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SevenTooMany
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The fruit trees I have growing in my yard...

Category: My Garden | Posted: Wed Jan 15, 2014 2:22 pm

Here are the 8 fruit trees I have growing in my yard. These photos were taken on September 24th of 2013.


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This is a Mericrest Nectarine tree we ordered through the USPS from Summerstone Nursery. It came as a bare root stick in the beginning of June, we fertilized it some, kind of too much, and the leaves wilted and it almost died, but came back strong and hopefully hardy enough to survive the polar vortex we recently had. Mericrest is suppose to be one of if not THE hardiest nectarines, so hopefully it will survive.


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This tree was marked as "Yellow Delicious" at the nursery we purchased it from. It has been growing for a couple years in our yard, but this past year was the first year it bore fruit. It's not Yellow Delicious but some kind of hard green cooking apple. We need it to pollinate the dwarf honeycrisp apple tree you will see in a bit.


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This Cherry tree we purchased at Meijer a couple years ago. It is a "Frankenstein" tree because its limbs are from 5 different kinds of cherry trees grafted onto rootstock. There is Sam, Rainier, Van, Bing, and Montmorency limbs. We had about 10 spectacular Rainier cherries in 2013, but it still has to grow to produce more cherries.


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This is a Frankenstein cherry tree we got from Meijer about 2 months after the previous cherry tree. It only has grafts of four types of cherries and the Montmorency cherry limb is missing from this one. It needs to grow...


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This is a peach tree we purchased from Lowe's. I don't know what kind of peach it is, but the peaches taste like mangos.


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This is a peach tree we got from K-Mart. I think the aroma of these peaches must really attract Japanese Beetles. It has been a disaster even with spraying Sevin to keep the beetles from devouring the peaches. The first year we planted it, it had the best peaches I have ever tasted. The beetles assure us that we will never taste a decent peach from this tree again. We have tried spreading grub killer around the peach trees, but haven't won the battle with the insects yet.


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This is a Stanley Plum tree we got from Gurneys via UPS truck a couple years ago. It was a bare root stick, had a couple blooms in 2013, but has yet to bear fruit. Hopefully in 2014 we'll have some plums.


( photo / image / picture from SevenTooMany's Garden )
This Dwarf Honeycrisp Apple tree was the tree that produced the best fruit in 2013. I pollinated it by taking a paint brush from the yellow delicious (hard green) to the honeycrisp. The bees can take credit for 40% of the work. The problem is that it really is dwarf. I had to rig wires to keep the limbs from breaking under the weight of the apples. I sort of wish I hadn't gotten a tree grafted onto dwarfing rootstock, but my hope is it will manage to grow thicker in the coming seasons. We got this one at the same time as the Stanley Plum from Gurneys via the UPS truck.

Overall I'm pretty pleased. The only tree that died was our red plum, but the Mericrest Nectarine tree took the place of that this year. We are learning every day in the summer, and once they have thoroughly established themselves, hopefully we can concentrate more on pruning and keeping the insects away rather than on keeping them alive...






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Comments

 

Frank wrote on Thu Jan 16, 2014 9:32 am:


Every tree has a tale, thanks for sharing SevenTooMany. Will you keep us updated on the fruit haul this year?




 

SevenTooMany wrote on Thu Jan 16, 2014 11:16 am:


Hopefully I'll be back to tell you how things go, Frank.




mart wrote on Thu Jan 16, 2014 1:33 pm:


Sevin is not the most effective product for fruit trees and if used long tern the bugs can become resistant to it. Switch to Permethrin or pyrethrin. Both safe and I have had no problems with any our fruit trees using these. We also have nectarine, peach apples and plum. Its good to rotate whatever you use.




 

SevenTooMany wrote on Thu Jan 16, 2014 1:43 pm:


Thanks mart, I'll try those products.




 

Frank wrote on Thu Jan 16, 2014 1:54 pm:


Thanks SevenTooMany!




mart wrote on Fri Jan 17, 2014 2:40 am:


Both permethrin and pyrethrin are easily found at most feed stores. I think Tractor Supply carries them too. Get the straight stuff and mix it yourself about 1 or 2 oz. per gallon of water. If you can`t find it,, both are the active ingredient in Sargeants Flea and Tick spray for dogs and cats. Just mix a little stronger since it is already diluted in the bottle. Add a squirt of dish soap to the gallon of mix so it will stick on the leaves and branches. I spray mine really well around the trunk to control ants and crawly bugs.




 

SevenTooMany wrote on Fri Jan 17, 2014 11:28 am:


That is really helpful information, mart. We shop at Tractor supply every now and again, and we also have 2 cats. I was beginning to think there was nothing to deter the Japanese Beetles, especially since they market the Sevin as a Japanese Beetle killer on the label. We will try these 2 new chemicals when we need to when the Japanese Beetle season is upon us. Thanks again.




mart wrote on Fri Jan 17, 2014 7:20 pm:


I can`t do without these two products. Permethrin is the active ingredient in many fly products for horses (I have 6 horses) so it is easy to find and is reasonably priced. I use both in my garden as well. Works wonders on potato bugs.
Pyrethrin is an approved product for organics,its made from mums I think. I think both products are in the same chemical class.




 

SevenTooMany wrote on Fri Jan 17, 2014 7:29 pm:


We take care of quite a few horses, too, here on our horse farm. We usually do the gardening to forget about our more pressing responsibilities with the horses...




mart wrote on Fri Jan 17, 2014 10:22 pm:


You will have to post some pics !! would love to see them. Mine are nothing fancy, just grade horses but they are my babies. Most were sort of rescues. Still have one we raised here.





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