Plan your fruit cycle.

I love to plan the garden in winter. It gives me a chance to think of the warm green days of summer. I have to replace 2 trees this year. One of the trees I planted last year was so badly damaged by deer that I need to replace it. The second tree apparently was not suited to life at my home. So I have to replace them.

I choose my trees, bushes, and vines by when they bloom and when the fruit is ripe. In my very small orchard I have trees that come ripe over nearly all the summer.

I have over the years added plants into the landscape that provide food at different times. One of the first fruits is strawberries. I have a small bed set aside for the strawberries. This often my first fruit each year. A second early fruiting bush is the honey berry, They are similar to blueberries in taste and are ripe about the same time as strawberries. My next fruit produced is apricots. They come on the end of June into July on my tree. The fruit of my Manchurian apricot stays on the tree for nearly a month. After the apricots come the nectarines then Green grapes,  currents, peaches, Red grapes, plumbs, pears, concord grapes, josta berries, and apples. I also have a run of nuts with the almonds starting in July followed by filberts and walnuts latter in the fall. As the trees have matured the amount of fruit and nuts has increased. Now I have fruit to preserve at the peak of flavor. The canned fruit most years will last me until the next years new crop. Often I have more than a years worth of fruit. So I have been able to build a supply of more than a years of fruit that is ready to eat. This has saved me a lot of money. Over the last year I have kept track of what I have not had to buy. I saved nearly $1200.00 with my home production.

If you have space in your yard start your own fruit cycle. If you take out non productive plants replace them with plants that will provide you with a source of food.

Before you start do your home work. Know when your first and last average frost date is. Choose trees that bloom after the last average frost and produce fruit before the first frost each year. When looking for trees and bushes to plant check how long it takes for it to produce fruit. You can pick early trees like apricots to start your cycle, a nectarine,  followed by a pear then a apple. This can start your home production of food by trees.

It will take about 3 years to get your first real crop from your trees. Each crop will increase in size as the tree matures. Most trees are very productive by the time they are 5 years old. Some people do not want to wait so long for fruit. I advise you to plant some trees and some bushes. raspberry, strawberry, honey berry, Golgi berry  blue berry. or grapes. Most of the bush and vine plants produce fruit much sooner. If you plant some trees and some berries you can have fresh fruit each year till your trees produce and much more fruit when they are all mature.

It you grow your own food you will not have any worries about where it came from. What chemicals are on it. How sanitary were the growing conditions were. If it has been tampered with by a terrorist.