1 - Where did you read that? Because it's far from the truth in all matters.
"Garden centers" usually don't sell whips, they sell pot bound, over grown, mismarked trees. They are the ones more likely to give you problems.
It's mail order that sells bareroot whips. They will survive winters much worse than yours. They are the right age to not notice the transplant.

2 - Never heard of the place. But going by the name they are preying on the newbie's desire to get big trees, not knowing that is the opposite of what you want.
I would find out if they are the ones that actually graft and grow their tree.

What myk1 said.

If you're going to buy trees (grafting them yourself is a much less expensive alternative but you end up losing a year and there's more fiddling around), in general, the best thing to do is buy from one of the better mail order places. In general, you want a bare-root, one-year old tree, which you are going to plant early in the spring as soon as the ground can be worked. Cummins, Fedco, and Miller have all given me excellent service, and there are lots of other good mail-order nurseries you could use that would have the warmer-climate varieties you might want.

The "fast growing trees" place charges $129 for a Gravenstein apple tree, plus typically $22 shipping, according to their website, for a 5'-7' tree. I personally see this as a poor value even if fruiting is accelerated when I can buy five bare-root trees for the same money. And I am not convinced that fruiting would indeed be accelerated by much because of the greater transplant shock.

If you have a nursery near you that sells bare root stock out of a refrigerated area in the spring, and you believe you can count on them having what you want in stock, that's a good route as well.

van well nursery, look no further

Yes ..I did find it kind of steep. After carfefull onsideration I will most like seek out a local nursery in my area, and buy there, that way if I run into problems with the trees, I can always ask them directly for advise. I have particular problem buy seeds online or through catalogs, but trees..that a whole different matter..thank you all for your opinions.

I really hate to say anything bad about a company I have never purchased from but here is what I think you should know.

They are not listed on the Daves Garden Watchdog. My bet is because like TyTy they asked to be removed do to their being so many complaints.

There is a website that lists complaints for this company and here it is.

Here is a link that might be useful: Complaints Board

They are also on Garden Watchdog. They go by multiple names including Brighter Blooms Nursery, Empress Tree Nurseries, fast-growing-trees.com, and Paulownia Supply. They've been discussed in the Tree Forum, and have a fairly poor reputation there.

Here is a link that might be useful: Empress Tree Nurseries / fast-growing-trees.com / Paulownia Supply

See the link below for a list of most mail-order fruit-centric nurseries, along with a brief summary of what they offer, Garden Watchdog ratings, and their web address.

Here is a link that might be useful: Fruit Plant Suppliers

Sorry you are right brandon7 somehow I missed them. Their rep is pretty good on GW too. Their rep is horrible on the other site though so it may be best to read and consider both before deciding whether or not to make a purchase.

I don't see why it might not be advantageous to purchase 3 year old trees if the nursery was reputable. I wish the nurseries I ordered from like ACN offered 2 year trees which are popular in Europe because they speed harvest by about a year. For dwarfs, anything more than 2 years would not only be a waste of money in my opinion but a disadvantage over a well managed 2 year tree and be likely to runt out because of its advanced maturity during the stress of transplant (unless you removed all spur-wood).

Wolf, if you decide to plant bare-roots stay far away from Miller Nursery unless you want tiny whips and possibly mis-labled trees. Cummins is good for unusual stuff but you may get larger trees from a larger commercial supplier like ACN or C+0 which I believe will fill small orders (ACN will, at least)- not sure about Van Well which was mentioned and is another reputable commercial supplier. I am reluctant to steer you from Cummins- great people, great know-how, great selection (until they start to sell out).

When ordering BR's the only reason distance is important in my experience (which is substantial) is the cost of shipping. BR's are so tough that I often park a box in the shade for a couple weeks before planting them with no ill affect. I supposed a truck could get stuck in extreme cold weather and damage trees from a Westcoast nursery if trees were already budded out.

Forget about getting stuff from garden centers, unless it's privately owned by a fruit-nut. You can't trust what they say about rootstocks or scions.

Order ASAP. The best nurseries tend to sell out- I put in my order months ago.

This is the first time I've ever read to stay away from Miller. I'm kind of shocked because of the ones on here that recommend them.

I generally recommend going as local as possible. It has little to do with shipping time although that is a consideration because you don't want them to dry out. It has to do with the climate the trees were originally grown in and built for. With Stark being about 3 hours away from me I bet the trees hardly notice they've been moved. Also they are very well in touch with what my weather is as far as when to ship. Not that I expect they look out the window to decide when to ship to me personally but weather that effects their shipping schedule is actually applicable to me unlike someone who is in a zone 5 1000 miles away.

I don't think a truck traveling across country would be an issue since nearly everything flies the long distances to hubs.

Mykl, I have ordered trees by the hundreds from all over the country. We are talking about clones (both root and scion) whose seasonal clocks have been absolutely shut down by long periods of refrigeration. Only someone like Miller would lay claim to be selling tougher trees because they are grown in a harsher climate. In fact many of their trees are apparently purchased from other nurseries.

There has been absolutely no noticable difference I've observed from my C+O trees from the west coast, the Hilltop trees from the midwest and the ACN trees from PA and RI (this is just 3 of the dozen or so nurseries I regularly purchase from). Except that the C+O trees tend to arrive already budding- which hasn't hurt their establishment and actually seems to get them off to a faster start.

Commercial nurserymen I deal with have made jokes about Miller calling them to buy runts for a dollar a piece to sell to their unfortunate customers. This subject has come up numerous times on this forum and Scott usually provides research that indicates Miller's low rating based on on-line feed back. I think Miller's blueberries and other smaller stuff like brambles are perfectly good, however.

That's good to know about Miller. Before coming here I always figured them to be part of the Gardens Alive and/or Foster and Gallager complexes (I missed out on Stark being part of F&G) so I steered clear of them.
Before I decided on Grandpas for next year's order I was going to order from them.

Notice that 2 of the 3 you list are in your general area. I'm betting deep down you do the exact same thing I do except you have more of a need to go out of your area than I do.
I don't say it's necessarily bad to go far away, I just think it's better to go closer when you can get the same thing.

I definitely do not like trees waking up before planting. No reason, I just don't. So you pretty much fed my fire.

I don't remember why Adams got crossed off my list pretty quickly. Maybe I glossed over them using Albemarle Pippin instead of Newtown for the name. I'll have to look back into them.
I do remember I crossed another that you don't list off, they fudged the zones colder than others so what I wanted wouldn't be guaranteed.
The first one mentioned in this thread threw up flags to me when they claimed their trees wouldn't need sprayed so you'd be helping the environment when you bought from them.

Sure, if I can get the same tree at the same price, I always go with the closer source- even if just to reduce co2 release. I just like to tell people that BR's are a lot hardier the common wisdom and I've gotten to the point that I treat them a bit rough- but not if they are beginning to leaf out because then they are pushing new root that can easily dry out.