As promised, this post is all about summer fruit, which is something we have in abundance here!
I am so pleased that seven years ago, we decided to plant as many fruit trees as we could possibly fit into our 779²m suburban block. Only a couple of trees have met their maker, so I would count my fruit-growing as a success.
So what summer fruit do we currently have growing around the garden. Well let me show you.
Jonathan Apples
No explanation really needed. These are amazing apples, and we have about 30 on the tree.
Jonathan Apple (L) and Blood Plum (R) trees
It is on dwarf rootstock, so we have been able to squeeze it in next to the Blood plum tree. Both are currently being watered with grey water from the washing machine and are thriving because of the regular watering.
Blood Plums
This is the best crop of plums that we have had in years. The secret was laziness. Yes, because of my knee injury in the middle of the year, I just didn’t get around to pruning any of my fruit trees. Subsequently, they are all heavily laden with fruit. I was told by a reliable source (Craig Castree) that you prune in the summer for fruit, and winter for growth. I have come to the realisation that I have been doing it wrong for so many years!
Pepino
The pepino bush has gone wild. I let it go to see what it would do, because I read somewhere that it was a ground cover. Well that certainly is true if you look at the photo below.
Pepino bush
What I have found is that any little branch that comes in contact with soil strikes roots, and therefore it is much greener on the ground than it is climbing a trellis. Climbing is a poor choice of words, because you have to tie it up, with the bush having no mechanism to hold on. We have the space on that side, so as it is laden with fruit, I am not going to cut it back yet.
Cocktail Pear
I probably mentioned this somewhere before, but we now have fruit on one of our cocktail pear trees. Five in total, so hopefully I can keep the pear and cherry slugs off the leaves long enough for them to ripen.
Apricots
Not a lot of fruit on the Divinity Apricot tree this year as we had a large crop last year. We are going to net the tree on the weekend.
Sultana
In the pool area we have our grape vines, which although there is no fruit, they are growing very tall now and in the next month will be able to be trained over the arbor. As well as this Sultana, we have a Ruby red seedless, and two Merlot (for wine making).
ANZAC Peaches
The ANZAC Peach tree has gone crazy! Largest peaches ever, which I can only attribute to the grey water that we have been supplying it. So much fruit that we just had to net it as it was starting to blush. The last thing we want is to give it all to the rainbow lorikeets.
ANZAC Peaches netted
So on Saturday, Kim, Ben, and I netted the beast of a tree. It took us about an 45 minutes with a bit of swearing. It is now so tall that we had to let some branches stick through and close the netting around it.
There are no gaps, but Kim’s peg basket is a little light on, now that we have used about half of them to keep it all together. I used twine to gather it around the trunk.
ANZAC Peaches Netted Side view
Here is the side view. It is also on dwarf rootstock, but you wouldn’t think it. We are going to have so many peaches!
Goldmine Nectarine
Lastly, our Goldmine nectarine tree. Not as much fruit as last year because I intentionally knocked off every second fruit as they developed. In 2013 the fruit was so small all we could do was make jam out of them. There was not enough flesh on the fruit to preserve.
So there you have it. We have fruit, lots of fruit! I left a couple of plum trees and an apple tree out, because the photos didn’t turn out very well.
Now what else did I miss? Well we also have blood oranges, navel oranges, mandarins, lemons, Tahitian limes, and lemonade but I will leave that lot for another post. They won’t be ready to eat for a few months or until winter, depending on the variety. Not really summer fruit, so I didn’t show them here.
My fruit tree philosophy is simple. Get them in the ground, the sooner the better. Which reminds me of this chinese proverb I read a few years ago;
“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”
So true. Get planting!
What sort of fruit trees do you have planted in your yard, or what are you planning to plant?
Hi Gavin,
glad you got your peaches netted, it would be tragic to lose them! Last year I got 13.5 kilos off my peach tree (same variety as yours) and it looks like it will be another bumper crop this year. I have apricots, 2 apple trees, 2 pear trees, 2 cherries, 2 lemons, nectarines, a fig, and also almond and hazelnut bushes.
The harder fruits have taken some patience – the apples and pears have taken 4 – 5 years to start producing, but it’s exciting now that it’s finally happening. I lost most of my cherries to earwigs this year – if anyone has any natural ways to combat this most frustrating of pests I’d love to know. I never saw them before last year, now we have them in abundance and they destroy things like beans as soon as they emerge from the soil.
Also, I’ve just had a new olive tree die for the second year running, with no clue as to why. It looked perfectly healthy for the first six weeks, then one morning I got up and the leaves were all brown. We’d had a modest amount of rain, but nothing excessive…
Madeleine.x
Love the trees and things and the Chinese Proverb. I am going to have to pinch that one I think.
Cheers
MOC
You are most welcome to use and abuse that proverb Mick in the name of getting more fruit trees planted in the ‘burbs!
We’ve a half a dozen apple trees, 2 nashi pear trees (1 got whipper snippered to within 5mm of the graft but it’s come back somehow), 2 cherry trees (with fruit ripening now squeee), 2 olives, a loquat, grapes (with 2 bunches on there), mulberry, and a fig in a pot. The almonds are growing well and I have 2 hazelnuts in too. My pot walnut is looking happy and will be planted out in autumn/winter. Exciting times and I also look to get some blackberries this year from my thornless bush. 🙂
Nice one Jessie. How big will the walnut tree grow do you think?
They get BIG so the plan is to plant it out next year along the fenceline. I can fit 5 or 6 along that fence. The main problem with walnuts is that they are allelopathic. However, black raspberries (aka blackberries) and surprisingly tomatoes will tolerate the juglans they add to the soil so I’m not too concerned. Should keep the weeds down under them if nothing else. 🙂
I remember reading about you planting all your fruit trees, and thinking i would start doing that same thing. Your fruit all looks so delicious but up here in the tropics our summer fruit is a bit different. I cannot grow in the ground alongside our carport so have planted in pots and created fruit salad alley. Last night I ate our first delicious fig, and have been enjoying the odd mulberry. Strawberries are growing in pots and continually provide juicy goodness, and the passionfruit vine is slowly filling in. Dragonfruit is growing well. In the veggie patch I have a barbados cherry and a struggling dwarf avocado. Lime and lemon in pots. The side garden is dominated by a huge lychee tree. A lot of fuit in our small patch.
Sounds like a tropical paradise Gillian. Dragon Fruit is amazing, and I love Lychee.
You certainly have been following the blog for a long time to remember when I planted the trees! x
Well done Gav. That’s a fantastic result. Your hard work has been rewarded big time.
Thanks Jean!
Looking amazing , Gavin. I marvel at the fact that you are getting more fruit out of your backyard than I am getting on the farm!! You have definitely inspired me to look after my trees better!!
Hi Gav Ive only got a plum tree at the moment (Ive got a lot of trees to get rid of before I can plant my mini orchard at the back of my property) but it is LADEN with fruit. Tomorrow we really need to get off our bums and net it before the birds find out about them. Merry Christmas and a happy new year 🙂