Starting over in North Georgia (7b)

General Fruit Growing
#1

We moved from San Jose, CA (9b) to Canton, GA (7b) this summer. We were in a temporary place but just closed yesterday on a 4 acre property with quite a lot of space to plant (I probably only had 1/8th acre in CA) but packed a lot in. Here is a picture of the lot:

New House
New House1920×1080 882 KB

The front of the house faces SxSW, I will be planting there, in the backyard, and in the back pasture last (once I can get an electric fence set up back there and remove that tree line so I can get morning/east sun too.)

I’d like to know what berries do best for you guys in my area, like @Chris_in_GA @strudeldog @figerama @ahgrower @bradkairdolf (Thanks to the map I could tag all you guys!)

Let me ask this whoever has the chance to answer:

Do you have SWD? If so what time of year is worst for them?
What berries do you plant that generally miss SWD? Which ones get murdered?

Your favorite Rabbiteye BB’s
Your favorite Muscadines for fresh eating
Your best blackberries (anyone tried Triple Crown or western types like Marion/Boysen?)
Your best mulberries (anyone have Shangri-la or Illinois Everbearing?)
Any SHB BB’s that are successful for you
Any raspberries that work for you
Any currant/gooseberries that work for you

Any other opinions for humid 7b (or 7a/8b) from other areas would be appreciated too, like @Auburn @drusket @haldog to name a few (Hope people aren’t mad at me tagging them I do like the map feature and I’m trying to get people in my growing zones advice.

Thanks all!
Kevin (formerly SanJoseFool, now GeorgiaGent)

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#2

Looks like you found a great place and have plenty of room to grow fruit. Listed below is a few of my fruit preferences.

Muscadines: Black Beauty(my favorite), Lane, and Supreme. All three are very good for fresh eating but don’t expect them to taste like grapes. I have been told zone 7b is a questionable hardiness zone for Supreme but I haven’t had and problems with the one I have. Most muscadine varieties will thrive in your area.

Blueberries: Most all the rabbiteyes will grow well in your area but they must hang on the bush longer to reach full sweetness. I’m grafting many of my rabbiteyes over to Southern Highbush so I won’t make any RE variety suggestion. Millennia (SH) has done well at my house and one of my favorites. Oneal and Star just don’t seem to have enough vigor on their own roots so I graft these.

Blackberries: In my area Triple Crown ripened in the hottest part of our summer and many were sun damaged. I’m growing Natchez and Prime Ark Freedom.

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#3

With your acres plant a few apple and pear trees. Black limbertwig, arkcharm, hunge, Anna should all grow well

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#4

Congratulations Kevin and welcome to GA. Looks like you will have some great space for planting. I am in north Forsyth co about 30 minutes from you.

I will give you a quick summary of my experiences with berries. First of all, blueberries are super easy to grow here, the natural PH of the clay soil is close to 5 and blueberries grow fine with around here with virtually no care. Here is a good publication from UGA on the subject: http://extension.uga.edu/publications/detail.html?number=C946

I gave up growing and yanked out SHB types and find rabbiteye types to be far superior for our area. I grow 10 or so rabbiteye varieties, we prefer the larger berry types and the top 4 overall that come to mind are Titan, Premier, Brightwell, and Ochlockonee.

I tried 4 or 5 raspberry varieties and after watching them all struggle with the heat, replaced them all with blackberries. There maybe be a raspberry type that will work for our area but I have not found it.

Blackberries are also easy to grow around here, I have seen some SWD in my orchard but as of yet, not noticed much damage to any of my berries. I only grow the thornless types, and have 5 or 6 varieties. Triple Crown and Osage are my favorites, I find them to be noticeably sweeter/less tart than the others. We seem to be right on the edge of growing Triple Crown successfully. Production can really suffer during hotter summers but the plants grow like crazy and you have a big harvest during more mild summers.

Feel free to PM if you want to come by and see my setup, I put up a electric fence last year that has worked well, I also have around 80-90 fruit trees. Glad to have you in the area, Chris.

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#5

Take a look at the ongoing pecan threads and consider putting in a few trees. Be VERY picky about the varieties. Most of the stuff available at local nurseries is disease susceptible and unproductive in a home garden environment.

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#6

Haha

S J Fool,

the humidity is going to KEEL you! Better invest in air conditioner futures.

Congrats on closing. So much more room!

Don’t worry. Some peach varieties can still be grown out here. You might even be able to expand your blueberry ambitions, if you’re into that sort of thing.

Have fun

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#7

Oh wow. I realize you are up near the mountains.

I bet you’re not too far from strudledog.

#8

I can vouch for good flavor of these at least as grown by me in z6b eastern conditions:

Ochlockonee
PrimeArk Freedom
IL Everbearing mulb

Fry Seedless red musc has shown me good cold hardiness.

Triple Crown is growing well.

I have tasted O’Neil SHB, Ison musc, and Yates apple, and they’re good too.

Marion is probably doomed if you try it. Too hot and humid!

Boysen might work. Kinda sour, but beautiful healthful berries.

You will see thunderstorms that amaze you. Rain like buckets on your head.

What’s your elevation (above sea level)?

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#9

Welcome. Looks like a nice place. Most of my plantings are young so not too much to report. I also pulled out my southern highbush blueberries. They fruited young but produced poorly compared to the rabbiteyes. I just have a mix of the rabbiteye varieties to cover a long season. They are indeed one of the easiest fruits to grow here. I have young Shangri La and Silk Hope mulberries. Both are really delicious if you get them in the stage just before fully ripe. This year’s late spring frost zapped the Shangri La and my blueberries so no fruit this year but that’s not usual. Other easy fruits here are figs, asian persimmons, and native persimmons. Pecans, chestnuts, hardy pomegranates, mayhaw, and chickasaw plums are also worth a try but I don’t have any producing yet. The boysenberries I tried were tasty but mine fruited poorly and died after a few years. I’m having mixed luck with fireblight resistant pears. Time will tell. My neighbor has outstanding asian pears and I’ll be planting some this winter. This forum is a great place to get information and folks are really helpful. Good luck with it.

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#10

4-acres is perfect in my opinion. Gives you all the room you want and not too much work having more acreage than that. I think you were wise to keep it right at four. Six-acres is a lot of work. I care for six on my own.

Looks like there are several-many trees behind the house to remove.

Congrats. I’ll bet it’s beautiful up there.

Dax

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#11

Hi & Welcome Georgia Gent!,
I grow mostly rabbit eye blueberries as well. Personally, my favorite is the Oneal. Great taste. I have about 30 plants in total of an assortment of blueberries such as Premier, Brightwell, Oneal, Tidwell (so something )So far, I have not seen any sign of the SWD but I know that with gardening, things change rapidly…Muscadines, I have Carlos, great flavor-midsize, Cowart, dark purple, Fry & Dixie (scuppernongs green). Although we have a lot of humidity here, I have been successful at growing a Flavor Supreme Pluot! That tree thrives here. Yes Sir! I have 3 pluot trees and 1 Santa Rosa and I am still waiting to get some growth on the Santa Rose Tree! Blackberries, I grow Apache and Navaho. They are huge but I have yet to get that sweet flavor, I think I need to change the location in my yard of where they are planted. Raspberries, I have Brandywine and Crimson something–I will look up the name and get back to you on it because those raspberries are delicious! I canot remember all the correct names of the stuff I have… I have them planted very close to my muscadine trellis. Anyway, I hope that this helps you out a little. I am in Douglasville, maybe about an hour or so from you? Not sure, but feel free to ask anything you need to know. We love helping where we can. How bout the snow we just had, wrecked m blueberry enclosure but this spring, I plan to build it better! Again, welcome to Georgia, your property is beautiful!

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#12

I’ve only been growing for a few years so still have a lot to learn, here in Georgia we will get early March weeks of warm weather which will cause the plants to bud out and then the winter will come back and kill them, so look for late blooming plants. I lost my Anna Kiwi, Russian Pomegranate, Dwarf Pomegranate, Dwarf Mulberry, LI Jujube, Chinese Strawberry tree but all this might have happen because I had just moved to the new house on March 1, 2017 and planted everything on March 6, 2017 and the freeze came in on March 14, 2017 so they probably didn’t have time to root in (they were weak) so you might think now when the best time to plant is so they root in, now or in April. All the plants did recover just no fruit.

SWD, not for me, I haven’t had a lot of fruit yet, I had a lot of Alder bugs eating my mulberries and some cane bores on my raspberries. Once these plants were weak I started seeing saw dust and small holes on some of the trees which were ambrosia beetles, killed some trees down to the ground but they did re-grow. I sprayed some pyrethrum on the trees and this prevented any more damage. Watch out for Deer and other critters.

The best growing plants I have grown are: Dorman Red, Loganberry, Illinois Mulberry, Tifblue blueberry and Emerald Carpet Raspberry good ground cover in shade. Jostaberry and Gooseberry have grown well for me but no fruit yet? Now as far as figs go I have 20 species but all still too young to judge. I found a man on Craigslist this summer you might want to try to find if you’re looking for fig trees. His name is Phil and he lives near you in Jasper he has lost of fig trees for sale, I don’t have his contact info but keep a look out on craiglist, or he might be on this site, I see that member Strudeldog lives up in that area he might know him or even be him. Also you have Willis Orchard they will let you pick up if the order is large enough I believe and there not too far from you.

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#13

Congrats on closing Kevin! It looks like you’ve got a lot of great space. I need to update my location on the map. I am no longer in Georgia and moved to Houston TX.

In Georgia, I grew Triple crown, which did pretty well for me. For blueberries, I grew exclusively rabbiteye. They were no maintenance at all and I had tifblue, Woodard, premier, and delite. For taste and size, my favorite was delite.

For muscadines, I grew southland and magnolia.

If you are willing to grow in containers and move into a garage during hard freezes, you can also grow citrus there fairly easily. I believe @strudeldog does that and I did that as well when I was there.

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#14

My climate is slightly different from yours. I’m on the other side of the state, Zone 8a, but I’d like to second rabbiteye blueberries and muscadines for (almost) completely carefree fruit.

The Rabbiteye blueberries I have are Powderblue, Centurion, Brightwell, and Pink Lemonade (no berries on that one yet, though.). They all taste pretty good to my palate. The one I was really surprised by was Centurion. You don’t hear as much about this berry, but I think it might be my favorite of the 3. It’s a late ripening berry, very dark in color, decent firmness. It just seems sweeter to me than the others, with just a hint of acidity. Sorry I can’t explain any better. But like I said, they’re all good. The only real pest I need to worry about are the birds.

I had muscadines at my place when I moved in, and did zero to them. I don’t like muscadines in general, so I pulled them up two years later, but in that time, I didn’t touch them and they still looked near-pristine. Only problem was one part had just a wee touch of powdery mildew/Black rot. But this vine was so vigorous it grew nearly out of control, so leaves were everywhere, and it was in a shady spot. It’s a testament to how low-maintenance these things are that one, grown in some of the worst conditions, had only a touch of mildew/rot, but it never spread, and even the affected plant produced some decent, good-looking grapes.

I have Navajo blackberry, just got fruit last year, didn’t see any SWD. I don’t have it written down, but I believe they ripened mid June to early July timeframe. They do produce for about 3-4 weeks. The fruit is very tasty, just have to make sure it’s dead ripe when you pick it. I didn’t do any sprays, and it got some brown patches (some kind of fungus) on the leaves. But it didn’t affect the fruit (nor really the plant) but I’ll probably spray a few times next year as I just don’t like to let fungus do it’s thing and build up, even if it appears to be doing no damage.

That’s all I can recommend at the moment, I have a bunch of other things planted, but nothing else that’s really produced yet.

Good luck, and I hope you enjoy your new home and land. Been up to Rome a few times, and it’s a nice area. Those mountains keep things a wee bit cooler than the rest of the state, and that can really help during the oppressive days of summer, and to get you some more chilling hours in the winter.

ETA: Isn’t it nice how much farther your money goes, at least when it comes to real estate, down here? My mom just retired down here from PA, and the prices really blew her mind (in a good way.)

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#15

Welcome Kevin,
I spent from 1994 to 2013 with a Canton address in the Hickory Flat area but on a wooded acre that was not ideal for fruits. I started trying to remote manage a small orchard in Ellijay about an hour north of you with things around 2000 as in some nut trees and more fruit starting around 2008 and on until 2013 when I moved just north of you in Jasper, I still have the Ellijay plantings but don’t really manage them, and really don’t manage very well at my Jasper location either. Some things that don’t do well for me probably would with a little more care. I don’t normally spray and don’t even keep things weeded well. I probably have tried growing at least a sampling of cultivars of pretty much any fruiting plant I thought might have a chance here and some that probably never had a chance. Not a good plan for someone that takes a minimalist approach to care, but I just go in expecting a lot of failures.

Do you have SWD? If so what time of year is worst for them?
SWD seem to love our climate, and sorry to tell you but I think they have made this area central headquarters. In years prior to 2017 they seemed to show up after most blackberry and early raspberry and right in middle of my fig season. I am heavy into figs, and many do good here but SWD in 2017 was here for my 1st main crop figs around end of July and I have not successfully managed them so my total fig year 2017 was pretty much a waste. 2017 had a lot of light drizzle cloudy weather and SWD thrive in that so hoping that doesn’t repeat every year and I at least get a part of season, if not in a few years I will be doing many fewer figs. Every year has gotten worse with SWD for me, but later Aug. is when the populations normally started causing problems for me I think.

Your favorite Rabbiteye BB’s
I did not prep my planting area well enough in either location, but my Rabbit eyes in Ellijay still do pretty well despite little to no care in Ellijay planting in a pretty good creek bottom loam. Here in Jasper in the hard clay and fighting Bermuda grass I am having a rough time with blue berries, but it’s all on me not giving them basic care . I hope to restart on them in a better prepped area but right now it’s down on the cycles list.

Your favorite Muscadines for fresh eating
I grow several types my trellised planting in Ellijay are in much need of pruning and weeding along with my Hardy Kiwi, in Jasper I have not put up trellised plantings as yet. I have some just planted at the base of wood line edge trees and some in pots that need planting in ground. I would bet you already have native ones in your woods They are everywhere here to the point of invasive but most don’t carry fruit I assume many are male and some I don’t think get enough light to produce well.

Your best blackberries (anyone tried Triple Crown or western types like Marion/Boysen?)
Triple Crown does well here. Better than the University of Arkansas thornless ones I have tried, but again my care is less than ideal, for some reason the deer hit my thornless blackberry hard and singled them out even though most areas are covered with wild native ones. Again I am willing to bet you have some in your woodland edges.

Your best mulberries (anyone have Shangri-la or Illinois Everbearing?)
I grow both and others Illinois Everbearing is a tougher tree here. Shangri-la leafs out early and many years gets hit back on late cold, and then seems to be a choice plant for Ambrosia Beetle which has actually killed 2 of my 3 Shangri-la root and all. Mulberry in general is a tough tree and you need to watch out in spring for Ambrosia Beetle More on them later. The best Mulberry for me has been Girardi Dwarf of the about 10 I have grown here.

Any SHB BB’s that are successful for you
I have a few in pots I am managing but R.E. do much better for me. In Ellijay right beside the R.E. I had a row that consisted of Jubilee Misty O’Neal Sharpblue Southmoon over a few year all but Sharpblue died under the same low care as the Rabbits I still have Indigocrisp SweetCrisp and Emerald in pots but so far more effort than I get from them SweetCrisp gets it’s chill requirement and blooms way to early it seems.

Any raspberries that work for you
Hetitage did better than Caroline for me but I am not growing them present. I have a friend that did well with Heritage and a Yellow I think Anne when he had time to manage and weed and they produced well but the SWD gave him problems he lives in Canton but was growing near me.

Any currant/gooseberries that work for you
I have a couple Pixwell that do well, but I don’t care for them that much. I want to try some others like Poorman, if anyone has some to trade would be interested A friend was growing currents I think they did okay I put some in but was trying them in to heavy shade I think trying to make use less than ideal planting area. I should give them another try.

Other suggestions:
You should grow Persimmon both Kaki and American. For me the lazy man been the best reward for effort expended and without major pests.

Pawpaw Like it here and are low care but like Mulberry I did lose some to Ambrosia Beetle last year

Pear easier than apples for my low care both Asian and Euro just be ready to prune off Fire Blight

Jujube although I have have them cold killed in late cold

Hardy Kiwi if you are patient

Sour cherries only stone fruit than does ok with no spray for me.

Che does good for me if you like the fruit

Goumi does good but mostly just a early season grazer plant

Muscadine for sure, but you are already planning them

Figs for sure if you can figure out SWD

One thing I am backing off from is Pomegranates I lost most of around 40 cultivars mostly Dr. Levins selections to cold and late frost after leaf and Ambrosia beetle I think I have about 4-5 cultivars that I have hopes for. That would be enough.

Biggest issues for me are the SWD and Ambrosia Beetles not sure which I hate more SWD just ruins my fruit Ambrosia Beetles have killed things I consider very tough and supposedly no care. I have lost figs, Pawpaw, Pear, Pomegranate. Mulberry, every Apricot I had and probably more to them over last couple year. Last spring was an eye opener for me on them. I don’t think I have lost Persimmon but I have seen were folks have stated they have and I might have on a couple trees but did not notice the Frass to Id.

Climate wise besides the obvious humidity A big frustration is late cold. We frequently have extended warm period in Jan-Feb which is always trouble. I lose things like Persimmon, Jujube, Pomegranate that survived 0F when fully dormant to temps in 20s because it got fooled by early extended warm spell. That’s what happened to those 2 Shangri-la The one last year broke bud in Jan, and gets hit back then the Ambrosia beetle loves the freeze damaged wood and comes in and finishes the job, but they seem to hit healthy growth as well The Pawpaw and Pear I lost last year seemed healthy prior to them

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#16

That Phil Guy is Crazy I would not go anywhere near him

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#17

Strudeldog-can you tell me a little more about your success with sour cherries? What variety did you grow? Did you ever get bug/fungus problems at all?

#18

I have had good crops on Montmorency, North Star, and I will count Carmine Jewell as a sour cherry. I had a couple Balaton but they never established well for me. At my Ellijay location I have good harvests of Montmorency, North Star with perfect pest free fruit. At Jasper Montmorency are close to the woods and they produce well but the Squirrels get most of them. I have had some leaf spots and yellowing but later than the fruiting season. I had beautiful group of Carmine Jewell producing well and believe I had posted pictures of them on one of the Carmine Jewell threads here, but that is another plant that fell victim to Ambrosia Beetle. They start to leaf out then die back. Some of them responded by putting out a lot of suckers with a radius of around 5 feet of base, and they should be true to type. I tried to dig some to establish but did not have luck with but one or 2. They didn’t seem to have many feeder roots at all, just a shoot coming from ground of a long reaching root from original tree.

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#19

Welcome to Georgia. I’m on the SE side of the state, so my climate and soil is quite different from yours. I did not see you mentioning pears. My guess is that you are in great pear growing territory. Of course, Georgia is not called the peach state for nothing. They will do better up there than down here. God bless.

Marcus

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#20

Thanks everyone! So much helpful information and I appreciate it very much.

Yes I saw that thread! I was planning on trying that myself because of it. Based on all the replies I’m not even going to try and plant SHB in ground will just try and graft to rabbiteye.

I saw your fence thread. It looks very nice. Yes I’d like to see your set up at some point, I’ll PM you after the holidays probably to see if we can set something up.

Ha ha, yeah that was rude awakening as I arrived in late July/August. Between the humidity and the mosquitoes an air conditioned house feels like heaven.

I like experimenting. I will be planting a marionberry no big deal if it doesn’t work out I’ll just remove it. I grew Flavor Supreme in CA it’s very good. Would love to know the varieties of raspberries that work for you.

Do you like the taste of Dorman Red & Loganberry? I had Emerald Carpet Raspberry in CA the fruit tasted great although I only got a few and the plant died on me. Does yours fruit?

They are close. Mixed reviews on them but mostly for sending weak/dead plants. If I go in person I shouldn’t have that problem as I can pick & choose. I might do that.

Maybe they were older varities? The newer ones are supposed to be better. Only muscadine I have tried was a wild black one this summer growing on some trees on my street. It tasted very good but the skin was thick and had a cluster of seeds in the middle that were hard to separate from flesh. Hopefully named varieties the seeds separate easier.

Yes it’s crazy actually. I think I could get a 2 bed/1 bath condo no yard in San Jose for the price of this place.

Yeah, I’ve seen you talk about them in prior threads. We’ll see what happens at my new place. Glad to hear the others in the area report not much issues with it (yet). My in laws are 5 miles east and have no issues (yet). Hopefully the predators for these flies will start to make headway and control them somewhat.

I definitely plan on growing a lot of the other fruits you mention just wanted to start a thread about berries first. SWD, Ambrosia Beetles, and late freezes you are taking my ignorance away and they say ignorance is bliss! Lie to me next time :slight_smile:

I think I joined your southern pear FB group a while ago. Definitely want pears (fireblight resistant). If you could pick three, which would you do? Prefer melting flesh, not gritty.