howdy reed, i'm a little ways from austin. & i've only been doing this 3 years. but figs, jujube's, persimmons, asian pears, & european pears should thrive there with almost zero care. just be sure to get fireblight resistant pears, anything from womack nursery will work, just google them i dont have experience with peaches, plums, etc; but when i google "tamu peaches" texas a&m says they can be grown if i'm willing to follow a spraying routine, & if i'm not willing to spray not to bother. apples also need spraying, & your soil has to be free of cotton root rot, which many areas in the cotton south have if you use the search function at the top of the board & look for "mountainman" & "scraper" you'll read from some fig & pear experts in austin

Ask bay laurel not to root trim. I've bought a lot of plants from, and have been happy except for the last pear, root was trimmed to almost nothing. Doans is probably low on inventory right now, but will receive their Dave Wilson trees next feb or so. Bay laurel, doans, raintree all resell Dave Wilson trees. Doans also has le Cooke trees, which are sometimes better. Womack is normally home grown trees, which I really like--but I suspect they resell a few Dave Wilson trees also If you're going to buy out of state, look at raintree, one green world, isons, just fruits and exotics--but be sure to pick the right rootstock for dallas. Anything from doans is ok here. Most everything from womacks is ok, but being mail order they sell throughout the country, so be sure to ask them if it'll grow in dallas.

I was thinking about my post as i was feed-watering my trees a bit ago. yes, I think so. My caution - or suggestion - is to have a feeding plan/program in place so that you can get enough food to the tree. Meyers are especially hungry. For the few potted trees i have, i have been successful with a weekly water-in of Foliage Pro alternating with Liquid Gold - a tablespoon of food with a tablespoon of vinegar (because my water is 9.4 pH) per 1 to 1.5 gallons (loosely measured). The weekly feed is in addition to Osmocote Plus in the top layer of the pot's soil. In my case for the 40 in the ground i just fed, i need to overfeed and spot-water/over-water to compensate for other established trees' roots; and in general water restrictions (we are still officially in a drought). The trees that produced lots of fruit this past season are underfed, pale green with yellowing tips here and there. The trees that i successfully limited to 3-5 fruit are just fine; deep green. And the trees under the neighbors' against the fence tall trees are struggling for food and water and sun. So they all got a dose of hose-end sprayer loaded with vinegar and liquid food. As someone posted a while back here on this forum... feed weakly weekly.

The only thing they did not talk about was the tolerance for thin limestone and caliche soils that is so common here. I had great luck with tamopan persimmon in down town Austin. I planted it right up against the house with the driveway right there. I used to clamber over the 8' fence and second floor roof to get fruit every other thanksgiving. It grew very narrow and tall in that space which was a good thing because the space demanded it. The natural Gardener has a good display of fruit trees in the spring. It is a seasonal display geared to the good planting time. They will have cold hour times listed for the different areas of Austin since it varies so much and some of the trees are very picky about how many cold hours one has. I too have mostly caliche and thin soils and no water to spare so I have not made the leap into fruit going out here above Hamilton pool. I have heard that one person dug a HUGE hole in Deer Creek ( rangy uplands soil) and planted a peach and had good luck. The water to water out here is hard as nails too unless you have a huge rainwater tank.