Growing your own food w/ fruit trees

[Anonymous No.789225]

So I've recently moved to a large plot of land and want to start growing various fruit trees (in hill country Texas). I've been looking at various options like avocado, apple, pear, peach etc but I seem so much conflicting info.

Mainly I've decided to start with something east like a pear tree (which they sell at home depot). I'm reading I'll need to buy two but don't by 2 from the store because they are clones and won't produce fruit etc. What do I need? How do I ensure my investment will grow fruit? Any suggestions?

[Anonymous No.789254]

>>789225
/out/ has an ongoing gardening thread that is worth a look: >>>/out/484761

When you look for a fruit tree, find out if that type of fruit needs more than one type of cultivar in order to fruit. Trees like apple trees and sweet cherry trees require more than one type to successfully pollinate. The problem isn't "cloning" it is just how they are. So get a honeycrisp and a granny smith and they will produce fruit together.

Also check out the styles of pruning. Like "espalier".

[Anonymous No.789265]

>>789254
This is good advice.

Also, some trees are self-fertile and won't need to be pollinated to make fruit but you will be limited in variety if you plant just these.

Rootstock is also an important factor when choosing a tree since it controls how high and vigorous the tree will grow and whether it needs to be staked permanently or not.

[Anonymous No.789270]

>>789225
Contact UTs or A&Ms university outreach. There are people there that can give you good literature based on properly vetted research. You will also be able to determine if your soil is suited for fruiting trees. The botanists and agronomists can help you get past the background noise of ameturs on the Internet.

[Anonymous No.789286]

Most fruit trees will give you a huge assload of fruit, once per year. If you want to have fruit all year, get used to jarring it.

[Anonymous No.789375]

>>789270
This.
Go to the source for information that suits your area. The hill country area is a challenging area for many fruit trees

[Anonymous No.790863]

>>789225
I would doubt that the home depot trees are that great
The best thing is to get a specific variety you like that is grafted on some quality roots
you can get low mid-high and high trees this way. low trees grow to about 9-12 feet and the high ones can reach 33 feet.

Be sure to do this >>789270 and think about what of the possible fruits you like most (you will get lots of it so I hope you really like it)

Do you want pears to use for cooking (firm pears), do you want them very juicy or sweet ? Keep in mind that not all pears can be kept for the same amount of time in a fruit cellar.
The juicy pears will rot faster then the firmer ones. Pears stay fresh this way for up to 3 months while apples can be kept for up to 7 months(depending on variety).

Something you can do is make cider/juice or dehydrate some fruits.
one your tree has grown a bit you will have a lot of fruit all at once be prepared for this. Cleaning 150 pounds of rotten apples is not fun.

[Anonymous No.790887]

>>789225
You should see if you can start a bee hive too, since bees are in decline and your fruit trees are in dire need of it.

[Anonymous No.790895]

>>789270
This.

[Anonymous No.790898]

>>790887
Reverse engineer this for optimal bee keeping

http://www.honeyflow.com

[Anonymous No.790990]

>>790887
Orchard owner and bee keeper here. Honey bees are not needed for crop pollination. There are 100s of other types of bees, wasps, and flies that pollinate the crops. There are even companies that specialize in bumblebee pollination.

FYI, all my bees died this winter. It may be related to the neighbor starting to plant yellow dent #5 corn a couple acres form here. I can't eat the honey now, when before the corn was planted I could. Now I get instant and severe allergic reaction to it. But, not from honey from a friend's apiary who doesn't have corn fields within a few miles of his place. The colonies started declining almost the instant the corn was putting out pollen. I don't know what the hell happened, but it fucking sucks ass.

[Anonymous No.790991]

>>790990
I never said honey bees!
But yeah, like you said, he could use alot of things, but bees are pretty gud (just as bumblebee). I'd avoid the kind of company that rents out beehives that comes on a lorry, since that tends to stress the animals.

About your hives, that fucking sucks. People are fucking so badly with the pollinators, they dont even realise what they're doing.
I hope the owner gets hit by a truck, and his plants get torched.

[Anonymous No.790993]

>>790990
Pls sue your neighbor for justice. This is bullshit.

If he started shitting in the aquifier you could get him, but he can plant corn that kills your bees?

[Anonymous No.791160]

>>790990
Thank Monsanto for making corn that's toxic to insects...

[Anonymous No.791306]

>>791160
Unsubstantiated fear mongering.

[Anonymous No.791436]

>>791306
well Monsanto has made corn that is toxic to insects, it seemed a good idea since it would not need pesticides.
Some types of corn are doubtful but yea

[Anonymous No.791446]

>>790990

Did you do an autopsy on your hives yet? I had quite a bit die this year, but i know exactly why. Last year wasn't great for honey, and it was a brutul winter, so they all starved. I even put them on sugar but they ran through all that, i never thought for a second that they could burn up that amount of food. But i guess they did, now i'm pretty well fucked.

If you start up an orchard, you don't have to keep your own bees btw. You could get in touch with your local beekeepers association and i'm sure somebody local would love to put some hives on your land. Fruit tree honey sells for big bucks.

Of course, bees are necessary for pollination, tons of other animals will do it if no bees are around. But bees are the only domesticated animal we can use to harvest honey, have control over the process.

[Anonymous No.791527]

>>791436
http://www.snopes.com/food/tainted/monsantocorn.asp
Educate yourself.

[Anonymous No.791597]

>>791527
But, that backs up what was stated ITT, also that article screams this image. Bt Corn is specifically designed to kill insects that eat any part of it. Thus, bees taking pollen from it can suffer colony collapse disorder. I grow heirloom corns like Bloody Butcher, Blue Hopi, and Painted Mountain. The bees love the pollen and completely cover the tassels.

>>790991
Yeah, if that happens to honey bee hives, I wonder what is happening to the natural local pollinators? How badly are they suffering?

>>790993
He can also spray RoundUp with impunity too.

>>791446
The bees all died this winter before the temps went below 32F and before it snowed. They have tons of food too. The only reason I have...had bees was for the honey. I don't think I'll continue to maintain an apiary anymore. I'm switching to full production maple syrup instead.

[Anonymous No.791606]

>>791597
http://academy.asm.org/images/stories/documents/100yearsofbtcolor.pdf

has narrowly targeted and controllable inseciticidal properties =/= kills every bug that touches it ever.

[Anonymous No.791616]

>>791606
>narrowly targeted
Lepidoptera =/= a narrow target range

And who do you think conducts this research? Companies that sell the products and are under no obligation to published negative results, government researchers who have had their budgets slashed and are not encouraged to conduct such research, or university researchers who would have trouble soliciting funding for such research.

[Anonymous No.791716]

Bayer is doing this thing where they are sending out free bee friendly plant seeds to people....called Feed A Bee. Or maybe it's just a horrible trick.

[Anonymous No.791753]

>>791597
If you buy "organic" produce it's been sprayed with the same stuff, but in far greater amount. 'Cos it's "natural".

Anti-GMO activists are the same as anti-vaxxers and global warming deniers. Ideologic arguments always trumps the scientific consensus.

[Anonymous No.791925]

>>791753
wat

[Anonymous No.791944]

>>791925
"organic" growers still use pesticides and herbicides. They just aren't very efficient so they have to use more of them. There's plenty of "natural" poisons out there.

[Anonymous No.791947]

>>791753
Depends on what "Organic" means. A buddy of mine grows some shit with no herbicide or pesticide but uses chemical fertilizers.
Some say anything non gmo is organic.

[Anonymous No.791952]

Organic has nothing to do with pesticide and herbicide, it's about not using fertiliser

[Anonymous No.791954]

>>791947
There's actual certification for labeling "organic".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organic_certification

It's mostly a scam though. It's part of why "organic" costs so much. It's not sustainable at the levels most farms need.

[Anonymous No.791991]

>>789225
Depending on the plant, you might need a male and female tree, or just 2 different trees so they can cross pollinate because some trees dont like masturbation. Generally speaking, you should buy more than that just because its your first time and you most likely will fuck up one or both and you don't want to be stuck with 1 useless tree 5 years from now. Go to a real nursy and buy the slightly bigger trees for 10-20 dollars more. These trees represent an extra year or so of growth and will generally have a higher chance of survival. Don't buy anything already blossoming, and if you do, make sure you brutally crush any blossoms the tree tries to produce in it's first year. This is will pretend your stupid tree from killing itself by making dinky little fruits when it should instead be establishing its root system. Do not skimp out on the water. Watering a fruit tree in its first year is imparative. If you have wind problems at any time of the year in your area, make sure you stack that fucker down while you are planting it so it doesnt become some twisted bendy retard tree which will inevitablly commit tree suicide after 5-10 years of being blown in one direction.

For your second year, make sure you carefully watch your new trees. The fact is, domesticated fruit trees hate themselves and try to commit suicide all the time. You need to manually prune off branches or smash buds so the tree doesnt produce so much fruit that it breaks its own branches.

[Anonymous No.792014]

>>791952
>Organic has nothing to do with pesticide and herbicide, it's about not using fertiliser

This would be wrong. They cannot use synthesized fertilizer. They use the same practices most farmers have been using since forever. Now that we have more efficient 'cides and ferts (better living through chemistry) most farmers use those to yield more food per acre. Organic is a load of bullshit fad.

My tomatoes don't taste better than store bought because of the chemicals I used. They taste better because my seeds are heirloom and I pick them at their peak. Store bought uses seeds for varieties that look good and travel well, not for taste.

[Anonymous No.792058]

>>791952
Organic is about scamming ignorant hippies.

[Anonymous No.792061]

>>789225
That sounds hard. Do I get to profit from my labor?

[Anonymous No.792076]

OK here's the deal OP. Fruit trees you can buy are all the same shitty clones that produce the same woody fruit as the supermarkets. Especially if you buy stone fruit. Commercial cultivars of stone fruit need spraying at the right day of the year or no fruit and leaf curl.

If you can possibly manage it, get ungrafted cuttings or grow some fruit trees from the seeds of the oldest fucking trees you can find.