Starting over again with the right root stock, growing them in raised beds with quality potting soil on the top, and uncovering the upper inch or two of the treeÂs roots to the open air, might make growing fruit trees possible for you. After losing several trees and rose bushes to oak root rot, armillaria, itÂs working so far for me. ThereÂs an unknown wild fruit tree that blooms, but never sets fruit, suckers, and thrives under the oak tree with the infection. The wild fruit tree is around 15 feet tall, has large black thorns. IÂm grafting some of its suckers with the scions and buds I want, and hope to replace the tree eventually with something that fruits. Uncovering the top root structure keeps it dryer, and makes it more difficult for the fungi to get established under the bark, run up the tree, and kill it. Also, fungus infections are very place specific. One plant will die all of a sudden, and all the plants around it thrive. I replace the dead plant with one in a large pot, half submerged. It thrives also, 90% of the time. The infection only seems to be in a small section of my back yard. There are claims about Mycorrhizal fungi "injections" of healthy fungi helping keep the plant overall healthy, and more resistant to deadly infections. Fungi infections are not easy to live with, but with a few adjustments, a productive home orchard may still be possible. Here is a link that might be useful: Oak root fungus on grapevines

I would only add soil as needed to replace recently eroded soil. Adding more than that over the roots can cause root suffocation. If you mulch is not preventing erosion, you probably either have a very steep bed or may be using the wrong mulch for this application. Shredded bark/wood mulches should hold together and prevent most erosion. Mulch is very wonderful stuff that has many benefits (including erosion control) for trees. You can however add too much. Consistently adding significant amounts of mulch twice a year is probably too much of a good thing. You don't want to build up more than about 3" to 4" of mulch over the tree's roots. Even yearly mulch additions can eventually add up to too much mulch for good root health by continually raising soil height. I usually start out with a good 3" to 4" layer of mulch and then add mulch every other year or so. Subsequent years usually require much less mulch.

oracleofmn: How bad is the clay? If it drains decent enough, you should be ok. Prunus will not tolerate standing water or poorly drained sites well. What part of MN are you in? Just asking as Montmorency is not as cold hardy as some other varieties so might be best only in SE MN or in a protected site. I recall a friend trying to grow that variety near Sleepy Eye, MN as his wife came from cherry country in Door County WI where Montmorency is planted heavily. They had trouble with winter hardiness on Montmorency. You may want to try Mesabi. I have that in my orchard in WI and it has fairly large fruit and yellow fleshed. Nice flavor. The yield is not as high as Montmorency however. If you like tart cherries that have a dark flesh and much stronger cherry flavor try North Star or Sweet Cherry Pie (originated near River Falls, WI. Evans is really hardy too! Sweet Cherry Pie has perhaps the highest yield as a friend of mine grows them in Western WI at his U-pick orchard. He has tried them all (including Balaton) and his favorite is Sweet Cherry Pie for high yields. 50 cherry trees? Wow. I have 3 trees and we get all the fruit we need for 2 families to share. I once lived in Lake City MN for 8 years so somewhat familiar with the Minnesota climate (mighty cold winters).

hoovb zone 9 sunset 23 This was great help!! Really you answer all my questions that I was searching long time. I was asking on Facebook communities for those questions and I didn’t receive proper replies just opinions, again thank you! I must cover about 40 square meters with this ground cover to give nice background to my other succulents. Side area is pointing to North and front garden point to East. In my country summer is extremely hot most of the time, day temperature from 11: 00A.M until 17:00 PM is 35-38Celcius from mid-June until mid-September. About the soil, I am in research how to convert my current semi clay soil to well drain soil to avoid issues. Some ideas to improve it with small gravel, pumice but I never read about adding bark/mulch as it holds moist and can rot stems. But yes, I agree it keep the soil cooler…! Both agaves attenuate were cuttings and I didn’t water them regular to avoid rot. But now is time to increase watering! Some neighbors have also agave attenuate and do well, but they have some sunburns. We cannot avoid this with such a hot weather. I can’t do anything with the reflection of the heat and hot weather, I can’t add protective layers top of the succulents to protect from summer heat because I build a landscape and adding such umbrellas up to the succulent will look ugly. Do you believe if everting acclimates the first summer, because this is the first summer that I had the plants there can be better next summer? I had also issue with other type of succulents that I transplant early spring, they got sunburn and die. I bought them from nursery where they have filter sun light and controlled temperatures and air flow and probably got burned due to extreme sun light… really is too much hot here... I am afraid to remove the remaining which are a lot because when I cut some to propagate some start to rot even before placing it to the pot. I think not only the sun light burned them but also the high air temperature can rot the stems. Yesterday I bought some rooted/pot senecios to have in stock to transplant mid-autumn. I have no problem with the maintenance because I am still young, and I like to do garden dirty jobs I have a vision to see blue chalk sticks spreading my garden, can’t wait to solve the issues and find the way … Have a look the pictures of the unfinished landscape. Nil13 usda:9a sunset:21 LA,CA (Mount Wash.) Your question is also very important because I am looking for automatic way how to water the covered area with Senecio. Currently I water all my succulents with hose with regulated flow. I am trying not to leave water to the area to avoid rot. I leave the water flow to run around the succulents. But now is easy because senecio still not covered the area but later will be difficult to water 40sqm. I have hoses that pass near the CACTI landscape for other trees (palms, birds of paradise etc.) which is automatic watering for 80+ plants and I am thinking to add sprinkler system to water senecio with the same way as they water football grass, but I am not sure if this way is correct and will not cause other issues. Today I found two new stems rot and I remove the roots to show you how they look. Did those roots look rot? East East South