Gardening & Landscaping
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Apple & Pear trees?
I live in zone 6-7 & I would really like to plant an apple tree & a pear tree in our yard. We have a pear tree now but it's half dead & seems diseased so we want to take it down. My questions are: When should I plant the trees-now or in the spring? What is the maintenance on these trees? Any other info would be helpful. Thanks!
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Re: Apple & Pear trees?
It is fine to plant most trees and shrubs in the fall. Apple trees seem like a lot of work; my understanding is that they require a significant amount of work, especially when it comes to pest management. In my area (Western WA) there are serious problems with apple maggots.
IMO, you're taking out one crappy tree and replacing it with two crappy trees.
If you want fruit, get ready to enter the high-maintenance zone. You'll have to go to war with a constant onslaught of insects and diseases. If you are buying an ornamental Pear just for the flowers, it will have babies all over the neighborhood, because Pear trees are really just huge invasive weeds. Oh, and Pear trees are also highly prone to breakage and limb failure, so don't plant it near anything or anyone that might be crushed by falling debris and sue you.
I don't know what type of pear tree you're thinking about, but please rethink if you're wanting a bradford pear. Not only are they a huge nuisance, but they smell like cat urine when they bloom.
We have a semi-dwarf apple tree with 5 varieties grafted on. We lose a few every year to coddling moths, but we've gotten a ton of great fruit off of it. I've done a couple of things for coddling moth control (a syrup-vinegar mixture in gallon jugs hanging in the tree, tangle foot strips around the trunk, and a spray-on kaolin clay treatment) and I do a bit of pruning if I see any sign of fireblight. I also cinch the branches up a bit when they get weighed down by fruit (I just cut down the strings today since we just harvested the last of the fruit). I probably spend 10-15 hours a year tending to it, and this year we got maybe 50 apples. Well worth it to me. I wouldn't call it high-maintenance, and it's a very nice-looking tree so far. But the climate out here is magical for all food products, so it might take more work elsewhere.
I can't speak to the pear, but I do know the ornamentals have a reputation for breaking back in GA.
I guess it depends on your priorities for your yard. I want to produce as much of our food as is practical in our small yard. If you're not interested in eating out of your yard, you could probably find something easier. However, if you enjoy growing your own food and will use it, I wouldn't let the maintenance required by an apple tree stop me. My citrus trees are probably easier (though not practical for you) because I spend maybe 1 hour a year on them, but I think the apples are much easier than the peach I put in this year will be.
You may also need more than one of each. You need to look for self-pollinator varieties or plant two or more different types of each.
When we bought our house, we had one each dwarf plum tree, dwarf mackintosh apple and dwarf bartlett pear. The mackintosh won't create fruit without a pollinator. I added a dwarf golden delicious and now we are starting to get fruit on both apple trees. My bartlett pear is a self-pollinator. I think I need to add another plum tree, because I don't get anything from it.
We have had a lot of issues with bugs on the fruit and as soon as they start to get ripe, something eats them. So you may want to invest in netting or an owl statue if you do decide to go with fruit trees.
I live in Texas. My mom has had a dwarf apple tree and a pear tree for over 10 years. They both produce buckets of fruit each year. The apple tree had minor bugs this past spring, but other than that my mom has done nothing to them. They grow, bloom and produce fruit without any problems. She use to cover them if we had an extreme freeze, but she hasn't done that in years.
We love to make apple pear pies with the fruit. I think the key is to plant them in a nice sunny place with plenty of room to grow. The dwarf apple tree has to be planted in pairs to produce fruit.