For the gardener on a small lot, the site of the home orchard may be limited by necessity, the placement of trees being to a large extent dependent upon the overall landscape design. The homesteader, who has several acres, has at least a modest choice.
Since fruiting plants are more permanent than vegetables, their placement in the landscape design becomes most important. And often their usefulness may be doubled by considering also their ornamental and shade values.
Apples, plums, peaches, and pears are such beautiful flowering trees that they may be used for the same design scheme as crab apples, dogwoods, and redbuds. Pecans and walnuts (as well as apples and pears) make fine shade trees, too.
In areas where they grow well, blueberries will fit in nicely with other flowering shrubs such as forsythias, hydrangeas, and spiraeas. A trellis or arbor becomes both useful and beautiful if bunch grapes or muscadines are planted to grow on it. Unsightly fences may be covered or a patio comfortably shaded if a few grape plants are placed thereon.
Pollination, as applied to fruit and nut trees, vines, and bramble fruits, really is a matter of “companion planting,” yet we seldom hear it called this.
Fruit and nut trees almost always do better if at least two of each kind are planted. For some varieties the need is imperative — they will bear scarcely at all without pollination help.
Few home gardens can accommodate more than two or three different kinds of fruit. To grow them successfully it is very important to consider varieties known to be self-fertile (also called self-fruitful), or known to be good pollinators for the other types you wish to grow. If your homesite is not large enough for many trees, check around the neighborhood and list the fruit and nut trees you find there. Some of them may be good pollinators for trees you would like to plant.
In this limited space I cannot possibly list every variety of each fruit that will ensure pollination, but there are a few general rules to follow for good results, and I have tried to include them in the chapters that follow. But remember that pollination, important as it is, is only one factor in success.
While I won’t go into the details of cultural practices here, it should be said that trees in a healthy growing condition will naturally derive more benefit from correct companion plantings. Healthy trees produce more pollen. And this applies to all trees, whether standard or dwarf types.
If you have room to set aside a definite orchard area, the first year you should do subsoiling, plowing, disking, and grading well in advance of planting. If possible, choose a gently sloping site with good air and good soil drainage. There is nothing a tree dislikes more than hardpan and wet feet.
Soil that absorbs water readily is the best, and you can test this by digging a 10-inch-deep hole and filling it with water. If the hole drains completely within about eight hours, drainage may be considered satisfactory. However, if the water remains much longer, drainage is poor. To prevent root rot, work crushed rock, gravel, or peat moss into the soil. Mixing compost with the soil will help in more ways than one.
Grow a nourishing cover crop such as rye, vetch, or soya beans, and disk this in after well-rotted manure or compost has been spread. Allow time for its decomposition, for the trees do not like raw manure or organic matter around their roots. In a natural forest setting, raw organic matter remains on top and only decomposed humus touches the roots.
For shrubs or bramble fruits, the materials should be worked into the soil at least one foot deeper than planting depth. For trees, mix the additions to the soil about two or three feet deeper than the intended planting hole.
The actual planting of the trees comes after the soil has settled. Planting trees in early spring is the generally accepted practice, but in the South or Southwest it is often possible to plant with good results in fall or early winter.
Shortly before planting, fill the hole with water and allow it to drain completely. This will prevent the surrounding soil from absorbing most of the water applied to the freshly planted shrub or tree.
Maintaining a layer of mulch around new plantings helps their growth, since it preserves moisture and in time becomes compost, providing plant nutrients.
Dr. Ehrenfried E. Pfeiffer, author of The Biodynamic Treatment of Fruit Trees, Berries and Shrubs, believed that a mixed culture in the orchard as well as in the garden helped to keep down insect pests. He advocated growing nasturtiums between fruit trees as a means of transmitting a “flavor” to the tree that made it disagreeable to insects. He considered it particularly effective when the flowers were grown under apple trees to repel woolly aphids. A washing down of the trees with nasturtium juice was recommended, if planting them was not possible.
Dr. Pfeiffer also suggested for orchard use stinging nettle, chives, garlic (against borers), tansy, horseradish, and southernwood. Permanent covers considered beneficial are clovers, alfalfa, and pasture grasses. Temporary crops to turn under for green manure are such biennial clovers as mammoth clover, red clover, and incarnate clover. He believed buckwheat useful on a light, sandy soil.
Though a mixture of red clover and mustards is considered ideal, Dr. Pfeiffer cautioned that mustard, while it sweetens the soil, can become a rapidly spreading weed and for this reason should not be allowed to go to seed. Alfalfa hay, particularly if shredded or chopped, was thought to have special benefit as a mulch.
Dr. Pfeiffer also recommended a paste for all fruit trees consisting of equal parts of cow manure, diatomaceous earth, and clay, to which horsetail tea is added. This mixture is applied with a whitewash brush or with spraying equipment in the larger orchard.
A number of excellent preparations for fruit trees are obtainable from the Bio-Dynamic Farming and Gardening Association (see Sources).
Here are some other helpful suggestions concerning fruiting plants:
• Marigolds planted near apple trees or between rows of nursery stock will benefit the trees used in grafting and budding.
• Wild mustard is beneficial to grapevines and fruit trees, but cut it before seeding.
• Dandelions in the area of fruits and flowers will stimulate them to ripen quickly.
• Chives improve the health of apple trees and will prevent apple scab. Use chive tea as a spray against apple scab and for powdery and downy mildew on gooseberries.
• Pollination is accomplished mainly by bees and other insects, so no sprays of any kind should be used at blossoming time.
• Ripening apples give off small amounts of ethylene gas, which sometimes limits the height of nearby plants but causes their flowers or fruit to mature earlier than normal.
• Oats may have an inhibitory effect on the growth of young apricot trees.
• If you must replace a young fruit tree on the same spot where an old one has been removed, choose a different variety.
• Garlic juice or the powdered extract contains a powerful antibacterial agent effective against diseases that damage stone fruits.
• Do not place apples near carrots in a root cellar, as they may cause the carrots to take on a bitter flavor. If apples and potatoes are stored near each other, both will develop an “off” flavor.
• Nut trees usually take a little longer to bear than fruit trees. While you are waiting for them to grow, interplant with peanuts (legumes). They will improve the soil and give you a crop as well.
• Nut trees are good to plant in pastures and near stables or manure and compost piles, to repel flies on cattle.
One gardener reported that her unthrifty young peach trees apparently were assisted by moldy oats from the cleanings of the oat bin when one bushel was applied to each tree. After several weeks all her slow-growing trees were putting out new, healthy leaves.
A possible reason for the good growth of the peach trees is in the mold, rather than the oats, for almost all trees have a symbiotic relationship with some fungi (including molds). The fungi grow around the plant roots and furnish vitamins and other natural compounds necessary for a fast-growing and healthy tree.
This brings us back to the soil again. Because of this relationship, it’s a good idea to have some of the original soil packed around the roots when transplanting a shrub or tree. Quite likely there will be fungi in the soil beneficial to the plant.
You may even do this: If you have a tree that isn’t doing well after being set the first time, take some soil from another tree of the same variety that is growing well and dig it in around your problem tree. There’s a good chance that your tree will perk up and grow.
This will work well not only with trees but also with other ornamentals and even with houseplants. If possible, investigate the original, invigorating habitat of such plants, remove some of the soil, and see if nature doesn’t have a cure for the ailing plant far better than any commercial fertilizer you could buy.
Some self-unfruitful varieties of blackberries require cross-pollination. Others, even though self-fruitful, may benefit from the pollen-distributing visits of insects.
The flowers of blackberries are very attractive to their primary pollinators, honeybees. If a variety of blackberry is known to require cross-pollination, ensure a sufficient supply of pollinators in large acreages by placing colonies of bees in or near the field.
Do not grow blackberries near raspberries. Plant them in moderately acid soil, 5 to 5.7 pH.
Mulberries, chokecherries, and elderberries may be used to attract birds away from valued blackberry crops. Blackberries themselves are strong vital plants that help in preparing the soil to support the growth of trees.
Have at least two different varieties — any two — in a blueberry planting.
Blueberries like very acid (4 to 5 pH) and open, porous soils, such as a mixture of sand and peat with loam. The water table should be 14 to 30 inches below the surface.
Boysenberries are sometimes called trailing or semi-trailing blackberries.
Bunch grapes such as ‘Concord’, ‘Fredonia’, and ‘Niagara’ are self-fertile, and one vine will give an abundance of grapes even if planted alone. Grapes like a moderately acid soil of 5 to 5.7 pH. Perhaps more than any other fruiting plant, they need good air circulation to prevent fungus disease such as mildew. This is particularly important in moist, humid climates.
Grapes
Grapes in their natural environment swing high in the trees, doing especially well if the tree happens to be an elm or a mulberry. Such grapes are seldom troubled by either brown rot or mildew. Since growing grapes in trees is impractical for most, the best solution is perhaps a terraced hillside unsuitable for other crops.
Try planting hyssop with your grapes for an increased yield, or use legumes as an intercrop. Cypress spurge is unfriendly, so do not let it grow nearby. To discourage the rose chafer, keep grass out of the vineyard, since its larvae feed on grass roots.
(See also Muscadine below.)
As natives of the southeastern United States, muscadines do well under the high temperature and humidity found in this area, but they also are resistant to drought conditions and disease. Under favorable conditions they will live many years, but are not hardy in the northern United States. Some varieties are self-pollinating, while others require a pollenizer.
Raspberries, which like a near-neutral soil (6.5 to 7 pH), are self-fertile.
Because of virus disease, black and purple raspberries should be planted no closer than 600 feet from red varieties. Do not grow raspberries and blackberries near each other, either. Do not plant any raspberries near potatoes, since they make the potatoes more susceptible to blight.
Almost all strawberries now sold, both June-bearing and everbearing, are self-fruitful. The “best” varieties vary from one area to another.
A cover crop of rye following sod will reduce the incidence of black rot on strawberries. They do well in combination with bush beans and spinach.
Strawberries will benefit if a few plants of borage, also a good attractant for honeybees, are grown near the bed. Lettuce is good used as a border. Pyrethrum, planted alongside, serves well as a pest preventative. A spruce hedge also is protective. White hellebore will control sawfly, and marigolds are useful, too, if you suspect the presence of nematodes.
Pine needles alone or mixed with straw make a fine mulch, said to make the berries taste more like the wild variety. Spruce needles also may be used as a mulch, but my personal preference is chopped alfalfa hay.
In some areas, growers plant strawberries as an intercrop in peach, apple, fig, orange, or other tree-fruit orchards. When the orchard is first planted, strawberries may be set out and grown for several years before the trees need all the ground. The strawberries furnish some income from the land, or at least pay the expense of caring for the orchard. The intensive cultivation given strawberries is especially good for young orchards. Also, because strawberries do not bear well unless moisture conditions are good, they will prove a good indicator of the orchard conditions.
Only a few apples will bear well if grown alone, producing a good crop from self-pollination. Most should not be planted alone or be depended upon for pollination in a combination; they are either low or lacking in viable pollen. Suppliers of fruit trees have information available on which combinations work best, and you should be sure you understand the needs of any tree you plan to buy.
If you have room only for one tree, there is still a way that you can have your favorite apple and pollinate it too. Graft a branch of a good pollinator somewhere on the host tree and this will serve your purpose. Apples like a near-neutral soil with a pH of 6.5 to 7.
All apricots are self-fertile, but they will benefit from cross-pollination to bear more heavily.
All sour pie cherries are self-fruitful and have no pollination problems. A single tree may be planted and expected to produce well from its own pollen.
Sweet cherries all are self-unfruitful and will require another variety nearby to enable them to set fruit. To further complicate things, there are even instances of pollen incompatibility among this group. A good nursery will give you information on pollination needs of the trees you are interested in.
Wheat is suppressed by the roots of cherry trees, and potatoes grown in the vicinity are less resistant to blight.
Lime, lemon, orange, and grapefruit trees grow better in the area of guava, live oak, or rubber trees, which apparently exert a protective influence.
Crab apple trees are often planted simply for their beauty. But they are self-fertile, and a good variety such as ‘Dolgo’ will provide both beauty and fruit.
Many people consider figs a tropical fruit, but there are varieties that will do well elsewhere. The fruit of the fig tree is peculiar in that the flowers form inside the fruit’s skin. Pokeweed grows well as a fig’s companion.
Most figs offered by general nurseries are self-fertile, but some varieties will not mature their fruits unless the tiny female flowers are fertilized by pollen from a special kind of fig tree called a caprifig. Other varieties bear larger fruit if they are subjected to this process, which is known as caprification. The pollen is transferred by a tiny wasp that spends part of its life in the fruits of the caprifig. In regions where Smyrna and other figs requiring caprification are grown, caprifigs are planted also.
Fig
Mulberry trees have rather insipid-tasting fruits but can be very useful to lure birds away from cherries and berry plants. The birds seem actually to prefer mulberries.
The Russian mulberry (Morus alba ‘Tatarica’), a rapid-growing tree, bears an abundant crop resembling blackberries, which may be made up into pies and jams.
Nectarines are self-fruitful. They also will pollinate peaches, and peaches nearby will help the nectarine to set a larger crop.
Most peaches are self-fruitful, but a few require a pollinator (which can be any other variety of peach). Peaches like a near-neutral soil with a pH from 6.5 to 7.
Never plant a young peach tree where an old one has been removed — plant a different fruit tree.
If peach leaf curl appears and only a few leaves are affected, pull them off by hand. Feeding the tree with well-rotted manure or compost high in nitrogen will help the tree back to health. Garlic planted close to the trunk will protect against borers.
Almost all pears require other varieties nearby for a good fruit set, the exceptions under most conditions being ‘Duchess’ and ‘Kieffer’, which are self-fruitful.
‘Bartlett’ and ‘Seckel’ are not compatible, and ‘Kieffer’ is not always a good pollinator for ‘Bartlett’.
If you live in an area where fire blight prevails, it will pay you to plant resistant varieties.
Some orchardists believe that pears are suppressed by the root excretions of grass, but a successful pear grower in California, believing the opposite, lets a variety of grasses and weeds grow in his orchard.
This same grower sprays against codling moth and leaf roller, using ryania because it is specific, killing only chewing insects. As a fertilizer he uses chicken manure to provide nitrogen, plus other animal manures, cottonseed meal, compost, and dried blood.
There are two species of importance. The first, American persimmon (Diospyros virginiana), is native to a large part of the United States, and the second, the Oriental or Japanese persimmon (Diospyros kaki), is a native of China and Korea. American and Japanese trees are not interfruitful. Persimmons come in dozens of cultivated varieties, which are considered superior to the wild type.
The common persimmon is a small, low-growing tree perfectly adapted for the homeowner with limited space, since it ordinarily attains a height no greater than 40 or 50 feet. The incon spicuous, greenish yellow, urnshaped male and female flowers are borne on separate trees.
Persimmon
A number of excellent grafted persimmon varieties are offered by the Louis Gerardi Nursery. (See Sources.)
Almost all plums require pollination, though there are a few that will fruit alone. Plums like a moderately acid soil of 5 to 5.7 pH.
Quince trees are self-fruitful.