Now is a great time to plant hardy fruit trees, bushes or vines in your landscape. Nurseries should have an excellent selection of newly arrived fruiting plants over the next few weeks for planting through early spring. Careful attention needs to be paid, however, to selection, planting, growing conditions and care provided.
As a rule, plants we grow for fruit require full sun, excellent drainage and room to grow. Find out the mature size and proper spacing of the fruits you want to grow, and take all of this into consideration when locating them in your landscape and deciding how many to plant.
The varieties of fruits you choose must be adapted to the mild winters of the coastal South. Always check that the chilling hours the plant requires will be satisfied by the cold we normally get (chilling hours are the accumulated hours below 45 degrees that occur during winter). Choose fruit varieties that require around 250 to 500 chilling hours on the south shore and 500 to 750 chilling hours on the north shore.
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You must also know whether the fruit you want to grow is self-fruitful or requires a pollinator. Self-fruitful plants will pollinate themselves, and you only need to plant one. Plants that require a pollinator will not pollinate themselves, and another plant of the same type of fruit, but a different variety, must be planted for cross-pollination and reliable production to occur.
FIGS: The fig is one of the most commonly planted and easily grown fruit trees in our area. The Celeste fig is the variety most gardeners grow because of its reliability. Other good fig varieties to plant in the area include Southeastern Brown Turkey (fruit similar to Celeste but more prone to splitting and souring), Florentine (large yellow fruit), LSU Purple (medium-size reddish to dark purple fruit) and LSU Gold (large yellow fruit).
PEARS: Fruiting pears produce beautiful displays of white flowers in February and delicious fruit in August. Pineapple is a popular variety for its quality fruit (better for cooking than fresh eating) and resistance to fire blight, a bacterial disease that causes flowers and leaves at the ends of branches to suddenly turn black as if burned.
A Yotsomizo persimmon. Kenneth Thibodeaux has a small persimmon tree
Other pears to consider include Baldwin, Garber, Orient, Kieffer, Biscamp and LeConte. It is best to plant two different varieties to ensure pollination and good fruit production.
PERSIMMONS: Japanese persimmons are low-maintenance fruit trees that rarely need to be sprayed. Their major problem is fruit drop, which is generally at its worst in the first five years after you plant the tree and then improves as the tree matures.
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Recommended Japanese persimmons for the area include Tanenashi and Hachiya (harvest these two varieties when the fruit is very soft) and Tamopan, Fuyu and Suruga (these three varieties are nonastringent and can be eaten when the flesh is crisp). Only one tree is needed for production.
BLUEBERRIES: The soils north of Lake Pontchartrain tend to be quite acidic, and this is perfect for growing rabbiteye blueberries. The south shore’s alkaline soils, however, make growing blueberries in the New Orleans area challenging.
Blueberry bushes are excellent for small gardens, as they stay much smaller than most fruit trees. Recommended varieties include Tifblue, Woodard, Climax, Premier and Choice. Southern highbush blueberry varieties, such as Cooper, Gulfcrest, Blue Ridge and Cape Fear, may also be planted. Blueberries are self-fruitful, but planting more than one variety improves production and quality.
BLACKBERRIES: These are relatively carefree to grow with the major task being annual pruning after harvest. Trailing types, such as boysenberries, dewberries and youngberries, must be trained to a trellis or other support. Erect types include Navaho and Arapaho (these two are thornless), as well as Brazos, Shawnee and Rosborough. Blackberries are self-fruitful.
A muscadine vine
GRAPES: Muscadine grapes are native to our area and require a moderate amount of maintenance. Support must be provided for the vines, and the annual pruning, in which up to 90% of the previous year’s growth is removed, can be quite a chore.
Self-fertile types can be planted individually and include Carlos, Cowart (considered one of the best), Dearing, Magnolia and Southland. Pistillate (female) varieties, such as Fry, Higgins, Scuppernong, Hunt and Jumbo, must be planted with a self-fertile variety close by for pollination.
OTHERS: A couple other fruits are good choices for edible landscaping. Loquats are an excellent small fruiting tree that produces yellow fruit in spring, and pineapple guava is a large, evergreen shrub suitable for a privacy screen that produces edible fruit in September.
Higher-maintenance fruits include apples, plums, peaches, bunch grapes and nectarines. These fruit trees generally require more pruning and spraying to successfully produce here than those already mentioned.
I am sometimes asked about growing cherries, raspberries and apricots. Unfortunately, there are no varieties of these fruits that are reliable producers this far south.
For information on home fruit production, go online and take a look at the LSU AgCenter’s excellent publication “The Louisiana Home Orchard.” It’s full of helpful information on variety selection, planting and pruning of many types of fruiting plants.
NOTES ON CITRUS: One other popular group of fruiting trees must also be mentioned, and that is citrus. Citrus trees, like kumquats, satsumas, oranges, grapefruits, lemons and limes, are separate from the hardy fruiting plants because they are not fully winter hardy.
Severe cold during winter (particularly temperatures in the teens) can cause major damage or even kill citrus trees. For that reason, citrus trees are recommended primarily for south Louisiana (while the other fruits mentioned in this column can be grown throughout the state.)
I recommend planting citrus trees in late February or early March after the coldest weather is past. Citrus are self-fruitful. For excellent information on growing citrus trees, go online and check out the LSU AgCenter publication “Louisiana Home Citrus Production.”
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