I haven't got any good advice, but how nice to be starting from scratch with space to fill up!

I'd think twice about what I put in the front yard. Fruit thieves. Thing like rhubarb are probably good bets there. Maybe some thorny berries in front of a window...

My only experience was with double jewel. It bore heavily once and then stunted out. I'd go for something tried and true in your area. Emphasize "in your area" I bet there is a grape that fits that description in your area. Very vigorous growers and productive by nature.

I can't pretend that I know anything about those choices in your location, but if I relocated to a zone like yours personally I would be putting less emphasis on stone fruit and pomes in order to take advantage of all the other fun possibilities.

I would be planting things like jujube, non-astringent persimmon, pomegranate, citrus (except the more tender types), olives, figs, loquats, black mulberry, carob, cacti (Indian fig, apple cactus, garambullo), feijoa, passionfruit, jelly palm, etc… the list could go on and on! Try growing those back in New Jersey!

Oh, and I'd also grow an insane winter vegetable garden during the rainy season! Ah, that old zone envy!!!

Have fun...

I would probably go with something other than Craig's Crimson. I see they have Lapins. I'd probably go with that on Zaiger dwarfing rootstock if they have it (otherwise Colt). Better yet, get a Bing and a Rainier (NOT Royal Rainier).

You are close enough to Newcastle that you could run up to Fowler nursery. Their home garden catalog is greatly truncated this year but they have Robada and OrangeRed. They also have Harrow Sweet.

All of the varieties shown on the website are not on the home garden catalog, you have to download it.

If you get a peach tree from Fowler get it on Lovell, Empyrean is too much of an unknown here. Better would be Citation if your local nursery has it. I'd prefer my cherries on Zaiger or Colt from your local nursery rather than the Krymsk that Fowler sells.

gary

Here is a link that might be useful: Fowler nursery

beware of deer. a friend bought property in the CA hills in 1986, planted hundreds of trees, first stand alone, then in cages, and he is still without fruit. also gophers, far more numerous and active there.

Welcome to the area!
Front Yard Nursery is a great place, I stop in there often. I haven't grown any of the varieties you're thinking of so I can't help there, but as already mentioned, have some major deer and gopher protection or you'll become that crazy neighbor who wanders around the yard cursing and stomping the ground. You'll need bird, 'coon, and opossum protection as well.

emmers:

First congradulations for having the guts to move from NJ to CA to follow your gardening/lifestyle dreams!!! I hope it works for you. I moved from TX to CA in 2000 for same reason. Had to move back due to health reasons but would do it again.

From your list I'd drop Housi pear due to poor eating quality and Comice due to fireblight and slow bearing.

I'd plant Lapins cherry rather than Craigs Crimson which runted out and died on me. I like Lapins better than Rainier or Royal Rainier and almost as good as Bing. Plant Lapins over Bing for self fertility.

Best two pluots are Flavor King and Flavor Supreme but the later requires hand pollination to set.

Emerald Beaut is a wonderful late plum that holds on tree two months.

The reason to plant stone fruit over all those alternative fruits mentioned is they, in general, are a lot better eating. I'd try a Black Beauty mulberry but for me jujubes were a waste of money.

My favorites are listed on the writeup linked below.

Here is a link that might be useful: greenhouse fruit production.

Hi, all,

Thanks so much for your insight! I realized last night that I hadn't included a pollinizer for Flavor King, so my list will require some rethinking. Gary, I had originally thought to use Fowler before I found this local place, but you're right - they do have the varieties I was missing at Front Yard.

So to complicate the plan:

Robada Apricot (F)

Lapins (FY) vs Sandra Rose (F) - possibly better rootstock, per Gary, or slightly better flavor, per Fruitnut?

Double Jewel Peach (FY) - any alternative recommendations?

Double Delight Nectarine (FY) - no nectarines at either nursery even make it on to Fruitnut's chart. What would be the best of what's available? I love nectarines.

Elberta Peach (FY)

Flavor King Pluot (FY)

Emerald Beaut Plum (FY) - Does this plum have tart skin?

Harrow Sweet Pear (F)

Fuji Apple (FY)

Olympic Asian Pear (F)

Sierra Beauty Apple (FY)

Hmmm...somehow I have 11 trees now. Funny how that goes :) I might still try to make it to 10 trees from FY for the discount (convenient excuse) - maybe I can reserve a mulberry or close my eyes and point at a couple of figs.

So open season - please make any and all recommendations from either nursery.

Here is a link that might be useful: Fowler Nursery list (PDF)

MsLizzyKate, yes, fun - though it's pretty intimidating at the moment! That's why I decided to just jump in. If I wait until I have my full site plan worked out I will probably be beyond my 20yr plan for this house before I get my darn pears!

Kokopelli5a - my 'front yard' is just a piece of my rocky hillside at the end of a 'country' road. The only passers by are the mailman and a neighbor's yellow lab, and the mailman would be welcome to some fruit! Grapes are in the master plan, but I don't have a location or support strategy worked out yet.

Fabaceae_native - it's funny - "Try growing those in NJ" is exactly how I feel about the stones/pomes. It's so humid and buggy that it was impossible for me to grow them there, at least with my organic/lazy approach. So my new location was more or less chosen to give me enough of a winter to grow all those favorites but still experiment with some exotics. And of course the veggie garden year-round, but that's another forum!

I do have mulberries and citrus and olives and figs on the plan, but I was relieved that seemingly I don't have to think about those until later in the year! I'm not quite convinced on persimmons or jujubes - was going to try them in NJ where my choices were limited, but here I don't know, and pomegranates taste like slightly sweet watery gravel to me. Maybe I've never had a good one.

eep - I have to run, but will continue responding in a bit.

Emerald Beaut doesn't have a tart skin. I've tried probably 30 Jap plums and this is the best one. It's the only one that's as good as a good pluot.

I agree with your choice of Olympic pear. IMO it's way better than Housi and can be stored until mid winter. Comice and Bosc are great fruit but mine took 7 yrs to bloom and I've had one good crop in 11 yrs. They are also very susceptible to fire blight. Your location will likely have bad fb pressure. It was bad in the foothills east of Fresno, my former location in CA.

Nectarines are my best fruit. You need an Arctic Star when you can find one.

Gary, thanks so much for the local insights and the guidance on rootstock choices - I've been avoiding delving into that subject because I don't want to get too complicated in this first go round, so I appreciate the pointers.

Glib, yes, I will have to fend off gophers, deer, turkeys, coyotes, bobcats and rattlesnakes, although hopefully the latter three won't be too interested in my trees. For this initial group I'll just have to plant in gopher baskets, cage for deer, and cross my fingers. Although one of my neighbors is having surprising success with the sonic repellant stakes against the gophers.

MrCaballus, thanks! It's good to hear that you have experience with Front Yard. I drove up to Cool when I was looking at houses in the area - it's beautiful, and I like that so many of the streets are 'Cherry'. How to you get to be 9b there, though? I'm envious - I am harboring a desire to, like tilting at windmills, futilely try growing an avocado tree.

Fruitnut, I've followed your research on the forum for years. I think that your greenhouse/water deficit environment will be similar to my conditions, which should be hot days, cooler nights, and no precipitation for 6 months of the year.

I'm sorry to hear you more or less left CA involuntarily, but you have managed to customize your environment remarkably well.

In the future I will have to figure out how to obtain more of your heavy hitters, but for now, if you were stuck on a 9a/7 low foothills desert island, and you had to pick peaches and nectarines from these two lists or go without those fruit entirely, which would you choose? :) (I know you've said peaches don't stack up next to your favorite nectarines, but I don't know if they compare more favorably to these)

~emmers

emmers:

I've planted a lot of those peaches and nectarines both here and in CA. But just haven't had enough fruit to form a good opinion. Didn't much like the Alberta I had in CA. O'Henry was better but not great.

In general I think Fowler carries a lot of great varieties. I think anything they endorse is worth trying including the nectarines from Europe. Part of that is the fact that they are near your location.

I don't remember how I determined 9b to B honest. I think I went with whatever map I was looking at said I was. To be honest, it's all over the place. We didn't have any snow for the first 8 or so years I was up here, and it never dropped below 26F at night. Last few years, it's snowed in December, except for this year of course, just to be different. And December of '13, it hit 17~18F for 5 or 6 nights in a row. Go figure.

I put in an Emerald Beauty, since we're mentioning them, a couple years ago. It's been a fast grower, and quite prolific. It's also apparently REALLY tasty to aphids as well, as it's the only tree in the orchard to get nailed hard by them. This year will be different though. (shakes fist)

I also put in a Loring peach at around the same time. Got more peaches last year than I could handle, even after plucking the budding fruit three times. So you might consider that if you can't find an Elberta.

And as for the street names, Auburn and the surrounding areas were apparently very popular fruit growing areas until irrigation became available in the central valley. We've got abandoned orchards all over the place. Mandarins are a big deal around the area the Fowler Nursery is located.

I can't speak from first-hand experience but I've read that Sandra Rose, while great tasting, is not a firm cherry.

I'm putting in a Fantasia nectarine this year.

Loring is my favorite peach.

gary

This post was edited by Waiting on Sat, Feb 7, 15 at 15:14

How about Honey Kist and Arctic Jay? I can get those from Peaceful Valley (along with a Lapins on New Root 1, per gary's recommendation).

Haven't decided if I would take a field trip or get them shipped, but Fruitnut rates others in the Honey series very highly, and Arctic Jay gets good marks.

As might be expected, California Cooperative Extension has lots of information about fruit growing.

MrCaballus, how do you like eating the Emerald Beaut and the Loring?

I'm down where all the street names are mineral or mining related - I like the fruit names better, but I'm biased! At least I didn't end up on 'Mosquito Rd' - had quite enough of that in Joisey.

Gary, thanks for the rec on Loring - I can feel my initial list expanding... How did you decide on Fantasia?

~emmers

I've always just made a trip up to Peaceful Vally. It saves on the shipping, keeps the trees from being topped, (inspect the roots by the way, I got a pear that had the graft torn in half.) and I can pick up a few bags of whatever fertilizer is cheapest. (They also have torn bags on sale, although they sure don't seem to mark them down by much.)

Check out the seed racks too. They sometimes have sales on last years wildflower seeds.

MrCaballus, how do you like eating the Emerald Beaut and the Loring?

They're both great. But then, everything fresh off the tree is.

I originally was scared away from peaches and pears due to the fireblight issue. (And of course, last year, what got fireblight? The Asian pears! Nothing else!) It wasn't until years later that I found out that it's more of an issue in humid areas. Fortunately I was still slowly expanding the orchard, so that's when I impulsively picked up the Loring.
O. M. G. I'd forgotten how incredibly good a real peach is! After 30+ years of stuff from the store, I'd forgotten about the incredible fragrance and flavor. Added bonus is that every one of the peaches last year was probably over a pound. (Never thought to weigh one.)

So I now have two peaches, and three European pears. Fantastic stuff. Wish I'd done them earlier.

Oh, and: Spray your trees! We've got a borer around here that loves the cherries. I lost over half of my original 10 tree planting within two years trying to be wholly organic. The cherries were the first to go. One has survived, but if I were smart I'd put it out of it's misery and just replant.

Honey Kist is similar to Honey Blaze. It's worth a try. Arctic Jay is my biggest nectarine and is the all time highest rated fruit by DWN taste panels. I rate it behind a few other nectarine but not by much.

I don't remember exactly why I chose Fantasia. There must have been a good reason because I wanted something that ripened later but I chose it anyway.

If I had the option I'd pick up my trees in person, as MrCaballus said, they won't be headed and you get to do the selecting.

New Root 1 will give you a much smaller tree than Colt, I didn't know you had so much room when I suggested it.

gary.

For pears you might cansider Warren, it's supposed to be FB resistant.

Glad to read you're putting in some things other than stone fruit and pomes!

Fruitnut, you're right about stone fruit being delicious, but I still would rather have 10 plants producing completely different kinds of fruit (likely at very different times of year) than 10 stone fruit trees. I really enjoy stone fruit for a few weeks when it is in season, but then I want something different.

I guess we all grow fruit for slightly different reasons as well… mine have to do mostly with providing a diversity of healthy and tasty foods for my family that are either not readily available from the store or are prohibitively expensive to buy. Then there is also the fact that diversity of plantings results in fewer pest/disease problems, and more dependable yield since your "eggs are not all in one basket" so to speak. I wish I could do the greenhouse thing like fruitnut, which would make everything more dependable from year to year, but unfortunately I cannot.

I live in the foothills about 100 miles north of Sacramento, I started my backyard orchard 5 years ago with 5 trees, now I have over 70!!
For me, it's birds that so the most damage to the actual fruit. Deer are a big problem also. I have two yellow labs that do a good job keeping the deer out, but a couple times a year they'll get into the yard and do some damage. They seem to love cherry and apple leaves the best. There are a few trees squirrels, but I take care of them with a pellet gun.
Everyone has different tastes, I love all my trees but these are the must have trees for me because of taste and how well they've done here:

flavor grenade pluot
flavor supreme pluot
flavor queen pluot
flavor king pluot
spice zee nectaplum
double delight nectarine- it's worth it just for the bloom
arctic jay nectarine
sauzee king dount nectarine
emerald beaut plum

This post was edited by Steve357 on Sun, Feb 8, 15 at 16:05

Most rootstocks do well for me. Personally I don't like peaches and nectarines on citation. I have a stark Saturn and an arctic jay, and both only grow about 2 or 3 inches a year

I don't know why your trees on Citation don't grow but my Loring easily puts on 2 feet of growth each year. I prune hard.

gary

Just a test to see if I get notified to either the old e-mail address, or the new one about things. This is only a test. Had it been a real post...

I'd put a smiley in, but Houzz won't let me. :p