How Old Are Your Backyard Fruit Trees & How Long Do They Live?

[Hemlock140]

When I was a kid we moved into a house with 1/2 acre and about 40 fruit trees. It had been pear orchard before the house was built, so most were pears, but also we had peaches, apples, plums, apricots and walnuts. I had to help by doing much of the pruning and spraying. in age When we moved in the trees varied but most were already 20 years old, and they were still doing fine when I moved out on my own 9 years later, so at least close to 30 years old.

[NYChistorygal]

While we're on the topic of fruit trees;

I hope to put a few in over the next few years. My yard isn't huge, so I'm looking for smaller trees. (Plus, I'm short!). Can I prune, say a tree that grows to 12-14 feet, down to maybe 8-10? Will that hurt the tree?

[Hemlock140]

Originally Posted by NYChistorygal

While we're on the topic of fruit trees;

I hope to put a few in over the next few years. My yard isn't huge, so I'm looking for smaller trees. (Plus, I'm short!). Can I prune, say a tree that grows to 12-14 feet, down to maybe 8-10? Will that hurt the tree?

You can keep the height down with pruning but it requires some skill to maintain the quantity of fruit. Better to just purchase smaller trees.

There are full sized, semi-dwarf, and full dwarf trees available. Most sold at the big box stores are going to be semi-dwarf, but you can get dwarf at a real full-service nursery or online. I have seen true dwarfs in Apple, Peach, Apricot, Cherry, Plum, Fig, almond and nectarine trees, and they stay at about 10'. A good nursery is best, because you can see and select the tree. When you order online it's often going to be a stick with roots, for easier shipping, and it still may be healthy, but take a lot longer to produce fruit.

[lammius]

And if you’re really tight on space you can train the trees as espalier. I’m growing a dwarf peach tree and have been training it into a fan shape against a southeast facing wall. Apples and pears take to being trained in a variety of shapes. It looks quite complicated at first but after reading an article and watching a couple of YouTube videos it’s not hard at all.