Well, its probably not ideal. low-wattage fertilizer is important with fruit trees. I am by no means an "organic" grower in outlook, but I use only natural fertilizer and lots of mulch because it matches what you need with fruit trees better--steady, slow delivery of modest amounts of nitrogen, other nutrients and micronutrients. (I realize you can definitely overfertilize with things like fish meal and blood meal, but I'm talking generalities here). I also live in a dry area, so I personally don't have to worry about my fertilizer washing away the way most growers would. So I wouldn't worry about fertilizing too early. The reason I don't is that I fertilize my trees once a month during the first part of the growing season and it would mess up my routine a little to get started early. But I suppose its better than starting late because you put it off and forgot.

Funny calistoga. I read the whole thing and still thought wynswrld98 meant each fruit was small. The first things I think of when the yield goes way down from one year to the next is lack of pollinators or unfavorable weather at the wrong time. I don't remember hearing of cherries being every other year like apples and some other fruit. For those apparently allowing a tree to overproduce by not thinning can result in biennial crops. They also do less cropping if given a lot of nitrogen so that they produce a lot of vegetative growth at the expense of fruit buds. In that case fertilization when not needed can be the problem rather than the solution.

Anything composting around your plants can pull N from the soil until properly broken down. I mulch around my fruit trees with grass clippings maybe 3 or 4 times a year but my main reason is for a more natural way of weed reduction around the base instead of using sprays all the time. Another added benefit mulch has is it also attracts worms. The down side is, worms attract birds, so I avoid when fruit is ripening. Also when I do much I also add sheep pellets to help against the initial N reduction. & one thing I didn't see here, so I must mention is grass clippings can make the soil more acidic which is great for the Blueberries but not so much for my other trees, so to battle against that I just add a little dusting of lime also. Lime helps to neutralize acidic soil. Best advice though is educate yourself on the needs of each type of tree, & buy a soil testing kit. Once you know the soil is right for the trees you can then look at other reasons that may be causing problems. Every place around the world is going to be different so I enjoy experimenting with my trees to see what gets me the best results every year. Of course taking into account that you always have an, "on season" then an "off season".

Geraldo,,,When you say it takes more fuel and chemicals to produce corn than what the corn is worth, obvously you are following the same investigative reporting procedures as your infamous TV counterpart. I grew up on a 160 acre dairy farm in Greenford,Ohio that was totally self sustaining. Currently I am hobby farming on a small 60 acres farm in Youngstown, Ohio. Lacking the initial startup capital to buy modern farm equipment, we opted to get some basics on the used machinery market, a 1960 Mineapolis Moline 36 drawbar horsepower tractor ($2000), a 1966 ford 20 drawbar horsepower tractor (2.7gal/hr), 3 bottom 16" moldboard plow ($300 new), a tandem 9 ft disc ($50) and a two row John Deere corn planter ($300). The large tractor burns 5gal/hr and plows 6 acres per hour( $.83/acre), discs 12 acres per hour ( $.41/acre). The small tractor plants the corn at 5 acres/hr ($.55/acre) We practice crop rotation by planting corn one year, then timothy and clover hay for two years. The legumes provide a very lucrative cash crop of hay, which we bale in small bales targeted to the individual horse owner market. Five acres of hay will provide enough cash income to provide all the fuel used by our equipment for the entire season. In addition, the legumes replace the nitrogen that is taken out of the soil by the corn thus we have no need of buying fertilizer. (Though the concept of crop rotation is almost abandoned in commercial large scale farming in exchange for no till planting, chemical fertilizers and herbicides, in truth George Washington Carver originated the idea of crop rotation for self sustaining farming before the civil war. While tinkering with my antiquated equipment and outdated farming techniques will in no wise rival the fuel efficiencies of our commermercial counterparts on the mega farms with 200 horsepower diesel tractors, I can still produce an average of 100 bushels to the acre. (100 bu x 56lbs/bu = 5600 pounds of corn.) I currently have contracts to supply corn for home heating fuel through a small co-op of 20 homeowner neighbors. Based upon this little experiment I am discussing with 4 or 5 local farmers who are interested in joining our co-op to have a market for what they do best, produce corn. As a sideline, we are now applying for a Federal Gasohol" permit, which will allow us to own and operate a "Still" to manufacture corn whiskey, which will be used as the primary fuel for all our current gas burning engines. Federal law requires that all the distilled alcohol must be labeled as automotive fuel only, but no doubt someone may get a bit fueled up on a saturday nite tooo.