Hairmetal, It's true traditional fruit trees like well drained locations. Nevertheless some fruit trees will tolerate a surprising amount of water once they're established. From my experience apricot (on apricot roots) and peach (on peach roots) won't tolerate much water. Apricot will tolerate less than peach, but both need to be on well drained sites, or raised plantings, to perform well (or live). Apple, plum, pear, and tart cherry (on Mazzard - not Mahleb) will tolerate some wet feet. My current thought is that apple on seedling roots is the most water tolerant of the bunch, with pear perhaps a close second. Plums on myrobolan are pretty water tolerant but they are a little harder to get started (in general) and so water stress simply adds to the difficulty (I'm speaking of Euro plums. Japanese type plums are easier to establish). That said, I wouldn't be afraid to put any of the more water tolerant fruits I mentioned in the spot you describe, if you could build even a little mound, as Drew mentioned, and planted shallow. I've planted both persimmon and pawpaw in wet locations. Persimmon will take a lot of water, but pawpaws didn't do well in water saturated areas and I lost some. I agree with Alexander, pawpaws naturally grow near streams in the wild, but I think the difference is they are seedlings. Grafted pawpaw are much harder to establish. I've found erect blackberries will tolerate loads of water (and drought as well) once they're established. They're tough. One side effect of planting a somewhat water tolerant fruit tree in a wet spot is that vigor is greatly reduced for several years. The tree will not size up for long time. Consequently fruiting is generally delayed. Still if you want to plant a fruit tree in a wet spot, it will become productive if the tree doesn't drown before it gets established. It just takes longer. Mounds, or some type of raised planting is the sure fire method to prevent drowning.

I purchased 7 bareroot apples from Stark last summer during their sale. I planted them in pots and never got around to planting them in fall, so I overwintered them. I placed the pots as tight together as I could against the wall of my garage, but outside. Ideally I suppose I should have covered them with leaves and tried to get a tarp over them, but I was unable to do so. The only protection that they got was that I'd shovel snow over top of the pots every time that it snowed here, so they were under a pile of snow for at least 50% of the winter. I'm in zone 5A and they came out of the winter fine, are in the ground now and have broken dormancy and look fantastic. I'm not suggesting that trying to overwinter potted trees in cold areas is ideal, but if you have to do it and can give them any protection, they'll likely be OK. Admittedly, we had a fairly mild winter this year but were still sub-zero quite a few times.

Banana Babysitter....you sound like a very good friend, that is being taken advantage of big time! I know this isnt the advise you wanted. She dumps some huge banana 'trees' in huge pots on you, and doesn't tell you when she will take them back? She is paying you how much for taking care of them, for the water, fertilizer,new pots, soil etc... they sound like they are getting big and need bigger pots,more soil,etc. And they are going to go back into a small apartment...when? They don't fit now in the pots they are in now, and she cant handle them?...right? How is she going to handle bigger trees? They aren't going to grow in reverse and shrink. So she won't be able to take them back. It sounds like she is taking advantage of your friendship. I mean being a friend is one thing, taking advantage of a friend is another thing. Sure they can live in pots for a long time, certain 'ornamental' ones can live in pots all their lives inside, but fruit bearing ones, and these sound like fruit bearing ones, will just be unhappy and not look good and can grow so many pups in the soil,they can break clay pots easily! And split plastic pots in half. They need to be outside in the ground. Call and tell her to come get her babies, or they go to the dump or a community garden, if you have one near you. Or at least ask when is she coming to get them? As you see they grow inside, sure, but as you also see, they arent to happy, they dont look to good, and to many pups are starting in the pots? Those will crack a pot very easily, so can just the roots! They can grow a long time inside,if you had ornamental varieties, thats one thing, but these sound like fruit type, and they need room to grow and full sun and tons of water, and fertilizer. They wont go into a small apartment. You have a lot of patience.

Damp-off of very young seedlings has never been that much of a problem for me, but I think the reason for that may be how I germinate them to begin with. It's a cue I took from my mother, which is basically to put the seeds in the same pot (around the edges of the pot) with an adult plant then water the adult plant the way I normally would. It means I don't use bottom heat and whatnot, so things sprout when it naturally becomes warm enough for them, but pretty much I don't worry as much about damp-off because there are older roots using the same water in the same pot. It's when I take the babies out that I experience problems. As I mentioned, I actually put some young Calamondins back with their Rangpur Lime host plant to recover after this winter. The other thing I practice quite a lot is the theory that it's not dead until it's dead and even if I'm sure its dead, it's worth a shot. You wouldn't believe the number of citrus seedlings and cutting grown figs I had come back to life after the moving issue the spring before last. I actually use the much maligned self watering pots, but not as self watering pots. The designers would say I'm using them totally backwards. I'll go down my line of trees and tip them to dump the water if I notice water actually standing in any of the reservoirs. (I can't imagine using them to "self water" because what that really does is create a high water table for root rot.) If you've ever taken a moment to look at one of those things empty, the bottom of the pot that sits inside the reservoir is like a pasta strainer. So long as the reservoir is always empty, drainage isn't a problem.