[HesterF]

So much depends on your climate. I wanted variety so we have:

On walls: Figs, apricots and peaches (peaches have had a great season, figs are grabbed by the wasps as soon as they ripen but are amazing)
Sheltered positions: Almond, persimmon
Then in various orchards or open areas cherries (sweet and sour), gages, plums and damsons (could also go with bullaces), apples (probably about 25 varieties), pears (4 varieties), quince, mulberry, medlar (only used for jelly really but can be kept), walnut (patience required), sweet chestnut (ditto) and hazelnuts
Soft fruit: Raspberries of various varieties, blackcurrants, white currants, pink currant (not convinced by that - lots of top growth, not much fruit), red currant and a couple of gooseberries
We've also planted 2 acres of vineyard which will start to fruit in two years time (or rather will be allowed to fruit) - that's a longer term project - as well as three vines for eating grapes.

The main reason we went for so many apple trees was because we drink a lot of fruit juice so we've got the crusher, press and pasteuriser so we can produce loads of apple juice which lasts for ages once pasteurised. If you are going to try and keep apples for eating throughout the year, you need to pick your varieties carefully so they store as long as possible along with some that are read to eat early. Otherwise you could end up with a glut of apples that have all gone wrinkly by March and you end up with a six month window of nothing decent to eat.

We are also very lucky to have a warm site so the peaches and apricots can blossom early and ripen in time (peaches in particular which we're eating now - apricots can cope with a shorter season but do blossom very early).

You also have to consider predators. We have planted 15 cherry trees but have yet to get more than the odd cherry because the birds have them all early - and this year pigeons stripped all the early leaves from the middle of the trees too which knocked them all back. So you might need to net trees and soft fruit. We're in Kent and virtually all the commercial crops are now grown under cover - all the amazing Kent cherries are from glass houses, polytunnels or at the very least netted. Apples are easier to protect but I did notice that a lot of ours have been attacked by birds already which then lets the wasps in.

Most of our trees were planted the first winter we moved here so 2 1/2 years ago - the soft fruit kicks off quickly but this is our first year with a few decent apples on each tree and the walnut, sweet chestnut, persimmon, mulberry, quince and most of the gage/plum types things are yet to produce anything. In the case of the plums I think that was weather related but the rest take five years plus to fruit.

If you can find a local nursery with a good variety of fruit, that helps. I've bought from two local places here - mostly Keepers in Maidstone who have a huge variety of all fruits and will advise on any area of the UK but clearly know this area well and Victoriana which are just up the road from here but have a more limited range (but had some apple varieties Keepers didn't do - along with the almond tree which is doing surprisingly well).

H

[farmers wife]

Edible Forest by Martin Crawfield is an excellent way of growing forests to eat.  We have based our orchard on much of his input - Have a lot more to plant particularly nut trees

[Orinlooper]

I suggest you look at it the other way around... what's fresh long season.. as in early rhubarb, storing apple varieties and bletted medlars for the season's end. look at dried fruit options too and possibly bottling fruit or your leccy bill is going to be huge. Grapes are fairly late season too.. dessert, juicing , wine. Figs are super fresh but obviously can be dried too as can apple and pear slices. Gooseberries freeze well as do plums and gages and stewed apple and pears.

Good suggestions but I still like frozen.

A good commercial freezer doesn't use that much power if you add even more insulation. Plus timing is perfect, it's off all summer when it warmer and would use more power. At the end of the season when I fill up the commercial freezer with excess fruit the weather is getting colder anyway. By he time it's full the average temp in my barn is not much higher than zero anyhow.

Sometimes when it's really cold the unit hardly has to work at all.

By the time it starts to get warmer the next year my freezer has almost been emptied and it will be off for months until we fill it up again at the end of the season.

Freezing suspends the nutrient loss, it suspends the goodness depletion it is the best way of preserving and also the easiest and least time consuming.

I know it's not as good as fresh, but it's the next best thing over the hungry gap of winter.

[ddangus]

There are several things to consider, realistically you will not manage to have fresh eating apples all year round but depending where you are and what varieties you plant  late July - late April should be possible.

You can either go for a lot of interesting varieties or go for a couple of established varieties that give you a longish season. Although sheep sounds a good idea unless you plan an orchard on vigorous rootstock  (M111 /M25) trained as standards  you probably have to factor in the frustration of your sheep eating some of the nice new growth.

A couple of considerations:
*For best results start with maiden trees that you prune yourself into the desired shape, although this means it will take at least 3-4 years before you get any fruit. Sounds like the best plan would be to go for a bush  or half standard form on M 26 or M 106. You could of course opt for two year trees to speed this along but a) they are more expensive and b) might not establish as well as quickly
.
* If you are in an area prone to late frosts look for hardy trees and avoid early flowering varieties that  are not frost resistant.
* If you are in the wet west of the country look for varieties with some resistance to scab
* Make sure that your trees if self sterile have suitable pollination partners.
* If you want cookers you could go for a dual purpose variety (Belle de Boskoop for example) which is also a nice eater.
* Some earlies only have a very limited shelf life one example of it is Beauty of Bath, which also has the  unfortunate characteristic of dropping it's apples very readily other like Discovery, Miller's seedling and George Cave  stay on the tree but again do not store  long.
* Some mid /late season apples to supplement the early varieties to consider are Adam's Pearmain, Jonagold and Pinova
* For cider I would again opt for dual purpose varieties unless you want to plant trees with fruit that are inedible and only for making quality cider (Dabinet, Tremlett's Bitter etc.). Some good dual purpose varieties to consider are Tom Putt, King of the Pippins and Katy. But this depends on how serious you want to take the cider making, I have made reasonable cider ( although with variable drinkabilty of some batches)  from cookers (Grenadier) and neighbours windfalls.
* You could of course go for local varieties that have stood the test of time.
.
Once mature the trees will yield probably around 60 kg of fruit on average, likely more, so assuming 150 gram per apple that would be 400 fruit per tree at least. So with 35 trees you would be well covered ! for your requirement. Of course this assumes proper training and maintenance  (fertilizer) and grass free for the at least the first 5 years and possibly thinning of fruit.

My short list for say 35 trees  on M106 or M26 trained as bush or half standard would be:

Discovery 2 trees does not store well but a nice early
Katy 5 Trees , good juicer
Belle de Boskoop 3 Trees ( as a cooker and late eater).
King of the Pippins  5 trees  ( dual (triple) purpose, eater/ cider/ cooker)
Tom Putt 5 trees (dual , eater /cider)
Adams Pearmain  5 trees eater
Jonagold 5 trees eater
Pinova 5 trees good disease resistant eater

Good luck with the orchard project and send me a PM if you need more advice. I agree with an earlier post Adam's Apples provides a good service and trees.


DDAngus

[pgkevet]

Waht, no russet?

[cloddopper]

Stereo ,
Where do you live , I live near Ammanford South Wales .

I may have two seven year old ( from Aldi ) plum trees that you can have if you feel like digging them out .  They are supposed to be self fertile Victoria plums on a semi dwarf stock , but to be on the safe side I got two. They've flowered these last two years but the flowers did not survive the local sharp frosts enough to produce fruits.

Digging them out should not be difficult at all as the biggest is only seven foot tall and the smallest is about five feet tall & growing in a very light soil .

 If that's no good to you , Pershore egg are one of the most prolific plums I've ever come across . Where I use to live two 8 yr old Pershore's responded well after a summer pruning , autumn & spring manure feeding across the root system and also giving a liquid manure feed through out the year . They gave up well over 20  stone of massive sweet juicy plums between them & to prove it wasn't a fluke they kept on doing it for the next five years we were there.
 I had to shore up the branches with a lot of 7 foot 4x4" fence posts as they were so heavily laden .