Silent, I have 2 William's Pride. The second one was planted last year. Both were from bareroot,were tall over 4 ft at planting. I did not know about pruning at planting then. I did not like the way both trees were leaning. This year, I decided that it's not too late to correct the one I planted last year. I dug it up and replanted it about 3 weeks ago (kind of late to do that)and head cut it down to 3 1/2 ft. It does survive,leave out, straight and short. That's what I want my trees to grow, short and straight (if possible). I'll do some pruning to the older one this summer, too. Your tree's branches are a lot lower than I would prefer. You should decide if you want to do something to correct the tree this year or not. You may waste this year but may be better off in a long run. Randy, To me, William's Pride is a very good apple. The trees are very resistent to CAR (in my area). I don't have to spray Immunox on them. I gave the apples to two of my friends. Both said they were the best apples they have ever had (possibly because they're the first ripe on the tree apples they ever had). I think you'll like it.

HI J, I have 3 peach trees. All have fruited in 2-3 years. I did not really amend the soil except for adding some top soil to fill the holes because I did not have enough native soil to put back. In my areas, rocks grow best. Rocks and boulders are everywhere when you dig a hole. I've fertilized the tree a bit in the spring each of the following years. I don't want to fertilize too much. If I were you, I'd get rid of competing weed around each tree and mulch it. Your apple tree looks stunted. A 3 yrs old apple tree should not look like that even in your type of soil. Not sure why, but you may want to consider relocating it. The soil in my yard is also land fill. The trees still grow decently. As for apple fruiting, I have apple trees that have fruited in 2nd and 3rd year on semi-dwarf rootstocks. My Honey Crisp is on an unknown rootstock. It must be at least 6 years old now but still have not fruited. My guess is it's on a standard rootstock which will take much longer. Make sure you have another variety of apple that blooms about the same time to cross pollinate. If there are crab apple trees in your neighborhood, you'd be all set.

The fruit trees should produce at least a few fruits by the fourth year. That's really when the trees have become semi-mature. This could mean you will have to wait for summer next year (because the first year does not count if it was not planted in the spring). If you still do not see any fruit appear on any of your fruit trees by next year, something is likely wrong. Maybe you are giving your trees too much fertilizer? That can sometimes delay fruiting. Also where is your location? If you are in climate zones 8-10, the trees might not be getting enough chill (and if that is the case there are certain things that can be done to help counteract this). Or your area might have experienced late chill this year, which prevented fruit from forming. Are the crabapples sending out blossoms at the same time as the apples? Have you seen any bees visiting the blossoms? How close are the pear trees to each other? If they are more than 20-30ft apart, that may be making pollination difficult in the early years.

Parker,I have been thinking of the same thing too--about the cold, particularly about the damage that was caused to it in 2010. I think the fertility of the tree might have been greatly compromised because otherwise the foliage growth seems to be prolific. In fact, I have had to trim off the branches every year up to 3 ft from their tips. Trying to keep it from growing taller and broader was a chore .. lol. Right now, it stands at least at 16 ft if not 18 ft. This all happened after the tree died down to 1/3 of its original size. Before the freeze, it was about 6-7 ft tall. I think something weird must have happened that made this tree to behave in a way that is most unpredictable. My other lychee trees although are slow in catching up, they do eventually put up a show of a full crown blooms. This year, I'm so happy to see my Hap Ip and Sweet Heart in full blooms. I'm thankful that my Brewster regularly fruits, although it seems to be showing a year of heavy alternate with a year of light bloom. This year, it's going on a light bloom mode. Anyway, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that all will go well as I also have to keep down the web worm infestation. So far, the BT we're spraying seems to be working. It's not a chemical, but a kind of a bacterium culture that the larvae from the web worm feed on. It makes them sick so they'll stop eating the young floral parts. They have been eating my Sweetheart every year until we found this wonderful spray. We're also spraying it on our mangoes as they also attack them. If you keep some lychees in your yard, it would be nice if you share pix of some of your plants.