What’s a fruit or nut tree you won’t grow, and why?
For me I’ll never grow black walnuts. Despite the fact that I love them I don’t want to deal with such a gigantic, messy, allelopathic tree. On top of everything else I can get more than I’d ever use from local parks, so I have better use for my space at home.
I may cull my peach trees, i love the fruits i just dont enjoy having to spray it for leaf curl every year i tend to forget and preventive care is a must for PNW. in general stone fruits including fruiting apricots etc.
I thought of growing a pecan or black walnut tree. Issue is black walnuts and pecans secrete jugalone. At first I thought it could be a good thing as it could deter weeds but when I asked on here people said I would just get different weeds. It will also kill things I want to grow like apples, pears and asparagus. Even if you would not want to grow those things it would be rude to your neighbors who may want to grow those things. Also with pecans generally you need two which ends up being a 200 foot area for pecans and a 80 foot area for walnuts.
I’m borderline with apricots.
I’m on the fourth generation in 13 years. They just keep dying, while my peaches and nectarines right next to them are originals. Plus I only get fruit every 2-3 years because of their early blooms.
Everyone will say winter sunscald, but I wrap them with white fabric every fall for the winter.
Sweet cherries. Absolute heartbreakers most years here in hot humid MD. Alllllmost ripe and then it rains and they all explode or turn brown.
I dont grow walnuts but they grow on my property aplenty. My dad was always in favor of them…but during my tenure i have cut down 10 or so because of the juglone. Its just a bully when it comes to what can grow around it.
I will never grow tobacco again. My farm grew tobacco for around 100 years… no where to sell it…no market. They actually paid my dad not to grow it in the later years.
I will never grow green beans again. Too much work.
I will never grow potatoes again… well if i do it will be if i see a spud sprouting. I just never seem to eat as much as i grow. If i buy a bag most of it gets wasted.
I will never grow boring tomato varieties again. Jeez there are so many wonderful heirlooms and hybrids.
I will never grow hominy again. too much work… who eats hominy anymore?
I haven’t done anything to my plums. They row like weeds and produce like crazy in Tacoma.
For me it has to be non-improved cultivars of fruits. Years ago I found a local goumi and got a bunch of seedlings started. They ended up being small and somewhat thorny. I have Tillimook improved cultivar as well and there is no comparison in size and flavor. Now I have a bunch of seedlings that I need to chop down and clean up. I know there are some fruits that come true or close to it, but if they don’t, I won’t waste my time in the future.
I’ve had really good luck with Frost, not having to spray it. I’m trialing Kreibich Nectarine and Nanimo Peach as well. All my others, I have to baby as well. I’ve found a bit of an anomaly for me. I have a chicken run of 20 hens and the peach trees that are close to the run shed the PLC leaves faster. They still get it but seem to grow right past it and still end up having good health and vigor early in the season. The ones that are away from the coop seem to linger in the PLC stage longer.
Sweet cherries
Oh, that’s another one I’ll probably never try, based mostly on what I’ve read here. Consensus seems to be they’re very difficult to grow in most climates and they’re one of the rare fruits that are as good from the grocery store as from your own trees, so why not just buy them?
I will never grow potatoes again
A few years ago the kids and I spent all Saturday digging up potatoes. The next day I went grocery shopping and they were on sale, I realized I had broken my back and wasted a weekend for about $10 worth of spuds. Never again.
please keep us PNW posted on how your stone fruit grows im planning to test more resistence varieties in a few years.
I culled or topworked the peach trees that were here when we bought the place, except for one that is curl resistant and makes big peaches with great flavor (and often split pits and bugs and such, but I don’t really spray either).
Indian Free wasn’t very healthy and never set, so I grafted it to Early Laxton plum. Charlotte barely set fruit, and half of those were doubles. I grafted it to Emerald Beaut from Vincent, which is probably Emerald Drop pluot.
Frost has done the best in terms of surviving disease and producing fruit. The fruit are not bad, relatively small but I probably don’t thin enough. Texture is okay. Flavor doesn’t compare to the unknown one that was here. But overall I rate is 2nd out of several because at least I get fruit from it.
I’m probably done with Apricots. Had a Puget Gold for 7 or 8 years and ate 1 or 2 dozen nice apricots from it, better than grocery store. Apparently they may perform better on some rootstocks than others.
I also tried to grow olive once. Arbequina. Deer ate it, didn’t recover, end of story. Not sure I would have hassled with curing them anyway.
So far the only fruits I can grow at home are blueberries, sweet lemons and kumquats. All my other fruits are destroyed by animals or disease. I am able to grow pears, sour cherries, straw berries and peaches at the community garden, My wife has a rental unit that we have Montmorency and Redhaven trees doing well.
i maybe picky i tasted frost peach from a friends house. the fruits were ok, i dont particularly like the fuzzy skin, i ended up peeling peach skin. i never had that problem with the peaches that i grew from my own garden. so i dont grow a frost peach. im looking for excellent flavor resistance to leaf curl peach. it maybe difficult to find but im hoping to test some later on. i just dont have the room at the moment.
I tried several times to grow Apricots, but overall
they are poorly adapted to the Puget Sound region.
Very early budbreak
Susceptibility to fungus
Bloom way too early.
Worse than Peaches.
Hmm… Wow thats a hard one… Maybe Well I dont like growing snow does that count?
I agree that Frost isn’t necessarily better than peaches from the grocery store.
Yeah, mine started out very healthy, and set and ripened fruit tolerably well when it flowered. But disease pressure took its toll and got progressively worse. Not helped by the fact that I didn’t spray.
But they were the best apricots I’ve eaten since living here, aside from some samples at the NAFEX convention at McMenamins Edgefield. Maybe those were from Purvis.
Now I order dried Organic California Apricots from nuts.com They are pretty good, at least this year. If somebody knows a better place to get sweet, translucent, unsulfured dried apricots, please let me know.
I’m giving up on pecans and peaches. They all keep winterkilling. I have other fruits and nuts that have never produced, but at least most are still alive. Maybe some day some of them will surprise me with a crop. We are not in a great fruit-growing area here, I guess. Apples and pears do well, and honeyberries and Romance cherries finally producing well.
