Whats your go to fruit tree???

[Mattyq2402]

I know i posted in the general forum about a habitat go to. Whats your go to fruit tree type in the midwest for whitetail attraction. Im in hills and have a 1 acre plot carved out with 19 young 2 to 5 year old fruit trees added. I have 9 trees coming this springs from blue hill and northern whitetail crabs all geared for october thru december drop.(i live in Az and my family farm is in southern Ohio so I typically hunt november 1st week) Ill be getting somewhat close to capacity and want to make sure my next year order is well thought out and I get something thats highly desired by deer. What are your reccomendations for drawing power and quick growth and production?

 

[Mortenson]

I haven't made fruit yet, but have I think 60 some planted in the past 5 years, including trees from both the nurseries you named. The NWC 30-06 and Droptine grew really well in year 2, this year. Of my regular apples, I'm most impressed with Enterprise as far as growth and health. Do you have any of those? Supposed to be a good Nov dropper. Kerr apple-crab gets a lot of love here, but as a slight wrinkle, Sandbur mentioned it's dropping early this year. Supposed to usually be later, though. Most diversified fruit orchards probably need a Kieffer pear or 2. From what I gather, they may hang a few into Nov, possibly more Oct.

 

[Mattyq2402]

I have 5 keifer, 3 whitneys, a liberty, a gold rush, an enterprise and 2 chinese chesnut from Morse, three persimmon of vary drop time and 3 dr deer pear from chesnutt hill. Im looking forward to the blue hill and nwc this spring. Got me two road kills, 1 whole season, 1 prime time, and a pippin. Nwc I went with 2 droptine and 2 cross bow. I know Im a ways out from fruit but I hit my 10 year mark monday so retirement is 10 away and moving back to Ohio to this farm.

Just wanna get a grip on what Im missing now rather than 5 years from now. I typically run clover or a fall grain mix in these plots. Im debating dropping a few trees and making a couple interior plots leading to the acre field where all these trees are planted. I have access to a forestry mulcher so may do this. Yall reccomend one central plot of small kill plots to supplement the large one?

 

[Mattyq2402]

Couple pics of the acre field Im talking about, I have space to add some more... Im worried the dead ash is gonna claim a tree or two.

 

[Mattyq2402]

First pick is the chesnutt hill trees in the tubes. Three dr deer pear and three persimmon. Next two are from the far east end of field and thats the apple, pear, and crab mix. Im thinking about hinging and using the forestry mulcher to clear a lane out the point past the end of the field. Had John Eberhart hunt my place a few years back and that was his reccomendation. If I can get that job done most of the blue hill and nwc will go on the lane.

 

[TenPoint]

I wasn’t aware NWC was selling for spring ‘21 yet.


Or are you talking about trees you planted this past spring?

 

[willy]

Pear trees in general. With a mix of varieties. Kieffer is first choice, trophy pears, doc's special, and asian pears. The doc specials really handled the last frost great this year, others not nearly as well. Apples are almost nonexistent.

I haven't met a pear I didn't like yet. Moon glo seem to finally be producing so they are off my $#it list. Apple trees produce but the deer in my area prefer pears. Also the asian beetles have decimated all the apple tree leaves and they haven't done so well the past couple years. They haven't bothered the pears. I also get way more fruit off of my pears than apples.

 

[Apple Junkie]

I think you’re doing a great job of selecting nurseries and varieties already, so I’d suggest you keep doing what you’re doing! I have to follow your lead and get some pears going somewhere.

For me, goldrush on a B.118 rootstock has produced the highest yields in a short period of time… almost too quick since it’s still a fairly small tree with lots of attention-grabbing fruit. Oddly enough, it’s an Ida Red tree on “standard” rootstock that is the most consistently productive tree in my orchard. It is also the oldest, so it may not be the “best” as other trees mature. If you plant a bunch of varieties like you’re doing now, you’ll hit your fair share of home runs. Love your foresight!

 

[sandbur]

I haven't made fruit yet, but have I think 60 some planted in the past 5 years, including trees from both the nurseries you named. The NWC 30-06 and Droptine grew really well in year 2, this year. Of my regular apples, I'm most impressed with Enterprise as far as growth and health. Do you have any of those? Supposed to be a good Nov dropper. Kerr apple-crab gets a lot of love here, but as a slight wrinkle, Sandbur mentioned it's dropping early this year. Supposed to usually be later, though. Most diversified fruit orchards probably need a Kieffer pear or 2. From what I gather, they may hang a few into Nov, possibly more Oct.

To clarify, one Kerr is dropping and one is not. Both are on B118 and from Cummins.
The one not dropping rested last year.


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[sandbur]

I know i posted in the general forum about a habitat go to. Whats your go to fruit tree type in the midwest for whitetail attraction. Im in hills and have a 1 acre plot carved out with 19 young 2 to 5 year old fruit trees added. I have 9 trees coming this springs from blue hill and northern whitetail crabs all geared for october thru december drop.(i live in Az and my family farm is in southern Ohio so I typically hunt november 1st week) Ill be getting somewhat close to capacity and want to make sure my next year order is well thought out and I get something thats highly desired by deer. What are your reccomendations for drawing power and quick growth and production?

My voice for a climate much farther north than you would be different. I always prefer crabs due to being more bite sized for deer. I have seen deer walk by bigger apples to eat chestnut crabs. In my climate, I feel hardy crabs are easier to care for.

Based on what I know now, I would choose the following to feed deer from August into March.
Norland or Trailman
Dolgo
Chestnut crab
(Maybe Haralred which is not a crab)
Kerr Crab
Big Dog
Buckman Crab

I would plant at least two of each as some tend to bare apples every other year. A late frost really throws them into this pattern, unless you are willing to do lots of pruning and thinning of apples on the heavy bearing years.

I would plant the second of each at a different location than the first. Look for a different micro climate, maybe different soil, a slight north versus south slope, or on the downwind side of a windbreak or some location where snow really drifts in. (The slower snow melt can delay blooming and give a crop when blossoms freeze on trees on a south facing exposure.)

Still learning.

My two cents for now.


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[sandbur]

This is the second year of me keeping a written log of fruit harvest/ ripening / dropping times. It helps make good choices.

My main Big Dog tree is resting this year, but I have three topworks in three different locations that are producing.


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[H20fwler]

I’m with Willy, make mine pears!
In my area pears are easier to grow, require little care and when one drops it gets eaten in less than 24 hours, deer will bed under the trees waiting for fruit to drop.

If I had to pick just one fruit tree...Kieffer pear or any variant of it.

 

[yoderjac]

I'm not in the mid-west, so depending on where you are, you may not be in the native range of persimmons. American persimmons are by far the best bang-for-the-buck fruit tree in my area. Because they are native, the need no maintenance at all. A persimmon seedling can easily take 10 years or more to produce fruit, and that is only if it turns out to be female. Otherwise it will never produce fruit on its own. There is a big inexpensive short-cut in my area. Persimmons spring up all over the place. I let them get to about 1" in diameter and then cut them down and bark graft them with female persimmon scions. An inch is ideal, but I've had good success up to 3 or 4 inches in diameter. Bark grafting is easier than other forms of grafting since cambium alignment is not a factor. With the well established root system of a 1"+ diameter tree, the grafted tree can produce its first persimmons in the 3rd leaf after grafting. You can take scions from your local female trees or buy commercial varieties inexpensively. I've traded scions with folks, used my own, and bough named variety scions. My objective is to have persimmons falling on the ground over a long time period for deer. Once the graft takes, you have to visit every week or so to remove water sprouts below the graft. After that, the tree is on its own!

Here is my experience with this process: http://www.habitat-talk.com/index.php?threads/sex-change-operation-transfered-from-qdma-forum.5547/

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Mattyq2402]

I have a bunch of walnut in my secondary plots. I have had no problem with grains and clover in them. If I can get sunlight to these plots by dropping a couple trees would you reccomend, if so what does best with walnut close by?

 

[Mattyq2402]

I haven't made fruit yet, but have I think 60 some planted in the past 5 years, including trees from both the nurseries you named. The NWC 30-06 and Droptine grew really well in year 2, this year. Of my regular apples, I'm most impressed with Enterprise as far as growth and health. Do you have any of those? Supposed to be a good Nov dropper. Kerr apple-crab gets a lot of love here, but as a slight wrinkle, Sandbur mentioned it's dropping early this year. Supposed to usually be later, though. Most diversified fruit orchards probably need a Kieffer pear or 2. From what I gather, they may hang a few into Nov, possibly more Oct.

I believe I have one enterprise and its doing well. As far as pears go O am planning on trying to get malus from blue hill next year if I can beat the rush. My next order may be all pear. Can u think of any go to pear types other than keifer and malus?

 

[Native Hunter]

Sawtooth Oak.

A historic late freeze in my area this year destroyed all fruit at my farm. This includes all pears, apples, and even tough native fruit like persimmons. No one remembers anything like it. It even completely killed the leaves on the sawtooths; however, they somehow managed to come back and are making acorns.

The best fruit or mast is the one that will be there regardless of what nature pours out.

 

[yoderjac]

You need to do a deep dive before buying sawtooth. They were one of the first trees I planted many years ago. They grew well and produced a lot of acorn. The problem was that they all hit the ground in September and were gone before our bow season started. I understand there is more than one "strain" of sawtooth and some do drop later. Make sure you get a strain that works for your objectives.

At my current place, we have riparian buffers with plenty of native oaks so I haven't planted sawtooth there. One reason to plant them is they they often produce when the native acorn crop is a failure. I decided to go the chestnut route for that.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Native Hunter]

My Sawtooths don't even think about starting to drop until Mid to Late October and they drop through Mid November, which is perfect timing for when I hunt.

The historic late freeze also destroyed my chestnut crop, but the chestnuts were not able to rebound like the Sawtooths. No one loves chestnuts as much as I do, but they were not able to bounce back after the freeze like the Sawtooths.

I stand by: The best fruit or mast is the one that will be there regardless of what nature pours out.

PS: 11 miles away at my home a few trees were set back by the freeze, but I ended up with good crops of all fruit on most trees.

 

[yoderjac]

My Sawtooths don't even think about starting to drop until Mid to Late October and they drop through Mid November, which is perfect timing for when I hunt.

PS: The historic late freeze also destroyed my chestnut crop, but the chestnuts were not able to rebound like the Sawtooths. No one loves chestnuts as much as I do, but they were not able to bounce back after the freeze like the Sawtooths.

I stand by: The best fruit or mast is the one that will be there regardless of what nature pours out.

Sound like you got the right strain! That late frost was strange here. My early pears produced fine. They are all gone by now. Like you, my chestnuts failed. My persimmons are producing. Strange year...

 

[Native Hunter]

Sound like you got the right strain! That late frost was strange here. My early pears produced fine. They are all gone by now. Like you, my chestnuts failed. My persimmons are producing. Strange year...

I did get the good ones, but it was totally by accident. I didn't intend to plant any sawtooths but when a guy brought me what was supposed to be a dozen chestnut trees, I could see that they were actually sawtooths, because the leaves were still on them. I was paying him less than a dollar a tree, so I didn't say anything to him and took the trees. That mistake of him bringing the wrong trees ended up being a blessing.