Apple has been blooming for over a week now. This is 4th leaf in ground for this tree on M111. This was my first espaliered tree and I think it has been a success. In fact, I may have to look at thinning the fruit spurs next season.

[Camos82]

Cot-n-Candy Aprium starting to bloom. This is my wife’s favorite tree…4th leaf in ground on citation rootstock. Very vigorous tree for my area.

[Camos82]

Eva’s Pride has been the 1st tree that I have in my collection to wake up in the 2 years I have had it. Wonderful peach and blooms profusely. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of purchasing it on citation. I will likely make an attempt to graft onto my Babcock peach on Lovell at some point.

[chadspur]

Beautiful trees. You’ve done a great job with that Anna. Do you happen to have a current picture of your Weeping Santa Rosa?

[Camos82]

Thank you @chadspur !

Here is my weeping Santa Rosa. Been in the ground 4 years, not sure what rootstock it is on. Buds are just beginning to swell. This has involved a lot of trial and error learning how to prune it and still not sure I know what I am doing. I am attempting to create some scaffolds as structure and I cut back to that point to 2-3 buds each winter. Has been working well so far.

[Camos82]

Weeping Santa Rosa is loving the recent rain. Fruit set has been excellent!

[Camos82]

Just finished fruit thinning on Cot-n-Candy Aprium. In my experience it is absolutely necessary with the heavy set of this cultivar. I am noticing that after 4 seasons I am beginning to chase fruiting wood up high into the canopy. I might have to do some more aggressive pruning in the next year of so to bring some more fruiting wood down lower in the canopy.

[Camos82]

Eva’s Pride has now been thinned. Probably will make another pass in the next week.

[Camos82]

Asparagus sure likes the rain and sun. Daily harvests for the last week. This bed has both Purple Passion and Mary Washington cultivars.

[Camos82]

Fruits set on Anna espalier!

[Camos82]

New additions to the orchard! Speckled Egg Nectarine on the left and Kit Donnell Peach on the right. Both on Lovell and from Raintree. I am very impressed with the caliper and quality of these trees. Hopefully they get acclimated to my weather soon and begin to take off. I will get in and do some pruning soon.

[Camos82]

I have a decent fruit set on Flavorella Plumcot this year! I love the quality of this fruit. Though it is a shy bearer…I actually like that trait as I don’t have to come in and thin as aggressively as I have to with many of the other trees I have.

Flavor Delight Aprium, Tomcot, and many pluots/pluerries are planted nearby as pollinators. In my climate, Flavor Delight’s bloom time is in sync with that of Flavorella Plumcot.

[Camos82]

I have been trying my hand at this informal espaliered Bartlett Pear for a couple of seasons. I have a grafted branch of Blake’s Pride on this tree as well. I have been struggling with pruning to encourage fruiting spurs on Bartlett. Maybe I am just too impatient. Anyone have experience with growing Bartlett as an espalier?

Here is a big box store D’Anjou. I have top grafted Fondante de Moulins Lille, Magness, and Harrow Sweet as well. Hoping for some fruit this year!