Fruit Trees For Your Garden

Imagine the sweet taste of a delicious apple. Taste the beautiful sharp and sour blend of a lemon on your tongue. Envisage the gentle and juicy feel of a pear as it dissolves in your mouth. Sounds delicious, right? Now consider the unseen amounts of pesticides and other harmful chemicals that have invaded these mouth-watering fruits? They don’t seem so delicious anymore, do they? There is no telling what has gone into the pear you bought from the supermarket the other day or the box of strawberries you bought from the grocery store! The only way you can be sure of scrumptious yet chemical-free fruit is to grow orchard trees yourself. Buy fruit trees and use this guide to help you ensure you plant and care for your trees properly. And don’t worry; you won’t have to take an hour’s drive to your nearest garden centre to get your hands on these. There is a wealth of fruit trees online nowadays for you to choose from.

Which Rootstock?

One thing you do need to consider when you buy fruit trees is the rootstock. The necessary information you need should be given in the specifications when you purchase fruit trees online from garden centres on the internet. When considering the rootstock, this does not pertain to a particular type of tree – it is a general consideration as all trees are propagated onto rootstocks. This is an important attribute to take into account when you purchase fruit trees online because it gives you a good indication of the vigour of the tree and the size you can expect it to grow to. The diversification in size can actually be extremely stark. Let’s use apple trees as an example. You may buy an apple tree that boasts a dwarf rootstock and so reaches a mere height of about 5 ft. However, you can have the exact same type of tree – yet with a vigorous rootstock – and this can grow to over 20 ft high. Now, imagine if you buy fruit trees and you don’t take this into account. You could end up with a garden that has been completely taken over by massive apple trees! The general guideline is to look for rootstock labelled either M9 or M27 when looking to buy fruit trees for your home garden. However, every outside space is different and so you need to consider the various fruit trees online with regards to the proportion of your garden specifically. An experienced tree surgeon can advise on this, and it is good to have one on hand in case something goes wrong with the trees you plant.

How to plant fruit trees

Now you have the basis to purchase your perfect fruit trees online, let’s delve deeper into how to plant them and look after them so that they stay perfect! The first thing you need to do is decide where you are going to plant your trees. They need to be planted in an area of your garden that will benefit from at least six hours of full sun each day of the growing season. Orchard trees need to be in a warm position so that they encourage pollinators. Furthermore, it is always a recommended idea to plant any new cold stored trees in early summer i.e. May or June. Why? You will notice a consistent growth pattern thanks to the fact that the air and soil temperatures are warm. If you plant the trees any earlier then you are likely to experience a stop-start pattern of growth.

In addition to this, if you truly want your orchard trees to flourish then you need to plant them in an area boasting at least three feet of soil. Nevertheless, we are well aware that for a lot of gardens this depth of soil is not possible, and thus to ensure your orchard trees aren’t compromised you need to ensure you have an effective irrigation management system in place. If you do so then you can maximise production in areas whereby soil is merely one foot deep.

Aside from soil depth, another important aspect that needs attention is whether there is the presence beneath the surface of an impervious layer of hardpan. This has to be penetrated otherwise there will be no scope for root growth or drainage and thus the conditions for your orchard trees to grow are undesirable, to say the least. If breaking through the boundary is not an option then make sure you buy a great quality soil and create a raised bed.

Once you have got past any potential problems that may have been in the way you can begin to prepare the site for your orchard trees to be planted. The soil needs to be cultivated not compact. And don’t apply fertilizer from the offset. A lot of guides for planting fruit trees online tell you to put fertilizer in the hole that has been dug out before the fruit tree has even been planted. This may seem like a good idea but it is highly ill-advised. You can actually damage the tree’s growth rather than enhance it because the chemicals can be toxic and thus damaging to any new roots. With regards to the actual size of the hole you are going to dig you need to make sure it is twice the size of the tree’s roots (at the very least). And, before you actually plant your fruit tree there is just a few more things you need to do; cut any broken roots!

To conclude, you have all the ingredients you need for the successful plantation and growth of orchard trees. You need to make sure you buy fruit trees that have the relevant rootstock for your garden size and space. This information should be readily available when you buy fruit trees online. Once you have done this make sure the soil is of a good condition and that your tree is in a place of substantial sunlight. Prune at the right time of year and have an effective irrigation system in place and you can’t go wrong!