Planting Orchard
Whitetail Deer
Planning on planting more trees. I am placing highest emphasis disease/pest resistance. I am in Zone 5b. I want some chestnut, more apple, possibly plum.
Pear is out (Fire blight). Persimmons are out (Tried and failed, I think too far north)
What has been your best tree for deer?
I planted kieffer pears as they are disease resistant, liberty apples, chestnut crabs, dolgo crabs, and am adding Kerr crabs in the spring.
In looking at trees on line, in the description sometimes it will say "September drop fruit" or "October drop fruit" or "November drop fruit" on the same type Apple tree.
Can they really cross breed to trees to do that or is that hogwash?
They no doubt are giving different times (months) for fruit drop because farther north/south...these trees would not have ripe fruit at the same time.
Crabapples are the least maintenance tree and are typically reliable producers too. For a pure wildlife orchard, I would focus on that. I would not rule out pears all together, there are some varieties that are more resistant to FB too.
Plums are good for people and summer food, but dont produce much for in season hunting.
Chestnuts and certain oaks are good adds as well, but plan on those being a longer time to begin producing (10 years maybe). Also these can be a challenge with fruit trees as they will get REAL tall eventually and will shade the fruit trees if planted close by.
Plant a variety of apples, as well as plenty of crabapples. Use mouse guards for a few years, and fence deer out until partially grown.
I'd call the local extension office and ask them what diseases are common in your area for fruit trees. Then call a nursery (Turkey Creek, The Wildlife Group, etc) that deals with habitat type trees and tell them what you want for disease resistance, fruiting dates, and bloom dates (bloom dates are important too). They will advise you well.
I'm in 7a so a list of trees that do well on my place wouldn't do you much good.
If your interested here's 7 pages of "Top 3 Apples" thread... https://habitat-talk.com/threads/apples-if-you-were-to-pick-just-3.15021/
Thanks for the replies and the thread. I think I will add a few crab apples to the mix. I am going to contact a local tree guy as well.
I would avoid most pears. Ours have been crushed by FB, even though they are allegedly "resistant." Our chinese chestnuts have been a gold mine. When planted in good soil, you can expect production within 5 years.
I've got one tree I'd never plant again and that's the Golden Hornet Crab. Prolific producer but nothing eats it.
My Chinese Chestnuts have been in the ground for more than half a decade. The one's that have survived aren't more than 3' tall. I keep trying them though.
My pears handle FB well (resistance to FB was my number 1 factor in deciding varieties), but only produce well every couple of years due to late frosts that zap blooms. They grow like weeds though and are putting on wood fast! Won't be long before their good yrs will produce a lot.
One think that you will see from the above responses is that location, not just growing zone, plays a HUGE part of growing success. Some trees just do better in certain environments than others and that can vary a lot state to state, county to county. Best to pick brains of folks locally as well.
My mature apple trees are loaded this year and will have many broken limbs.My crabs are also loaded a rarely break a limb and I see alot of deer eating late in year.Not as many coon and coyote issue either.My asian pears are loaded but stronger than apple. I would plant crab apples and FB resistant pears and make sure any apple are CAR resistant. There are some good orchards out there and on the 30 tree I planted last year they came from 4 or 5 orchards and every tree is still alive.I don't buy from wildlife group,they just seemed real small or Morse nursery thats where I got trophy pears years ago that are not at all FB resistant and have grafted persimmion that don't appear to be females. Check out habitat-talk.com
you should try some Franklin apple trees hold late and versatile
Osceola….if you’re interested, I can send you some chestnut seeds (conkers?) when they drop this fall. They’re Dunstan chestnuts. Not sure if you’re interested in propagating them or not.
I have found with the chinese chestnuts that the soil makes a huge difference (shocking I know). With good fertile/bottom land soil, mine start producing in 3-5 years. Rocky or thin soil, they grow at a 1/3 of the pace and take twice as long, if not longer, to produce. I've trees half the age that are three times the size of their cohorts planted in poor soil.
Buckdeer lives less than 30 miles from me. We have VASTLY different success with trees due to the vastly different soils and weather patterns. It really can be pretty spotty on what succeeds and what doesn't. I got my Golden Hornet from him. Mine is growing great, I suspect his is too. But there's other trees that we've shared that I think did much better on his place than mine.
I've gotten lots of Dunstan nuts from t-roy. He ships absolutely great nuts, jump on his offer if you're interested in some. We have t-roy chestnuts growing all over the county!
I appreciate the kind words about the quality and condition of my nuts, Catscratch! I take a lot of pride in keeping them in prime shape……;-)
Lol! I've abused mine with many acts of carelessness and bad choices. Glad to know someone is taking care of theirs!
Due to the prior two comments, I hesitate to say that I would like to try some of your nuts...but yes, I would love to try and raise some Dunstan. Please let me know when they are ready.
Ok, Osceola. I’ll put you on my Onlyfans accounts list. ;-)
JK….I’ll reach out to you this fall, & I’ll ship you a couple dozen (or more if you want). Looks like several of my trees are pretty loaded up this year. I’ve never propagated any mast trees, but Catscratch and CAS-HNTR have. I’d bet they could give you a few pointers, if you’ve never done it either.
Sounds great. Let me know what I owe.
This is my best tree.
This is my best tree.
I’ll charge you the same as what I charged the guys I sent nuts to last year…
Picked two boxes of Asian pears off two trees this weekend. They are about 1.5 month early due to drought, so no help for deer season, but I sure like them!
I've got to plant some of those Asian pears! Buckdeer, what varieties do you have? Do you have a favorite?
Don't remember the name but thinking only 3 different ones very common and have couple of all 3.I will try to see where I got the last ones from Willis nursery and they were Chojura and Shinko
Thanks Randy. I have 2 holes to fill in my orchard and have gone back and forth a lot on what to get. Been gun shy on the Asian pears thinking they may not do well on my place, but I do like to try new things!
Planted 11 bare root Dolgo crabs last year. 6-7' tall. All of them were loaded with apples at end of summer. This year they all bloomed but not a single apple on any of them. I sprayed the damn beetles last year, but didnt this time. I assume they ate all the leaves and buds. Trees dont look great right now at all. Lots of missing leaves. Plenty of moisture and i used fertilizer spikes again this spring too.
Apples. But you shouldn't be too fat north for Persimmons. We had lots of them on our place in Ohio.
bears have been real hard on my orchards I planted for deer
This year has been fun for the trees at the house. They started off looking real nice in Spring, but it went south fast. First the deer started hitting them pretty good, so I had to scuffle with more cages. I don't know why they weren't caged at onset of planting; guess my wife thought I should do it. Those worked great until the effin cicadas came. According to many writings, those things do no damage... ummmmm okay. The cicadas work was then finished by the Japanese beetles. We only have a small orchard, but not sure any of our apples will make it.
Let's say the weather pattern has been a bit abnormal. April brought 8.5" of rain and July 9.5". Basically every other month between (and including August), we've seen around 1.5" or less. Ample moisture, but its came in waves for sure. Feast or famine.
