@Sparty your orchard area and mine have similarities. I think we have spaced them about the same. How many fruit trees total and generally what types of fruit? What is your process for keeping the underside of the trees so neat and tidy? Mow, weedeat, or a combination. Love your arbor too!!
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Thanks. Most of what looks like soil in the garden is hardwood mulch. It just rained so it looks like the soil. The soil is topped with several inches of leaf compost every year. The base of the trees aren’t great right now because I haven’t weeded and mulched them yet this year. I usually just pull weeds and add some hardwood chips. We have about 80 trees in various groups around the property. Persimmon hybrids, apple, pear, plum, pluot, apricot, peach, sweet cherry, sour cherry, pawpaw, nectarine, cane berries, grapes, hardy kiwi, and figs.
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Your squares around the trees look very nice, I’m tempted to do the same. My trees are mounded up quite a bit since they are on clay, so I’m not sure how squares would look with the circular mounds. We both are fortunate to have the space to grow our trees on large footprints. While I do have some espalier and close-spaced tall spindle trees, I set most trees about 15-20 feet apart. I like to get a tractor through them. My kiwi trellis/gate in the garden is set just wide enough to get the front end loader bucket into the garden.
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LOVE that fenced in garden . . . and that GATE! There is something . . . I don’t know . . . ‘fun’? . . . ‘romantic?’ . . . ‘inviting?’ . . . maybe all those things - about a gate. Maybe it’s just crazy me.
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Thanks! That’s great you like it! 
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Speaking of garden gates, I should probably plug my teenage son’s blacksmith business here somewhere. He made our gate hardware, amongst other things.
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Wow! Very good looking and hand made gate lockers!
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Very nice collection of tools, got everything now to make big money. It pays better than growing fruits.
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He does have a decent collection, but those photos are from a local blacksmith museum. There’s a club, of sorts, that meets there occasionally.
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Can I adopt him? 
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Ha! He’s a great kid…we’re keeping him.
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Beautiful photos of your craftsman at work ! What a great and time-honored art.
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I’ve been saving my onion bags. Now I have another use for them!
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It’s the first year i use this potato bags and i’m very happy! They are very cheap and perfect to this job!
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Does your son have a website where he’s selling his work?
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You can order some of his items on Etsy. You can also message him for custom requests.
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Thank you for the link. Congrats to him for starting a business doing something he likes and is good at.
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I don’t usually post photos unless the manicure is complete but the older I get the less it bothers me!!! We do get it done…usually…but not today. Just some shots of my orchard and vineyard this morning.
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