This is a transcript of a great presentation I got a chance to join, hosted by Alison Arnold my local NC extension agent. (It’s an amazing program we residents are lucky to have!)
Craig has a lot to say on NC fruit trees 🍑🍒🍐 so I’ve outlined the species he talks about, and if you’re considering one of these I’d definitely check out that section. Keep in mind this is not an exhaustive list, it’s an offering of good ideas. Jujubes anyone?
Fruit Tree’s for the Home Garden from North Carolina Cooperative Extension
- Persimmons – A Double Delight: Craig introduced us to both Asian and Native persimmons. I LOVE my Fuyu persimmon, especially in early winter. They’re little orbs of sunshine, and if you get a bumper crop they make sweet garden gifts when it’s grey outside.
- Pawpaws – Craig’s Personal Fave: He couldn’t stop raving about pawpaws, calling them his most favorite fruit. I’m intrigued by these custard-like, tropical-tasting gems. Definitely looking into these!
- Figs – A Fig for Every Elevation: The variety of figs he discussed was impressive. From Celeste to Brown Turkey, there’s a fig for every spot in my yard. We’ll start with just one for now…
- Pomegranates – Exotic and Tantalizing: Can you grow pomegranates in NC? Yes! The idea of growing pomegranates like Grenada and Angel Red in my own backyard is thrilling. My family loves pomegranates, I grew up on them in California, so this was a nice surprise.
- Mulberries & Elderberries – The Unsung Heroes: These might not have been the stars of the show, but I’m seeing a lot of potential for my garden’s corners. Right now we have more common blackberry & raspberry vines.
- Bush Cherries – A Tart Surprise: Craig’s excitement about bush cherries was infectious. Jewel and Crimson Passion sound like they’re not just fruit producers but also garden beauties.
- Asian Pears – The Orchards’ Pride: The talk about Asian pears was a real eye-opener for some. It’s already one of our favorite fruit trees along with this little Meyer lemon citrus.
- Jujube – The Date of the Garden: Craig introduced us to Jujubes, and honestly, I’d not heard of them. These small, date-like fruits with a sweet, apple-like texture are new on my list.
- Quince – The Forgotten Treasure: The English side of my family loves Quince, and my neighbor has an old Quince that’s doing great. They grow in Asheville. These subtle but aromatic, pear-like fruits are perfect for jams and jellies.
- Goji Berry – The Superfood Star: I was surprised he brought up Goji Berries! Had no idea we could do these. These little red powerhouses are not just healthy but also quite the eye-catchers in the garden.
- Chokeberry – The Hardy Native: Chokeberries might sound a bit intimidating, but Craig’s description of their resilience, flowering, and health benefits made me curious. Plus, they’re native, which is a big plus for supporting local wildlife.
- Kiwi (on trellis) – A Climbing Delight: Last but not least, Kiwis! Craig’s tips on growing these vine fruits were a revelation. I’m already envisioning a kiwi-covered trellis in my garden, but you need big sun to get these to sugar out.
Craig’s talk wasn’t just about listing cool trees; it was a deep dive into the soul of fruit gardening. His tips on site selection, frost management, and pest control were pure gold. He didn’t get into some trees I have already planted, like a sour cherry and a Greengage plum, but it did broaden my horizons. OK, here we go with the transcript!
“My name is Alison Arnold. I’m the extension agent here in Buncombe County, and I’ll be your host today. So welcome to gardening in the mountains, fruit trees for the home Garden.
I’d like to welcome our speaker today, Craig Monty.
Craig has worked as an extension agent for the North Carolina Cooperative Extension for over 25 years. He’s presently the extension area specialized agent in commercial vegetable and fruit production in the 39 Westernmost counties of North Carolina.
Craig graduated from Berea College in Berea, Kentucky with a bachelor’s degree in agriculture and has years of experience growing small fruits in his own landscape. We are super excited to have him here today to share his tips and tricks.
Craig: All right, sounds great. I decided to title this PowerPoint, “Not Your Mama’s Fruit Trees for the Home Garden”. Cause we’re really gonna talk about a lot of other fruit trees that mama had, but maybe some different varieties and different things like that.
So I’m gonna first take off with some technical information. Just I want you to get on the same page as me. We’ll get into a lot of different fruits and have some stops in there. But I want you to understand what, what the, what the terms are for home gardeners and for homesteaders.
You know, when we look at different kinds of fruit crops that we’re growing, we either have a niche crop, a specialty crop, an alternative crop, or a value added product even when you’re doing it for the home garden.
And what we’re really looking at today are niche crops that are the crops that appeal to a specialized section of the, of the population like us in our home gardens. What fruit trees can we grow on a small scale and have good production in high, high value that’s in there?
A special crop is something that someone’s intensively growing. That’s the tree nuts. That’s that different horticulture crops, floor culture, those kind of things.
We’re really talking about niche crops today.
An alternative crop will be something that that fills a niche in a cropping system. Like if you’re doing soybeans or you’re doing, you know, you’re vegetable garden and you’re putting something in between that.
Then when we take our crops and change them into a form, like I do a lot of jams and jellys, that’s making strawberries into jam is what we’re talking about on that.
So we’re all on the same page on definitions. I want you to think about, there’s all kinds of tree fruits and shrubs that are suitable for your niche home gardening. And this just an unbelievable amount that we never talk about in there.
Some of the more common ones that I’m gonna talk about today are persimmons Asian and native. Of course, I can’t do anything without talking about paw paws. That’s my most favorite fruit. Figs, pomegranates, mulberries, elderberries. I added a few shrubs in there cause I really felt like that. Even though we’re talking about tree fruits, some of these shrubs really work real well. And you’ll see with some of the pictures at the end how we do multiple plantings at different levels in the landscape in there.
Select the Type of Tree To Grow – Start With What You LIke to Eat!
So when you’re thinking about tree fruits, especially selecting the type of fruit to grow is the first step. And I’ll say right off the bat, if you don’t eat it, don’t grow it. You know, you need to know which tree
Craig Monty: Sunlight’s, very important. A lot of the tree fruits that we’re gonna talk about are, a few of them are a little bit tolerant to low light or shadows, but you want full sun, which is about six hours. You know what I don’t realize sometimes, even when I’m looking at site selection to help someone is I forget about shading. If we got larger trees that throw shade over some of our smaller trees, watch out for that. You know, cause the sunlight affects that color and sugar content in the tree fruit that you want. The more sun you’ve got, the, the more sugar content will build up in that fruit, you know, so what I’ll do a lot of times, and you’ll see some pictures later when I get into the photographs, is you feel cut the lower limbs of a lot of these trees in our landscape. We can allow sunlight to come into the canopy, especially for some of these trees that grow under the canopy in there.
One thing I wanted to make note of, when you’re thinking about growing fruit trees and you’ve had a lot of vegetable plants in a certain area, be aware of nematodes, especially if you’re gonna grow some plums and figs. Those are the ones that get damaged a lot. If you’ve had a vegetable garden for many, many years and you’re transitioning to fruit, some of those nematodes may be moving along in the soil. So you may wanna test for that if you have that as a suspect.
So at home we can’t really do this big creation and are worried about frost pockets. We just need to do an observation in a large, a large orchard, this is what we’re looking for. You know, something stops that cold air from moving in and causes a frost pocket right in this little area right in here through here. We just want to have good drainage and make sure when you’re thinking about that, the air drainage is what you’re looking for and you’re not trapped in a little area.
Craig Monty: Just a little bit on fertility high pH, which is mostly what we’re gonna have in our home garden areas. You know, the biggest thing that you want to remember and even make note of people in the home garden over fertilizer, we want to add fertilizer every year. Every year.
If your fruit trees are growing less than 10 inches each year in that current season’s growth, then they’ll respond to fertilizer. If you’re getting 18 inches, I think I got five feet on one of my apple trees last year growth. My god, that’s way too much!
If you’re getting around 18 inches or more, don’t even think about fertilizing. If you’re composting nut like me and I add, you know, mulch around my fruit trees every year and a little, little bit of compost, you’re probably getting enough fertility that’s, that’s, that’s there.
The best time to fertilize if you’re not getting that growth of that 10 inches is in the win the late winter, early spring. So that would be now right before we fertilize or pull that mulch back and add that fertility in there. Uh, oops.
🌳 Best Asheville Nurseries for Fertilizer 🪴
Craig Monty: One last one, one couple more things before we get into different, different varieties. Purchasing plants, you know, make sure your area’s ready to plant. Sometimes you’ll wanna actually stick ’em in a container and grow ’em out a little while to make sure you can take good care of ’em, but order well in in advance so you’ll know when that planting date is.
Right now, we have great local nurseries all over Western North Carolina with a good selection of blooming fruit trees. However, make sure you look at the varieties before making a purchase. Sometimes the variety may not be what you want.
If you tell the local nurseries what you’re looking for, they may be able to get those varieties for you if you get into their order system ahead of time. Reams Creek and some nurseries in Asheville are great examples of this.
When to Plant based on Root Type
Let’s talk about planting. The planting process varies depending on the species.
For tap-rooted plants like pawpaws, fall and winter planting may work better. Make sure you plant at the recommended depth for that specific species, water well after planting, and that’ll help them establish.
Remove any Dead Plants to Reduce Need for Pesticides
When it comes to pest management, focus on keeping the plants healthy and preserving natural enemies. Try not to spray pesticides too often. Find allies and pollinators, learn about natural enemies, and maintain a healthy cultural environment. Sanitation is important too, so make sure you remove any dead plants from the trees. This helps reduce the use of pesticides, which should be a last resort. When using pesticides, try to find organic or environmentally friendly options.
Companion Planting for Floor Management of Fruit Trees
Lastly, let’s talk about the floor where the trees are growing. We need to manage the floor by controlling weeds and mulching. Mulch is the best thing to use, and natural mulches are preferred over plastic. If you need to use a biodegradable mulch or ground cover while the trees are establishing, that’s fine. Make sure there’s always something growing on the floor, as bare ground is not recommended for a home garden. Companion planting is great for floor management. In my garden, I grow pawpaws, and below them, I have leaves and other plants growing. This creates different levels in the floor management, and less exposed soil is better. Find a companion that works really, really good for your floor management.
Alison Arnold: I’m gonna just jump in. Let’s just stop right here and have a time period if that’s okay. If anybody has any questions about, about the, the technical part of growing fruit trees.
We have a couple of Craig actually. One about nematodes. One is, what is the prevalence of nematodes in Western North Carolina the that are problematic and how do you, how do you manage for those?
Nematodes from Garden Stores: Sprays & Cover Crops
Craig Monty: Yeah, one of the things that we’ve noticed is if there’s a lot of transplants that have come that you’ve bought, say at a big box store and you put them in your garden, sometimes those come from Florida or they come from other areas that are more sandy. So they have a little bit of nematodes in them sometimes and you’re moving them into your home garden.
So just avoid that area or plant something that will, there’s all kinds of chemicals that for nematodes, but you can do a cover crop of rye grain that’ll reduce that enough to where you lay that out. So put that in your rotation. So maybe give it a year if you’ve grown tomatoes in there or peppers or eggplant, those, those not shade type plants carry those nematodes a little more.
Or if you’ve had sweet corn in there, you might have some clipper beetles. So just, just be aware of what you’ve had in that area before you put fruit trees in there. If you’ve had just a normal landscape with ornamental plants, you shouldn’t have a really problem with that. I think it’s $5 to have that tested with NCDA if you have a concern, I wouldn’t really worry about a lot of those chemicals. It’s just maybe do a, do a cover crop.
How to Protect Fruit Trees From Frost?
Alison Arnold: Okay, great. What are your best tips for protecting fruit trees from frost? You mentioned about siding, but once they’re in, how do you deal with That?
Yeah, one of the biggest things for the home garden is we have options that a commercial nursery doesn’t have. So placing them, if you see frost early every year coming into your landscape, avoid that area if you can.
The second thing is to make sure that you pick a variety, like if you’re wanting to peach really, really bad, find a variety that blooms really late like contender or, or Georgia Bell. Those are little later varieties so we can avoid these frosts we’re having right now.
My contenders have just, just, just bloomed about a week ago and they’re now forming peaches. So now I know that, you know, I, they can stand a little bit colder temperature than they could when they were in bloom.
We can actually protect, if the trees are very small and dwarf trees, you could actually wrap those trees with a fabric, you know, that were a row covers for a, for six or seven degrees, but in the commercial nursery they can’t do that.
Tip: Water Fruit Trees to Protect Against Frost
And then the last thing you can do is to actually, if the trees are small and dwarf, we can use water. We can actually, I’ve saved some of my cherries, I’ll, you’ll see a picture of my North star that’s very small, that’s like six feet at the most. But I was able to put water on that and then just leave the water all night long. I think it was last year we had like a, I think it was 18 or 20 degrees later in the season, so I just let the water go all night long. There’s a way to do that. So those are all the methods that we can do in the home garden that we can’t do in the commercial nursery.
Alison Arnold: Okay. One, one more question. “how do we define high elevation?”
What is High Elevation for Growing in North Carolina?
Craig Monty: High elevation for us and fruit trees would be 24 to 2,500 feet and higher. And that 25 and 24 lower, we can grow almost anything. So let’s say you’re looking at figs as a tree to grow. You know, the Verizon figs are used to that lower elevation.
So if you’re going higher, you would have to pick something like party Chicago, Celeste, those kind of fruit trees. And we have local nurseries that know very well about the figs that are doing better for elevations. Like, I can’t think of the one in Black Mountain. It’s, oh, um, not edible landscape, but it’s something like that. But those local nurseries have more experience for you. So know where your elevation is in your home garden and then adjust for that.
You know, he has a lot of varieties that I normally don’t recommend, but he’s used to knowing that okay, if you’re at 3000, do not use Negra. You know, you’ll use something different in there. All right. Okay. Super. Thank you so much. All right, let’s keep, let’s keep going.
I’m gonna hit some, hit some trees now that I really recommend for you to do in your home garden. Let me get to, uh, let me minimize Alison so I can’t see her. There we go.
Native Persimmons to North Carolina
The first one that you really need to think about is your native persimmons. There’s a lot of grafted cultivars out there for us. We’re gonna have a ripening in October through November and you don’t have to wait till the frost hits. You don’t have to wait till they fall on the ground. You have to wait till they begin to soften on the tree.
If you look at the picture I’ve got here the top, you see where it’s been cut off, but you can see the persimmon is beginning to wrinkle. That means it’s beginning to get less astringent in there. And this particular persimmons, native persimmons are or either male or female. So we just buy the female varieties because we are know in our area, we have a lot of of native persimmons that are in there. One here’s a list of cultivars. Early golden is excellent. Dollywood’s another one that’s done real well for us. It’s more of a higher elevation, you know, and there, so here’s some good varieties. The quality is really good on these. They’re a little bigger than what we just find naturally out there.
Asian persimmons
The next persimmon is the Asian persimmons. They’ll even ripen later into the season for us. You know, some of the varieties you wanna look at that, that are not as stringent are the hot, I can’t say these, but I listed them here. Far, far, you, the fu you the, the gho are non astringent and do real well for us in the region here. We can pick them and just eat them without letting them change in that. It’s a large tree. So pick those out, you know, if you’ve got an astringent variety, it’s the same as with the native. You wait till it starts beginning to soften or wrinkle just a little bit, then that’s what it, that’s, that’s when it’s ready to go.
Fig Cold Tolerance in North Carolina
Going on to the next one and then I’ll take a break in a minute here, Alison, but I wanted to talk about figs cuz I mentioned those.
Their cold tolerance is real important to look at. You know, the ones I’ve got listed here are doing really good for us at that 3000 or less range. Most of them will get damaged less than 10 degrees.
But if you’re looking at something for high elevations that work for us, the Celeste is a little earlier, LSUGolden’s a good one, Brown Turkey, is that ever bear? That’s if you’ve got a fig in the mountains and you don’t know what it is, it’s probably Brown Turkey cuz it will continue to ripen even if it’s a later or in the season. My favorite, the last one listed, is Heart of Chicago.
And you don’t need cross-pollination for figs. All of them are self-fertile. A lot of times if you’re high and you got a wind blowing towards you put it in a protected area in there. And I like to keep these fig trees pruned to a bush form rather than to a high form. That way we can protect them a little bit better.
I’ll talk about pops real quick. It’s the largest edible native fruit to the United States in our region. They’re gonna usually ripen between August through the end of September. A few varieties that are a little later will go into October, but not too many of ’em.
Their grafted cultivars are much better than seedlings because we know what the fruit size is. I just mentioned a few cultivars that do well for us. Most of the Peterson varieties do well. Wabash seems to be the biggest for us in our region, does a very good color in the fruit mangoes. Another, you need two cultivars are two different trees from different areas to have good cross-pollination.
The span in the understory is eight feet in the row and whatever width you need, like 10 feet between rows in there.
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They’re astringent as well, but not quite like a persimmon. So you wait until the fruit begins to soften and then cut the fruit off of the tree in there is the best way to do that. Don’t wait till it falls down or the possums will beat you to it.
Let’s stop right here. Allison, is there a question that we need to cover before I continue with these varieties?
Asian Pear in Western North Carolina
Yeah, we’ve had a couple Asian pear. At what age do they start bearing fruit?
Okay, with the Asian, it’s very variable to variety. Most of them are gonna be at the four year range between four and six in there according to how they’re growing. Sometimes they’ll bloom at the two and three year, but pinch ’em off, let those structure of the limbs get a little bigger before you allow them to fruit. Okay.
Especially the, the fu you will go really quick. It’s about three years. Okay.
Alright. And then somebody asked the difference between fu you, Hannah, Fu U and Fuo zero. Yeah, they’re, they’re both non astringent, but they’re, they’re just difference in size and color on those two. They’re just from the same species, but they’ve been bred differently. Okay.
Okay. And then one more, how does Little Miss Figgy do at 2,400? Little Miss Figgy would do great. Don’t, don’t put it higher than say 3000 and it will not like that wind if you, if it’s, if you got a lot of wind coming from the southeast protected on a side of a house to where it’s not getting that wind or it’ll freeze down just a little bit. It can’t take, but like minus five in there. Okay.
Alright, that’s it. Thank you. Alright, I’m gonna continue on with pomegranates and don’t let me go over, I don’t wanna go over too much time.
Growing Pomegranates, a Deciduous Shrub
Okay. Pomegranates are one that we really need to look at. It’s a Middle Eastern fruit. It’s a deciduous shrub that really looks very nice in there. We have that multiple bloom cycles on pomegranates, so it’s a long range of harvesting. It ripens, A lot of times I see them like in the pied moth, they’re gonna be in August, they’ll start coming in, but for us it’s usually September.
And so you’re, it, it does a lot like a paw. It’ll bloom and it’ll bloom and it’ll bloom and you’ll have a series of them beginning to rip it. So it’s kind of hard to do that varieties, oh wait a minute. They’re, they’re, they’re, they’re dried a lot and they’re fresh. I’ve seen them more processed from the home garden to where we’re getting that juice out of there.
Grenada Pomegranate Variety
More than anything else. Grenada is a really good variety that does well for us. Angel Red is the one that I’m showing here in the picture. It’s a nice deep color soft sea. That would be something like Utah in there. I’ve seen, if you can look for the Russian series, you have to order those. The the r series works a lot better and it’s better, it’s more cold, hearty, especially of those of us that are above that 25 to 3000 and we want a pomegranate growing.
They don’t need cross-pollination. They’re very much in the same realm.
If you think of a fig, and I’ve talked about how that less than 10 degrees tends to freeze them back a little bit, but they’ll come back pretty good if you get some freeze on the ends of it.
The biggest thing about pomegranates, especially if you are living on a dry ridge, these are really tolerant to dry to dry sites and so they’ll put a good little tap root down and survive a lot of our dry droughts without water in there.
Bush Cherries for Flowers & Fruit
Okay, the one I’m going crazy about on my property are bush cherries. I never thought of them as a great tasty, but there’s a lot of ’em like that are out there. Different colors. This is one of the ones that I have here. It’s a real, most of ’em are tart. This one’s jewel that I’m showing here. A, a darker color’s crimson passion.
They have a very fragrant flower. That’s what I didn’t understand when I first started growing these. I’ve got four, five varieties now of the bush cherries. Uh, a lot of ’em have a pink flower with a little red center. So that’s a really pretty dwarf shrub that you can grow. You know, probably eight feet tall. Mine are at the six-foot range. I’m keeping ’em there. Mass plantings make a nice screen. So look at these as an alternative to having fruit in. I’m getting like at, at the, at the six-foot range. I got two quarts off of one bush. So you could actually almost make a run a jam off of your tart bush cherries. I’m so excited about them. I’ve just ordered three new varieties this year.
I’ll put in here just a few little things about some shrubs that I’ll think are that you need to be thinking about. You know, there’s these new varieties. The blackberries, this one, here’s Primark Freedom. It’s not a very good picture cause they’re a little bit bigger than that, but they’re very large berries. They’ll get two varieties. You get two crops a year off of these new types. You know, prime Gym is one that’s grown out there, but they’re thornless, they’re, you know, you can grow them on a tr or sometimes even as a bush. They’re pretty hardy for that.
Another one that I don’t recommend for commercial at all, but I’m so excited about it. When I lived in Oregon, I, you look at ’em, you think of ’em as they’re a mulberry, but they’re a really nice blackberry called Columbia. Great variety. It was developed in Oregon. It’s heavy yielding. It has to be, this one’s a trailing so it has to be held up a little bit. But it’s a really great one. I had this one and ordered it last year and it’s just not doing real well yet for me cause it was so small. So I’ll probably plant it in the fall. But you see how long they are and they’re very, very tasty.
Bush Blueberry in Containers
Another shrub that you really need to be looking at, especially if you’re trying to do things in containers on a small scale, is the bush blueberry. These berries are actually very small, but they’re excellent ornamentals. Most of them grow to about three feet tall. I counted about five to 10 pounds per bush last year, and it takes about 80 berries or more to make even a cup. But they produce well.
Let me tell you a little story about this. My grandson took care of all the little bush cherries (blueberries) I bought last year. After the season, he called me and said, “Hey Papa Paul, can I have some other fruit to take care of besides those blueberries? I just hate eating blueberries.” So I’ve given him the strawberries now.
Look for the Brasil berry, which is a brand or a patented type of these bush blueberries. They’re either called Brasil be or Bush and berry. The PERA is the one I’m in love with, and I have a picture of it that I’ll show you in a few minutes. But all of them seem to do well for us. They make a great hedge, and I think I have a picture of that to show you. This is a great variety to look at, Sunshine as well.
Peak Lemonade Blueberry
Another one I laughed about when I got one for a gift was a peak lemonade blueberry. I have a picture of it where I’m using it as a shrub border. They’re similar to southern blueberries and to me, they’re stunning ornamentals. I just fell in love with them. They’re very nutritious and colorful. If you look at the photograph, they’re really dark red. It’s hard to tell when they’re ripe, but the redder they are, the sweeter they are. You can also find pink ones. They’re great for zone six even, so you high elevation folks would do well with this one.
Cranberries & Ben Leer Variety in NC
A lot of us think of cranberries as something we can’t grow, but we have a clone from Wisconsin that’s working really well for us here. It’s called Ben Leer. It works well in acidity, so work some peat moss into the hole when you plant it. It’s very low growing, and we think of them as more and more of a shrub. I wanted to add this one in here because it’s great for a home garden to have just a few oddball little fruits. This picture comes from editable landscapes up in Afton, Virginia. That’s where I got mine. We’re having good production off of it.
Bananas for Home Gardens in NC
Bananas are also great for a home garden, but you need to take them in and out. The dwarf banana is one to look at. People think of bananas as something very ornamental, but this little prince is a super dwarf variety. It makes very small bananas, but it takes a long time. It’s a nine-zone, but it’s one we can take in, does well on a patio, and makes big leaves like an ornamental would.
If you’re thinking that you’ve got to have a little bit of bananas because you’re from a region that has them, this is the variety that can work here. It never gets over four foot tall, so it’s easy to move around and protect it for the winter. I just wanted to add that in.
My favorite blackberry ( zone five self-pollinated )
This is my favorite blackberry I’ve had for many, many years. I just wanted to put this in here just because Craig wanted to. It’s not really one, but it’s a very thorny blackberry, but it’s white and this is a picture of it. This is the first fruit I had off of it last year. It’s a zone five self-pollinated. I got my berries last year in July, but it’s an unusual fruit and I just thought I wanted to add that in.
Elderberry for Home Gardens
Elderberry is another one that is really great for the home garden. We’re seeing the birds be a problem for us, but a full sun or part shade works really good. The Niagara seems to be a good cultivar for us. That’s the one I have. I actually have the American that gets enormously tall. If you see the humbles here in the picture, you can actually put little bags up on the humbles to keep the birds from getting those in the home garden. I think I had little bags over every one of mine last year, so I was able to save them all. Sandal and Samuel are the two really short varieties. Sometimes hard to find, but they’re European and they’re very small, maybe six feet. So it works really good for the small or garden.
Growing Jujube in Western North Carolina
Then I’ll talk about jujube and take a little break. Jujube is one we really need to be thinking about. It’s a really great fruit. I discovered this when I was living in Oregon studying small fruits. There they are about a plum size fruit. Very drought tolerant. Self-pollinating. If you’re in an area where you have a high pH, it’ll take a pH as high as eight. The problem I’ve seen with this is it suckers a lot if it likes the soil. So you’ve gotta keep the suckers pulled off. These are two different variety pictures here. This one comes, I think I stole this from the New Mexico university. You can see the difference is this one is a nice redder color, so it looks really nice in the landscape. Crunchy like an apple.
Trellis Hardy Kiwi
Hardy kiwi is another one. It’s gotta be trellised. It’s a grape-like fruit. It has a really tart flavor. Male and female, you gotta have both. One male will pollinate five females, so it’s deciduous and it makes a nice attractive vine for a border.
Let’s stop right here and see if there are any questions before I continue.
Nan King Bush Cherries
The bush cherries, are these the Nan King types? No, there’s actually, there’s a few that are Nan King that that read one I showed you, but the, the nan king has a bigger seed than some of the bush cherry varieties that are out now. What’s the name of the company that Gurneys is the company that has a bunch of varieties. They have, they have released the Nan King has got a bigger seed than other varieties.
Which of these plants are native to Western North Carolina?
Okay, sure, sure. And also, just be mindful of anything that would be suitable for shade or light shade as you go through this.
I see that, for instance, on the mulberry you have that, so didn’t talk about that one. Yeah. Okay, great. Yep, thank you.
Some of the shaded tolerant varieties, all of your blueberries in the shrub variety are shaded tolerant papas. You can actually put underneath a canopy, and that’s the way I’ve got pictures in a few minutes to show you how they do in shade and how they do in the sun. But mulberries are one you need to look at. Let me try to get my slides. I’ve got y’all. There we go.
It’s easy care. It’s one that we’re not taking advantage of because it’s really a nice fruit. It’ll do a lot more shade than people realize. You can keep it smaller. It’s a big tree but easy to take care of. Yes, just prune it, you know, in there.
Some of them are either DiUS or mon, so it has male and female. So make sure when you’re ordering that you–and most of them that you’re gonna get are gonna be self-pollinating–that in there, you know, but make sure it is that way. It’s very fast-growing, so it’s very aggressive. You’ve gotta prune it pretty much. It’s native to our area, but we’ll want to choose varieties that work for us in there. I’ll try to remember each one to tell you about whether it’s native or not.
Quince Cultivation in Western North Carolina
Quince is another one. This one is not native to us in the fruiting size, but you want to get a variety that does a nice big fruit on it. And there are a lot of them out there. Gurney’s has got some, and that’s one of the go-tos for the oddball shrubs that are out there. It’ll make a tree if you let it. I didn’t put varieties in there because there are so many different ones. But I would pick one that is more in the fruiting type rather than, like, I do a lot of flowering quincy. I have a double flowering one. I use that for a banker plant for aphids. But this one is not. It’s gonna be more for fruiting type for us. All of them are self-pollinating. They’re on the market. We’ll get our fruit in September and October. So make sure that you’re getting a variety that is a little bit earlier in blooming. They have to have full sun. They won’t fruit in shade in there. Well-drained. I think I put that on there.
Chokeberry Cultivation in Western North Carolina
Another one that people are looking at called chokeberry. It’s one of the erroneous, you know, it’s native to North America, but we don’t see them too much in our area here. It’s like the shrub that’s kind of been cut and gone away. But it is native to us in there. Beautiful flowers that are white in the spring. The color for me on the foliage is more important than the barcos. The berries are not, to me, that great in flavor. They’ve gotta be cooked to make ’em a little bit better. They’re very short, three to six feet, but the fall color is really, really dark red and really nice for us in the landscape.
And a lot of times when the fruit comes on, if it’s heavy, you can see the picture too. To the left you’ll have that darkish green color leaf and that really, really dark black color of fruit. So it actually looks nice even if you’re not going to eat it.
Goji Berry Cultivation in Western North Carolina
Another one that I’ve been experimenting with myself is the goji berry. I’ve had to move it three times now, the second time I moved it is when I realized the heavy amount of fruit you can get off of a goji berry. I’ve now put it on a trellis because it is so aggressive and loves the semi-shade, even though it’s supposed to thrive in full sun. As long as you’re getting that morning sun on it, it will fruit all the way till it freezes. I got fruit last year off of mine even around Christmas. The flavor’s not too great for me because it’s so tangy, so if you process it into some kind of compote, it works really well. But it really needs support. The lower picture is actually the fruit off of mine. It looks nice too if you have it on a fan trellis. I put it on one of those, but it was too small, so I’ve got a wider one and I’m gonna cut it back to that.
Papa Small Orchard
Moving on to some of my pictures, this is one of my papa small orchards. If you see, these are the papa trees. They’re a little bigger than this. It’s two years ago. But you see underneath here I’ve got leaves as my mulch. Now I’ve got a walkway back here, but if you look at these smaller plants underneath, this is ginseng, here’s some over here. So I’ve grown them in little patches. Then last fall, these were removed and placed all underneath these papa trees. I have a stream over here in the background, but this is the way I’m doing levels above. This is full shade with a little dappled light coming through on this picture.
Another picture is another angle of the same area. You can see these little patches of papayas here. These are the fruit. These are the walkways that go in through here. So I’ve got a high canopy above papayas that are in the next canopy. In the background here, that’s cohosh. And I’ve got smaller plants that I’m growing underneath that canopy.
Paw Paw in Full Sun & Full Shade
This is a pawpaw tree that has grown in full sun and has been pruned. This particular tree is in full fruit and is five years old in a hot sun time period. If you look at the next picture, you can see a pawpaw in full shade that’s six years old and is also fruiting this year. But you can see how open the branches are on this pawpaw. This tree is right off my front porch, and my landscape is completely edible. I’ve planted up to 70% plants that are edible or usable.
Here’s a typical orchard that’s on the upper side of my place. You can see I’ve got levels of things growing underneath, including fruiting pawpaws that are four years old. You can see how large they’ve gotten in four years. I’ve got some smaller ones in the back, but I keep adding as I find them. These are particularly older trees that are in semi-sun or what I would call morning sun, and you can see how heavy the canopy is here. It’s about 50 trees on the edge of a forest.
Brazzle Berry Blueberries
Another picture shows a wonderful small low bush called brazzle berry blueberries that I’m nuts about. Look how shiny the leaves are on these blueberries in my landscape. I’m getting two crops off this plant because of our long season and because we have a fall. A lot of our azaleas and blueberries get confused about our light, so I get one crop in the spring, then I’ll pick them all off and then all of a sudden I’ll get another flush of blooms every year. It’s a wonderful little edge plant.
I always wanted you to see a picture toward my cabin. This is that bush cherry I was talking about, and I got two quarts off of it last year. In the background, there’s another bush cherry, and I have pink lemonade as an edging plant stuck in the landscape in different areas. You can see how it’s nice to add smaller trees and shrubs, some trees back in here, and figs in this area.
Another picture shows full-on shade plants. This is a pawpaw tree, bush cherry, and cinnamon ferns that I eat the little French when they first come up and make pit pickles out of them. Lastly, there’s a picture where I put that goji berry I was telling you about. It’s an older picture, but the goji berries are still growing.
Regosa Roses for Rose Hip Cultivation
Now, growing up on this trellis right here, this is another great opportunity. I didn’t put this plant in there, but I’m crazy about regosa roses because I can get the hips off of these – they’re big hips off of these. You can see the blooms that are in on this one here. But you can just do that as an edge and then keep them in check. And I didn’t mention, but these are those blackberries and raspberries we were talking about. These are raspberries here, and then half that starting here are blackberries so that you can add that into your landscape very easily. And then put fruit trees that… that… that… that one cherry bush cherry was over here at the side of that.
This is an example of taking a normal, this is north star cherry, which is one of my favorites.
Dwarf Cherries in Western North Carolina
You know, if you’re looking at sour cherries, the Montmorency, the North star and the Bayton are the three that do really well on a dwarf rootstock. I’ve got cherries, this is two years, and I’ll let it fruit. You can see I’ve got it propped up right now because the cherries were quite heavy last year. But you can still get a lot of that fruit on it really quick with a dwarfing rootstock on there.
Just a closing picture of a walkway coming into my house and all the different edible plants – bush cherry here on the left on there. Here’s my contact information, and we’ll stop right here. And Tetons and Allison, wow, that’s great. I went through it pretty quick. So yeah, that’s a lot to take in. We will certainly be posting the recording of this talk as well as the PowerPoint and resources. The chat box has been really busy. Craig and I saw it going up. Beep, beep, beep.
Paw Paw Root System
So gonna go just so the paw paw, what type of root system does the paw paw have? And will you be moving those when they mature? They look like they might have been in a close area. Yeah, I let them grow in close areas. And so I don’t have, like in my orchards, I just place them wherever they feel like they need to be. But I keep them about eight feet apart, and pawpaws grow differently. You need to understand it grows differently than like a cherry tree.
Cherry Trees have a Fibrous Root System vs Tap Root System
A cherry tree has a fibrous root system, while a pawpaw has a tap root system that goes straight down. So, the sooner you get it in the ground, the better it will do, as it will push roots down first and grow very slowly on the top. After the second and third year, you will see a big growth of expansion on the top. The pawpaw grows quite differently from a cherry tree. There’s a pawpaw right behind me that’s five years old, but the first two years, it just sat there and put the tap root down. Did that answer your question, Alison?
Gogi Berry Varieties
On the Gogi berry varieties, we really don’t know the varieties that work well for us here. I forgot the name of that variety, but it’s the earliest I could find on the market. We’ve got one farm up in Black Mountain that I’m working with. We’ve got four vit varieties there, and all of them are still producing in July and August when it starts getting cold. We’re not getting enough early on that. If anybody finds an earlier variety, we need to share that with our other folks, but right now we’re just in the experimental stage for the mountains.
Is black and red mulberry compatible to graft? Yes. The rootstock doesn’t matter. But if you’re putting a red on a black, make sure that below the graft, there will be a lot of growth. Try to keep that cut off for the first three or four years if you’re trying that grafting.
Black Walnut Tree & Companion Plant Tolerance
There were a couple of questions about black walnut tolerance. What would you say about that? Which ones would be tolerant of growing near black walnuts?
Okay. Of your fruit trees, very few of them are going to be tolerant of the black walnut cherries. Definitely not. You’ve got to make sure you’re at least 80 feet from a big tall walnut tree. Pawpaws are very tolerant. Black sea blueberries are tolerant, but none of the rest of them I can think of, not even blackberries. Some of our blackberry varieties will just really stunt if they’re near that. So just stay away from the black walnuts. Good question.
Okay. All right. And then of course we get our perennial question around deer. Mm-hmm. and I would also add bear, but you know, they’re, they’re asking about deer resistance.
Deer Resistance in Fruit Trees
Okay. On fruit trees, most of them are not deer resistant. Pawpaws are gonna be very resistant. They will not eat the leaves. They’re very toxic. Even if you crunch ’em up, they even smell kinda like gasoline. That’s not a problem. The problem with them is they’ll smell them when they get ripe. Then they’ll come and they’ll break down your limbs trying to get to those ripe fruits on the Pawpaws. When you’re looking at a lot of the other fruits, the biggest problem I’ve had with fruit trees in the home garden for me has been raccoons and bears. Bears will come in and lay by my blueberries and just reach up and pull the blueberries down and eat them. So I’ve had a lot of issues with that.
Deterrent Sprays for Deer
What’s worked for me on a small scale is those sprays that deterrent sprays have worked. I now have these little screamers that I put at the edge of my fruit trees where they’re, when they walk in it makes a sound and flashing lights for birds. I look like the white trash down the street with all the little cans hanging up all of the, I do see c the, the little CDs drill holes in them. I’ve got those little spinners that go round and round just to make action. It just looks horrible for that time period. But that’s that short time period that my fruit is there.
Bagging Fruit for Bear and Pest Protection
I found that bagging fruit works wonderful for me. You know, I didn’t do it until last year. I bought these little bags where you can actually put ’em up over your grape clusters. It’s very expensive, so it’s not for commercial use, it’s for us home gardeners that want to do that. I had a hard time finding them; I saw them in China and bought them. The only place I found them was on Amazon. Just search for “fruit bag”. I put them on my pawpaws, grapes, elderberries, cherries. I’ve not done that with blackberries, I’ve just tried to put netting over my small cherry trees.
Which Berries can be Invasive?
I’m gonna assume that when somebody did ask a question about which ones are invasive, blackberries and brambles, if they’re happy, they’re gonna spread. Yep, yep. So yeah, fruit trees, you’re not gonna have a problem except for with pawpaws, they’ll make a patch. They have stolons, they’ll move. Cherries are not a problem. I’ve had a few problems with bush cherries, you know, I’ve got that one I showed you in the picture, they’ll just come up down below. But I’m eating them all now, so I’m not having a problem with that. But you know, if you let them fall to the ground, they’re going to start populating. But the rest of them I’ve talked about are not invasive. Mm-hmm. Okay. Just aggressive.
Fruit Tree Flowering
Sometimes I think earlier we talked about Asian pears, but could you repeat how long it takes for a pawpaw to come into flowering? Yes. Most pawpaws are going to be at that five-year range, you know, very rarely. I’ve got Wabash fruiting at three and four, but I cut all the blooms off there. They’re just structures, not there. Most of your Asian pears… No, we didn’t talk about pears, but anyway, most all of the fruit trees in the home garden will start producing fruit on a four-year time period.
Cherries, you’ll get them in four years, sometimes earlier depending on the variety. If you’ve got a pawpaw that’s grafted, it’s going to be a lot earlier than a seedling. Cherries dwarf in three years, non-dwarf up to that mid-size range takes a couple of years. Did that help a little bit, I think? Yeah, yeah. That helps a lot.
Pruning Guidelines for Fruit Trees
We don’t have a lot of time left, but if there are any pruning guidelines that you would like to share that will help people navigate their trees when they go out? I have some slides. Can I go through about four minutes of that? Absolutely, some of those. Sure. Because I think if everybody would understand that most all fruit trees in the home garden are going to be what we call a central leader. That’s the way I like them all. I tried my peaches, that will not work. You don’t get enough sun on your peaches. So that one’s going to be an open center and I’m not going to cover that. But I’ll quickly in four or five minutes give you some slides that are in there that we added. That will show you a little bit of a way to do that. I’ll do it really quick, Alison. Okay, perfect. Thank you.
What shape to train your fruit tree?
All right, so what shape do you want to train your fruit tree? There’s no correct answer, but mine is central leader. I do all of mine central leader except for my peaches. I’m actually doing my plums as a central leader as well. But this is what they recommend and that’s in your notes in there. I’m going to go over the central leader really quick.
Training a New Tree
When you first buy your tree, you want to train it. So in those first three or four years until you have fruit, it’s going to be trained. A lot of them are coming as whips. If you’re buying from a good local nursery, you’re probably going to have a larger six or seven-foot tree that’s already beginning to shape on that. So you have those two ways to buy.
If it’s a whip, it’s going to be one particular 30 to 40 inches somewhere in there, you know, cut it off. You can see right here this little drawing I’ve got, you cut it off. And the reason for that, once you get it, you take all the blooms off too as well. You want to break bud down lower and get a lot of limbs that you can shape as you go up.
Second Year Fruit Tree Training
In the second year, after cutting the tree in the first year, it will make a few limbs down below. You should cut it again and it will break bud. At this point, you’ll have whirls, which are a top view where the limbs are equidistant.
You want to grow and make whirls where there are no limbs between them and start another whirl at the top. In the life of the tree, you want it to look like a Christmas tree with three scaffold whirls.
Maintain a little space between those whirls so that the tree can have enough air and light to grow. Stop the tree from getting too big by cutting it back, and keep it in shape. For instance, keep your papaya trees at that eight to 10 foot range. Constantly cut the end piece off and reduce the size of your fruit tree.
Every year, you should aim for one trunk, trying to get those angles a little bit wider. Remove any branches that cross each other, space the lateral branches, and remove anything that grows in between.
Any dead or diseased branches should also be cut off at any time of the year. If anything grows tremendously, like the four-foot growth in the middle of summer, cut it back. Get rid of anything upright or out of the way.
Home Gardening & Summer Pruning Every Year
To properly prune your fruit trees, it’s important to remove any improper or unnecessary limbs during the summer. However, it’s crucial not to make any drastic cuts during this time. If the tree gets too tall, you can spread out the branches. It’s essential to avoid removing too many limbs during the growing season and to wait until the dormant season to do any major pruning.
Talk Wrap Up
Thank you, Craig, for providing us with this valuable information. It’s clear that fruit trees are not just for your mother’s garden. We appreciate your time and expertise.
For those interested in attending more gardening programs, please visit the Master Gardener website for a list of upcoming events. We’ll also be sending out a recording of this session and an updated handout on April 20th.
Thank you again, Craig, for joining us today. Have a great day in the garden, everyone!