What to Look for when Buying a Fruit Tree (part 1)

What to Look for when Buying a Fruit Tree (part 1)

Although the process of growing and caring for a tree is generally challenging and even difficult at times, sometimes one of the hardest parts is choosing which kind you want. You have to choose between the many
sizes, fruit, and other attributes. The different sizes include: dwarf, semi-dwarf, and standard. Your choice can affect everything about your growing experience, including the amount of work you have to put in and
the amount of rewards (fruit) you will obtain.

Dwarf trees are ideal if you only have a limited amount of open space in your yard. They take up as little as only as eight-foot diameter plot of land. Although the dwarf fruit trees are smaller than the others, their fruit is just the same size and the shortness makes them easier to prune and harvest. Dwarf fruit trees aren’t known for living quite as long as larger fruit trees. They begin to bear fruit after three to five years, so if you are going to buy a dwarf fruit tree from a nursery you should always check and see how old it is.

Semi-dwarf trees are medium sized, and when they are full grown they take up a fifteen-foot diameter. Semi-dwarf fruit tree's height can range from as low as ten feet to as high as sixteen feet. To keep them from getting to large you should prune them at least once a year. Occasionally semi-dwarf fruit trees take a season off and produce little or no fruit, but mostly they produce hundreds of fruit every year. Many people enjoy having semi dwarf fruit trees because they produce more fruit than a dwarf tree, and they are generally easier to harvest and maintain than a standard fruit tree.

Standard sized fruit trees take up much more area the then any of the smaller tree varieties, and they are also harder to keep manageable and to harvest all of the fruit. If you do not prune them at least once a year
they can grow as large as thirty feet. If you are just looking for a good tree to provide you with plenty of delicious fruit from and to keep your yard shady, a standard sized tree would be the perfect tree for you.
Standard sized fruit trees take a very long time to reach their full height, but they usually begin to bear fruit after only three to five years.

If you can't eat it, don't plant it,
Greg