The Best Fruit Trees And Bushes To Plant
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Here are some ideas within certain states about the best fruit trees and bushes to plant. One of the most rewarding things you can do for your family and your food storage goals is to plant your own fruit trees and bushes. Once established, they provide a steady harvest year after year with very little ongoing cost, and there’s nothing quite like walking into your own backyard to pick fresh fruit for breakfast. Today I want to walk you through some of the best options for home growers, along with tips for choosing the right varieties for your climate and your space available.
The Best Fruit Trees And Bushes To Plant
Why Grow Your Own Fruit
Growing your own fruit means you control exactly what goes into the soil and onto the plant, which is wonderful for families who care about clean eating. It also means real savings over time, since a single mature tree or a row of berry bushes can produce far more fruit than most families can afford to buy in a season. Fruit trees and bushes also add to your overall food security. Even in years when grocery prices climb, a backyard orchard keeps fresh fruit on your table.
Best Fruit Trees To Plant
Apple trees are one of the easiest fruit trees for beginners. Apples are hardy, store well, and have varieties suited to nearly every climate zone. Look for disease-resistant varieties like Honeycrisp, Gala, or Liberty, and remember that most apple trees need a second variety nearby for proper pollination.
Cherry trees are wonderful for families in cooler climates with a true winter chill. Sour cherries like Montmorency are especially easy to grow and are perfect for pies, jams, and dehydrating. Sweet cherries need a bit more care, but they reward you with fruit that is delicious straight off the tree.
Peach and nectarine trees produce quickly, often within two to three years, and the fruit is wonderful fresh, canned, or dried. They do need a sunny, sheltered spot, since the blossoms can be sensitive to late-spring frosts.
Pear trees are low-maintenance and long-lived. Wide varieties store for weeks after harvest, which makes them a great choice if you want fruit that lasts into the cooler months without much processing.
Plum trees are compact, often more tolerant of poor soil than other fruit trees, and produce heavily once established. European plums are wonderful for drying into prunes, while Japanese plums are best enjoyed fresh.
Apricot trees do best in regions with cold winters but early, dry springs, since late frost can damage the early blossoms. When conditions are right, a single tree can produce an enormous harvest.
Best Fruit Bushes To Plant
Blueberry bushes are beautiful, productive, and packed with nutrition. They do need acidic soil, so plan to amend your planting area with peat moss or a soil acidifier if your native soil leans alkaline, which is common here in the Intermountain West.
Raspberry canes spread readily and produce two crops a year if you choose everbearing varieties. They’re one of the most forgiving fruits to grow and a favorite for children to pick straight from the bush.
Blackberry bushes are vigorous growers that produce heavily in midsummer. Thornless varieties make harvesting much easier, especially if you have young children helping in the garden.
Currant and gooseberry bushes are wonderful old-fashioned choices that thrive in cooler climates and partial shade, making them a great option for a spot in your yard that doesn’t get full sun.
Elderberry bushes have become increasingly popular for their immune-supporting properties. They grow quickly, tolerate a wide range of soil conditions, and the berries are excellent for syrups and home remedies.
Tips For Choosing The Right Varieties
Always check your hardiness zone before choosing a variety. Here in the Salt Lake Valley and much of Utah, we generally fall into zones 6 or 7, which works well for apples, cherries, pears, plums, raspberries, currants, and many apricot varieties, while peaches and blueberries need a bit more planning and soil preparation.
Pay attention to chill hours, which are the number of cold hours below a certain temperature a tree needs each winter to produce fruit properly. Choosing a variety suited to your chill hours will save you years of disappointment.
Plan for pollination. Many fruit trees, especially apples, pears, and sweet cherries, need a second compatible variety nearby to produce fruit. Always check pollination requirements before you plant.
Give your trees and bushes room to grow. It’s tempting to plant closely for a fuller look right away, but proper spacing keeps plants healthy and productive for decades.
Mulch generously and water consistently, especially during the first two years while the root system is establishing itself.
Growing Fruit In Hotter And More Southern Climates
I know many of my readers garden well outside the Intermountain West, so I wanted to add some guidance for those of you in places like Arizona, Nevada, Oklahoma, and Texas, since your growing conditions are quite different from ours here in Utah.
In Arizona and southern Nevada, summer heat and low chill hours are the biggest factors to plan around. Low-chill apple varieties such as Anna and Dorsett Golden perform far better than traditional apple varieties that need a long, cold winter. Peaches and nectarines also do well if you choose low-chill varieties bred specifically for desert climates. Pomegranate trees thrive in this heat and are among the easiest fruiting plants in the region. Figs are another excellent choice, tolerating both heat and drought once established. For bushes, look at desert-adapted grapevines and jujube, which handle extreme heat beautifully. Afternoon shade and deep, infrequent watering help any fruit tree survive the hottest stretches of summer in this region.
In northern Nevada, where winters are colder and closer to our own zone here in Utah, many of the same trees that do well in Utah, including apples, cherries, and pears, will also thrive.
In Oklahoma and Texas, growing conditions vary widely by region, but humidity and heat are usually the main challenges rather than cold. Peach trees are a favorite throughout much of Texas and Oklahoma, with varieties bred for southern heat and humidity producing especially well. Pecan trees are a wonderful long-term investment in this region and are practically a Texas tradition. Plum trees, particularly Japanese varieties, handle the heat well and produce reliably. Fig trees also do nicely throughout most of Texas and southern Oklahoma. For bushes, blackberries are outstanding throughout this region and often outproduce raspberries, which struggle more in southern heat and humidity. Muscadine grapes are another wonderful regional choice, especially in eastern Texas and Oklahoma, where humidity is higher.
No matter which of these states you call home, the same basic principles apply. Choose varieties bred for your specific chill hours and heat tolerance; give your trees afternoon shade if your summers are extreme; mulch well to protect roots from heat stress; and water deeply rather than frequently to encourage strong root systems.
Preserving Your Harvest
Once your trees and bushes start producing, you’ll want a plan for preserving the extra fruit. Canning, dehydrating, freezing, and making jams or fruit leather are all wonderful ways to enjoy your harvest throughout the year. A backyard orchard pairs well with a home food storage plan, giving your family fresh fruit in season and preserved fruit year-round.
- Dehydrating Apples
- Dehydrating Bananas
- Dehydrating Blackberries and Powder
- Dehydrating Blueberries and Powder
- Dehydrating Cilantro
- Dehydrating Cucumbers and Powder
- Dehydrating Ginger and Powder
- Dehydrating Green Onions and Powder
- Dehydrating Kale and Kale Powder
- Dehydrating Kiwi
- Dehydrating Lemons and Powder
- Dehydrating Marshmallows
- Dehydrating Peppermint Marshmallows and Powder
- Dehydrating Mushrooms and Mushroom Powder
- Dehydrating Onions and Powder
- Dehydrating Pears
- Dehydrating Pineapple
- Dehydrating Raspberries and Powder
- Dehydrating Spinach and Powder
- Dehydrating Strawberries
- Dehydrating Tomatoes and Powder
- Dehydrating Watermelon
Final Word
Planting fruit trees and bushes is one of the best long-term investments you can make for your family’s health, your grocery budget, your food security, and your efforts to beautify your yard. The work you put in now, choosing the right varieties, preparing your soil, and giving your plants room to thrive, will reward you with baskets of fresh fruit for many years to come. Start with one or two trees or a small row of berry bushes this season, and watch how quickly your little homestead grows. May God bless our world, Linda
Copyright Images: Green Apples Depositphotos_409699570_S, Red Apple Trees With Wicker Baskets Depositphotos_94264302_S
Hey there, all you Food Storage Moms friends. I suggest that you don’t forget aronia berries, which are a super superfood and extremely easy to grow (at least in our Central New York area that gets winter cold). They are jam-packed with longevity enhancing polyphenols!! We were actually worried about our berry bushes and fruit trees after such a harsh, bitterly cold winter, but instead we found that our rose bushes (cousin to
many berry plants) and all of our berries have gone CRAZY with so many fruits coming on! That may be a self-preservation, “rebound” tactic of those plants after such bitterly blowing, freezing weather most of the winter.
Just remember that with Aronias, which tend to be astringent, you should freeze them and THEN eat them. The freezing removes the astringency and you get a yummy superfood berry for your Greek Yogurt, oatmeal or whatever. A great berry to dehydrate or freeze-dry for your prepping pantry and very much a zero-care plant if you live where it rains from time to time! Out here in Central New York, growing Aronia berries are practically a gift that keeps on giving!
Hi Jess, oh those berries sound great! I love when they keep producing every year. Linda
Good morning Linda,
I picked up something new I had not heard of before a few weeks ago at Tractor Supply. I bought 2 Northern Sand Cherry bush starts. Great for zones 3-7.
They grow 3-6 ft tall and have blue-black cherries that make great jams. A nice addition to my fenced in back yard. I have been living in town for a year now and I love it. I also planted 2 concord grape vines I picked up at Aldi. I have a 6 x 9 garden. Going to double the garden next year.
God bless you my friend!
Sending love and hugs,
Jackie Perkins
Hi Jackie are you still growing your garlic??? Your garlic is on my website!! I did not know you moved into town, how nice!! I love hearing about what you are going grow in this new garden! https://www.foodstoragemoms.com/how-to-plant-garlic-in-the-fall/ This post has your name and the garlic you sent me! Love and hugs to you, my sweet friend! Linda
Yes I moved a year ago. Sold my place and bought a house in town on a quiet street, nice neighbors.
I had to leave my garlic last year with the old place. But I have garlic ordered and it will be delivered in the fall. I will plant and have new garlic come spring next year! I will send you some!
You are a sweet friend!
God bless you, Jackie Perkins.
HI Jackie, I am so glad you found a home in town with great neighbors. What a blessing. You grow the best garlic! God bless you, my sweet friend! Hugs, Linda
In haste: The very best, gourmet raspberry plants we have ever eaten are the Purple Royalty raspberries. Gorgeous, LARGE berries and very prolific. We finally tilled under our old canes after almost 30 years last year and replaced them in a new spot with canes from Burpee’s. To our great surprise, the root “balls” had roots that extended 12-18 inches, so we laid the roots out flat in the rows. Now, a year later, they are producing some extra canes at the end of those long roots and TONS of purple berries are coming on. YAYAYAYAYAY!! Of course, we always get amazing berries by using the Espoma BERRY FERTILIZER! Wow, is that stuff amazing!! Also, if you need to acidify a blueberry patch, you can always use the Espoma “Hollytone”, which is for all acid-loving plants.
I also found out that this year Burpee’s is featuring a new everbearing black raspberry that not only produces 2 crops, but produces a large plant that is very vigorous: WINOT variety. We bought 4 plants to put between the few rows of old plants that are still somewhat lightly producing after 30 years!
One last suggestion for those who like to make their own medicine at home: “Bob Gordon” Elderberry is sold by The Farm On Central. We have done business with them twice now, and all has been quit good and not expensive, either. Bob Gordon is supposed to be a variety that produces lots of nice-sized elderberries with minimal care…. Can’t say yet, as our are still growing from “sticks”/cutting they send you, but we are very hopeful!
I hope you don’t mind me posting so much info. about all these berry varieties that are better than run of the mill. It just seemed a good idea to share with you all the knowledge we have about berries, since we practically have a berry farm over here!
Hi Jess, you have more experience with berries than me. I love your tips! I can almost visualize it, rows and rows of berries. Life is good! Linda
Oops. When rushing I sometimes make grammatical mistakes: NO! We do NOT eat Purple Royalty PLANTS!! But the berries are like nothing else you’ve ever eaten…so fantastic that people come up to me and ask “What is that other raspberry you’ve included in the dessert you brought to the pot luck today?”
ALSO: Since my original version of that latter posting disappeared and I had to start it all over again, I forgot something you should know: Espoma fertilizers can be purchased from Amazon, if you cannot find them at your local farm store. We are on Amazon Prime, so that means free shipping. Otherwise, the fertilizer may be somewhat heavy to pay for the shipping.
Hi Jess, your comment disappeared? I’m sorry. What raspberries do you grow if they are not Purple Royalty plants? I don’t have raspberries. Linda
Hi, Linda: Linda: I only grow the Purple Royalty, because they are the tastiest ones on the planet and very vigorous plants.
You may wish to try one variety that claims abundant red raspberry crops throughout the season. Oh, I remember from years ago when I was trained as a Master Gardener by Cornell Cooperative Extension, “Heritage” Red Raspberry was all the rage and also an everbearing plant that bears fruit 2xs/year! That is pretty old information, though, since I studied to be a Master Gardener when I was pregnant with our oldest, son Tim. Tim will be 44 in late October! Maybe look for a variety that has better characteristics with one of the parent plants that may have included the Heritage variety?
One of the best things about raising all of the bramble berries is that you generally only need to cut them back to just under waist high in very early spring and give them some berry fertilizer. If they get enough rain or you water them a bit during droughts, they will produce just fine all on their own. We don’t even do much of anything for the Aronias. I totally forgot to give them berry fertilizer this year, but I’ll bet we’ll still get gallons of those! At least, all of that information is true over here, in the “Fruit Basket of the East” (Wayne County, in Central New York.) We absolutely DO put up bird scare balls (Think AMAZON) to keep the birds away, though, or there would be very few berries left to harvest!! That is exactly why I gave up on harvesting dark, sweet cherries each July, due to the voracious birds!! We do love that by not spraying anything in our gardens for more than 2-2 and 1/2 decades, we see lots of birds and pollinators come to our gardens! In July, once I wake up in the a.m. to the birds twittering outside my bedroom window, I know the birds are or have nearly finished harvesting this year’s crops of sweet cherries….Not worth the bother anymore. They strip the cherries off the trees before they are even ripe, so when they are ripe, there’s almost nothing left!!!
We also use Jap. Beetle traps to not lose too many berries, as well. I’d say with those few tricks, we still get at least 90-95% of the berries that set each year! The problems we have the most of over here, revolve around peaches and cherry trees getting fungus diseases due to clay soil that holds the water…We did have a beautiful young apricot tree one year, too, but some sort of borer attacked it when it was in gorgeous full bloom, and it died within 10 days…broke my heart, as I am a ferverent apricot aficionada. Sorry for another loooong reply with more info. on berry bush care!
Hugs to you, Linda et al.,
JESS
Hi Jess, wow, I have nver heard of bird scare balls. At my age I won’t be planting any fruit tree in our miniature back yard. I would like to try some fruit bushes, we shall see. Great information, my sweet friend. Thank you! Hugs, Linda
Linda, this was a timely topic since I’m harvesting bushels of Anna and Dorsett Golden apples and many pounds of plums right now. I’ll be making plum jelly and probably dehydrating some into prunes.
With the apples it’s apple pie filling, apple sauce and maybe apple butter. Also, I’ll probably make some Apple Chips.
About the low chill hour trees. Our plum trees were Mariposa and Santa Rosa but after about ten years the Santa Rosa got a bad case of thrips and died. The Mariposa is still going strong and produced heavily despite our almost non-existent cold weather this past winter. It consistently ripens starting in late May and going full bore through June, which is two full months earlier than most pundits predict.
I wasn’t expecting much fruit set from our Gala Apple tree due to the warm winter we had but it is producing enough that I just had to do some thinning. Surprise, surprise. So, even a Gala Apple will work in the desert SW.
Our Bonanza Peach only produced enough for fresh eating this year. Delicious but only about two dozen or so peaches. Normally, with a colder winter, it produces more.
Our Brown Turkey figs are doing nothing so far this year, which is surprising given their low chill hour requirement. I probably didn’t give them enough compost last fall. We live and learn.
It’s important for people to learn how to preserve their own harvest. Saves money. I won’t have to buy apples until at least October or November–and that just because I like eating fresh apples.
As for plums, the jelly I make this year will keep until next Spring’s harvest as well as supplying gifts for friends, family and neighbors.
Hi Ray, oh I love hearing how well your garden is doing, my sweet friend! I have tomatoes now with flowers and my zucchini and staightneck squash are doing great! It’s been 5 long years since we moved. I need my hands in the earth again! SQUEAL! The pots from Costco work great! I am trying to get wo more. Finger crossed. Linda
We planted 2 apple trees, 2 peach trees and 2 pear trees. Never got an apple, ever got a pear and only got peaches one time. We also had plum trees, but it got blight and had to be dug up. Now, we have a pecan tree. It’s making pecans! Yay! We do need to just cut the barren fruit trees down.
Hi Deborah, darn!! Those would have been great fruit trees. Texas is well known for their pecan trees. Linda
We love them. Big shade! I used to go pick them up with mother and cracked them with grandparents. We’d put them in the freezer to use in cookies pies and cakes. Of course, I’d eat almost as many as I put away for the freezer. LOL I still love them any way.
Hi Deborah, my grandparents used to live in Arlington, Texas. They had a small pecan orchard. We would help shell them. Fresh pecans taste delicious! Linda
Yes ma’am! I’ve even eaten a few frozen ones. LOL And home parched peanuts! Yum So so good. One time we were headed to the deer lease with the parents. I ate so many raw peanuts, it made me sick. LOL I got sick before I could say anything all over the truck. Not fun. I not sure if I ever ate another raw peanut. I totally dislike boiled peanuts! Yuck! Peanut butter is good though!
Hi Deborah, I have never had boiled peanuts. Oh my gosh, you threw up all over the truck. Linda
I ate the boiled peanuts in Mississippi.
And yes, I did through all over the pick up. Dash and all. Gross it was! I hadn’t thought about that in years!
Hi Deborah, well we can all laugh about it today! Great story! Love it! Linda