You could try thisplace - located in Longmont, CO, they offer recommendations for fruit trees most suitable for your high elevation, Rocky mountain location.

It is important to select only those varieties that will thrive and fruit in your area so that limits the choices, and local providers are typically the best in knowing and sharing what those specific varieties are.

I would also wonder about the initial size trees you are contemplate planting. Fruit trees are seldom sold as large, relatively mature specimens - more often very young two or three year old trees or even whips. You may need to wait a few seasons before you can start harvesting, but younger, smaller trees establish much faster and easier in the landscape than do larger, more mature ones. And that applies to ANY trees, not just fruit trees.

Here's another link for appropriate fruit varieties.

Thanks so much for your information. As you can tell I am an impatient novice. I want to see fruit in those trees PRONTO! I will try to do my homework before I purchase the trees. Thanks also for the link!

Epicurious,

When you google search old Gardenweb threads, you may come across a handle name Milehighgirl. She is the lady Fruitnut talked about, very experienced, knowledgeable but the growing condition in Denver is so discouraging to her. You definitely have to lower your expectation.

Gardengal, - my experience with "local providers" is not as positive.(if local providers mean local nurseries). They sell popular trees that do not always suitable for my area. Also, the people who work there do not know much about fruit trees beyond the basic, either.

While fruitnut is right, I would have to say that Denver is probably still not the worst place to grow fruit. Wild American plums are abundant there every year, as well as chokecherries. Cultivated fruits that crop most years other than apples include cherries, peaches, pears, raspberries, currants, mulberries, and especially grapes. This is based not on my own experience growing there (I'm in NM), but frequent visits over the last 15 years and family ties going back way farther than that.

If I remember milehighgirl's frustration correctly, it had to do predominantly with the failure of things like persimmon, pawpaw, and apricot. I hope she will chime in with more details.

Yeah....Milehighgirl, now it finally hit me, that girl is a mile high in altitude, I'm just a slow dude.

eastmeetwest, I'm sorry that's been your experience. And I'd have to agree that my opinion is tempered by local conditions.......I'm sure that level of knowledge and competence is not uniform everywhere.

I live in an area with a plethora of good quality retail nurseries and being a 20 year nurseryperson myself, I can attest that these are the go-to places for the best plant selection as well as any necessary information on selecting and caring for any kind of plant. They have experienced buyers that bring in the most suitable plants for the area and most have information centers staffed by extremely knowledgeable professional horticulturists.

It is the box stores - Walmart, HD, Lowe's, Costco, etc. - that bring in stuff that won't do well, is not suited to the climate or isn't hardy as they tend to purchase in bulk for their stores across an entire region, if not the country. And they aren't nurseries anyway so staff is not the slightest bit plant savvy.

Quality nurseries can easily compete with these providers of inexpensive (and often poorly grown, unsuitable or not hardy) stock. There is one of each of the above box stores within 10 miles of my nursery (which has been in operation for more than 50 years) and the business thrives because the customers know that they will get the best plants and the best service here.

It's unfortunate that is not the case everywhere.

FWIW, Colorado has an excellent extension service with a lot of very current and location-appropriate horticultural information. They should be a great resource for the OP.

My advice would be to start small with just a few trees and learn from your mistakes. Figure out a way to cover them and protect them from spring frosts and maybe severe winter cold while young.

I planted my first four fruit trees in Jan 2014 and two mostly died this winter. All of these were dave wilson trees planted bareroot. a Chinese apricot had all of its scaffolds die and the scion sent out new sprouts down low but I will take this tree out I think. And I had a St Julien plum that has died I think. (This is a rootstock that I let grow out when the peach scion failed to grow after heading).

My Redhaven peach and Harcot apricot survived fine but they had lots of flower buds that all fell off. A Zelkova (shade tree) that was two feet tall that I planted bareroot in May 2013 made it through the first winter fine and grew to 7 feet but I think has mostly died after this last winter. My roses and quince died back more this year than any other. I am not sure what hurt the trees--we had a very warm fall followed by an abrupt cold snap to single digits I think in early November, or it might have been the very cold period below -10F in late December, which was the coldest I have experienced since moving to Colorado in 2009.i can look up the exact temps later.

Apples do well here and trees in parks produce mostly blemish free crops most years with no sprays or other care. My neighbor had a huge crop of European plums last year. Carol Omeara of Boulder county extension has peach pruning videos on YouTube so I guess she thinks they are worth the trouble.

I think Milehighgirl's main interest was things like peaches and she hoped that later blooming trees like pawpaw might be more reliable if she could get them started. I was sorry to hear that she was done with her multi year fruit tree project and I learned a lot from her posts here.

Wah wah wah wahhhhhhhh

Knowing myself and aware of how persistant (stuborn as a goat, really!) I am, I can see that I will try to beat the odds and still take a chance planting those trees. Just the thought of a small success is encouraging enough. I want to reduce the posibility of failure by previously doing a ton of research and your advice provides a lot of enlightment. Yes, most of what I read here is not that encouranging but I know you guys are trying to save me some hair-pulling experiences, so thank you. Perhaps I'll read back this thread in a couple of years and regret not having saved my time and energy in such illusory project...but at least I tried.

Just found this older thread...not more encouraging. Starting to wonder if I'm just being irrational by trying to continue with the orchard idea:

http://forums.gardenweb.com/discussions/1483251/im-ready-to-throw-in-the-towel

Epicurious,

We all felt bad for MHG. She is really knowledge and a valuable contributor here.

If you'd like to continue on your project, I hope that your microclimate will be on your side. Sometimes, sites that are only a couple of miles away could yield different results. Good luck.

Fruit trees are a bit of a gamble around Denver. I am currently at 8300' in the foothills, but used to live and garden in the Denver suburbs, and have a bit of experience from there.

Apples and peaches seem to do well (get fireblight resistant apples). You likely won't get fruit every year but many (of course the details of your site may change your averages for better or worse). I did not have much luck with apricots and never tried pears. I did get apple and peach harvests. Nut trees (walnuts and some hardy almonds) may work too.

Choose your tree locations as best as your site allows (full sun, shelter from chinook winds, good soil, drainage).

BTW, the local Costco here (in Superior) had bagged, bare-root fruit trees in this week. Single varieties for under $12 on Bud118 rootstock. Multiple varieties for more. I couldn't resist and picked up a few. They appeared to be of good quality and at the time I was there was a pretty good selection of varieties. Might want to check them out.

Thank you Steve...I'll stop by and see what they have.