Introducing myself to Scott's forum

Hi Mike! Welcome and may God bless you and your fruits this year! Happy new year!

  • Brian

Hi Jose! Welcome and may God bless you and your fruits this year! Happy new year!

Iā€™m Bonnie, listed as Vermonter2, now located in Halifax in very southern Vermont, up in the hills so Zone 5a. Grew up in Vermont but spent 30+ yrs in the Boston area. Have been interested in fruit since age 12 +/- when on a Vermont hilltop I stumbled across a very old apple tree, the apple red with tiny white specks, fabulous flavor and texture, and had no idea what it was. In recent years have learned more about heirloom apples, there are some great resources (orchards and people) in New England.
The one effort at fruit growing in the Boston area was a peach tree, didnā€™t know about pruning to control height so ended up spraying the ā€œdwarfā€ tree from the second story window of our Victorian house. Between squirrels, leaf curl and brown rot (the squirrels would take a bite out of each peach, toss it on the ground (not ripe enough despite a red blush) and move on to the next)ā€“so my husband and I removed the tree.
I always wanted to grow more fruit so at our retirement property (24 acres) we cleared some 2nd growth forest, removed a lot of stones, and now have a small orchard plus berries. Iā€™ve become more interested in European plums, which led me to this forum. Weā€™re currently growing plums, cherries, pears, peach (bears and raccoons have gotten their share of the latter), currants (largely black, so wonderful for jam), gooseberries (ditto), raspberries red and black, Marionberries and Hazelberts. Scott Farm in nearby Dummerston VT grows over 130 varieties of heirloom apples (sold at our local food coop as well) so I havenā€™t planted apples.
Have been trying figs (after renting a house in Provence with 2 huge fig trees, with fruit so ripe the Magpies were diving in to help themselvesā€“the ripe figs were a revelation, I never knewā€¦!!). After tiring of watering figs in tubs twice a day and having the weather turn cool/cold before the crops fully ripened most years, I stopped temporarily. Am looking at in-the-ground planting, but would need to have some structure to provide late season warmth, maybe a removable not-quite-greenhouse.
Iā€™m new to forums and posting, still have to figure out what and how to do everything, Iā€™m not computer savvy. Given time constraints, will just repeat what I saw someone else mention, that Fedco Trees has scionwood, esp. apples but also pears, and the listings online show photos of each appleā€“accurate pictures because Fedco Trees founder John Bunker (scionwood probably coming from his orchard) is one of the countryā€™s apple experts. People wondering if they have, for ex., the true Ashmeadā€™s Kernel should check out the photos. Deadline for ordering scionwood is February 19.

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Welcome Bonnie!

Welcome, Bonnie. I love Vermont.

One of members here is Eric aka @PlumHill. He owns an orchard in zone 4b Vermont. I recall he grows many Euro plums. Hope he will stop by here.

The fig guy.

Eric is definitely a plum guru!

Hi, Iā€™m Jay. Iā€™ve been on the site for almost 2 years, kind of just lingering about and have yet to introduce myself as I am a bit (extremely) shy. I live in the southern Bronx area in New York zone 7b. Iā€™m quite new to gardening, started to really immerse myself into it in 2017 after I graduated from high school, but have always had an interest just never had the time. After the grape vine in my backyard died because everyone was too busy to maintain it, my mother stopped gardening for a couple of years (stopped in the backyard entirely). Then I stared planing strawberries back there.

I first joined the forum because itā€™s hard to find people in my area (the cityšŸ˜¢) that love growing fruits or even have the slightest intrest in gardening, but realized the wealth of information on the forum provided by gardeners for other gardeners.

It started with aloe, bareroot strawberries and a dragon fruit plant. Then sprouting seeds from grocery store fruit (mango, avocado, citrus, starfruit) , and that quickly led me down the rabbit hole of learning about species of fruit Iā€™ve never known before, and fruit Iā€™ve heard of, but different varieties, with different bloom times, and characteristics.

In the last four years, Iā€™ve developed a passion to breed new varieties of fruit, including pear, mango, mulberry, avocado, starfruit, strawberry, kiwi, hardy kiwi, and blueberry (Iā€™m sure there will be more in the future). I also have a love for bonsai, my latest obsession are blueberry bonsai. I just began some bonsai work on the varieties Brunswick, Pink Lemonade, and Sunshine Blue.

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Welcome Jay! Lots of fruit lovers here! Best of luck with your breeding efforts, hopefully Iā€™ll hear about you in a few years as the inventor of a new variety or two!

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Many thanks JCT!!

Welcome Jay!

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Thank you SpokanePeach!!

Welcome Jay! Aloe was my first plant too, got it for the dorm room in 2003. Still have it after 18 years and 6 moves between 4 different states.

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18 years? Thats amazing. All my plants and seedlings are coming with me too when I relocate to a warmer climate.

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Welcome Jay,
From the sound of it, you are on a younger side of growers here. Glad youā€™ve jumped in.

We have quite a few members who are into plant breeding. The name that comes to mind is @itheweatherman/Ulises. You may have seen his threads.

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Thank you for welcoming me. Iā€™ll be 23 this April. Most people my age would want to go to the club or throw a huge birthday bash, but Iā€™d much rather go buy fruit plants and plant seeds. I have seen a few of Ulisesā€™ peach and almond threads a while back. Amazing stuff!!

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Good to see you here, Doci. Ex NY here myself.

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Wow. Lots of new ā€˜facesā€™.
You will find that forum is not only extremely educational, but ā€˜socialā€™ as well. I think of many of the members as ā€˜pen palsā€™ - and during this crazy covid time - itā€™s been great to be able to visit with others, ask questions, share successes and failures, and share with others who have the same interest.
Welcome to Everyone.

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Welcome, fellow Jay! I think youā€™ll find yourself in good company here. I, too, was more interested in gardening than clubs in my late teens/early twenties (and still am). Sounds like you have a good head start on a lot of us!

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Welcome, Doci.

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