I am interested in starting a small orchard with some of my favorite fruits. I am looking for Plum trees, any kind but I especially would like a purple leaf variety. Pear trees, a couple varieties unless I can get one that is self fertile, and non astringent asian persimmons like fuyu or giro. If you have any of these available please let me know. Thanks, Pat

HI rovabay welcome to your new obsession. Santa Rosa is an excellent choice as a self pollinator. That was my first producing tree and there was no other plum anywhere near. Fruit was not large, and also few in quantity, but that's what happens without cross pollination. Now that she has a mate I have to thin out 90% of the baby plums or I get cherry sized fruit. One caution. I read somewhere that 3 diff strains had been released all with the Santa Rosa name. I've seen pics of other folks plums that look more red than mine. Mine are a very dark skin, very tart, but flesh is yellow and juicy. I can't vouch for other Santa Rosas ability to self pollinate. I love Asian Pears, and many folks are saying most are partly self fertile. I planted 4 diff kinds my first year so I can't agree or disagree with that. In all honesty I'd go Semi Dwarf on all trees and see if you can fit 2 into each spot. Lots easier to care for and more production that way. Pruning a combo tree takes a learning curve, and usually one variety takes over anyway. So if you hadn't planned for other pollination you'd be in trouble down the road anyway. My vote on Asian Pears is Raja if you can get it. I also love Hosui, but that tree takes a lot of work. Most folks love Olympic Giant, but just put mine in so can't comment on taste yet. It would however extend your picking season, plus OG is a great storage pear. I do have 20th century but haven't been wowed by it yet. However it's young, and they say some trees need to grow up before tasting their best. Pam in cinti

I missed this thread and probably could have been some use as I grow Asians in the humid northeast- which is more like your climate than the locations of most of the posters here. To me Korean Giant aka Olympic is best of Asians because it is the biggest and sweetest variety I've grown. University of Kentucky concurs in their research. I've never seen an Asian here bothered by fireblight, maybe because they start growth before warm weather. The consensus in this part of the country is that the Asians are easier to grow than Euros because they are not susceptible to scab or psyla, which can be devastating and more difficult to treat than most problems on any fruit here. I used to really like the taste of my KG's but after I had unlimited access to them I began to lose interest. I now far prefer my different Europeans because they are more interesting to me. This is all so subjective and people who sample my KG's usually just go gahgah Fireblight is something that can be spread from more susceptable trees to less. I have not seen research on this but my observations are conclusive as far as I'm concerned although I've only actually seen examples on 3 sites. On one site the quince there had fireblight for 2 or 3 seasons before it spread to europears. It went from susceptable pears (bosc most affected) the next season to most of the apples with Honeycrisp most affected. The strikes never went deep except in the Bosc and Quince and last year wasn't too bad. I've yet to loose a tree to fireblight after 2 decades of caring for thousands of trees in the northeast. This is probably because I don't manage any full dwarf apple trees which are more susceptable. In your climate you may get Jap type plums without much difficulty, or not. Scott has troubles in Maryland but I get unsprayed fruit often in S. NY and vacinity. Illinois Everbearing is usually touted as the best Mulberry for my climate. I have also tried Oscars, which I didn't care for. Silk Hope couldn't take our winter. Burnt Ridge has some IE available.

Wobur: Glad to hear you are getting some good fruit. After our last discussion, I was thinking you may have too much late frost to grow anything. I have had some problems here with small fruit on my outdoor plantings, mainly with apple. Fruit is much larger this yr. I applied more N fertilizer and more water. But that can have a downside, the fruit may not taste as well. In your case, I'd try thinning even more aggressively where the fruit is small. Asian pears in particular require a lot of thinning. Would you mind telling me about where you live in CA and what your elevation is? I like to look up the weather records for places like yours just to have an idea how things work in various climates. And I might want to move back to CA someday. The Fruitnut