Apricots seldom do well in SoCal because of insufficient cold.

Plums are a much safer choice because you can get kinds that do well. Other choices are certain peaches and apples.

In general, your guiding principle for success is to use low-chill fruit trees -- in other words, trees that will produce fruit in spite of mild winters.

Your best source for trees are local garden center -- large independent nurseries, but not the box stores -- because the personnel there know what thrives in your area.

And try to locate the Sta. Monica Garden Club. Don't know its current status but it used to be very active and experienced members would be more than happy to answer your questions.

Have fun with your new choices,
Jean, who previously gardened in Long Beach, CA, for 30-some years.

Santa Monica has the perfect climate for Loquats- a disease free, pest free, drought resistant, prolific, early bearing "stone fruit" of sorts. Better tasting than most actual stonefruits, except for the outsized pits. There's probably some growing near you as landscaping plants. Look for the small yellow to orange fruits in May-June, somewhat smaller than an apricot. Be sure to get a named variety such as Gold Nugget or Big Jim to minimize pit size. Rollingrivernursery.com has them, though local nurseries should also have them. Check out crfg.org and cloudforest.com for more info. Also look into Pineapple Guavas aka feijoas.

Join up with the local California Rare Fruit Growers chapter, consult the Sunset Western Garden book, check out Digitalseed's website for low chill cultivars, Dave Wilson Nursery website (see Tom Spellman's picks for Southern California). Many of the published chill hours for specific cultivars are conservative. There are peaches, nectarines and plums (also apples) that are very low chill. Someone brought scion wood to the LA CRFG scion exchange from a bearing white peach tree in Santa Monica thought to be an old Armstrong cultivar 'Springtime' no longer in commerce but you can graft it onto another tree. There is a low chill apricot brought from Sicily, I think it's called Joe's Italian available at Exotica Nursery in Vista - other apricots need more chill generally although I lived in Los Angeles (Imperial Hwy/ Crenshaw) and we had a Royal Blenheim apricot that bore fruit. But you can still grow Apriums (predominantly apricot crossed with plum) Flavor Delight and possibly Cot N Candy (new this year so chill requirement is unknown). Other pluots are low chill - check Digitalseed, etc. for cultivar names.

Here is a link that might be useful: Digitalseeds peach page

Here's a sample listing of low chills:
Values in parentheses are required chilling hours. Generally 500 hours or less are considered low chills.

Almonds
* Garden Prince Dwarf (250)
* Neplus (250)
* Nonpariel (400)
* Price (400)

APPLES
* Anna (200)
* Dorsett Golden (100)
* Fuji (400)
* Gordon (400)
* Pettingill (100)
* Pink Lady (400-500)
* White Winter Pearmain (400)
* Winter Banana (300-400)
* Yellow Bellflower (400)

APRICOTS
* Gold Kist (300)
* Katy (400)

Blueberries
* Jubilee (400)
* Misty (150)
* O'Neal (200)
* Sharpblue (300)
* Sunshine Blue

Cherries
* Lapins (400-500)
* Royal Ranier (400-500)
* Stella (400-500)

FIGS
* All varieties

Grapes
* All varieties

INTERSPECIFIC HYBRIDS
* Cot-N-Candy Aprium (350-500)
* Dapple Dandy Pluot® (400-500)
* Delight Cherry-Plum (400)
* Emerald Drop Pluot® (400)
* Flavor Delight Aprium (200)
* Flavor Grenade Pluot® (300)
* Flavor King (400)
* Flavor Queen (400)
* Flavorella Plumcot (250)
* Plum Parfait Plumcot (400)
* Splash Pluot® (400)
* Sprite Cherry-Plum (400)

Jujubes
* All varieties

Kiwifruit
* Vincent (100)
* Tomuri (100)
* Issai (300-400)

NECTARINES
* Arctic Glo (400-500)
* Arctic Star (300)
* Desert Dawn (250)
* Desert Delight (100-200)
* Double Delight (400-500)
* Panamint (250)
* Southern Belle (300)
* Snow Queen (250-300)

PEACHES
* August Pride (300)
* Babcock (250-300)
* Bonanza (250)
* Bonita (400)
* Donut (400-500)
* Earlitreat (400)
* Eva's Pride (100-200)
* Flordaprince (150)
* May Pride (175-200)
* Mid-Pride (250)
* Red Baron (250-300)
* Saturn (250-300)
* Southern Rose (300)
* Strawberry Free (400-500)
* Tropic Snow (200)

PEARS
* Flordahome (300-400)
* Hood (100-200)
* Keiffer (350)
* Monterrey (300)

PEARS (Asian)
* Shinseiki (350-450)
* Shinsui (400)
* Tsu Li (300)
* Ya Li (300)

Pecans
* Mahan (250)
* Mohawk (250)
* Pawnee (250)
* Western Schley (250)

PERSIMMONS
* All varieties

PLUMS & PRUNES
* Beauty (250)
* Burgundy (400)
* Catalina (400)
* Friar (400)
* Laroda (400)
* Mariposa (250)
* Methley (250)
* Nubiana (400-500)
* Santa Rosa (300)
* Satsuma (300)
* Weeping Santa Rosa (400)

POMEGRANATES
* All varieties

QUINCE
* All varieties

Walnuts
* Pedro (400)
* Placentia (300)

Sergey,

Sorry for being so late with this post. The roses having been my focus so far; now I am turning to my fruit trees (It's pruning time!) Anyhow, I live in Santa Monica, about twenty blocks in from the ocean and have been growing peaches, apricots, figs, loquats, guavas, most of the citrus, blueberries, boysenberries and frais des bois for twenty years.

Dave Wilson, as others have mentioned, is the single best resource both for trees and information. Armstrong's Nurseries carry their plants and will order anything they don't have on stock, but so will many of the smaller independent nurseries. I am also partial to Pacific Tree Farms down in Chula Vista and in addition have bought the odd tree at the Santa Monica Farmers Market, the Huntington Library Spring Sale and the Papaya Leaf Nursery out in Grenada Hills.

Again, as others have suggested, the key is to plant trees with the right chill-hour needs for our area. The trees I planted twenty years ago, when there just weren't that many low-chill varieties around have been supplanted by varieties that sound much better to me. Mid-pride grows an enormous number of peaches which tend to ripen all in one week at the beginning of July each year. Some years they taste great, other years just bleh. I did use a weekly foliar spray of kelp this year and had a bonanza year of good tasting fruit on every plant.

If you are starting from scratch I would seriously recommend Dave Wilson's suggestion to plant four different varieties in one hole to spread out your harvest time. All the details are on his website.

About six years ago I put in a Goldkist apricot, which again I believe has been supplanted by better varieties (I have my eye on that Joe's Italian and also the white apricot being discussed on some stone fruit forums) but since it took forever for my apricot to bear (it doesn't get a lot of sun) I am reluctant to pull it.

You will discover that on the coast that while we are certainly warmer than Russia, we don't get as much heat as some low-chill varieties need for good ripening. A lychee I bougth in Grenada Hills with fruit, refuses to bear down here. So talking to people in your area that have fruit trees is wise. If you find a club, I would love to know about it. I have been gardening solo since I left Hollywood and its wonderful community garden twenty-one years ago.

But hey, you're in California now! Don't ignore the satsuma tangerines, the Meyer lemons, the figs and other trees you couldn't grow in Russia. And persimmons! I am trying to find room for one (or three) now. Good luck. Write back if you need more specific info. PS I am all organic if that matters to you.

I live in Long Beach. Do peaches and nectarines do well in this area? I'm reading many of the peach trees are hit with a worm and spraying (sevin) is needed. I would like to plant a Snow Queen nectarine or sweet yellow peach but am hesitant because of the recommended spraying. Please advise.
Newbie with trees

Long Beach gets some pretty good chill hours (I was told this is due to the cold air flowing down the San Gabriel riverbed). Peach trees usually need some spraying for peach leaf curl, maybe some fungus control on the coast because of the moisture.

There's also this.

Here is a link that might be useful: The California Backyard Orchard

Blenheim (Royal) apricot trees can be grown in coastal Southern California. If you plant a young tree there is fairly high chance it may not be able to survive the summer, but more mature trees that have already had time to establish a root system are more hardy. Fruit production from Blenheim will be on and off different years. There may be a few years without any fruit at all, and there will never be a huge amount of fruit, but I would not say the tree is not worth planting. There will be a fair amount of fruit most years, when the tree is older than 5 years.

Blenheim is really a medium-chill variety, but may be more adaptable to the Los Angeles and Orange County area than commonly believed. In this climate, stone fruit trees really benefit from just a little partial shade. In the Winter this helps them avoid daytime temperature highs that can really detract from the chill accumulation, while in the scorching Summers it helps keep the leaves from becoming too dried out in the hot sun.

If you're looking at cherries, Lapins is medium-chill but appears to be a little more adaptable to this climate than experts would have thought. Fruit production will be on and off different years (basically there will only be any fruit every other year), and the tree will need consistent watering, especially during the summer. During the first year the cherry tree will really benefit from some partial shade in this climate, you might consider putting up a temporary shade tarp cover to protect it while the roots have a chance to become established in the ground. A plant without an extensive root system is going to have difficulty handling the water demands caused by being in full sun (even if you watered everyday). Unlike Blenheim, Lapins is probably not a variety worth growing in this region, unless you are a real cherry enthusiast and have a lot of patience.

There are newer apricot and cherry varieties that do better in this region: 'Gold Kist', 'Katy', and the pair 'Royal Lee' and 'Royal Minnie Lee' (you will need both for pollination). Katy produces vigorously (though some people say the apricots do not taste quite as good as Blenheim and are smaller). Royal Lee produces satisfactory, it will take at least 4 years before you begin seeing any substantial fruit production. The variety Royal Lee has only recently become available in the last 10 years so there are few people who have long-term experience growing this cherry variety.

Global climate change is changing everything.

My Goldkist and Royal Rosa apricots produced
heavily for several years, then stopped with the warm winters we've had the
last two years. A large Katy tree averages around one fruit a year. The birds
get that. Flavor Delight aprium still fruits and I have a few apricots on
Blenheim this year. Sha Kar Pareh "Z" apricot produces fruit so
tasteless and bland I don’t pick them anymore. I have around five other apricot trees that have never fruited.

I had great crops from the low chill Royal Lee and Minnie
Lee cherry trees for several years. This year there's nothing.

There’s nothing on my Black Beauty mulberry.
The Pakistanis are still productive.

The only plums/pluots still producing at
all are Burgandy, GeoPride, Emerald Drop, Splash, and Early Golden. I have
around eight other plum/pluots that were productive for several years, then
stopped also two years ago.

I'm replacing all of my non-productive stone
fruit with fig trees. There are some amazing tasting figs now that you can buy
on the Internet; flavors of honey, brown sugar, melon, strawberry, raspberry and
blends of these as well as many others. They taste best if grown at home and picked at their peak.
Once established, fig trees need very little water, spray or fuss. They make great
shade and live for a much longer time than stone fruit. One of ours was strong enough to build a large tree house in it for the children to use as a playhouse.

Perhaps the warmer winters we're having will change at some point in the future but I doubt it will happen in my lifetime. Live and learn.

Seemed like a colder than usual Winter where I am, my stone fruit have all done surprisingly well this year (I mean considering that I'm not in a climate zone for stone fruit).

But I do agree there has been an overall warming trend over the last 25 years. I am thinking some of this may have to do with all the development that has taken place in the region, because all the paved surfaces affect temperatures.

Hey there! I moved into an apartment with a 3 year old peach tree, but it has a terrible fungus. There are gummy cankers all over the trunk and branches and it pours out of this giant open wound that takes up almost half the diameter of the trunk. It gets worse after it rains. The leaves are also curling in, turning brown and falling off. I tried cutting out as much of the cankers as I could last year, then spraying with a fungicide and repeating a couple months later and it actually looked a little bit better for awhile, but now that spring has returned it's just a mess again. I'm so sad to think I'll lose this tree, but I don't want to lose the plum tree it's next to as well. Help! Should I cut my losses and take the tree down? Almost every branch is infected, but there are still a ton of peaches on the tree. The leaves are falling everywhere and it doesn't look good. ANY and all advice would be hugely appreciated!

Santa Rosa was successfully grown in Gardena which is very close to you.