Modern Rustic: Starting an Orchard

A homesteading guidebook for growing fruit trees, berries, grapes and nuts

By: Eric Beuning

Copyright 2013 Stephen McDonald

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1 – Planning your new orchard

Sun

Drainage

pH

Chapter 2 – Picking what you want to plant

Size matters

Pollination needs consideration

Plan for harvest time

Chapter 3 – Finding quality plants

Bareroot

Container grown

Chapter 4 – Caring for your plants

Watering

Pruning

Training

Chapter 5 – Dealing with diseases and common pests

Preventing insect pests

Dealing with animal problems

Chapter 6 – Berries and grapes

Blackberries

Blueberries

Elderberries

Gooseberries and currants

Raspberries

Strawberries

Grapes

Chapter 7 – Fruit trees

Apples

Cherries

Pawpaw

Peaches and Nectarines

Pears

Plums

Chapter 8 – Nut trees

Chestnuts

Hazelnuts

Walnuts and Butternuts

Conclusion

What would I recommend you buy?

Final thoughts

Introduction

When you are getting most of your own food from the land, the garden tends to get most of the glory. It also calls for the most work. On the other hand, an orchard can provide a lot of food while requiring less work than a garden in the long run.

There are few things more rewarding than watching your orchard full of fruit trees and berries grow.

Keeping an orchard is a long term investment. Most fruit trees won’t even give you a hint of production in the first three years. When you consider that most have a lifespan of 20 to 30 years, it is a great long term investment.

Buying commercially grown fruit comes with the fear that you will be introducing chemical pesticides to the family table. Fruit grown at home using organic methods is safer and arguably more nutritious. With some thoughtful planning your fruit trees can also become a beautiful piece of landscaping.

In-season, a mature orchard is a thing of magic and beauty. Trees that explode with colorful flowers in the spring, yield succulent fruit with nectar-like juice that dribbles off your chin and runs down your arm through the summer and fall. Bumper crops of fruits and berries can often be made into jams, canned whole or dried for trail mix.

I can personally attest that the sound of opening a jar of strawberry jam, made from vine ripened berries picked at the peak of perfection in June, sounds like an Italian aria to your desperate tongue in January.

Speaking from a practical standpoint, after the trees have come into maturity the amount of maintenance they require is remarkably small, compared to a large garden full of annuals.

The following chapters will show you how to plan and tend your own orchard. We will explore planning and planting. We'll dig deep into understanding soil, mulch and fertilizer. We will tackle the endless battle against common pests and look at some of the best options, both common and exotic, for picking the best fruit trees and berry bushes.

Chapter 1 – Planning your new orchard

You might be staring out your window as the last of the winter snows melt and thinking of what you want to do with that large, open sunny patch near the garden. Or perhaps you just want to punch up the landscaping in your yard.

The most important aspect of growing an orchard demands that you understand what types of fruit trees and berry bushes will grow best in your climate. There are some fruit trees that absolutely despise growing in frozen ground. While there are other types of fruit trees that need a hard freeze for hundreds if not a thousand hours each year.

Luckily many orchard providers these days are conscious of what grows in each of the growing zones. They often list it with each type of tree or bush. They are based on the averages for your growing zone.

If you are unsure of your growing zone, the US department of agriculture hosts a detailed map on their website that will help you out. A quick call to a county agricultural extension office can also help get you pointed in the right direction.

It is best not to tempt fate by trying to grow something that is not meant for your climate type. For instance I have grown fruit trees in zone 4 that were noted to only be able to handle the winters in growing zone 5. I thought with careful mulching and covering I had beaten the system. Three mild Minnesota winters later I was getting excited for my first harvest of sweet cherries. Then back to back brutally cold winters slammed the area, followed by a late spring of inconsistently cold weather. The trees lingered, but ultimately died.

If you absolutely have your heart set on a fruit tree that cannot safely be grown in your zone, you can always try to grow the tree in a large pot inside a four season greenhouse. You will need to be mindful of course to select a dwarf variety that can handle life in a pot.

Sun

Most fruit trees and many berry bushes require full sun light through the growing season. The sun is always shifting its position in the sky. This shift becomes more dramatic the farther north you live.  If you have the patience for it, the best plan is to take a full year to observe a patch. Simply place an 8 foot stake in the soil and every week note the influence of the sun on the stake, its shadow and any influence by other trees. A tree without leaves in spring can suddenly become a horrible shade block in the full leaf of summer.

While many orchard supply companies will tell you that a fruit tree needs a minimum of 6 hours of full sun per day, I would honestly advocate a site with a bare minimum of 8 hours of full sun. In my opinion for all sun-loving fruit trees the ideal is a location where the tree gets at least 12 hours of full sunlight during the summer solstice in late June.

If you aren’t inclined to spend a whole year watching the sun, or you have a location that is wide open then you can turn your attention to the soil.

The composition and quality of you soil plays a huge factor in how successful the trees will be.  It is not unreasonable to assume that the root system of a fruit tree will be twice the size of the tree itself. Clay soil tends to hold onto a lot of water. It also compacts and restricts the roots. For some types of trees, like apples, overly wet roots can be a death sentence. At the same time, sandy soil has poor water retention which causes the tree to expand its roots desperately deep.

In both of these instances you may need to take action to amend the soil before planting a single tree.

While there are elaborate scientific tests you can have done to determine the composition of your soil, you can still get a pretty good idea from manipulating it by hand.

Simply take a small handful of soil, around 1 cup in volume, from 12 to 16 inches below the sod layer. Make sure the soil is modestly moist.  If it hasn’t rained recently in your area, I would just give the area one inch of water the night before.

Form the soil into a ball. Try to squeeze it out into a tube form slightly longer than the width of your palm. If it falls apart easily, then it is on the sandy side. If it holds together but feels hard it might have too much clay. The ideal is a 1 inch tube of soil that still holds together yet is not hard.

This will go a long way towards helping you plan either what you want to plant, or if you are willing to take on the added expense of amending a large amount of soil. Trees like peaches and apples prefer sandy soil, while many plums and berries prefer wet clay soils. We will discuss this later in the individual entries for each type of fruit.

As a rule of thumb you can get a rough idea of the kind of soil a tree prefers by the juiciness of its fruit. A strawberry plant likes moist soil because it is quickly pulling that moisture up each day and using it to plump the berries. An apple takes a long time to develop its fruit and thus doesn’t use as much water in the short term. Overly wet roots tend to sulk and invite problems, pests and soil borne disease to the apple tree.

Drainage

The drainage of your soil is not only affected by the clay and sand content. It is also influenced by mineral content, slope and the possible change of character in the sub-soil.

I once had an apple tree that vexed me. I had planted it in what appeared to be a spot with sandy soil. Yet it sulked and suffered as if it was planted in a giant wad of clay. After the tree died, I dug it up and inspected its roots looking for a cause. It was when I dug down to the bottom of the root ball that I discovered the problem was a thick layer of clay three feet below the surface.

Fruit trees need proper drainage in order for them to maintain aeration around the roots, expand their roots and gain access to nutrients that trickle down through the soil from the surface. If the soil is water logged and the tree cannot process the water, it becomes impacted. The tree starves from a lack of nutrient transfer of it can suffer root rot.

You should be suspicious of a change in sub-soil character if you live near or in an old river or creek basin. Rivers move a lot over the course of geological time, over the course of a century they can deposit conflicting layers over top of each other. If you are in one of these regions I advocate digging down to around 5 feet just to make sure there isn’t some kind of change in the sub-soil. 

You can get an idea of how well your soil drains by digging a hole the size of a 5 gallon bucket. Fill the hole with water. Wait one hour before checking it again. If the hole has completely drained out you are probably in an ideal location.

Fill the hole again with water. This will represent the effect of a period of heavy summer rains. If the hole hasn’t drained in three hours the soil might have too high of clay content or too poor of a slope for you to grow fruit trees.

You could still grow berries in that location, though. If you wanted to explore landscaping options you could rent a backhoe, dig the area out and bring in a load of sandy soil to fill the hole. You could build a raised planter box, or even install underground drainage pipes that would act like drain tile. In either case if you are concerned that you have too poor of drainage in your soil, you can call the county agricultural extension office for further insights.

pH

The next thing you need to understand about your soil is the pH. This is a measure of how acidic your soil is. While the chemical scale of pH ranges from 0 to 14, most soil is around a pH of 5 to 9. A soil pH of 7 is neutral. The lower the number is, the more acidic your soil is, the higher the number, the more alkaline it is. Most fruit trees and berry bushes do best in slightly acidic soil around a pH of 6. However there are some berries such as blueberries that prefer a very acidic soil around a pH of 4.5 to 5.

Testing the pH of your soil is easy. Most hardware stores and nurseries sell the same cheap soil kit you would use to test the soil in your garden. The only difference is that when you test the soil of your garden you are sampling from 4 inches below the surface. When you want to test the soil for fruit trees you want to test the soil at 12 to 16 inches below. If you want to test the soil for low growing berry bushes, you should test the soil from 6 inches below the surface.

If your soil is too far off there are many ways to adjust it. Soil that is too acidic can be augmented with lime the same way you would adjust the soil for the tomatoes in your garden.  Soil that is too alkaline can be mulched with a modest layer of mature pine mulch and a ground cover of grass clippings.

Chapter 2 – Picking what you want to plant

While many berry bushes and fruiting canes can be transplanted and thinned every few years, fruit trees, once established are there for the long term. In the case of nut trees you’re putting a tree in the ground that your grandchildren will probably harvest. This is very much a time where you don’t want excitement to overrule reason.

If you’ve gotten this far you’ve probably already got a mental wish list of fruit trees and berries you want to grow. We can assume that you’ve done your homework to understand your growing zone as well as the character and composition of your soil.

This is the time to pull out a sheet of graph paper and start sketching your ideas out.

Size matters

Not all fruit trees grow to the same mature size. Thanks to the art and science of grafting we now have relative control over how large a fruit tree will grow. The nursery germinates the trees. Once they have reached a predetermined size, usually after one year, they cut the trunk of the baby tree from its roots and carefully graft it onto a predictable root stock.

The characteristics of the root stock ultimately dictate how large the tree can grow. While the top of the tree dictates what kind of fruit it produces. When you read the entries for each fruit tree you will see terms such as: Dwarf, Semi-Dwarf and Standard

A fruit tree grafted onto a dwarf root stock will generally grow 8 to 10 feet high and depending on the type of fruit and how it is pruned it will branch out slightly wider than it is tall. The disadvantage of a dwarf tree is that it will produce a smaller yield. Generally one mature tree will provide enough fruit for 1 to 2 people in a single season. Also a dwarf tree will require additional staking and ties to help hold it in place until it reaches full maturity. This is a preventative measure against the high winds of summer storms that might topple the tree’s small and shallow root ball. This small shallow root ball could be seen as an advantage if during your soil explorations you discovered a layer of clay hiding deep beneath a layer of sand.

The biggest advantages of a dwarf tree are that it will become mature and produce fruit earlier in its life than a larger tree. It also is much easier for the average person to pick. Since they are small they also cast less of a shadow and thus you can plant more total trees in an area without fear of them competing for sunlight.

One of the things I love about growing dwarf trees is that they are perfect for landscaping. I currently have a contemplation area growing out past the garden that is bordered by dwarf apple trees and Japanese plums.

Semi-dwarf is the next step up in size. Generally a semi-dwarf tree grows 12 to 15 feet high and depending on how it is pruned and trained it can get as much as 18 to 20 feet wide. Fruit trees that are trained to a central leader like apples might only be as wide as they are tall. However trees that are trained to an open center, like plums and sweet cherries might even exceed 20 feet wide.

The disadvantage of semi-dwarf trees is that they often require a ladder or a pole picker to harvest all of the fruit. When they are at full maturity they can also be a hassle when they need routine pruning. While these things do double the amount of work that goes into the tree, they often triple the production of dwarf trees of the same type.

Standard trees are the iconic looming beasts from pictures of old time orchards. The type of fruit tree will determine the trees mature size. A standard size peach tree may only be a little larger than its semi-dwarf counterpart. A cherry tree may sprawl twice as wide while barely gaining anything more in height. While at the same time a standard size apple tree will loom large over the landscape casting shadows on many other trees in the area.

If you have enough space in your orchard it is an easy jump of logic to think that the advantage of a standard sized tree is the massive amount of fruit it is capable of producing. However this is a case of its biggest strength is also its biggest weakness! While it is true that a standard size tree is capable of producing a superior volume of fruit compared to similar trees grafted onto dwarf root stocks, it is also much more labor to tend that fruit.

Fruit trees draw a host of pests and can develop problems through the course of a season. Many of these can be handled using simple applications of insecticidal soaps and organic powders. In most of these cases the entire tree needs to be treated. If you simply apply an insecticidal soap to the fruit on lower branches, the pests will simply migrate to the upper branches, thus leaving the tree infested.

Also a standard size fruit tree takes much longer to come to maturity.  Once it does come to maturity it tends to have smaller than average fruit for much longer. Now if you are growing fruit on a homestead that is sure to be handed down for generations, this might not be that big of a deal to you. If however you are hoping for a large yield of fist sized apples, you might have to bite your lip for the better part of a decade.

In my humble opinion, unless you know the type of fruit tree will stay a manageable size, I would leave a standard size fruit tree for commercial growers and stick to a mixture of dwarf and semi-dwarf trees.

Pollination needs consideration

While most annual vegetables will do just fine being self-pollinated, this is only true for a handful of fruits and even most of the fruits in that small handful will do better when they are given an ideal mate for cross pollination.

For some trees that need cross pollination it is as easy as planting another tree that bears the same fruit within 100 feet of it. For other fruit trees, like apples and Japanese plums, they really do need to be planted near different trees with similar characteristics. For example two Honeycrisp apple trees planted next to each other produce fruit that is smaller and less crispy than if you planted a Honeycrisp with a Golden Delicious.

In some cases, these cross-pollination needs are related to traits that improve the quality of each trees fruit. However some cross-pollination needs are related to the time of year or soil temperature that certain sub-types flower. This is especially true with apples.

I have to admit that when I planted my first orchard, I largely ignored the suggested pairings for the cross-pollination of the four apple trees I bought. The biggest problem was that all four apple trees bloomed at different times. There were many springs where one apple tree would be starting to drop its unpollinated blossoms just two days after the next tree was opening its blossoms. This ultimately meant I would only get a tiny amount of fruit. The only salvation for two of these trees was the fact that I had a neighbor within the range that a bee was willing to fly that had a crab apple tree, which could get the job done.

Later in this book we will go into the specific pollination requirements for the different types of trees as well as some of my personal recommendations that I have grown or seen grown in orchards that I have visited. The thing that is most germane to you planning what you want to grow and how many trees you want to plant is to consider both the distance as well as the number of trees you want to plant of a certain type.

You need to think like a bee. If you spend an afternoon in the garden or orchard watching bees buzz from flower to flower, they don’t just jump one flower on an apple tree right in front of you to the flower of an apple tree 50 feet away. They tend to move from one flower to the flower closest to it. Once they’ve exhausted their efforts on a certain level of flowers, they move to a flowering tree that is close to it.

This essentially means that the farther apart you plant two cross-pollinators, the more total trees you will need to plant in order for all of them to be cross pollinated. The general rule of thumb is to plant three trees that all have complimentary cross-pollination characteristics within 50 feet of each other. While this works for many types of fruit trees it can cause problems in others, especially apples and plums which might only have one or two suggested cross-pollinated companions.

If you want three different types of fruit from three different sub-types of trees, this is certainly a good idea. In my personal experience, I try to work things out in sets of four, or more aptly two sets of two. For example, Honeycrisp apples prefer to be cross-pollinated by Red Rome and Golden Delicious. Instead of planting one Honeycrisp, one Red Rome and one Golden Delicious, I chose to plant two Honeycrisp and two Golden Delicious trees. This way I know that if some random storm uproots one of the trees with straight-line winds, that there is still another that can handle pollinating the other two. I’m not forced to buy another tree next year and then wait three to five years for it to become mature enough to produce flowers.

Plan for harvest time

One of the beauties of having a mature orchard is the fact that with a little work in the spring and some timely care through the summer, you can get a large amount of production for a small investment of labor.

It is easy to get in over your head if you have too many trees that are all ripe and ready for harvest at the same time in the season. Picking, storing, canning or drying all takes time. If you have a large enough labor force that you can tap into in early September, then planning an orchard that ripens at the same time might be ideal. If you’re like me, living with a small family in the country, it is better to plan your plantings to come ripe in succession.

Using my orchard as an example, my June Bearing Strawberries come ripe then go out of season just as the raspberries are ripening. The raspberries and gooseberries begin coming out of their peak production just as the early plums and blueberries come ripe.  About the time the last plum is picked the peach trees are ready for harvest and canning. This is all followed up by a succession of apples that takes me through September and into early October.

By staggering the orchard this way it insures that there is always something going on that requires my attention. But there is never so much coming ripe that I don’t have the time to process or preserve it for long term storage.

Chapter 3 – Finding quality plants

The age and size of the plant you buy matters a lot. This is especially true with fruit trees. While very small seedlings can be very cheap, they are also very weak and may take several more years before they produce their first fruit.

Speaking from personal experience I am convinced that it is better to buy fruit trees that are already 2 to 3 years old. This size of tree has been through a few winters, it has known the swings of seasonal weather and it has had longer for the graft on the trunk to grow strong.

When buying fruit trees you essentially have two options to choose from; bareroot or container grown.

Bareroot

Bareroot plants are usually only sold by on-line and mail-order providers. Since you don’t actually get to see the plants before they are shipped it is worth it to take the time to find a reputable dealer. In this day and age it is not enough for a company to just have a snazzy looking website. Check out their customer reviews and comments. I have personally been impressed by bareroot plants from quality dealers and severely let down by scraggly twigs shipped to me by charlatans with a fancy webpage.

Bareroot plants are selected for shipping during the dormant phase of their growing season. As a result most are only available in spring. Only a handful of bareroot plants are available in the fall. Since they are shipped just before they come out of dormancy you will need to plant them immediately. Most providers will tell you the earliest possible date for shipping. This will give you enough advanced notice to dig the holes and prepare the planting site.

Bareroot plants straight out of the shipping container can look a little strange. The roots have been persuaded to hold a straight shape. When they come loose they look like a strange tentacle tree monster hungry to burrow into the soil. While they might look a bit pathetic in this stage they are none-the-less primed to grow.

The hole should be deep and wide enough to allow the roots to spread out and anchor themselves deep. Many bareroot trees will need a small mound of dirt placed under them to help support them in the hole. This mound is especially handy because the tree can rest on it allowing you to take the time to spread the roots out.

When it comes to the tree’s final planting depth, you need to be mindful of the crown or grafting swell. This is the place where the tree was grafted onto the rootstock. It usually looks like a knob a few inches above the sprawl or the roots. In grafted fruit trees and vines you want to make sure this crown is planted 2 to 3 inches above the ground. If you are planning to apply a thick amount of organic mulch every year I would personally advocate planting it 3 to 4 inches above ground. Keep adding soil to the mound until you feel you’ve gotten the final height correct.

It is also a good idea to give the roots some additional fertilizer at planting time. The preferred organic method is to soak the bareroots in a compost tea. I personally also augment with additional phosphorus by scattering bonemeal into the hole. This additional phosphorus will help promote root growth, while the nitrogen of the compost tea will promote leaf development.

Container grown

Container grown plants are most often found in local nurseries. In general they are more expensive than bareroot plants. Often they cost double or triple in order to cover the cost of soil from shipping and the labor to tend them, potentially for months.

A properly tended container grown tree that hasn’t become root bound has a better chance for success than a bareroot plant. However a poorly tended container grown tree, that has been root bound or water logged is less likely to survive compared to its bareroot counterpart. When buying container grown plants it is best to shop around. In general nursery and greenhouse suppliers will have the best stocks as their name is on the line with local businesses and potential repeat customers. The pop-up nursery in the corner of the grocery store parking lot is less likely to have quality plants.

If you are a cunning and patient shopper you can shave a little off the edges on the high price of a container grown plant. You see most of these trees are grown off site and shipped along with their heavy soil to the retailer that ordered them. As the season goes on, these trees get harder and hard to sell. Rather than incur additional cost by shipping them back to the grower, who likely won’t accept healthy returns, they will choose to offer the plants at clearance prices.

The longer you wait to buy the lower the price will be. However as time passes you will see less selection and less healthy plants. Sure the last of them might be selling for 50% off in late June. Most of these plants are root bound, beat up, water logged, or in some other way unhealthy. In my personal experience the time to strike is in the same week that the retailer drops their prices by 25%. This is around the time in late spring or early summer where you can still save a couple of bucks on healthy plants, before the selection is picked clean.

When looking for a quality container grown plant you want to look for a couple of key things. When at all possible you should start by shopping reputable dealers, selling certified plants. If these plants have been virus indexed, then it is all the better.

While it is okay to see some roots in the drain holes, it is a bad sign if those roots are escaping the container. This usually means that the plant is root bound and will struggle to establish itself in your soil. The leaves should be bright green. You should avoid any trees that have yellow leaves as this is usually a sign of being water logged or otherwise improperly tended.

Before buying the plant make sure to look under the leaves and at the base of stems for any potential egg clusters. Since these trees were most likely grown offsite they could carry exotic and common pests that could wreak havoc through the rest of your orchard.

Planting a container grown plant is similar to planting a bareroot one, except the soil from the container will serve the same purpose as the mound does when preparing the hole. Removing the plant from the container is probably the trickiest part. Once the container is gone the soil structure could crumble. Before you even consider removing the container you should set the pot in the hole and check to make sure the crown is 3 to 4 inches above ground level.

Once you are sure you have the depth correct, you can then remove the plant from the pot by gently squeezing the sides to loosen the dirt a little.

While some people might advocate turning the pot upside down or using your feet to hold the pot while you firmly pull up on the trunk, over the years I have developed my own method.

Most container grown plants come in cheap plastic pots. I prefer to use a sharp box cutter on a shallow setting to slash down each side. I tip the pot over slowly and lay the pot its side. Then I slowly shimmy it free at the edge of the hole.

Once the plant is in the hole you should carefully pick out any loose roots and help them to sprawl out into the wider part of the hole. If a root does not come free from the ball easily, it is better to leave it than to risk disturbing its relationship to the other roots.

Chapter 4 – Caring for your plants

After a tree is planted, and each spring thereafter you should mulch the roots with 2 to 4 inches of mulch. The mulch should be spread out six inches beyond the tree’s drip edge. The drip edge is the maximum reach of the branches. Through the course of a season the rain drips from the tree’s leaves, which are designed by nature to direct water towards the roots. When this water lands on the mulch it then carries the added nutrients into the soil. The mulch also helps to insulate the plant against drought, holding in moisture longer than bare soil alone.

Regular watering and properly moist soil is important all through the tree’s life. It is especially important during the tree’s first two years. Mulching is also important for weed control. A healthy fruit tree can usually out-compete a few weeds. It is none-the-less true that every single weed is stealing some nutrients and water from the tree. Any weeds that do manage to sprout or grow up through the mulch layer should be hand plucked.

Fertilizing your plants is an important aspect of keeping a healthy, productive orchard. Earlier when you performed your soil tests that should have given you a good idea of your soil’s strengths and weaknesses. Armed with this information you should be able to adjust your fertilizer to match. Most mineral fertilizers like bonemeal or kelp meal slowly release into the soil over time. This means you only need to apply them in the spring for young plants. I would advise applying them in the spring and fall for fully mature trees.

Nitrogen fertilizers are very quickly released, absorbed and used up. As such you will need to apply nitrogen more frequently. A rich compost layer that uses grass clippings will help mitigate this need. However I still advocate applying nitrogen ever two weeks during the spring and early summer when trees are developing their new shoots and leaves. After the Fourth of July, when most plants are working on putting their energy into developing fruit, I only apply nitrogen fertilizer each month until harvest.

Watering

Watering is another critical consideration to a productive orchard. While the old fashioned method of using a sprinkler is easy in that you can set it and forget it, it is not the best. Hand watering with a hose insures the plant will get all of the water it needs but can be very time consuming, especially if you have a large orchard.

The best method for watering plants is a drip irrigation method. This is especially handy if you are using rain barrels to gather and store water. Determining how much water a tree needs is not so much a matter of watering time as it is about the depth of moisture. The general rule of thumb is that the top 4 to 5 inches of soil should be moist most of the time. In hot, dry weather with sandy soil this might mean you need to irrigate for an hour every two days. In a rich loam soil with modest precipitation you might only need to water once a week.

Pruning

While you can shove a tree in the ground and let it grow wild with modest results, you will inevitably get better results as the tree matures if you give it proper pruning and train it to the correct center. Some trees such as apples need to be trained to a central leader to develop a strong trunk that will help the tree develop strong fruit throughout its life, while plum trees do better with trained to an open center. We will go over these in further detail later in the individual entries.

Pruning is important throughout a fruit tree’s life. It is often done to provide better ventilation, remove less productive branches, train the center of the tree for more productive fruit, or to control new shoots which might sucker from the crown.

The best time to prune your fruit trees is when they are dormant. While this will change depending on your growing zone, in general the best time to prune them is in late winter or early spring. This will encourage new and vigorous growth when the tree springs to life. This is also a time of year when the insect population is little to none so the tree will be able to repair the minor damage before the bugs of summer have a chance to capitalize.

The right tool for the job is important. While hardware stores and greenhouse magazines might be awash in new pruning gadgets, you really only need three tools in the shed. A pruning shears is essentially a robust scissors. It is probably the tool you will use the most, especially in the early years when the branches are small and thin. If you only grow dwarf trees then pruning shears might be the only tool you need at all. While you can usually get by with a pruning shears that has a single hand grip, I personally prefer the type that has long handles to give me the extra leverage I need to get through medium sized branches.

A pruning saw is little more than a handsaw with a modest curve in the blade which allows it to get better purchase on large branches that need to be completely removed. While it might be tempting to buy one of the very cheap versions available at the store, it is worth the extra money to pony up for one that has a comfortable handle. Nothing causes hand cramps faster than trying to grip onto a big blocky wooden handle while you grind back and forth.

A pole saw is essentially a longer version of the pruning saw. The long attached pole allows you to reach up to higher branches that might need pruning for ventilation reasons. Usually you’re only going to need this if you have an orchard full of standard trees that have gotten out of hand late in their maturity or have suffered storm damage.

There is a variation of the pole saw which has an interchangeable head for a pruning shears. This attachment does make it easier for you to work high small branches. When selecting a pole saw that utilizes a cable system to help you saw I personally prefer to look for a metal cable that is either galvanized or vinyl coated.

The act of pruning itself essentially directs or redirects the character, shape, growth or production of a tree.

Thinning cuts are often used to remove small branches that are crowding or interfering with other branches. A tree that is overly crowded with small branches is susceptible to a number of problems, the most dangerous of which is fungal growth and infestation by pests. The lack of ventilation caused by overly thick foliage creates prime conditions for these problems to occur. The damage some of these funguses and pests can cause could spell the death of the tree if left unchecked long enough.

Heading cuts remove small and medium new growth behind blossoming shoots which will allow the plant to dedicate its energy into developing stronger fruit on lower, more mature branches. It is also absolutely critical to remove any suckering shoots that emerge from the crown or grafting swell. These are essentially the tree’s attempt to make supplementary trunks, which will ultimately reduce the tree’s production for years.

Training

Another reason for pruning comes from the process of training. There are a lot of reasons to train a fruit tree. Some training is required for trees like apples, which need a strong central trunk and plums that need to be trained for an open center. Tying up grape vines is another aspect of training which may or may not require pruning, depending on the age of the vine.

Other aspects of training often relate to landscaping design. Trees that need to be trained to a strong central trunk do poorly when trained into elaborate landscaping designs. However trees that prefer to be trained to an open middle can, with a lot of patience and planning, be trained into eye popping fence rows and topiary that also produces a nice yield of fruit each year.

The most popular landscaping application is to take years pruning and tying new growth to train the tree into a fan shape or living fence. This is also called an espalier. When training a living fence to vires that are supported by strong posts it is best to orient the fence running north-south. This way you get light on equal sides of the plant. If you are training the tree to a wooden fence or stone wall it is best to orient the plant east-west since the foliage will only be on one side.

Chapter 5 – Dealing with diseases and common pests

There is nothing worse than spending years caring for an orchard or verdant row of berries only to see it attacked by some random fungus or voracious pest.

One of the best ways to prevent disease is by making sure you buy certified plants from a reputable dealer. If you can find and afford virus indexed trees, then it is all the better. The best defense against fungus is proper pruning. While fungus and spores can live through the winter in the soil as well as bark, they travel on the wind and breed wildly in the wet shadows under a plant’s leaves. Proper pruning to allow the wind to ventilate the tree will reduce the amount of time a fungus has to set up shop.

It is also important to think of other plants, especially the plants in your garden that might harbor pests and diseases. For instance raspberries and tomatoes both play host to the dreaded fungus known as early blight and can also be vehicles for fire blight.

Fire blight is a virulent bacteria which loves to attack new growth and tender shoots. The first year it infests a tree it will develop small black cankers on the upper branches. Close attention needs to be paid to the upper branches of mature, standard height trees. The black cankers host the bacteria over the winter. Then it takes off attacking the tree often killing a large number of branches just as the tree comes to life in the spring.

Vigilance is your best defense. Pay attention to the tree during harvest time. Note any tree with black cankers on the upper branches. These trees should have the infected branches pruned in late winter when the snow is on the ground and the tree is still deep in dormancy. Put the pruned branches in an isolated bucket and burn them immediately.

In the spring you should spray the affected area that you pruned with a preventative spray such as streptomycin. Then in the spring avoid applying nitrogen to that tree. While this will reduce the amount of new growth the tree has that year it will also give any surviving bacteria less of a place to call home.

If your fruit trees are under attack from a serious infestation of fungus and you can’t quite manage to identify the source you can always fall back on spraying the tree with sulfur. Organic sulfur spray is to fungus what chemo therapy is to cancer. It can easily damage the entire tree and is especially damaging to new growth.

While you might be tempted to hose down the entire tree with a sulfur spray at the first sign of fungus, it is best to spray a test branch that has some new growth.  Wait a few days to see how the branch reacts before you go in whole hog.

Preventing insect pests

Every orchard tends to draw its own bugs depending on region and climate. Just like molds and fungus you need to be mindful of not planting too close to your garden. If you are growing dwarf sized trees you might be able to get by with handpicking the occasional bug you can see munching on a leaf.

I have to admit that handpicking rarely lasts long enough and usually you will have to turn to other more aggressive methods. Sticky traps are a great tool for catching apple maggots and fruit flies. You should hang one trap per dwarf tree, two for a semi-dwarf. A fully mature standard tree might need as many as 4 or 5 traps to keep the most pests in check.

Another more organic option for you to try is to hatch your own predatory insects to hunt down and kill your insect enemies. The master assassin in the class is the classic Praying Mantis. You need to be mindful that if you hatch an egg case of praying mantids in your orchard, they will kill all insects. Mantids operate without prejudice killing pests as well as beneficial insects. Colorado potato beetles and honey bees taste the same to a praying mantis. The praying mantis is happy to rip the head off and feast on any bugs that land nearby.

There are some years where it seems like your fruit trees can go through most of the season without attracting a single bug. Suddenly as the fruit begins to ripen the tree explodes with ants and fruit flies. For these minor insect flare ups you can fall back on organic insecticidal soap. They are often sold in medium sized spray bottles. As long as you are not plagued by frequent rain you should be able to spray the fruit once a week. These bottles usually come with a small packet of information from the manufacturer which will help you with additional tips and frequently asked questions.

Dealing with animal problems

The deeper you live in the country the more animals will be attracted to the succulent delights of the leaves and fruits of your orchard.

In my experience birds are enemy of summer while rabbits are the bane of winter. Rabbits are by far the most dangerous because if they are left unchecked they can eradicate your entire orchard in a single winter. During lean times rabbits will quickly turn to eating the soft succulent bark of fruit trees. Rabbits can quickly eat all of the bark off the tree in a ring, called girdling. Fruit trees transfer most of their water and nutrients through the soft layers just under the bark. When a girdled tree comes out of dormancy in the spring the roots will be unable to send enough key nutrients to the burgeoning foliage and the tree will die.

The cheap option is to buy simple tree wrap to bind the trunk in the fall before the first snows. For a slightly larger investment you can buy little white plastic sleeves that fit over the trunks, which can be reused for another 2 or 3 years.

I have used both of these options before and they have kept my trees safe during two back to back mild winters. Then just as I was getting confident they would keep me safe from the winter rabbit onslaught, we were hit with a harsh winter. The available forage base was less and the deep freeze lasted longer. This drove the rabbits into such desperation that they kept chewing away with their ever-growing teeth until they made it through the protective layers and feasted.

While hunting the rabbits out is indeed an option, you would need to be a crack shot who loves to chow down on rabbits daily to be able to cull out a large population like mine. While Jack my resident barn cat certainly does his share to thin out the herd, the best offense is still a good defense.

My favorite Aegis shield is to turn to black corrugated plastic tubing. This is usually available in 4 or 6 inch diameter and is sold in the plumbing section of the hardware store for use as a cheap outdoor drain pipe. This stuff is so tough you have to cut it with the metal blade of a reciprocating saw. I cut it off specific for each tree in sections that cover from the ground level to the bottom of the lowest branch.  The last thing you want to do is short yourself only to find the rabbits run across the snow drifts to girdle the bark just above the top of tubing.

Once I have the custom length cut I make a slice down the entire length of the tube. Then I peel it open on that seam, slip it around the trunk and tie it tight again with stove pipe wire. I will be honest with you, the first couple of times you peel this tube open will be a terrible pain. This is the sort of thing where you should get a good night sleep the night before, eat a can of spinach and wear thick leather gloves.

Once I have the corrugated pipe wrapped around the trunk I tie it shut with stove pipe wire. The added advantage of choosing a black corrugated pipe is that when the sun begins to strengthen in the late winter the pipe heats up and melts some of the surrounding snow. Since fruit trees tend to build up drifts around them, this added little bit of melt can thwart rabbits that try to use the drifts as a staircase to the upper branches.

Most berry eating birds migrate south for the winter, so they really are only a problem in the summer. Many birds are attracted to the color red. This means they have a nasty tendency for completely ignoring your berry patch or cherry tree while the fruit is green. Then an instant after the fruit ripens they strike like well trained assassins. I literally had a sour cherry tree picked clean by black birds in the two hours I spent running to town to buy bird deterrents!

On paper the best way to stop birds is to use bird netting. In reality, once a bird has figured out there is food under or inside the netting they will keep trying to infiltrate it. This usually results in either the netting getting damaged, the tree getting damaged or both. The worstcase scenario I’ve ever had was the time three black birds found their way under the netting for a 50 foot row of strawberries and then couldn’t find their way out. They spent the better part of two days eating berries and thrashing away at the net damaging plants and runners alike.

The best results I have found against bird damage combines netting with something reflective. Before I cover the tree or row of berries with the netting I first decorate it with reflective fire tape and hang old CD’s from the branches. The flashing of reflective light teased by the wind replicates, in the bird’s mind, the light given by fire. This holds them back at first and even if they do build up the courage to test the net, they tend to be skittish and give up early.

Another, less practical approach is to plant an alternative for the birds to eat that ripens around the same time. For instance elderberries and cherries tend to ripen at the same time. The birds will initially be attracted to the elderberries, which when eaten raw causes mild stomach upset. Eventually they give up on the area altogether. While I’m personally not a fan of this method, I have seen people use it effectively.

Deer can be a serious problem in rural locations depending on the amount of forage there is available. Many of the horror stories you hear about deer decimating gardens and fruit trees comes from people living at the edge of the suburbs where the animals are pressured for available habitat and forage. In rural areas or outer suburbs where the population of animals doesn’t exceed the forage base, they might not need more than gentle dissuasion.

While the knee jerk reaction to stopping deer is often to erect a very high fence, this usually leads to a lot of frustration when a desperate deer decides to keep trying until it knocks a section of the fence down. The better alternative is to use two 4 foot high fences spaced 6 feet apart. Deer will be afraid to try to jump the fence for fear of getting caught in between. Growing brambles such as raspberries or black berries in the void between the two fences is a nice bit of added insurance.

There are also many old wives tales about deer being afraid of the scented soaps hung in the wind or liberally sprinkling cayenne pepper in the area. In my personal experience these do work for a short time. Unfortunately every time it rains the soap becomes useless and actually slowly can change the pH of your soil if overdone.

The cayenne pepper tends to have a lifespan of 3 to 4 days, so this means in the course of a summer you’re going through buckets of the stuff. Not to mention it has a knack for getting in your nose making you sneeze wildly. Over the course of a year it just ends up being too much work, pain and misery for my liking.

What I have found works best for a scent deterrent is to grow rosemary. Deer despise the scent of rosemary!  The closest I have ever had one come to a rosemary plant is 10 feet. The one hang up is that it needs to be a mature rosemary bush and not just some little sprig of a plant you bought at the local nursery last week.

If you live in growing zone 7 or warmer, rosemary will live year round in your soil. If you live in growing zone 6 or colder I personally advocate planting rosemary in a container, such as a 5 gallon bucket or planter. The rosemary can then live the entire season in the field near the tree you want to defend. In fall after the tree has been harvested you can bring the rosemary indoors to grow in a sunny window. Or you can keep it in the barn or garage, to go dormant. You just need to make sure the location you over winter it in does not go below 32 degrees for a long stretch of time.

Chapter 6 – Berries and grapes

I have to admit that from a homesteading perspective I see grapes as being mostly a luxury item. But they do have a magic all their own. The real advantage of berries comes from the fact that from most you get early rewards.

The average fruit tree takes 3 to 5 years before it gives you the first little globes of fruit. Nut trees can take even longer. A row of berries you can usually get something the first year, or at worst the second. This makes berries a great way to get some emotional validation while you are waiting for your fruit trees to come mature. While at the same time strawberries, raspberries, blueberries and black berries provide tasty treats the whole family can love.

Blackberries

Blackberries are a close relative of the raspberry. Both grow on canes and produce aggregate fruit. However when a raspberry is picked the core stays behind with the plant, in a blackberry the core remains with the fruit. It is also worth noting that both plants can harbor early blight and should not be planted near garden plants that are susceptible to early blight such as tomatoes and potatoes.

Growing zone: Varies by type. Generally 4 to 9.

Time to maturity: Most blackberries bear fruit on the canes that grew and matured the year before.

Pollination needs: Most blackberries are self-pollinating.

Pruning/Thinning: No pruning is needed. Simply remove any dead canes. After 3 years canes may need to be thinned in early spring if they are growing too close together.

Harvest time: Late June to mid-July.

There are essentially 3 different types of blackberry that many different varieties branch out from.

Thornless blackberries grow on canes which are devoid of thorns. While this is convenient for picking it also means you can’t use them as any part of a defensive perimeter for a garden or orchard. The canes also tend to be softer than other varieties, which causes them to fall over easily in storms. A plant that is on the ground for too long can suffer from rotting fruit or the scavenging of rodents. If you are going to grow thornless blackberries it is best to tie them onto a trellis or a fence line with soft cotton twine.

Thornless blackberries tend to grow in warmer growing regions. While there are a few varieties that might be able to handle the winter in growing zone 5, most need to be in growing zone 6 or warmer in order to survive.

Thorny blackberries are similar to their thornless sisters, except for the fact that they have stiffer canes that won’t fall over as easy. Their thorns also allow them to be used as defensive perimeter. Some thornless varieties are hardy enough to handle the winters in growing zone 4, however most still need growing zone 5 or warmer.

Primocane varieties are somewhat new to the scene and have some rather unique traits. The most important is that they can bear fruit on first year canes as well as second year canes. This means you get a small bounty of fruit a year sooner than if you planted thornless or thorny varieties. Most have thorns so they can be used in a defensive perimeter.

Primocane blackberries can also tolerate the harsh winters of growing zone 4, making them an attractive option for northern gardeners. Since they are a manmade variety, most have some form of disease resistance bred into them so that they can handle life closer to the garden. You can tell a primocane variety by its name. They are usually tagged with names like Prime-Jan, Prime-Jim and Prime-Ark.

Long term storage options: If they are quick frozen, Blackberries will handle life in the freezer for 6 to 8 weeks before freezer burn sets into the spaces between the aggregate fruit. However it is probably better to make them into jam which can be canned and put up in the root cellar for up to two years.

Blackberry wine is very full bodied. It is also very laborious as you must remove every single core and cook the berries up to 180 degrees for one minute in order to kill any bacteria living in the spaces in the aggregate fruit.

Blueberries

Blueberries are a functional and productive plant that can also serve as a nice landscaping accent through spring, summer and fall. In the spring the small white or pink flowers make a great accent. In the summer the berries transition from green to pink before settling into either deep red or purple. In the fall the leaves turn blazing red and make an excellent visual companion with maple trees.

Blueberries prefer to grow in acidic soil with a pH around 4.5 to 5. Soil with a pH this low is uncommon in most gardens and orchards. Usually to find a pH this low you have to look to the soil of a pine forest. This means the soil pH will need to be amended the winter before you plant and again at planting time. Test your soil with a basic soil test kit the summer before you want to plant blueberries.

Applying sulfur in winter and spring is a non-organic method of adjusting the soil’s pH. If you want an organic alternative, I would recommend digging a healthy amount of pine straw or mature pine mulch into the soil in the fall. Then dress the plant with pine straw immediately after planting. If you are lucky like me and have a stand of pines on the property you could always dig a significant hole in the orchard and fill it with soil from the forest floor.

While there are a few blueberries that are self-pollinating, most blueberries are not. These plants have unique traits that require another variety to pollinate with. Most quality plant providers will note this already for you in the plant’s description. While it is not a hard and fast rule that you must follow the pollination recommendations, it is still the best route to your most productive yield as the suggestions are based on cooperative traits between the two plants.

There are three different types of blueberries that you can grow, Low bush, high bush and rabbit eye. The growing zone you live in will determine which one grows best.

Growing zone: Low bush (Zones 3 to 6). High bush (Zones 5 to 7). Rabbit eye (Zones 6 to 9).

Time to maturity: 3 to 5 years

Pollination needs: Varies by type

Pruning/Thinning: After 3 years the plant will have established itself and should receive routine pruning each spring to cut back old growth or thin for air space.

Harvest time:Varies by type and variety. While a few ripen in June, most take until mid-July to early August. You can spread out your blueberry season by choosing multiple varieties that ripen at different times, just be mindful of each plant’s pollination needs.

Low Bush blueberries make a sprawling bush that lives low to the ground. They tend to grow better in northern climates. Because they grow so low they are more susceptible to rabbit damage both in winter and in peak season. I personally surround each of mine with a ring of rabbit guard fencing year round. I prune them in late fall right before the first snow. Then I cover them with half barrels or large buckets for added protection against animals who may try to use the snow drift as an escalator to get over the fence.

High bush blueberries are better suited for temperate to warm growing zones. They make a tall bush which often produces smaller berries than low bush varieties. Consistent watering is important if your area is prone to drought as a stressed bush may drop its berries in desperate dryness.

Rabbit eye blueberries are more suited for hot climates and produce very small berries on spindly plants. While they can handle drought a little better than high and low bush varieties, they still need to be tended and watered regularly.

Long term storage options: Blueberries that are flash frozen can be kept for up to six months in an air tight bag. Blueberry jam made with no-sugar added pectin is a great way to preserve the berries whole. They can then be spooned gently from the jar and used in things like pancakes and muffins.

Blueberries make a rather dry wine that requires a large amount of sugar to balance. As a result, blueberries are best companioned with another sweeter wet berry, like strawberry to make a blended fruit wine.

Elderberries

Elderberries are old school berry bushes which used to grow wild. Two related varieties exists, one originated in Eastern Europe the other from Eastern North America.  Early settlers in the New World used to look for elderberry bushes when choosing plots of land to homestead. It was generally considered that if elderberries were growing on a plot of land that it was a sign of good soil.

Growing zone: 3 to 8

Time to maturity: 2 to 3 years

Pollination needs: They can self-pollinate but will do much better when planted with a companion for cross-pollination.

Pruning/Thinning: After 3 years the bush should be established enough to handle thinning of less productive branches, which will improve ventilation.

Harvest time: Most ripen from late July to early August.

In the spring elderberry bushes bloom with a striking array of fragrant flowers. The flowers have a lot of medicinal value for stomach ailments. The berries themselves, when cooked and eaten help boost the immune system. Both the flowers and the berries are known for having strong antioxidant properties.

The berries should not be eaten raw as they can tend to cause a mild stomach irritation. The chemicals responsible break down quickly when cooked. Elderberries will draw birds initially, but the birds eventually develop the same stomach irritation and give up on foraging in the area. As a result elderberries are a nice companion plant for cherries, sour cherries and strawberries.

The bottom line is that elderberries are not the sort of thing you grow for the sake of chowing down on a pile of berries. They are only worth considering if you are going to explore and exploit their medicinal value.

Long term storage options:  The flowers can be dried and saved as tea. Or they can be slowly brewed and blended with sugar needed pectin, to make a jelly which can be canned and put up in a cool dark place for up to six months.

The ripe berries can be put up as jam for up to two years. The juice of elderberries makes a wine so tart that drinking a single glass of it may inhibit your ability to smile for several months. However when the juice is added to a sweet wine such as raspberry or strawberry it lends brightness while improving the depth of flavor for both ingredients.

Gooseberries and currants

Gooseberries are a member of the currant family. This family of plants tolerates modest shade well. This means you can plant them in less than ideal sun conditions compared to other fruit trees and berries. Gooseberries grow thorny bushes that continue to sprawl over time. If you have about 10 years of patience a hedge of gooseberry bushes is basically impenetrable to deer, rabbits and raccoons.

In the 1950’s it was found that gooseberries and some types of currants could harbor pine blister rust disease which has the ability to decimate pine forests. The federal government quickly banned the sale and cultivation of gooseberry plants. Decades later improved research revealed that only a handful of pine species were susceptible to the disease and regulations have since been eased up. It is still wise to check with your county agricultural extension office before you order them. Most reputable providers won’t sell gooseberries to states which still uphold the ban.

There are many different types of currants and gooseberries. Each one has its own unique flavor but all are tart and high in vitamin C.

Growing zone: 3 to 7

Time to maturity: 1 to 3 years

Pollination needs: While some are self-pollinating all do better when they are cross pollinated.

Pruning/Thinning: After plants have been established for three years you should only prune away dead branches to allow for better ventilation.

Harvest time: Varies by type, most produce from late June through late July.

Currants tend to grow between 3 to 6 feet high and they tend to grow as wide as they are tall. Since they have shallow roots they should not be planted in an area that is directly exposed to straight line storm winds. They should also be mulched each year with a thick layer of compost to keep the shallow roots moist in drought conditions. Bushes should be planted 6 feet apart to allow proper spacing.

Gooseberries can vary a little bit by type, but in general they grow 7 to 9 feet high and as much as 12 feet wide. They are also shallow rooted and require thick mulching. However, their roots are stronger and more diverse than currants and can handle exposed storm winds. If you are growing the plants for maximum production they should be spaced 6 to 8 feet apart. If you are planning to use them as a defensive hedge, then planting 3 feet apart might limit your production but it will give you an impenetrable wall of thorns in 5 to 7 years.

Long term storage options:  All gooseberries and currants are candidates for jams and jellies. While they are tart when eating out of hand, the sour flavor is not over powering. When gooseberries are made into wine, with the right sugar balance they make a crisp libation that is refreshing served ice cold, in a spritzer or used in a shandy.

Raspberries

Raspberries are in the same family as blackberries. Where blackberries have more versatility in their canes, raspberries have more versatility in their fruit. While all raspberries make aggregate fruit, some are dark purple, some are bright red and some are even bright orange.

There are some disadvantages to this versatility in that some raspberries are susceptible to diseases which they can then spread through the patch. Black raspberries in particular are prone to viral diseases and aphid infestations. Because of this they should be planted at least 100 feet away from other plants.

All raspberry plants can harbor early blight and should not be planted near a garden where tomatoes, peppers, eggplant or potatoes are planted.

Another major difference between raspberries and blackberries is that the core pulls free. While this might seem like a minor thing on the surface, it greatly improves the processing time after harvest.

Growing zone: 4 to 8

Time to maturity: Two years

Pollination needs: Self-pollinating

Pruning/Thinning: Dead canes should be removed as soon as you see them. If plants propagate to a degree where they are crowding each other you should transplant the smaller plants out of the area in early spring.

Harvest time: Most come ripe in early to mid-July. Some will continue to produce berries through the rest of the growing season.

Long term storage options: If they are quick frozen, raspberries will handle life in the freezer for 6 to 8 weeks before freezer burn sets into the spaces between the aggregate fruit. However it is probably better to make them into jam which can be canned and put up in the root cellar for up to two years.

Raspberry wine is very full bodied. The berries need to be heated up to 180 degrees for one minute in order to kill any bacteria living in the spaces in the aggregate fruit.

Strawberries

In my mind strawberries are to an orchard what vine ripened tomatoes are to the garden. They are the type of thing you just can’t get at the grocery store. To taste the magic of a vine ripened strawberry you just have to grow and pick it yourself.

Strawberries need cool soil temperatures to produce fruit. This means they do best when they are planted in a location that gets good morning sun and afternoon shade. They can be planted in scattered mounds or a single thick row.

The advantage of the scattered mound system is that for the first couple of years you don’t have to worry about thinning the plants and simply snake your way through the mounds picking. The disadvantage of the scattered mound system is that once they come into full maturity after 3 years you are dealing with pure chaos when you have to accept the fact that runner borne plants need to be transplanted in order to reduce crowding. Added to this is the fact that birds absolutely adore strawberries and a scattered mound system is harder to cover than a single long row.

Planting strawberries in a single row makes them easier to cover with protective netting. I have a series of 2” X 4” boards driven into the soil so the top is 18 inches above the ground to give added lift to the netting. This is convenient for picking as I simply walk down the row quickly folding back edges enough that I can make the quick pick before moving on.

Strawberries can take damage to their tender roots during a hard winter. If you live in growing zone 5 or colder you should burry strawberry plants under 4 inches of mulch just before the first hard frost.

Growing zone: 3 to 9

Time to maturity: 1 year

Pollination needs: Self pollinating

Pruning/Thinning:  After 3 years plants will be established and may become crowded. You can avoid crowding by transplanting runner borne plants in early fall. I simply walk down the row with a cardboard flat pulling out stray plants from the row as I cover the main row with mulch. The stray plants are then added to the end of the row or used to start a new row.

Harvest time:  Varies depending on type. See below.

Excluding Alpine berries which are more of a landscaping strawberry that you start from seed; there are essentially two different types of strawberries, June-bearing and Ever-bearing.

June-bearing strawberries produce a large amount of berries from early June until early July. They spend the rest of the growing season sending runners out to propagate new plants for next season. In general June bearing plants do poorly their first year. After that they produce nicely from year 2 through 4 before needing to be thinned out of the row or mound.

Ever-bearing plants produce a small amount of berries in early summer and late summer through early fall. Unless it’s a cool, wet summer the ground is usually too warm for ever-bearing strawberries to produce fruit in mid-summer.

For my time and money June-bearing strawberries planted in long, 3 foot wide rows are the way to go. In my experience the total amount of berries you get in that 4 to 6 week production period in early summer is still more than the total you get from the same number of ever-bearing plants.

June-bearing plants will even give you more flowers and fruit if you give them a dose of phosphorus rich fertilizer once a week starting as soon as the ground thaws.

Long term storage options: You can quick freeze strawberries if you lay them in a single row on a sheet pan in your freezer, if you turn it on the lowest setting so the fan starts blowing. The key is to freeze them as fast as possible.  After 4 to 6 hours they should be frozen rock hard and can be kept in zip-top bags for 3 to 6 months before they freezer burn.  However, when you thaw them you will still see a good amount of liquid that releases from the fruit.

Strawberry jam made from vine ripened berries, reduced on low heat, with low-sugar pectin is only slightly less magical than unicorns.

Strawberry wine, while it might be a cliché in several country music songs, is ultimately a great base for a standalone wine or to be used as a blend with other fruit.

Grapes

I’ll be honest with you here, grapes are probably one of the least practical fruits you can grow from a homesteading stand point. They really are a luxury fruit that take up a lot of time and space and require a long learning curve, which makes it difficult to justify the fact that many varieties don’t have a lot of long term keeper value.

Unless you are absolutely crazy about raisins and grape jelly or have designs on producing your own wine for trade with other homesteaders, then you have to get creative with how you justify growing them. That being said enjoying a handful of table grapes is a refreshing thing that reminds you just why we all love summer so much!

Grapes do poorly when exposed to hard winter temperatures, so make sure you are picking a variety that grows well in your growing zone.

There are essentially two different types of grape you can choose from, table grapes and wine grapes. Since wine grapes require a long growing season in order for them to develop full bodied flavor it is wise to not push the limits on your growing zone.  If you live in growing zone 5, my advice is that you pick a variety of wine grape whose northern limit is zone 4. It is a heart breaking thing to spend a full season pruning vines, training them onto lines and tending the grapes only to have them killed by an early fall freak frost.

Growing zone: 4 to 10

Time to maturity:  Varies by type, generally 3 to 5 years

Pollination needs: Most are self-pollinating but it is best to have at least two of the same kind to improve pollination opportunities by insects.

Pruning/Thinning:  After vines are established within 2 to 3 years they will require annual pruning.

Harvest time:  Varies by type but most require 160 to 180 frost free days to ripen the fruit.

All grapes must be trained to a trellis system in order to keep the vines properly ventilated. Also because the fruit is so high in sugar and water if it is allowed to touch the ground they will quickly rot. There are three types of trellis systems you can use.

A kniffen trellis is the classic trellis most people think of. It uses long rows of sturdy posts with wires strung between them.  The grapes are trained and tied onto the wires with a soft cotton twine. The trick with this kind of trellis system is to allow for three wires increasing in height. This allows you to give the vine something to grab a hold of early on to give it an anchor to climb. As the vine matures and the trunk grows taller you can remove the lowest wire with your first pruning.

I used a kniffen trellis with my first set of grape vines. While it worked, I planted it in an exposed area to give the vines maximum sun light. Unfortunately this also meant the area was exposed to straight line winds and in their fourth year the post system was compromised by the storm. If you are going to use this system of single posts I recommend a distance between posts of no more than 8 feet.

Also in hindsight I anchored the posts by pouring concrete at the base. When the soil failed it simply turned the post over. If I were to employ a single post system again I would use packed rock in the post hole instead.

A T-shaped trellis system is another alternative that I have seen used on small hobby farms that produce table grapes which grow on vigorous vines. The idea is that a single post rises in the middle of the row and the wires are suspended at the ends of the T’s.  This allows the vines to grow wider and sprawl out to soak up the sun. To be honest with you, the first time I saw this system was shortly after my blow down event and I was put off by the idea of using a single post in any system.

That experience led me to try using a V-Post and that is now the system I prefer to employ for grapes. The idea is that two posts rise at a modest angle from separate anchor points of packed rock. A spacer board is placed flat on them and bolted on each side with a single carriage bolt. It almost looks like you turned the legs of a picnic table upside down. Then wires are run from both posts down the line.

The single bolt allows a little bit of shimmy in the whole system, while the two posts still stay related to each other. After a major storm event you might have to go out and straighten everything up a little but you shouldn’t have a catastrophic failure that kills the vines.

Long term storage options: Grapes tend to ripen in clusters. If a cluster of grapes is only half ripened give it a few more days and they should all be ready for harvest.

Table grapes are really only good for canning as jelly or drying as raisins. Some wine grapes can be dried into raisins but most are only good for wine or wine blends with other fruits.

It is worth noting that the wood of pruned grape vines when properly dried is a great addition for grilling vegetables in the spring. The smoke produced by burning dried grape wood especially brings out the flavor in grilled onions and leeks.

Chapter 7 – Fruit trees

Apples

Apples are the back bone of most homesteading orchards. They are versatile, flavorful, healthy and when put up properly can be kept for a long time through the winter.

Apples will grow in zones 3 through 8. In general you find more crisp apples which keep longer if you are in the northern growing zones from 5b to 4a. This is a product of the apple’s relationship to cold weather. The apple tree itself needs a certain minimum number of chill hours for the tree to ready again to grow vigorously and produce fruit the next year.

Technically chill hours are supposed to be determined by the number of hours a tree spends at 45 degrees or colder. I would personally argue that the measure should be defined at 39 degrees, which is the temperature at which water begins to make the chemical change towards expanding into ice.

Also when apples are ripening on the tree, the fruit develops more flavor and longer keeping starch if the fall weather has cool nights and warm days. If you are thumbing through a fruit tree catalog and you see a cultivar you like that is rated for growing zone 4 to 6, the tree will actually produce stronger fruit which will put up longer in zone 4 than it will zone 6. In this way apples are sort of the opposite of grapes when it comes to the growing zone limit.

Apple trees need full sun and prefer well drained soil. If you don’t have a location that gets full sun all day long it is best to choose a location that in the fall gets good light in the morning through early afternoon. This will give the apple the best chance to ripen its fruit properly by capturing sunlight right away. Apples trees that have poor morning light and good sun in the afternoon often struggle to get their fruit completely ripe in the waning days of fall.

Well drained soil is an even more important factor for apple trees. While the roots do not like drying out they also need aeration and room to grow. Clay rich soils are death traps for apple trees. Sandy soil with a thick layer of mulch out to the drip edge is a much easier scenario to deal with.

Growing zone: 3 to 8

Time to maturity: 3 to 5 years

Pollination needs: All apple trees require cross pollination by a select few cultivars. A quality retailer will have this information readily available.

Pruning/Thinning: Once established after 3 years an apple tree will require pruning every spring to cut back unproductive growth and improve ventilation. An apple that is initially planted too deep or whose crown is covered for too long with mulch can sprout suckers from the base of the trunk. These suckers must be pruned in the dormant season as it will greatly sap the strength of the rest of the tree.

Harvest time: While there are some apples that will come ripe as early as late July or early August, most come ripe between mid-September and late October.

Apples must be trained to a central leader. Meaning a firm, tall stake is placed near the trunk at the time of planting and the sapling is tied to it with loose cotton twine. As the trunk of the tree thickens with age you will need to retie it. The goal of training the tree to a central leader is to develop a strong trunk which the tree can rely on like a spine for a lifetime of supporting a large volume of heavy fruit.

After the first year of growth you will want to prune the tree back to 4 primary limbs. The goal is for these four limbs to have an angle of less than 45 degrees from the ground. Meaning they should be closer to parallel to the ground than parallel to the central trunk. If they are at an angle more vertical than this you will need to use guywires to hold the limbs down.

Once the tree is firmly established to the point where the lowest branches emerging from the central trunk are 2 to 3 feet above ground level you can thin the tree again of superfluous branches to improve ventilation and tree balance. You may need to add limb spreaders for branches that are too close together.

As you prune the tree over the years be mindful to prune in equal balance. The tree is designed by the forces of nature to balance the wind blowing through it. So long as the volume of leaves and weight of the branches is balanced on all sides the tree will be able to withstand all but the most severe of storms.

If you live in zone 5 or colder it is a good idea to paint the lower trunk of the tree with a 1:1 mixture of paint diluted with water. This creates an additional skin that will help resist splitting in the cold. This is in addition to using a plastic wrap as protection against rabbits and other rodents.

Apples are pretty picky about their cross pollination needs. Most reputable dealers will tell you the best pollination partners for the trees you want to plant. Unfortunately dealers can run out of the partner trees you want. In this case there is a fall back in the form of the crab apple tree.  Crab apples, metaphorically speaking are the promiscuous cheerleader of the apple world. They flower for a long time in the spring, bees love their pollen and they easily cross pollinate with most apple trees. The disadvantage is that any apple which is cross pollinated by a crab apple are going to produce seeds that are invalid for starting and grafting your own trees in the future.

Long term storage options: While apples ripen best during fall days where cool nights are followed by warm sun, once they are picked they need to be kept cold. They should be placed and kept in temperatures between 35 and 45 degrees, in 80 to 90 percent humidity. While there is some forgiveness in the humidity, especially during the driest depths of winter, the cold requirements are absolutely critical.

Kept in optimum conditions I have seen crisp apples last up to 8 months. However once apples are allowed to warm up to around 55 degrees for even a day, it causes the fruit to release ethylene compounds which starts the process of the apple spoiling. Even if the apple is chilled down again after this the total life in storage will be diminished.

This means once it is picked it needs to go into cold storage as fast as possible and stay in cold storage without exception until shortly before it is used or eaten.

Apple wine is the back bone of many fruit blend wines. It is often crisp, clean and bright. It takes well to blending with sweet additions like strawberry or sweet cherry. If you use dry or tart additions like elderberry or gooseberry then you may need to amend with extra sugar in order to keep the brewer’s yeast alive long enough for maximum sugar to alcohol conversion.

Cherries

Cherries come in two different versions. Sweet cherries do better in temperate climates, while sour cherries do better in cooler climates, especially where harsh winters are prevalent. To be honest with you sweet cherries are another luxury fruit like grapes. Sour cherries tend to have the better long term storage value in pies, jams and jellies.

At the same time a life without sweet cherries is like a life without ever falling in love. Sure you’re not going to die but you will spend your time feeling like you’re missing out on something special.

Birds are the enemy of all cherry trees everywhere. Personally I would say the only thing that birds like better than bright red cherries are strawberries. This means you are going to have to cover your trees with bird netting. Sisyphus is having a better time rolling a boulder uphill for all eternity in Hades, compared to a man who decides to grow an orchard full of standard height cherry trees with dreams of keeping them safe from the birds.

Growing zone: 4 to 8 for sour cherries. Zone 5 to 8 for sweet cherries.

Time to maturity: 2 to 4 years

Pollination needs: Most need cross pollination. Even plants that are self-pollinated will still produce better when cross pollinated with a member of the same cultivar.

Pruning/Thinning: Cherries do better when they are pruned and trained to an open middle.

Harvest time: Most cherries come ripe between mid-June to mid-July.

Cherry trees need to be pruned and trained to an open middle in order to provide ventilation.

After a full year of growth you should prune back the central trunk and then select 4 primary side branches that are strong. Prune the last 1 to 2 feet off the end of these branches. They should be allowed to remain within a 45 degree angle of where the central trunk was. 

Over the next year they will sprout more side branches. The following spring you should allow the first suckers that spring forth from the initial 4 branches and then trim 2 inches after the first off shoot. This will allow the plant to continue to expand its canopy while also allowing the ventilation the soft wet fruit needs to stay free of mold and fungus.

Long term storage options:  One of the most underestimated aspects of picking and storing cherries is the need for ventilation once they have been picked from the tree. The high sugar and water content of the fruit makes it prone to gray mold and several unique forms of fungus that might not present themselves on the tree, but will bloom and grow like wild fire if left out in unventilated bags and boxes during the high heat and summer humidity.

As a result, it is best to keep cherries in 1 to 2 deep rows in flat boxes with a fan blowing on them for the first day after picking. Then load them into a refrigerated space to improve storage.

In general sweet cherries do poorly when they are made into jam or pie filling. With the right recipe they will put up in the root cellar for to 1 year. Sour cherries can last longer when put up as pie filling and jam with sugar-pectin.

Cherries make a very dry wine alone but when combined with a sweeter berry wine like strawberry they help improve the depth of flavor presented by each.

Pawpaw

Pawpaws are sometimes referred to as the Michigan banana. They grow on trees that look tropical with their large exotic leaves. The kidney shaped fruit usually weighs in around a half pound but some varieties can weigh up to a pound. The fruit even tastes tropical. Some are reminiscent of banana while others might taste a bit like papaya.

The trees take longer to mature to fruit bearing age than most other fruit trees. The might need up to five years before they bear their first fruit. However once the tree comes into full maturity it can produce 25 to 50 pounds of fruit each year!

A mature tree is 15 to 20 feet high and sprawls out to roughly the same size. Papaws need cross pollination from a compatible variety. A reputable supplier will note these for you.

Planting location is very important for pawpaw trees. While the trees appreciate full sun, they also do poorly when planted in an exposed location. Their large leaves tend to catch the wind and straight line winds can cause a great deal of damage. In fact I recently had two trees that I planted at the edge of a field completely destroyed by a mid-season wind storm!

For this reason alone it is probably best to plant Pawpaws in the middle of your orchard or in a location that is less likely to see straight line winds. For example where I live straight line winds tend to come from the West or Northwest. The pawpaw trees would probably have lived had I planted them in a location that was buffered by other trees or had an eastern exposure. As straight line winds rarely come from the east where I live.

Growing zone: 4 to 7

Time to maturity: 5 to 7 years

Pollination needs: Pawpaws need cross-pollination by another variety with beneficial traits.

Pruning/Thinning: Pawpaws naturally train themselves to central trunk. However early in their lives it might be good to stake them for added support.

Harvest time: Most ripen between mid-September and early October.

Pawpaws are somewhat rare in that you can actually harvest the seeds, replant them and get a viable tree which will be strong enough to produce fruit. The seeds need to be dried and kept in a cool location 39 degrees or colder, for a period of 3 to 4 months.

You can start them in a 1 gallon planter filled with potting soil and lined by burlap. The sapling can then grow in the 1 gallon of soil for the first year. The next spring you can wait until the soil has warmed up and all threats of frost have passed before transplanting the sapling. Simply pull the burlap out of the planter and set it in the hole, over time the roots will pass through the mesh of the burlap as the fabric decomposes.

Pawpaw saplings grow very slowly at first so you will have to be patient. Once they are three years old they should behave like any other sapling fruit tree.

Long term storage options: Pawpaws don’t keep for long in a root cellar. Just like peaches they can be frozen so long as they are peeled, halved, seeded and rubbed with lemon juice. Then store them in vacuum freezer bags for up to 6 months.

Pawpaw wine is a rare treat. Usually you can only find it in Lower Michigan. However since the trees tend to produce such a large amount of juicy fruit, even a modest number of trees can make you the talk of the county fair and farmer’s market!

Peaches and Nectarines

Peaches and nectarines are nearly identical fruit. Nectarines do not have the fuzzy skin peaches do. Both fruits have freestone and clingstone varieties. In freestone peaches the pit comes away easily from the fruit. Assuming you are going to be processing them in large volume for canning, freezing and drying, it is more convenient to choose freestone varieties.

All varieties of peaches and nectarines require a certain number of chill hours in order to produce new leaves and blossoms in the spring. You should not be cavalier about which variety you choose. Once a tree has sat dormant for its required number of chill hours it will spring back to life so long as the ground is thawed.

If your region is having a spring with wild swings of weather, this could mean that the tree would begin to blossom, or possibly even flower and a snap frost could come in and damage the tree for the rest of the season. This means it is absolutely imperative that you do not push the limits of what tree can grow in your area. When in doubt you should try to err on the cold side instead of warm.

In recent years, so called“Polar Peaches” have been gaining in popularity. Peaches like Reliance and Intrepid have been bred to need 1000 chill hours and grafted onto root stocks hardy enough to handle life in zone 4.

Growing zone: Zones 4 to 8 for peaches. Zone 5 to 9 for nectarines.

Time to maturity: 3 to 5 years. Trees in warmer regions will reach fruit bearing maturity sooner due to the longer growing season.

Pollination needs: Self-pollinating, but trees will do better with a companion.

Pruning/Thinning: Both peaches and nectarines need to be trained to an open center. Trees grafted onto semi-dwarf root stocks can be trained to a fence but they will produce less.

Harvest time: Most ripen from late July through mid-August.

Long term storage options:  Both peaches and nectarines do well when canned in a light syrup. They can also be peeled, halved, stoned and frozen. However they will brown if you do not first rub them down with lemon juice before freezing. The browning is a matter of oxidation not spoilage.

Peaches do not make a good stand-alone wine, but they are a great accent to add sweetness to other dry fruit wines like blueberry.

Pears

Pears are a bulky fruit, rich in fiber and vitamins. Once they grow to maturity they are heavy producers. This is even true of dwarf sized trees. This makes them a very convenient, space saving addition to your orchard.

Most pears are not self-fertile. This means you will want to plant at least one other variety. A reputable dealer will have suggestions on which trees to pair together. There are two different types of pears, European pears which tend to only grow in zones 5 through 8 and Asian pears which have more cold tolerance and can grow in zone 4.

European pears are what you are used to seeing in the super market produce section. They take well to being canned. Asian pears are more reminiscent of crispy apples.

Growing zone: Zone 5 to 8 for European pears. Zones 4 to 8 for Asian pears.

Time to maturity: 3 to 5 years.

Pollination needs: All pears require cross pollination.

Pruning/Thinning: Pears do better when they are pruned to an open center.

Harvest time: Most ripen from late August through September.

While Asian pears do poorly when landscaped into a living fence, European pears are quite amenable. With a little bit of patience and thoughtful pruning European pears will take quite well to living on a south facing wall or stout wooden fence. If you intend to train the tree to the wire line of a fence you will want to have strong founded posts and wires that can bear the weight of the large volume of fruit.

Because of their high sugar content pears tend to attract insects. Flies and ants all seek out the fruit looking for a good meal. The easiest solution is to spray the fruit with an organic insecticidal soap. Then it is also a good measure to spray the trunk. The soap on the trunk will slow down the advance of ants. Unfortunately you will have to reapply after each significant rain.

Long term storage options: Pears keep in the same cellar conditions as apples. They should be placed and kept in temperatures between 35 and 45 degrees, in 80 to 90 percent humidity. While there is some forgiveness in the humidity, especially during the driest depths of winter, the cold requirements are absolutely critical.

While Asian pears should go straight from the tree to the root cellar, European pears that may have been picked slightly under ripe will continue to ripen at room temperature for up to a week. After that week has passed they must go down into the cellar with all the others.

Asian pears do not take well to canning but you can sauce them like apples. European pears will take well to canning in a light syrup, so long as they are peeled, halved and the seed core is removed before canning.

Plums

Plums are a beautiful addition to any orchard and even dwarf varieties can be heavy producers. There are two different types of plums you can choose from. European plums have dark skins and yellow flesh. They are not as cold tolerant as Japanese plums. Japanese plums are red or golden skinned and have a firmed texture to the meat. They can tolerate the cold better and in fact require more chill hours in winter to be able to produce the next spring.

All plums require cross pollination. Japanese plums are very dependent on cross pollination from other trees that have beneficial traits. This can make it quite an issue when you first start your orchard, as some types of trees are in such high demand that they can sell out early. So if you plan on planting a stand of plums in your orchard this year, it is best to find a reputable dealer and pre-order while there is still plenty of snow on the ground. I didn’t take advantage of this when planting a stand of plums and as a result, my mature plums flower each spring then do poorly because their preferred partner is two years less mature and not able to flower yet.

European plums are far more forgiving. While they do need to cross pollinate with another plum that has beneficial traits, there is a wider range of European plums to choose from, so you aren’t as likely to be forced to pre-order.

Growing zone: Zone 5 to 8 for European plums. Zone 4 to 7 for Japanese plums.

Time to maturity: 3 to 5 years. Japanese plums are more likely to be closer to 3 years, European are more likely to take 5 years to produce.

Pollination needs: All plums require cross-pollination by companion trees with beneficial traits.

Pruning/Thinning: European plums need to be trained to a central leader, just like apples. Japanese plums because they sprawl out need to be trained to an open center. Japanese plums also have a penchant for crowding their branches with young new shoots. Once they are established, they will need yearly pruning in order to maintain proper ventilation.

Harvest time: Both types of plums ripen between early August and early September.

One of the biggest differences between the two plums, aside from the fruit, is their soil preference. European plum will actually tolerate moderate clay soils. This is related to the higher water and sugar content of their fruit. This makes European plums very attractive to people whose clay soil has limited their options.

Japanese plums are much more like apples in that they do not like having wet roots. This is probably a product of their crisper fruit. At the same time they still do require adequate moisture. So if you have overly sandy soil and struggle with the soil drying out, it is a good idea to apply a heavy amount of mulch around the tree, all the way out to the drip edge. Just be mindful to plant the tree a little higher so that the thick mulch layer doesn’t end up burying the crown or grafting swell of the tree. This could lead to the tree developing suckers from the crown and ultimately reducing the energy it puts into developing the main trunk.

Long term storage options: Japanese plums can be picked slightly under ripe and they will continue to ripen for up to one week at room temperature. European plums will not continue to ripen after picking.

Plums do not keep well in the long term as whole fruit. Instead it is better to either dry them into plums, can them as jam or process into wine. You can cut them in half, remove the pit and freeze them in quart sized zip top bags. They will keep in the freezer for 6 to 8 months. You can then thaw them, chop them and cook into a fruit chutney, sauce or fruit salad.

Plum wine is a real treat. Since the price of plums at the grocery store is so high, it isn’t very cost effective to make wine with store bought fruit. However the large volume you can get from your home orchard allows you to chop, press and juice the fruit in significant volume. While you can blend it with other fruit juices, plum wine is the sort of desert wine that can stand alone.

Chapter 8 – Nut trees

For the most part the nut trees that you plant today will be harvested at their peak maturity by your children and grandchildren. Nuts are dense in calories, fats and protein. Some, like walnuts have heart healthy oils. Nuts can keep for up to a year when processed and dried properly, this makes them a great supplemental nutrition source during lean winters.

Most nut trees are not grafted like fruit trees. This means they can grow to staggering heights casting massive shadows that you need to be mindful of when planning your plantings. Some nut trees like walnuts and butternuts release compounds into the soil called Junglone. These compounds are toxic to many other fruit trees and garden plants. The rule of thumb is that the plant transmits these compounds into the soil in a radius around the plant equal to twice the height of the mature tree. Even after the tree dies these compounds are released by the decomposing roots for up to 10 years.

The following entries are not meant to be an ultimate compendium of all nut trees. Instead think of it as a highlight of nut trees that can be grown in a wide range of growing zones.

Chestnuts

Chestnuts are one of the few nut trees that can be successfully grafted. They are also cold hardy to zone 4 but some grafted varieties are limited to zone 6. So be sure to do your research before buying. Chestnuts need to be cross-pollinated with another chestnut tree. The general rule of thumb is to space the trees no farther than 100 feet apart.

A commercial grower I met with years ago had come to the conclusion that 30 feet in-between trees was the ideal distance that allowed them to grow to their maximum height without crowding and shading, while still giving them the best pollination relationship.

Growing zone: Zones 4 to 9

Time to maturity: 5 to 6 years

Pollination needs: Needs cross-pollination

Pruning/Thinning: Chestnuts need to be trained to a central leader.

Harvest time: Most chestnuts ripen between mid-September and early October.

When pruning chestnut trees and training them to a central leader it is important to thin back weak branches and encourage the thick strong ones through the first five years. By encouraging the thick strong branches early you ensure the tree will be strong enough to hold the great weight of its bounty when it comes into maturity.

Long term storage options:  Chestnuts should be harvested and placed directly into cold storage. Luckily they keep in similar conditions to apples and pears. A root cellar with the temperature held in the mid 30’s and 90 percent humidity can keep the nuts for up to 6 months.

The most important key to preserving the nuts is to collect them as soon as they drop. Nuts that are allowed to sit on the ground, especially in rainy conditions can pick up fungal spores and bacteria that will carry over and invade the root cellar. Any nuts you harvest that are wet and dirty are better left in the field rather than risk bringing in unwanted microbes.

Hazelnuts

Growing zone: American zone 2 to 8. European zone 4 to 8.

Time to maturity: 2 to 3 years

Pollination needs: A cross pollinator of the same type.

Pruning/Thinning: They will eventually grow into thick hedges or trees with dense branches. Once the tree begins to make nuts you should prune back old unproductive branches every other year.

Harvest time: Early fall

Hazelnuts produce a small nut. There are two different types of hazelnuts, European and American. American hazelnuts have better cold hardiness and improved resistance to common blight and fungal diseases that can plague the trees.

Hazelnuts bloom in early spring, often before the leaves emerge from the buds. If you live in an area where spring weather can swing, causing random freezing events it is best to avoid planting hazelnuts in low lying areas. In these cases the trees should be planted on a high spot in the orchard that receives good morning light.

Most hazelnuts need cross-pollination by another tree. While you don’t need a unique variety it is best to pollinate American with American or European with European.

Long term storage options:  Nuts must be thoroughly dried before being put into cold storage. So long as they are kept in a cool dry place they will stay viable for up to a year.

Walnuts and Butternuts

A mature walnut tree is a big bold monster of a tree that produces nuts wrapped in hard green pods. While there are many different types of walnut tree, such as Carpathian, English and Black walnuts, they all share the common trait of needing many years to reach nut bearing maturity. Butternut trees are the kissing cousin of the walnut. They have all the same traits, growing habits and nearly identical nuts. The one major difference about the butternut is the fact that it can begin producing as early as 3 years.

Growing zone: Walnuts zone 4 to 8. Butternuts zone 3 to 7.

Time to maturity: 5 to 10 years for walnuts. 3 to 5 years for butternuts

Pollination needs: Walnuts and butternuts have male and female components. Because of this they need to have a compatible partner tree for cross-pollination.

Pruning/Thinning: Walnuts naturally develop a strong central trunk.

Harvest time: Butternuts ripen in August. Walnuts ripen between September and October.

Both walnuts and butternuts are deep rooted. These roots release a compound into the soil known as juglone. While this chemical is safe for the lawn, it has the ability to wreak havoc with other fruit trees and most garden plants. Because of this Walnuts and butternuts need to be planted a significant distance away from susceptible plants. The general rule of thumb is that the juglone will spread through the soil twice the tree’s height. When a walnut tree is small, this distance can be insignificant. However since some walnuts can grow to over 40 feet tall, you must take their mature height into account when planting.

Long term storage options:  Walnuts and butternuts both are laborious to harvest, process and prepare for long term storage. One advantage of English walnuts is that they fall free from the husk upon ripening. All other walnuts and butternuts the husk falls free from the tree, leaving it is up to you to get at the shell and nut meat inside.

The husks have a tacky substance on the outside that can stain just about every substance known to man, including concrete. It is best to collect nuts and lay them out on a tarp or multiple layers of overlapping newspaper. The nuts can also stain your skin, so it is advisable to wear gloves at all times when handling them.

Removing the husk can be a challenge. While I know there are websites out there that tell you to drive back and forth over them with your car, I personally have seen this go horribly awry. The nuts are round and if the tire hits them in just the wrong way they get squeezed out the side with incredible force. In my mind I would rather take the time to remove the husk by peeling with a dull knife. It’s simply not worth the broken windows and mutilated ankles that can come from a driving accident.

If you absolutely find the process of peeling the husks to be too tedious, you can try to roll them under your foot.

Once you have the husks removed you can dispose of them by burning them or throwing them away. They have a good concentration of juglone still in the old husks and should not be included into your compost or mulch.

Lay the nuts out in their shell a single layer deep on sheets of cardboard lined with newspaper. Place them in a cool, dry place with a fan blowing over them. Roll the nuts once a day for the first week to make sure they don’t have moisture settling out on the bottom. Painter’s desiccant placed in the corner of the room will also help speed the drying process.

After two weeks of drying, the nuts should crack open relatively easily using a standard nut cracker. If they resist, continue drying.

The nuts will store just fine in a cool dark place if left in the shell. Some people will advocate removing the nutmeat from each shell, and placing them in vacuum sealed bags for long term storage. While this may buy you some additional storage time, I don’t know that it matters much, considering the nuts left in the shell will keep for up to a year and you will be into next year’s harvest.

Also, walnuts are known to contain heart healthy Omega-3 fatty acids. Removing them from the shell starts the process that slowly breaks down the fats through oxidation.

Walnuts can also be shelled and blended into walnut butter. It is best to roast the nuts before grinding. This increases the flavor and sterilizes the nut meat. Blend the nuts to your preferred texture in a food processor. While the nuts are blending, you can add a dash of cinnamon and a modest sweetener like honey or stevia. The nut butter should then be kept in a sealed container in the refrigerator.

You can also extract Walnut oil from the nut meat but you will need a hand crank nut press designed to blend and extract the oil. There are kits out there which can do double duty both as a nut press and an apple cider press!

Conclusion

I understand that if you’re in the market to start your own homesteading orchard that it’s probably not in the budget to just buy 2 or 3 of each of the plants mentioned in this book.

In all honesty I don’t even have all of these plants any more. I left half of them back at my old property when I moved north into the wilderness.

So let’s imagine for a moment that you’re in a situation like the one I faced a few years back. I moved deep into the wild on the edge of forest, with 10 acres of sandy soil to work with and shallow aquifers teamed with rain barrels drawing from the barn roof for water.

Let’s also say you had a budget of around $300 to get yourself started.

Let’s also use the numbers from my favorite on-line fruit vendor’s catalog to help guide the example. Other than some berry plants, they sell most trees as bareroot plants.

What would I recommend you buy?

For starters you need something to keep you excited early and often. Nothing puts a smile on your face like picking your own vine ripened strawberries.

For starters I would go with two rows of Surecrop, June-bearing strawberries. A row of 25 plants costs around 10 dollars.

Next I would turn to the magic of Primocane Blackberries. You can get a six pack of plants for 25 dollars. If you plant them with around 3 feet of space between each plant they will continue to double themselves each year for nearly a decade before you are dealing with serious crowding issues.

Between the strawberries and blackberries you’ve got some early rewards for your patience.

For myself personally I turned to gooseberries because I use their thorny fast growing brambles for a defensive perimeter as well as a snow block for winter drifting. For someone who isn’t married to these notions I would advise blueberries.

You should be able to find 3 mid-bush blueberry plants for just under $12 per plant. Assuming they are carefully planned for cross pollination they should keep a family of 4 in blueberries for years to come.

So at this point you’ve got yourself covered on enough berry plants that will give you a small yield early that with time, thinning and proper care will turn into a pretty significant pile of berries that will carry you through from June straight through to late July.

Now the knee jerk reaction here is to turn to fruit trees next. However I think it’s best to finish strong so I’d say it’s best to finish with the hot and sexy fruit trees after planning some basic nut trees. Now if you live in the southern part of the country in zones 6 through 9 then warm soil loving nut trees like almonds and pecans will probably top your list. Since these nuts don’t grow in my region, I can’t really speak to them.

Instead going from my experience I would invest in two butternut trees. You can get them for around $20 per tree. Two of them will meet each other’s cross pollination needs. They should give you the very first nuts in about three years and will start to explode with production for decades and dozens of feet to come. Just be sure to plant them at the far end of your property so that the juglone won’t cause troubles with your garden or other fruit trees.

This means you now have $180 to spend on fruit trees.

In general you’re going to be able to buy fruit trees for around $20 per tree. Right off the bat the spine of your homesteading orchard is going to be apple trees. I would sink $100 into 5 apples right off the bat.

When it comes to size I would choose three apples that are dwarfs which you can pick by hand through most of the life of the trees. I would plant them south of two semi-dwarf apple trees. For the semi-dwarf’s I would choose a crisp variety that is known for its long term keeping ability.

This now leaves you with $80 for four more fruit trees.

These are the trees that can be your luxury items.

For my money an orchard needs at least two plum trees to give it a little magic. Choosing two trees that benefit from each other’s pollination needs will leave you with two more trees left to choose from.

This is admittedly a tough spot to be in when making your first orchard plan. There are so many attractive options to choose from and once you stick those last two plants in the ground, it means you will have to wait at least another year before expanding your options. And really that means waiting another three to five years before you see fruit from those second choice trees.

My personal pick would be to go with two pawpaw trees. Sure there is a bit of a bias here since I am still suffering the pangs of my last pawpaw failure. More importantly I would pick them because they are a luxury fruit, which needs a little longer than most other fruit trees to come mature. Once it does come into fruit bearing age it produces a large amount of fruit for eating fresh, making into jam or fermenting into a unique and delightful wine.

Getting a head start on pawpaws is a nice investment in the future to pay for your patience on the back end of the experience.

Final thoughts

Having your own homesteading orchard can indeed be a lot of work to get started. However, once you get it established it bears fruit and pays for itself in spades. The savings in total labor cost and the ability to trade bumper crops of fruit for other things your orchard and garden may not be able to provide is even more valuable than the orchard appears on paper.

Other Books by Eric Beuning

Modern Rustic: Greenhouses and Gardening

Growing and Cooking Herbs

The Container Gardening Book