Scott's PDF file is really helpful reading. I live in the same general area, outside Washington DC, and will add a few comments. Nanking cherries: you need two trees, they are tasty but small -- pea size. They ripen early and seem to avoid pest problems. Sour cherry was not mentioned. I think the natural dwarf North Star is an excellent choice. I have had few problems with it. You will need to net it against birds, but it is such a small tree this is easy to do. Squirrels will strip pear trees -- it happens to me every year. I have also had codling moth on my pears. This can be avoided by bagging, but that requires more work. I agree that Asian pears are easy to grow and start producing early. I have not had any major fireblight issues. Squirrels will also strip fig trees, if the birds have not ruined your crop first. Persimmons are a big yes. But the earlier ripening ones, which means the non-astringent ones, do get hit hard by the marmorated stink bug (as does pretty much everything else that ripens, say, before late September). Late ripening astringent ones like Saijo are the way to go. I have had no insect or animal damage on these. Scott does not mention berries. Blackberries are easy to grow though may need to be trellised. They are attractive to birds though. Blackcurrants are easy to grow and do not appeal to birds or squirrels, or that matter, humans either when fresh, but they are superb as jelly and in various culinary applications. Elderberries are easy to grow, but again are not for fresh eating. Birds love them. Cornelian cherry are very slow growing. Russian pomegranates are now being sold by Isons, the muscadine nursery. I received very nice plants for very reasonable prices this year. They may be sold out now.

I'm in Rocky Mountain foothill Z5a, which would be pretty different from Midwest 5. My hit list: "Glenora" grape. The only thing fruiting this year after the terrible cold snap of early February. Produces second-rate fruit for a couple of years before it gets going. "Polly" white peach. Cold snap killed the blossoms this year, but otherwise its in fine shape. Its available as a special order from Bay Laurel Nursery. It was slow to come into production, but faultless once it did. "Redhaven" yellow peach. A little marginal for my area, but it seems to almost have a will to produce fruit for you. Its widely available, and very high quality. I am pretty sure you can get one and plant it this weekend. "Rosy Gage" plum is shaping up to be a VERY good plum. A little shy bearing so far, but its still a new plum, and I had pollination issues to solve. I have an idea once it hits maturity it will produce well in a good year. Pollination is an issue with Euro plums more than other trees. You have to make sure you have the right combination. "Castleton Plum?" My fall planted [a mistake in z5] "Castleton" died in the Big Freeze of course. I'm not terribly satisfied with the pollinators I have for "Rosy Gage" I would double check to make sure it cross-pollinates with "Rosy Gage" If it does I would go for it. This is in the realm of speculation and reputation rather than experience, however. Apricots: If you live in an area where you can even occasionally get a crop, you should grow an adapted apricot. There is just no comparison to a store-bought apricot. None. Furthermore, apricots if it grows well in your area are extraordinarily attractive trees that deserve a high-profile spot in your landscape. I like the taste of Wilson Delicious from Stark's best of all. 'Moorpark' works OK too. But as I mentioned, in my area the crop is an afterthought. Sorry, not enough luck with apples or pears to make a recommendation. As I mentioned, if you live Back East, these recommendations don't mean much.

Hi Bruce, Thanks for all the suggestions! The right varieties of Avocados can grow here--you do see a lot fewer than in Southern California and I gather that fruit production can be a lot less reliable. Actually a guy was just telling me Saturday that there used to be a commercial orchard nearby (but closer to the Bay, so less frost). I haven't been able to confirm this. What I did find are articles about Avocado trees on the Stanford campus (they are about 12 miles away, with essentially identical climate). Obviously they have survived our coldest winters: http://trees.stanford.edu/ (follow link for fruit trees) "As one approaches the Inner Quad from Serra Mall, there is a shady grove left of Memorial Court with a grove of noble avocado trees known to generations of alumni. The ripe avocados that may be found from time to time often attract enterprising harvesters and with luck one may find windfalls. The sheltered courtyard situation has enabled the trees to thrive with occasional signs of frostbite on the glossy oval leaves, up to 10 by 4 inches in size. Two of the trees are thought to be 'Fuerte'; the others are Guatemalan." The trees I found in the nursery are expensive and I didn't find anything that looked like a dwarf except for the 'Don Gilogly' variety which has been pretty thoroughly trashed on forums like this. I looked for pomegranates with minimal seeds (I believe they exist...) and didn't find anything. I find it too much trouble to deal with inedible ones. There's one big difference between the deep South and California (besides moisture and summer heat) which can affect hardiness significantly. The warmer parts of the South are often a lot warmer on average at night (and day) than equivalent USDA zones in California. For example, Orlando on January 31 st: 72 F/ 50 F. San Jose: 58 F/ 40 F. I believe both are 9b. The plants in San Jose have experienced a lot of temps in the 30s all winter--yet frosts are rare. Occasionally it will dip below 32 for just a couple hours than right back up again. In Florida, of course, it tend to get cold when a huge cold front plunges South, and I think (?) temperatures can stay colder for longer. So although they technically get just as cold, some plants can adapt to gradual change (and constant colder temps), whereas some enjoy generally higher temps, yet the sudden change may do them in. Now how this applies to individual plants--citrus, avocado, etc. I don't have a clue. Certainly if one has sheltered locations, is willing to work at it, or has a source of cheap plants it's worth experimenting. Cheap plants: something I should have added--our local nursery is celebrating 60 years and having all sorts of unbelievable specials. On Saturday it was 60% of any one item (absolutely anything--say you had your eye on a $1500 fountain--now $600). I was in fact a bit boring and bought a Key (aka Mexican) Lime. I've always heard it's too cold here, the nursery says they're fine, but it's best to protect them when it gets particularly cold. It's a $16 experiment (usually $40) so even if it dies, no big loss. Our Bearss lime is about 10 years old and has never borne too much (it seems to be picking up this year). As far as I know it's never been seriously frost damaged. We replaced an old (yet small and very productive) Myer lemon here 2 or 3 years ago (it died). The new plant hasn't fruited heavily yet, although it did bloom heavily a few months ago. These bushes/trees perform so well here that it should soon. The 14th of next month is the nursery's day for 60% off all 2 gallon Bearss limes and Myer lemons. This day is a bit less flexible than the original anything goes 60% off day, and it will be hard to resist yet another Myer Lemon at $12 (normally $30). However...it turns out that a third spot just opened up (a bush just died). And the nursery is having another 60% off any one item at the end of its 60 day celebration (specials every day--I find it hard to imagine they're not going broke). So looks like I'll be buying something else--if not a tree, things like fertilizer and soil, peat, etc. will always be used. I like the suggestion of a peach tree. We used to have this miniature one about 10 feet from those spots where citrus are--it couldn't have been more than 3 feet tall. It bore extremely heavily every year. This is a suburban neighborhood, and the squirrels were gone initially. They are back in full force and I understand they love peaches. I mentioned that I have some rooted fig cuttings. This is a great fig growing area with no rain from May through September. I'm going to put one of those in the ground in the 3rd spot. It's an LSU purple, which comes heavily recommended as a vigorous plant with great fruit. It's generally grown in the South, but apparently most all figs are great here. It also has properties that should work well for a plant that will need to be heavily pruned--only a small breba crop (fruits off the previous year's wood) plus it's supposed to bear heavily off of new wood--I understand that people in colder climates whose trees have frozen back to the ground can get fruit. The cutting is smaller and younger than is ideal to put in the ground, but since I have two others I'm giving it a shot. So my remaining question is: what to buy at a nursery sale where I can pick any one item--anything--for 60% off? For anyone who has read through this incredibly long post--what would you buy?

Alexander, its hard to tell what the sun exposure is from pictures, but my guess is that big tree in the southeast may block sun until 10AM or so in your fruit tree spot. If you had sun from 10-sunset that would still be OK, even though morning sun is the best. What I would recommend is to stand in the spot where you want the trees and rotate your head as if you were following the suns path from sunrise to sunset and see how often it is not blocked. Your sun will be something like from 55 degrees to 75 degrees in the sky during the growing season (90 degrees being straight up) so face south and look up about that amount when rotating your head east to west; every 15 degrees you rotate your head is an hour of sun exposure. If you think you will get 6 or more hours of sun you will be above the bare minimum for fruit trees. In terms of the distance you will need, for 4 trees something like a 10 foot circle is a standard spacing. Depending on how far your septic system goes it could be better to have one long row or two shorter rows. To figure it all out, just make a map of your property on paper and measure the sun exposure in various spots to find the boundary of the "good sun but no septic system" spot and see if it will have a 10' circle for each tree fitting in it. Scott