Apples or peaches you need a no-chill variety and apples are the most pest-prone fruit trees there are. Peaches you need to dormant-spray every year for leaf curl. What about strawberries? Not a tree, but they're easy and much tastier grown at home.

Persimmons need very little care, once established most trees produce abundant crops with little fertilizer.

Pomegranates fit that category too. Plums are so abundant that they can become a nuisance with all the fallen fruit. I'm not sure about the pluot and aprium crosses' resistance to disease, but I'm considering one of those. No chill pears and Asian pears are a possibility too. Grape and kiwi vines are worth considering, grapes sprawl but kiwis can be trained upward into a large shrub form

Here is a link that might be useful: Dave Wilson Backyard Orchard

You can ignore the chilling hours on apples, as they will all bear for you. But for trouble-free fruit, Anna and Dorsett Golden bear before most of the pests show up and give heavy, reliable crops annually. Anna especially is great for fresh-eating and makes killer pies.

Fuyu persimmon is pest and trouble free, and also bears very heavy crops of tasty fruit annually.

Applenut

The four guava trees I got here in Torrance thrive in full sun. When I had passion fruit vines, they did very well in full sun.

Pineapple guavas are easy, pretty, and productive. Loquats are yummy and very pretty landscape trees, too.
Renee

If you totally easy and care free, I would consider Loquats, Persimmons, Lemons, Avocados (some are easy, some are not), Figs (super easy... in fact, weeds in a way), many species of Passion vine, Concord Grapes, Grapefruits, Kumquats, Bananas (these require some removal, support and replanting, but pretty easy). These are so easy hardly any watering or worry needed. I find the stone fruits to be more of a hassle and less likely to make a good crop without extra care and battling of the pests.

Cherimoyas are delicious. I had a friend in Camarillo who grew them, but I have never seen one in Simi Valley. I think it's too dry for them here. Otherwise I'd grow them.

I have been unable to purchase peaches, nectarines, or apricots that taste anything like the ones grown at home, so I think these are good choices for a backyard garden. My neigbors have apricots on one side and peaches on the other, so we grow nectarines. Works perfectly.

I love my avocado trees because I can give avocados away for half the year. Avocado trees are a great way to win friends and influence people! Loquats do not work as well.
Renee

I know this has been talked about before, GG1950, but how do we frost-free coastal LA gardeners get past the chilling hour requirements (like the ones I linked at Dave Wilson's site) for stone fruit? Any thoughts on fungal-resistant hybrid plumcot cultivars for the coast?

Dicot,

Don't bother trying to grow high chill hour fruit. There are many low chill fruits able to frost free gardeners, cherries included.

Gardenguru,

Totally agree with you, grow the stuff you can't get in the store, or is to expensive. I grow more then half the list you mentioned.

On the one hand, I think we make too big a deal about "chill hours". Only because most of the fruits that we can grow in California (coastal, inland, wherever) aren't impacted by the concept. There's literally hundreds of Mediterranean and Subtropical fruit that don't need nor want "chilling".

On the other hand, if you do stick with those fruits that supposedly need it (most pomes and stones), get the cultivars that are suited to your chill zone. I say that as a recommendation to beginners or those who simply want a dependable fruiting tree. Many will suggest that "chilling" isn't a viable concept and that gardeners should grow any kind of apple or cherry or whatever. Fact is, even those who suggest that admit that you can't be guaranteed a good crop ever year.

dicot: as for coastal plumcots, have you tried 'Flavorella' or 'Flavor Grenade'? And do you have a 'Santa Rosa' plum for a pollinator?

Joe

Try a Papaya, doesn't take up much space.

I'm in USDA zone 10, Sunset zone 24 - have seen frost once in 20 years. I successfully grow Anna apples, Monterey pears, Santa Rosa Plum (weeping) and several low chill peaches: May-pride, Mid-pride, Florida Prince, and Bonanza II (a dwarf tree with full size peaches). The troubles I have had (lots of fog during the summer) are peach leaf curl, apple scab, powdery mildew (on the apple), some fireblight on the pear, and some sort of fungus on the plum and peaches late in the season.

gardenguru,

where is the best place to get these exotic fruit trees?

It's not like the variety at my local Home Depot is that extensive.

Do you recommend any place?
thanks

Chill hours are hours below 45 degrees, not below freezing. Anna apples do well, even near the coast. My sister grows cherimoyas and mulberries in Costa Mesa, and many of my nieghbors grow guavas. If you want stone fruit, the Dave Wilson chart will tell you which varieties need the fewest chill hours. You can ask your local chapter of California Rare Fruit Growers for suggestions. I just planted nectaplum and aprium, because I decided to get something I couldn't easily buy in the store.

Here is a link that might be useful: Planting Fruit Trees

Check out the Papaya Tree Nursery website for the truly exotic stuff. Alex Silber, the owner, will answer questions via email and is often at local CRFG meetings. San Gabriel Nursery in San Gabriel has good trees though I haven't really looked for the exotic stuff there. Ditto for Green Arrow in North Hills

My Santa Rosa plum died from root rot since I posted, so I give up on stone fruit near the coast. A Mexi-lime or more grapes is next on the list.

Go with grapes. New citrus pests on the way.

Weeping Santa Rosa for Sunset 24? I am in 23 and was told I would never get fruit. Those are beautiful trees and supposed to have superior flavor. How much fruit are you getting in 24? I might try it if you get reliable results.

I grow Fuji and Pink Lady apples with success as well as Tangerines, strawberries, Santa Rosa plum, Pomegranate, fig and blueberries. Blueberries take lots of water and special soil. I grew bananas very well but you have to cut down the stalk that just made fruit and it is very heavy and full of water. It was a pain to dispose of it and I didn't have the room to let it lay there so goodbye bananas.

Across the street are two date palms that make dates in abundance every year. They aren't the tall kind you see in Palm Springs. They look very pretty and the dates are high quality.

Maybe you are over watering your citrus. Mine weren't doing anything, then I started remodeling and my sprinklers got taken out and I was only watering once a week. Now they look great. Use cactus soil (its sandy so it drains well, and pick off any yellow or curly leaves. Peaches do great in california...just have to net them so the birds don't eat them.

Look for grapes that are resistant to Pierce Disease.

There aren't any that I was able to find. Resistant rootstock doesn't transfer resistance to the graft. You can read more here :Pierce's disease

According the descriptions in the DWN chill/zone tool, some heavy producers here are:

* Sweet Bagel peach (and by a longshot the latest peach harvest)

* Geo Pride pluot (plum, apricot hybrid, with some peach)

* Shinseiki Pear

I don't have any of these three, but am considering the first two. I do have:

*Minnie Royal cherry tree, which is supposed to be prolific...but not yet for me! Folks are saying it can take 7 years for Minnie Royal and Royal Lee to sync up.

Eggalinameggalina: I know you posted this thread several years ago, but I'm curious: what did you end up adding, and how are the trees doing? And which avo dwarf? Holiday? Littlecado?

Igteacher, some are more resistant than others but Victoria Red is probably the best bet.http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/extension/fruit/Piercegrapes/pdr.html

If your in Los Angeles you have to visit family owned Paradise Nursery - Specializing in Fruit Trees and Installing Backyard Orchards in Southern California for decades

The latest reports have shown that apples tend to be more adaptable to lower-chill areas than was previously thought. A field test by Tom Spellman of Dave Wilson Nursery showed that several apple varieties rated for 800 chill hours grew just fine in Irvine (which only gets 50-100 real chill hours). The following apple varieties in particular did unexpectedly well in the test: King Tompkins, Braeburn, Gravenstein, Cox's Orange Pippin. Scarlett Sentinel and Ashmead's Kernel also produced satisfactorily.

But I will just point out here that the results might have had something to do with the fact that the coastal influence has a moderating effect on temperature, and in the winter it rarely ever gets above 65 F in this region, higher temperatures being very detrimental to effective chill accumulation. In other words, the same moderating influence that prevents there from ever being any chill hours below 45 F may be, paradoxically, the same influence that allows the trees to grow well even in the absence of chill hours below 45 F.

I am not saying that Apples are the most suitable type of fruit to grow in the Los Angeles area, but if you want to grow them it is certainly possible.

A Satsuma mandarin is always a nice tree to have in the yard. They taste so much better right off the tree than bought at the store. Very easy to peal and nearly seedless, great for snacking on or giving away as gifts around Christmas time.

Pomegranates really grow effortlessly in Southern California, take very little water, and their fiery orange blossoms and decoratively shaped fruit are very ornamental. Many people think that eating pomegranate involves too much work to remove all the little arils inside and is too messy. Perhaps because they are not familiar with the proper technique for cutting open and eating the fruits. The CRFG fact sheet on pomegranate says: "Consumer demand in this country is not great. More pomegranate fruits probably wind up as decorations in fruit bowls than are consumed."

I think pomegranate makes excellent juice, perhaps superior to any other fruit juice when it is freshly made. But it does take a lot of labor; for best quality juice the arils need to be first separated out by hand from the inner white membrane and then pressed. If the arils are not separated out there will be a bitter flavor imparted to the juice from the white rind.

"I was wondering what are the easiest, most fruit bearing trees to plant in Southern California. (I just put in a dwarf avocado and I also have two figs, a pomegranate, lemon, lime, and orange. Do you think its wise to try apples or peaches? The citrus trees seem to have a lot of different maladies, while the figs seem to be thriving on their own.)"

"Sunset Zone 23 has always been Southern California's best zone for avocados"-Sunset.

Natural, ideal fit for Suptropical So Cal -

• Avocados,
• Figs,
• Pomegranates,
• Persimmons
• Jujube
• Loquat
• Citrus (great evergreens, but recent disease issues)
• Low chill Apricot/Aprium,
• Low Chill Plum/Pluot,
• Low Chill Nectarine/hybrids
• Mangos, Bananas, Guavas & other tropicals (esp. if you have a hot, south-facing wall.)

Fussier Trees -

• Peaches (climate),
• Cherimoya (hand pollination),
• low-chill cherry (Royal pair can take 7 years to sync up & produce fruit),
• apple of any chill rating (grow just fine, but one blight can wipe them out),
• pear (grow just fine, but one blight can wipe them out)

Consider first:

• Sunset zone information - quite helful
• How "low chill" do you need? (Compare to Sunset maps) If you want fruit, you have to select varieties with chill requirements less than the number of chill hours you get in the majority of years. (If your chill range is 150-500, a tree rated 400 might give fruit prolifically one in every seven years.) I would set the Dave Wilson Nursery tool under your median chill hour to look for varieties.

Not trees, but good perennial fruit:

Kiwi, Grapes, Passionfruit, Low chill southern highbush blueberries, Low chill hybrid caneberries (boysen, olallie, rasp, black etc), Gogi, etc.

---------------

One more link:

Here is the VERY helpful Dave Wilson Chill Zone selection tool. It's a very long link, but I've adjusted the settings to get you started. Make sure you adjust these settings for just under your average chill hours per year (set here for 300) and your USDA zone (set here for 10). If you have FROST (most don't), then maybeadjust the harvest dates too.):

http://www.davewilson.com/product-information/quick-screen/fruit-varieties-zone-chill-testing?field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=apple&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=apricot&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=cherry&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=fig&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=jujube&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=nectarine&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=peach&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=pear&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=persimmon&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=plum&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=interspecifics&field_product_fruit_group_value%5B%5D=domestica&field_product_zone_lowest_value_op=%3C%3D&field_product_zone_lowest_value%5Bvalue%5D=10&field_product_zone_lowest_value%5Bmin%5D=&field_product_zone_lowest_value%5Bmax%5D=&field_product_zone_highest_value_op=%3E%3D&field_product_zone_highest_value%5Bvalue%5D=10&field_product_zone_highest_value%5Bmin%5D=&field_product_zone_highest_value%5Bmax%5D=&field_product_chill_hours_value_op=%3C%3D&field_product_chill_hours_value%5Bvalue%5D=300&field_product_chill_hours_value%5Bmin%5D=&field_product_chill_hours_value%5Bmax%5D=&field_harvest_date_value%5Bmin%5D%5Byear%5D=2012&field_harvest_date_value%5Bmin%5D%5Bmonth%5D=1&field_harvest_date_value%5Bmin%5D%5Bday%5D=1&field_harvest_date_value%5Bmax%5D%5Byear%5D=2012&field_harvest_date_value%5Bmax%5D%5Bmonth%5D=12&field_harvest_date_value%5Bmax%5D%5Bday%5D=31

In the 40s, 50s, and 60s people planted apricot trees in Southern California. The variety was Blenheim (Royal). They did not always do well, and fruit production was off and on different years, but people did plant them and eat apricots. Nowadays there are low-chill varieties available, such as 'Katy' and 'Gold Kist' (though some people do not think they taste as good as Blenheim).

Something else that can be pointed out here, because of all the development that has happened in the region and the asphalt paved roads, fruit trees may not accumulate as much winter chill as they used to 50 years ago. Widespread regional development can raise average temperature highs by as much as 6°F.

Looking for a supplier of 1 Gal. Dwarf Fruit & Berry plants.

For Southern California Balcony grown in 5 gal. containers

Laguna Hills Nursery in OC also specializes in home fruit for so CA gardeners and offers free classes. San Gabriel Nsy has a great selection too.

HA! 5 for a $1 Avocados in 2010 days are long gone. A single large Hass is now $3+

And why I just planted an Avocado. Hass.

I love Plums,Apricots and Nectarines. If I had room I would plant more. I can tell you,home grown Plums are 100X tastier then Supermarket plums. Plums,I planted..just ran out of room for the others.