Thanks -- no hijack at all. I'm interested in any background that can help me understand the context. Our soil is very well drained, almost no clay. It's volcanic sand and gravel, with plenty of windblown alkali dust. That makes it hard to imagine that it would be likely to drown with a drip system. We have drip lines around most of our other fruit trees, and they seem to be doing fine. I was stomping around under the tree today, and I did push into some soft ground that was indicative of gopher burrows. Which leads me to return to my first final question: "Is it too late?"

Harvestman, do both of the apricot locations have more than one or two other varieties of apricot as well? Pollination must have been far better than we all thought. I know your area is at least ten days to two weeks ahead of mine. Would any of those varieties of apricot be good with my Harglow?

Is it a bush or fan trained tree? My RHS book on pruning says November to February for bush trees (they include Apricots under Peaches and Nectarines) For fan trained trees (under fourth and subsequent years: Nov to Feb: Prune by one quarter those leaders tha tneed to produce more growth to fill out the framework. July to Aug if tree has occupied all available height stop the extension shoots by pinching out growing tips That seems to be it: The title of the book is Pruning by Christopher Brickell and it is part of The Royal horticultural Society's Encyclopaedia of Practical gardening and was published in 1979 (my edition is 1981 by Book Club Associates No ISBN The other part thatI have is on Propagation... these are really useful books!

monibucky I don't know if they make a fruit picking pole, but what I use is a swimming pool telescoping skimmer pole. I tape a milk jug to the end of it. I cut the top of the jug and make a vie cut to catch the stem. Then when the fruit is in the jug with the stem in the vie you can use the pole to pick it and the fruit falls into the jug. You can just keep on going till the jug is full or your arm gets tired. If the plastic isn't strong enough you can use a vegetable can and do the same thing. I pick all my best apples this way at the top of the tree. I hope this helps some of you out.