I've never heard of that. I'd be worried about root and sunlight competition - I think you'd need to worry about them drying out more in the winter. Pest control - when it might be time to spray for aphids or peach borers or something, the others might not like it. Are you very short on space? I'd be tempted to plant different dwarf trees 6 or 8 feet apart. Then I dunno about Montrose, but over here, we get so many late frosts that apples are about the only fruit that is remotely reliable. Right now, my plums are white with blooms, peach trees pink as can be, and its gonna get down to 23º Wednesday night.

Montrose is much better...we're only supposed to get down to 27 tomorrow night!

The high density idea is interesting. From what I've read, it did start out of space limitations ( which I don't have). Kind of like the multiple varieties grafted on one root stock, it allows a rolling harvest period if you choose wisely. Through pruning and competition, the trees do stay smaller which makes harvest easier. I'm sure my resident herd of deer would appreciate that. It also lessens the yield per tree, but that's not seen as a negative since the average individual doesn't need a zillion peaches all in one go.

ive only been in my house a few years, and the existing fruit trees seem to be more ornamental than fruiting, although that might be a pollination issue. I've no idea what varieties they are. There's one Apple which does well and gives lots of small but good fruit.

What varieties of peach and plum are you growing?

Oh gosh. When I planted my fruit trees, I popped for a whole bunch of copper tags that I could emboss with the variety name and attach, in perpetuity, to the trees, then a couple years later saw my wee daughter had collected them all for her doll house. Oh well.

Off the top of my head, I have Red Haven peach, which is sort of the Palisade standard, then a white peach, then a 'cling' early season peach, then a red Japanese plum, then Green Gauge, blue damson, some French prune thing that the raccoons just love. Then for apples I have Johnathan, Spizenberg, Cox's Orange Pipin, Pink Lady, Arkansas Black, Almata, and then 4 or 5 others I can't remember.

I have to say that obscure varieties of home grown apples are sure fun. They taste so much better than anything else. They do take about 8 years before they start bearing fruit, but then I can dry 'em, turn 'em into apple sauce, freeze for pies, etc.

Thanks for the variety list. I'm completely in the dark when it comes to stone fruit growing. Never even thought about raccoons either. One got in my garden last year and got all my strawberries (over an 8' fence, and then shredded the cage over the berry bed). Maybe I'll stick to buying plums at the store!

Hi Max,

I don’t have room for fruit trees (oh, how I wish I did!),
so I don’t really know what I’m talking about here, and if I had to try to pick
just one or two fruit trees to plant I don’t have a clue how I’d pick them, but
I just want to “throw out” one other possibility that doesn’t usually come up
when talking about fruit trees. If you
do decide to grow one/some, a really easy to grow one (I believe) is the
Italian prune/plum tree. The plums are
small, but if you let them ripen completely they’re incredibly sweet and
yummy—I don’t like a lot of plums because they get so tart near the stone.

There was one of these growing behind the greenhouses in one
of the perennial growing fields at Paulino’s when I worked there, and it got NO
care whatsoever—except watering, which it got when the perennials were
watered—and it bore (a lot of) fruit almost every year. It stayed fairly small—with no pruning. I ate my lunch in that field, and every year
I’d be watching the fruit start to ripen—and then some of the laborers would
come out (en masse) and pick almost all of it before it was really ripe. I always got a little bag full for myself
after they were done (I’d sorta “climb” it to reach the ones they hadn’t
bothered with) and I’d take them home and let them ripen the rest of the way
there, and they were so good—but they would have been even sweeter if they had
ripened fully on the tree.

I googled for a page with some good info for you, but
couldn’t really find a very useful site, but here’s a pic of the plums, and
that really is what they look like. I’m
salivating!

http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/prunes.jpg

And while I was looking for the Italian plum info I never
found, I ran into this “Growing tree fruits in short-season gardens” pdf from the
University of Idaho. Skimmed thru it and
it looks like you might find some useful info here—just not much about Italian
plums!

http://www.cals.uidaho.edu/edcomm/pdf/BUL/BUL0867.pdf

Montrose is my favorite “little” mountain town! (But it’s sure not as “little” as it used to
be, especially out along the highway!)

Skybird

Thanks Skybird! The Italian plum is one I have been looking at, so it's good to have somebody who has actually tasted one. And thanks very much for the links. Off to read them now.

Montrose has pretty much exploded lately. We've been coming to this area for almost 20 years now (have a home in Telluride). I remember when there was only one traffic light in Montrose! Not any more...we bought a small property a few years back to have a garden and it's a nice town. Just too darn windy in the spring!

The Idaho Extension article was very helpful, so thanks again. And at least we don't have moose!

LOL! I remember when
there were NO traffic lites in Montrose!
Not sure if there was a stop sign or not! I moved to Denver in 1964! Durango the same! I don’t think there were even any stop
signs—and there were most definitely no 6-lane roads going thru town, and Rt
160 was a quiet little two-lane road that went lazily by the edge of town! And at least 50% of “Durango” was the train
station! I avoid Durango like the plague
nowadays. At least the “downtown” part
of Montrose has still maintained it’s “character.”

Telluride! The first
couple times I was in Telluride it was all but a ghost town! That’s why we went there! And Lake City WAS a ghost town—and you needed
4WD to get there safely! I guess it’s
all called progress! I guess!

But Montrose was my Place of Refuge after 9-11. After 48 hours I couldn’t deal with watching
the United plane flying into the second tower over and over and over anymore, so
I threw everything I could think of in the car and headed west. Wound up in Montrose, and that’s when I fell
in love with it. Found a little motel
room with a kitchenette on Main street and stayed there for four nites. It was exactly what I “needed” just then.

Have you ever done the drive over Owl Creek Pass? A couple women at the Ute Museum recommended
it to me that time when I was looking for places to “go” during the days, and
it’s a VERY nice ride “in the hills.”
Starts just north of Ridgway, and comes out again—several hours later—near
Cimarron. When I did it the first time
there was virtually no other traffic, so when I wanted to “look,” or take a
pic, I just put the car in park—or turned it off!—in the middle of the road,
hopped out, leaving the door open, and walked around for a little while! If you’ve never done it, I highly recommend
it as a peaceful R & R drive sometime!
I’ve done it twice now.

Another nice thing about the Italian plums is that they’re
close to freestone. No trying to gnaw
the meat of the plum off of the stone!

Glad you found some useful stuff in the Idaho article. It looked like pretty good info to me.

Skybird

What a story. I have to say, one reason we like Montrose as much as we do is the very peaceful energy here. Sounds like you felt it too. Of course, not so much on the main drag! And Telluride....we aren't in town, thankfully. I won't even go in to pick up the mail if I can avoid it. My husband is always having to go to the hardware store for something, so he does it. Really beautiful though.

I've passed the Owl Creek sign a million times. I'm going to take a picnic and do the drive as soon as I can. Thanks for the tip

Ah, Montrose wind. The youth soccer fields on top that hill SW of town: stand up and your lawn chair ends up in Kansas.

Here in NE Wyoming everything ends up in South Dakota ;)

Love it! What were we talking about again?