Selecting Fruit Trees for the Homestead

One of the most exciting things about homesteading for me is planning our orchard and reaping the sweetness of fresh home grown fruit!

Fruit tree selection and placement definitely requires some forethought as some fruit trees are very high maintenance. You don’t want to go to the expense of planting a lot of fruit trees only to have them fail to bear fruit or succumb to disease.  Well-drained soil is very important as is exposure to full sun and proper pruning.

 I’ve made a list of the fruit and nut trees we would like to plant for our homestead (see the plan above for where the orchard will go) that would work for our area in North Carolina:

1. Apple

Can’t have a farm without apple trees, right?!?  I’d love to have several varieties of apple trees, some of them heirloom perhaps.

2. Pear

3. Peach

Peaches are the most high-maintenance of the bunch that we are looking at. I’m planning to plant only the white-flesh variety, as they have a higher antioxidant level (and I like the taste better too!).

4. Nectarine

5. Plum

6. Fig

We cannot wait until fresh figs!!!!  In North Carolina a really common type of fig is the Brown Turkey fig and that is probably the one we plan to go with.

7. Cherry

 We will probably only plant one or two of these because I’m not sure how well cherry trees actually do in our area.

Nut Trees:

1. Pecan

2. American Hazelnut

3. Walnut

Are there any that I’m missing? What kinds of fruit trees are your favorite to grow?