Recommendations for small home orchard?

General Fruit Growing
#18

Lucky, I’ll be a volunteer kid for you and come eat your other fruits with delight. Then I’ll tell you how delicious they are.

#19

well good for you!
something your neighbor may look forward to, since the general consensus among many who posted their thoughts here(and i agree with them) is that many common fruit trees grown in your locale will require some spraying.

#20

Lucky,
I would stick with the tried and true varieties like Kieffer and duchesse d’angouleme. If you plant those you can’t go wrong. Why anything else? Douglas and the harrows might be worth consideration. No or low spray goal is achievable with those choices.

#21

Lucky,

One I would cross post this to the old Nafex listserv and try to perk up Fackler’s and Lehman’s attention among others.

That being said, when I see home orchard, I think in terms of high quality low yield as you don;t have to make it pay.

Raspberries

So let’s start with raspberries…go with fallbearers only and grow them only for a fall crop - period. The reason is if they cut the canes down in the winter and burn them the insect eggs and pathogens pretty much go with them.

For apples:

(all modern disease resistant)
Empire(Sept) , Enterprise(late Oct), Williams Pride, Dayton(late Aug), Liberty, Sundance, Co-op 39/Crimson Crisp (Sept)and GoldRush(late Oct – Nov) Sweet 16(late Sept-Oct), Wine Crisp (Mid Oct) Zestar(late Aug), Pristine

(Antiques with disease resistance)
Ashmead’s Kernel (mid October) Roxbury Russet(late Sept-Oct), Arkansas Black(late Oct-Nov), Grimes Golden (Oct), Hudson’s Golden Gem (Oct), King David (late Oct)St Edmunds Russet/Pippin (early Sept), Hoople’s Antique Gold, Kenner Seedling, Razor Russet, Chehalis

As a home grower, I would strongly suggest getting over the tree idea for apples and really, really take a strong look at 4 or 6 arm horizontal cordons. They are easy to maintain, produce extremely clean and high quality fruit. Think of it, each fruit gets the same sun exposure, great air circulation, thinning and spraying are easy. And I have to pass this tip on, for a home grower, cordons plus one or two box fans are amazing combinations. And with the list I gave, if they choose to bag the insect problem is greatly reduced (and can almost always be eliminated by wrapping in paper and then spraying the paper with an insecticide : ) With a few exceptions you would have to pay me to get me to go back to growing apples or pears in tree forms.

Pears:

I think all these will meet the chill requirement:

Harrow Delight
Harvest Queen
Harrow Sweet
Magness
Warren
Potomac
Burford Pear

All are top flight.

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#22

TheFluffyBunny,
I like your pear choices but I don’t know what burford pear tree is. Can you let me know if that’s a typo or one I’m not familiar with? Great choices on disease resistant apples.

#24

That pear is now on my wish list The FluffyBunny. That is the first time I can remember seeing that variety.

#25

I would be happy to send you some Ayers Scion if you decide you want to “build” them one as you mentioned above.

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#27

I’ve found here in humid suburban Maryland (near DC) that peaches and nectarines are the hardest trees to get good fruit off. I’ve got a Flat Wonderful peaches tree. Very vigorous, as Olpea mentioned. Lots of problems with brown rot the last few years. Lost the last two crops to it.

Asian pears seem reasonably trouble free – occasional fire blight strikes, but so far so good. Montmorency sour cherry has done well with no spray. Persimons are probably the best bang for the buck for the nonsprayer, both Asian and American. I find apples can give a reasonable crop with just one insecticide spray at petal fall. Tom Burford recommends Pomme Grise for organic growers, and I agree it is a tough apple, and I think very tasty (but not in the modern sugar bomb way). I also like the old Grimes Golden, another tough apple. (Incidentally, the Burford pear is sold by Vintage Virginia Apples. I think they are the only sellers.) Enterprise apple is very trouble free; it stores very well and has its best flavor after a few months in storage – not so good straight off the tree. I put Josephine raspberries in at a friend’s place and I agree with the cityman that they are an excellent raspberry – large and vigorous.

Pawpaws are another pretty trouble free fruit. Muscadine grapes are another relatively trouble free fruit, though require trellising.

#28

I’m just starting out with planting trees, but if your neighbor is willing to consider a more unusual fruit, I recommend Mulberry, specifically looking for a dwarf variety like Black beauty. We just moved from a rental home that had several mulberry trees that were definitely dwarf – about 10 -15 feet tall and good sized trunks – the fruit was really tasty, not too far from a blackberry taste if your neighbor likes that. We lived there for 3 fruiting seasons and did nothing to the trees – one year out of the three they didn’t fruit much – and the other two years the birds ate most of the fruit --but I would think with a little more care (the soil was terrible there) and protection from the birds they’d be worth it!

I’ve grown Caroline (red) and Jewel (black) raspberries in zone 7a (South Central VA) and really enjoyed them – didn’t spray, though the planting did decline after about 4-5 years due to disease, and bugs got some of the berries. Still plenty to enjoy though. I’ve been reading others say Caroline doesn’t do well in humid heat, but my experience was very favorable – great flavored berry.

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#29

you pretty much summed up what i was going to say about the other half of my screen name :sunglasses:
mulberries are just incredible, right? or should we say, outrageously easy!

black beauty mulberry is excellent, but it may be the only mulb which could be challenging to grow in kentucky. The nigra’s are the gold standard of mulbs, taste-wise, but difficult to get to live long in cold and humid areas. (If chico jujubes will be a challenge to get to fruit in kentucy conditions, the jujus will still fluorish and proceed to ‘live forever’ there–outdoors) I can’t say the same for Morus nigra’s, which might need to be grown as potted specimens and brought indoors should a hard freeze loom. . Morus alba’s and rubra hybrids should be pretty tolerant of the local winters, and there are many good ones. Illinois everbearing, kokuso, etc Pakistani’s are in a different class of alba’s when it comes to taste(but not to imply it is much better), and it may just be that lone alba which could be a tad more tender to hard freezes compared to other albas

with nigra’s btw, they can be grown as potted specimens with no problems whatsoever, since they are naturally dwarfing in nature, and extremely slow-growers, even when grown on the ground(at least here in vegas)

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#30

Thanks, folks.
I’m quite familiar with mulberries. Have had IE, Wellington,Collier, Stearns, Kokuso, David Smith, and several good M.rubra selections growing here in my orchard for decades. Tried Pakistan, but it’s just too tender… and as far as I’m aware, the M.nigra selections are out of the picture here, as well.

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#31

Aus,

Which muscadines have done well for you?

#32

Hi Matt,

I put in an Ison a couple of years ago. It grew well and set fruit after a couple of years without any fungus or insect probems. Unfortunately, some sort of unknown disease attacked it and the whole thing just died. May have been some sort of root problem. I have put in a couple of others that are doing well. They dont seem to be nearly as susceptible to rot as other kinds of grapes. They are certainly worth trying in our humid climate – Isons is the place to get them (I’ve been impressed with the quality of the fruit trees they sell too – range is not huge, but they are large vigorous plants.)

#33

I’ve been thinking of trying Ison and Fry Seedless (red).

#34

Fry seedless looks interesting but I don’t remember seeing any post from anyone who has actually tasted one. In my area muscadines are mostly pest free. My only objection is the seeds. I’m considering adding it and just see how it works out. Bill

#35

@BobVance has been growing Fry Seedless red muscadine for 3 years but no fruit yet. You might remember we discussed this earlier here:

This is a different variety from the plain Fry cultivar, which a golden seeded muscadine suitable for wine-making.

#36

I’m hoping he has some that mature this year and that he can give us his taste test opinion. Bill

#37

Me too!

1 Like
#38

Matt,I’m finally going to dive in and try some muscadines in Maryland. Can you let me know if that red seedless Fry turned out any good?

Thanks

#39

@Matt_in_Pennsylvania is his new handle, that may help.