My Liberty, grafted (by someone else) on M111 and planted by me in 2017, yielded virtually nothing for four years. Small harvest the 5th year, Huge harvests in 2024 and this year. This is a good, disease resistant early-mid apple that is crisp, aromatic, and juicy. I’ve read others think it’s a bug magnet, but the worst bug attacks around here are to the russets, especially Hudson’s Golden Gem. Liberty does have issues with sunscald, though. This is the SECOND batch of sunscalded fruit - I basically cut off the burned side and the core - that I have cooked in the last couple days. There’s about 25 pounds already of blemish-free Liberty alone in refrigeration. I still have about 2/3 the tree to pick.
This has been by far my most consistent tree, and I recommend it. I might try Surround again for the sunscald.
I also agree with an earlier poster to get an early and a late apple, and with another poster to add a couple other kinds of fruit trees for variety and spaced out harvest (I.e. plum, pear, persimmon.)
Ah, but someone else planted those peaches, right? Peaches are drama queens when they’re young, demanding attention or else they’ll try 80 ways to commit suicide. You bought a farm with the trees that wanted to live on it. They may even have suffered some of the same diseases, but overcame them. Take a good hard look at their trunks, and any odd pruning for clues.
I got a 30’ pear tree and 2 monster walnuts that way… I won’t knock inherited trees. But I couldn’t claim success as I picked their harvest, either.
Whatever’s with where I live… it’s just that the peach trees are ok. I think cause they’re so vigorous? I had four \ that were here when I bought the place - and they made me feel successful, so I planted more… I had 50 apple and pear trees and 4 peach trees, but the peaches made me happy.
In my location, the peaches are young drama queens in that they are slow to get started and I thought they’d never do a thing. I looked at all the pictures on this site of “two year old peach” and “three year old peach” and mine were like… so tiny.
I remember looking at a picture @Olpea posted of a 5 gallon bucket next to a seedling peach and thinking “what is wrong with my peaches?”
My friend down the road planted hers at the same time and they were huge and bushy!!! Then finally, finally, mine didn’t look so pathetic. and they had fruit! which I sprayed! and they clung on and FRUIT, while the neighbors had none.
I AM trying some stuff which is difficult for my area (fig, apricot, berries) but pear and apple have been challenging partly because I have lots of older, diseased trees that I’m trying to figure out. =/
You can see a few mis-shaped ones (stink bug?), but most are almost perfect.
Which do you (and family) want more of? That should drive a lot of it.
I think at least 4 peaches, as they can have mortality issues. You may want to make them multi-grafts with 3-4 varieties on each. It would be good to have a mix of ripening times. I’ve got too many late season peaches and not enough early ones. Part of that is my thinking the late season ones are better quality, but it doesn’t help to be flooded.
As far as the apples, I’ve really deprioritized apples once I discovered jujubes, as they fill the same niche in my diet, but better. Only a few apples (Evercrisp, Goldrush, Golden Russet, etc) can compete. I have more apples growing, mostly based on inertia and give away a lot of them, sometimes only sampling one, to know it is good enough to give away. With apples, you’ve got a lot of choices in terms of rootstock and pruning. Starting over, I might do half a dozen apples, pruned to extreme spindles at fairly tight distances. That way I would get good sun penetration, but more manageably small crops.
This is a Golden Russet on B9 (dwarfing rootstock) and it still has a ton of apples. And this is just half (or a bit less) of the tree. Even though I like them, it is still probably more than I’ll need.
As far as how many jujube trees to have? However much space you have Actually, my harvests there are quite variable as well. Anywhere from 0 to 50 lbs, though you’re more likely to get to the upper end (or at least 10+ lbs) from more mature trees of productive varieties. The main reason to have some apples is that jujubes seem limited to about a month of fresh storage, far less than some keeper apples. Jujubes can keep indefinitely when dried, though they are far better fresh.
I live in the mid-atlantic. Not sure where @Shuimitao lives.
“Easy” might be a stretch, but compared to other fruits they seem easier to me.
Reasons:
I have a lot of problems with low vigor and peaches are very vigorous.
Peaches seem to thrive in a hot summer
I’m surrounded by cedar trees that host CAR and trees that host fireblight so I feel like I spend a lot more time spraying the apples and pears and having to cut bits off them.
For the apple and pear the spraying and cutting is very time sensitive. It’s a problem when I have a regular day job. For the peaches, I just have to get the spray done (weekend is fine).
I only know apples but I’d say 4-5 year old tree on g890 1-3 bushels is about right. 9-10 years could be 10 bushels or more if the tree has space.
A lot of variables
I have a 12 year old big McIntosh on M7 that produced a whopping 25 bushels of quality sellable apples in 2024. This year we got 16 bushels from it and apple size was down.
Actually, my harvests there are quite variable as well. Anywhere from 0 to 50 lbs, though you’re more likely to get to the upper end (or at least 10+ lbs) from more mature trees of productive varieties. The main reason to have some apples is that jujubes seem limited to about a month of fresh storage, far less than some keeper apples. Jujubes can keep indefinitely when dried, though they are far better fresh.