Plant in spring, early as you can.

Some varieties are less prone to insects, but sooner or later they all get attacked if you don't spray. I think part of that is how much damage are you willing to put up with.

No need to wait until your in the nursing home, most fruit trees will fruit in their second and third year.

You may have to deal with peach leaf curl, brown rot and rust, along with fireblight.

Also remember that deer, birds and squirrels can devastate as much or more then insects.

I wouldn't get your hopes up about getting fruit in your second or third year. I am still waiting for fruit from a dwarf pear tree planted in 2006 that is already at least 12' tall, and have yet to harvest any fruit from several other kinds of fruit trees planted in 2008. Then, when they do bear, it is just enough for a snack the first couple years. Consider it a special treat if they get fruit within three years. If you are hungry, plant strawberries. It is an excellent idea to plant fruit trees, but it is a long-term investment that can also become an obsession. Northwoodswis

Pears and European plums would be more of the exception. I've had apples, peaches and hybrid plums bear fruit the first year I got them. Same for sweet cherries. Overall, you need to wait until year 3 or 4 to see real harvests, that is if you can keep the pests, disease, frost, freezes at bay.

Be sure to determine before you plant that the varieties you want are self-fertile, or what other trees you will need to plant for pollination.

If you're new to this, you can get a good foundation by looking carefully through the publications and bulletins of interest at Rutgers. Also, check with your county extension office to see if they have a local fruit hotshot. Misterbaby.

Here is a link that might be useful: Extension Service

Scott can probably help you with variety selection as well as anyone on this forum as he's in a similar climate. You should order a Sweet TangO peach from Adams County Nursery today! Bares very quickly, and relatively easy to grow. Great flavor!

Make sure you're aware of harvest sequence so you have a steady harvest of fruit. With 3 or 4 varieties of peaches you can have them from the first week of July well into Sept.

J. plums, especially Satsuma, are perfect for kids and easy to grow- also available from Adams. Actually perfect for everyone.

Make sure you plant a Goldrush apple.

In your climate, expect to start getting peaches and most J. plums by the 3rd year if you don't allow grass or weeds to compete, have decent soil, and give them water through dry spells. Pears can take a very long time and there's quite a bit of variability with apples.

I'm in southeastern NY, so you can probably trust my recs. I also manage about 100 estate orchards for a living so I get lots of chances to observe new growers and what they like.

Harvestman, are you sure about the name of that peach variety? I just checked the Adams County website and saw no peach named sweet tango....

It's just called Tangos, or NJF 16. Look under the Peento peaches on the Webpage.

The problem with growing for kids is that their taste buds are very sensitive. They will often eat only the best tasting fruit. Unfortunately, the best tasting fruit is often the hardest to grow. Commercially, plum is mainly grown in the deserts of the southwest because it is very susceptible to fungus. Apple is very susceptible to the curculio. Peach is a bit cold sensitive so NJ may be difficult. If you try to speed up growth and fruiting by watering and fertilizing it only makes fruit trees and vines even more susceptible to diseases and insects. Slow and steady is ideal. Another approach is to teach them about jams and jellies and instead grow the more disease resistant varieties. The most disease resistant are often the most nutritious, but not the best tasting. Jams and jellies helps to improve flavor. My favorites are:
Grapes - Beta, Oberlin Noir, Marquette, Bluebell, Trollhaugen, Mars, America
Apple - Liberty, Freedom
Cherry - Evans / Bali, Surefire
Apricot - Harglow, Jerseycot, Hunza
Peach - Red Haven, Reliance
Blackberry - Triple Crown, Doyle
Of course St. Lawrence Nursery has some good grafted plums.
And there are even some hardy exotics like honeyberry, raspberry, and current.

Here is a link that might be useful: FRUIT

I'm sorry GreenGarden, but I strongly disagree with most of what you posted. Kids usually love the fruit they can pick from trees and are much less picky about fruit from this source. OK, this is anecdotal, but I've seen hundreds of happy kids harvesting fruit at harvest parties thrown by my clients.

There is no correlation between disease resistance and nutrition that I know of, and the disease resistant apple varieties often are no easier to grow than susceptible ones besides having to add a fungicide in the mix when you have to spray for insects anyway. WP and Liberty are very attractive to insects and are not high vitamin C apples like Baldwin and Cox Orange Pippin as I recall.

Reliance is not a suitable variety for south Jersey and is recommended only for its winter cold hardiness. It also bares in Redhaven's season. South Jersey is prime peach country and there are literally hundreds of varieties that can be grown there.

Almost all the varieties that Adams County Nursery sells will do well in S. Jersey- with varying levels of maintenance, of course.

There has been increasing scientific evidence that children are especially
sensitive to fungicides and pesticides used on fruit and then eaten raw.
I was simply trying to offer alternatives.
South Jersey does occasionally have a late frost where much of the peach crop is lost.
I was simply trying to offer some alternatives for those odd years.
I did not say the entire orchard should be planted in them.
As a nutritionist, I have spent my entire life studying nutrient levels of different varieties.
It is just a general trend that many of the least popular varieties are actually the most nutritious.
I did not say always at all times for every nutrient.

Where are peaches grown where they don't occasionally suffer from weather related issues besides in Fruitnut's greenhouse?

I bet the Georgia peach industry suffers more from untimely frosts after untimely warm periods than S. Jersey.

Reliance does not protect it's peaches from late frost as well as Madison and other varieties with a longer bloom period.

I agree that young children need to be protected from exposure to pesticides and that might affect a parents choice of growing fruit types that must be sprayed almost up to harvest. Scott grows stone fruit in Maryland without the use of synthetic fungicides but it does take more effort.

Apples and pears don't require fungicide after spring even if they are susceptible to scab and cedar apple rust.

I'm in North Jersey on a valley floor with high risk of spring frost but my Contender Peach has produced heavy every single year. No spray and perfect peaches every time so far. I think micro climate plays a big part.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:122764}}

I have about 30 varieties of peaches here in southeastern NY, and they are very reliable producers that have only been frozen out once on a test winter where it went below -22 F. Crops have been reduced twice by late, hard frosts but my frost tender varieties have done about as well as those known for hardiness in the 22 years I've been growing peaches here.