One bit of good news, Artic Star doesn't need bees. It is wind pollinated and self fruitful. If you check past posts on low chill fruit for southern CA, you will find what you need.

Good Luck!! The Fruitnut

Check out your rootstock and cultivar. Sometimes, the apricot trees won't come into good production until after 5 to 7 years. It could also be related to the size of the tree, it may need to be of certain size to be producing fruits, not only the lack of chilling hours.

I have a harcot tree that did not produce fruit for me until it reached 5 years of age. We are overflowing with chilling hours for that matter, so that was not the problem for me. I talked to the local nursery where I got it and told me about the 5-7 years for that particular combo of rootstock and cultivar.

You can always graft peaches, almonds, nectarines unto your apricot trees. I have grafted non-patent plumcots on them, and later on grafted plums, and am planning to graft some wild plum interstems so that I could graft a cherry unto them next year.

I have both a Moorepark and a (younger) Blenheim, and get more chill hours than you do. The Blenheim has blossomed well every year we've had it. The Moorepark seems to struggle to put out blossoms some years. In this climate, it also gets pitburn, so Golden Amber is my alternative for the same fruiting season. I think it may require less chill, but it blooms over a prolonged period. Blenheim also gets pitburn and sunburn here. Tomcot is recommended for our area because of day to night temperature swings during bloom, but I don't have this variety. Floragold set fruit well for me, but the tree died. I found the fruit bland until fully ripe. I had fruit on a new Royal Rosa tree last year.

I've had good luck with the fruit set on Flavor Delight Aprium and Harcot apricot here. Part of my problem with low fruit set on other varieties is probably blossom disease, which is very prevalent in our area, where rain seems to hit the blooming apricots just about every year. You might try Flavor Delight, Gold Kist or Katy on the coast. I saw a Dave Wilson combo tree at the nursery which looked like it consisted of relatively low-chill varieties of apricot with Flavor Delight.

Joe's idea of grafting over your tree may be worthwhile if the tree is in good shape.

Carolyn, have you tried spraying tea tree oil during the pink tip stage? I'll report on how it goes. It seems to be promising. It will be the worst case test because the storms came right during the peak bloom of Royal Rosa, Goldkist, Tomcot, Apache and Flavorella. I will get some results in a couple of months from now.

Thanks for the replies. I already planted a Goldkist this winter but it hasn't come out of dormancy yet. The grafting idea sounds good, but I don't know how to do it and don't have anything to graft onto it but nectarines and peaches, which I already have enough of. Another strange thing about the Moorpark. The main trunk and branches eminating from it have never produced any fruit, but two sucker type branches (but above the graft) have produced all the fruit. If the main trunk doesn't produce again this year I may cut just it down and leave the two sucker trunks.

I didn't know about tea tree oil, Joe. I guess I'll be the control, because it rained all through the bloom of my Flavor Delight and Royal Rosa. Maybe I'll try it with some of my later varieties.

Californian,

The part of about the suckers does not make sense. I would not cut off everything but the suckers. With most varities, you should see some fruit in year three with full production coming in year 5 or 6. That is assuming the tree grows properly from day one. If you have an issue with chill hours, than you might want to consider something else.

The fruiting lower branches does make sense. We discussed a similar problem on a different thread here with BavayÂs Green Gage plum, which seems to require a certain level of chill to even grow. I and another person in Zone 9 had experienced growth on the bottom two or three branches, and die back on everything over a few feet.
An experienced nurseryman that I talked with suggested that there was a blanket of cold air that came down the mountain above Altadena, collected and stayed a few feet from the ground, providing sufficient chilling only up to a certain height. IÂve observed a layer of ice in the outside doggie bowl, frost on the grass, when the official temperature was in the upper 30s. He suggested keeping the dormant trees which needed the extra chilling in pots, placing them on their sides once dormant in the coldest part of the yard. This is the first winter IÂve tried it.
A Google book named The GardenerÂs Assistant by Robert Thompson describes "Forced Plums", growing plums (apricots are suggested elsewhere) in pots to bring inside a greenhouse and force into early bloom and fruiting each year. A similar fuss could be made to extend chill hours here in SoCal, if necessary "to bring the fruit to perfection", as Thompson describes. The Moorpark apricot is supposed to be perfection. You might not want to bother, though.

Here is a link that might be useful: Forced Plums

I am not familiar with growing conditions in So. Cal, but cutting of the main branches and leaving the suckers (if I understand this correctly) does not make sense to me. If the tree will not produce, why bother? Maybe it is just me, I never was into trying to fit square piece into a round hole.

Followup post. I may have given up on my Moorpark too early. The past two days it has been covered with blossoms and I even saw a lone bee visiting them. Maybe it just did need an extra year. But why it flowered so much this year considering the winter was so warm beats me. Now to see if many of the blossoms actually produce fruit. I even see blossoms on branches coming off the main trunk which I never saw before. Maybe getting more rain this year than last years super severe drought helped, even though this year may end up with below average rainfall too. I also sprayed the tree with lime sulfur, even though the directions said don't use on apricots, don't know if this had any effect.

I grew up in San Jose Ca., in a home adjacent to the Cancamella home on land they had subdivided from their original Moorpark apricot orchard, located on Moorpark Ave.

In the "olden days" (60 years ago) we would get some frosts in the winter and enough cool weather to allow the trees to set properly. The trees tend to bear heavily one year and lighter the next. The trees will grow to 2 feet across at the trunk and up to 20 feet tall and as wide. They make beautiful shade trees. The fruit is usually set on year old or older spurs. They are self-fertile but they do require bees for pollination! If you thin the fruits to about 3 inches to 6 inches apart they will produce huge fruit. The Moorpark was originally prised for it's fruit size and is fine flavor. They require deep but irrigation of their entire root spread. We used to build dirt berms at the edges of the branch spread and flood irrigate the entire area with about 6 inches of water for 2 days about three times per summer when the fruit was set and starting to grow. We would let the ground dry out for picking and then after picking we would again irrigate in late summer to give the trees a bit of a boost prior to fall and winter rains. Enjoy your tree, it should be a great performer!

I'm posting this a couple of years after the fact, but I have some insight into frost hours that some may not know. The term frost hours is misleading since frost hours are acquired at temps somewhere between 35 and 45 degrees F. You don't need to have frost on the ground to accumulate frost hours. So Cal can accumulate a decent amount of frost hours unless you live near the ocean.

I am glad your tree has blossomed. I grew up near Moorpark, CA where the former Williams Ranch hosted acres and acres of Moorpark Apricot trees. That is long since gone and now filled with thousands of homes ironically called "Peach Hill" (I never could figure that out).

When I was 5 years old I went to the Williams Ranch with my family to pick apricots. They were so juicy, big and sweet. I liked them so much my Mom let me plant a seed in the back yard planter (loaded with planter mix). No special preparation! About a year later it was about a foot tall. My Dad transplanted it and staked it up. We made a big berm and filled it up with water and then let a soaker hose sit there overnight on slow drip.

It took 5 years for the tree to bear fruit but it was WORTH the wait. It didn't produce every year but rather about every other year. There were no other trees around it. I am sure that had something to do with it's pollination. We had that tree from 1961 to 1978 until they widened the city road and a fire engine sideswiped it!!! DONE! The damage was too traumatic and it was chopped down.

We are left with many years of good memories and great fruit. The tree was a fantastic shade tree and beautiful piece of natures work. We had many family events around that old tree.

I am now 55 years old and going to start growing a couple of apricot trees for future generations. Thanks for the great posts and memories!