Apple trees?

I would like to plant a Honeycrisp apple tree. As some of you know, I'm pretty close to the coast, only about 500 feet, but the yard is fairly well protected from the wind, and I have wonderful soil. But of course, it's cloudy here more frequently than other zone 8 areas where apples might do better. Anyone have any experience with apple trees this close to the coast? What other fruit trees might do well here?

I'm not on the coast, but my favorite apple tree I planted is the variety "Melrose" which is an older type, great storage apple and also tastes great. You might want to ask some of the local people in your area what has done well for them. Possibly someone there has Melrose and can tell you how it produces for them.

Thanks mauryhill!

I don't know what apple tree would be ideal.. but I got my fruit trees from raintreenursery.com (I got their combination 4 x 1 dwarf apple tree, 4 x 1 dwarf cherry tree, a desert king fig, brown turkey fig, a goji berry, and a black beauty elderberry). I already had a s. nigra white tipped elderberry, as you need another s. nigra with the black beauty to allow it to produce fruit, but that does really well in shade much of the day.. almost crazy how much it still grows! My apple trees and cherry trees I planted behind a 3 foot retaining wall to try and protect from the wind a little bit (as I live on a large lake and they get fairly exposed harsh winds). It was the most secluded yet sun filled part I have on my property and they still whip around like crazy (although they still do just fine with the wind whipping them!). I always intended to espalier them, so I started that and they uphold very well with that as well. The fig trees I have are not really wind hardy I guess, but I have them planted on top of the retaining wall, with the wind at them full force.. I was worried that the wind was going to rip them to pieces.. but they are doing surprisingly well.. My desert king fig tree is already producing fruit.. and I planted him in February 2013 as a little root stock stick.. I was really happy with how hardy the plants were that I got from raintree nursery. They have descriptions on their trees as to what types of environments work well with them, and they are in Southeast Washington, so not too far away from where you are located compared to many nurserys! It is so cloudy where I live most of the year.. but the trees I got are growing like crazy! I certainly do not have coastal winds.. but they are strong enough to wipe out many trees during wind storms here.. look into espalier ideas as an option which might help!

Poobear, do you have pix? I'm especially interested in how the 4x1 dwarf apple, goji berry & elderberries have worked out; they are all tempting to me.

The first one is of my desert king fig that is producing already! The wind was really getting to him and he was starting to have a little curve to him so I support him half way (so he does not rely on it) by putting the bamboo support at an angle (I read it in an article to do it that way).

The second one is my brown turkey, although I placed the stake next to him with no tie to help him stay straight with all the wind.

Third picture is of the whole area, where the two apple dwarfs are on the left and right sides behind the retaining wall, the cherry dwarf is in the middle behind the retaining wall, and the figs are between the cherry and apples trees on both sides. It's sort of hard to see because they blend in a little with the arborvitaes.. It is also hard to tell, but I am working on their shape so they will espalier along the retaining wall (for the apples and cherry tree will go a little more up then over). They are all south facing (on our north fence line) and so they get sun from the time it rises until almost when it falls. It is hard to believe they were only sticks when I planted them a few months ago!

4th Picture is of my black beauty elderberry, I actually had to move him to a location that got LESS sun, because he was having a little bit of a tough time in the full heat on my property does awesome in mostly shade and over cloudy despite the "full sun" description. He gets intense heat in the morning, but shade in the afternoon. He started off only a few inches tall and is now almost 2 feet!

5th picture is of my white tipped elderberry - the fern is on the left, then a camellia, then (although you can't see it due to the angle of the photo) the black beauty is on the right of the camellia. This is on our south property line, and so the sun is blocked by the cedar fence, although it comes full force in the morning (as I have the lilac trees shaped to be mostly structure at the base and light shines through excellent). I am planning on pruning them to be more tree shape, and eventually underneath will be shaded plants. The taller the elderberries get, the more sun they will get as they will eventually be taller than the shade line of the fence.. but I am surprised at just how well they do under a more partial shade condition. They also seem to be real bug resistant too, as I have this euphorbia my mother gave me that I can't for the life of me get rid of the aphids (tried lady bugs, spray religiously with water, hand pick, spray with soap etc) but the elderberries just grow strong and seem to be pest free!

I will post goji berry in next post (as I only get 5 photos per post)

Photo 1 - I found a little bit better picture of my fruit trees (the two apples, cherry, and two figs).

Photo 2 - My goji berry, although this photo is a few weeks old.. and he has grown MUCH bigger in just a few weeks with the heavy rain we have been having! Goji berry is on the north property line (so south facing sun) and gets full sun all day long. He started out only a couple inches tall. I plan on using a trellis with him, but am waiting until he gets a little bit more developed and establish roots a little better. Raintreenursery.com has the same cost of shipping if you buy 1 plant or 40 plants basically, so the goji berry is one that my husband picked out (as I said, hey might as well get a few to plant since the shipping would be more for our money to get a few plants we would never have tried!). I have never actually eaten a goji berry before.. but apparently they are the most nutritious fruit that is edible. I plan on dehydrating these and using them while I ride my bike!

Photo 3 - another photo of my elderberries. along the fence in the background. You can see.. my vegetable beds hardly grow with the sun that we had gotten when I took this picture.. but those elderberries were growing like crazy before our heavy sun just started coming out this week!

Photo 4 - One of my apple trees in April, which looks like a completely different tree now because of the growth!

Photo 5 - is a cheap grafted apple tree I planted at work (bought it from costco). It is facing east, and sit right in front of a heater vent.. The picture was taken in early Feb, and it is not 3 ft taller, never is watered besides the natural rain, and seems to be more prolific of a grower than I ever could have thought! It is a dwarf as well, and I think it just loves the heat that comes from the heater vent?

Let me know if you would like to see more pictures or ones that are more close up!

O wow, so nice to get so many photos. Clearly you have a challenging site but that also looks like quite the view. You've done so much, very impressive.

Thank you poobear, for the info and the pictures. And I have to say, I love that multicolor bamboo fence!

Yeah, me too. Is that something special, or will it turn tan like every other bamboo stake I've seen?

Thanks for the kudos!

I actually got the idea for the bamboo fencing on here! Some really great ideas from this community, and I found the bamboo fencing at Lowes. (Home Depot has the same exact stuff, but 2x as expensive for the same name brand, don't really get it). Anyways, the stuff they had on stock was in 6' x 6' or 6' x 8' rolls. The color I got was mahogany. I don't really know why but some of them had a green tint to it, maybe the stain was lighter? They had a plain color bamboo, but I thought the darker was nicer looking. The different colors is not really noticeable though, and the tints all seem to blend in very well as a background to my plants (which will eventually grow in and fill the space in 10 years). It has a warranty on it too, which was a nice surprise that came with purchasing. The information that comes with the bamboo fencing says they recommend that you update the stain every couple years (and I think the warranty is for either 15 or 30 years). It is SUPER heavy, and I had to have 3 Lowes employees help me load my car with them! I actually bought all that they had in the store because our property is so long and skinny.

I attached some photos of the difference the bamboo fence makes! The first is a photo of our property line when my husband purchased the property (it was abandoned property for 3+ years, and I had never had a garden before but I completely cleaned out the safari overgrown plants (which many were actually hedges coming over from the other lot). With some problems with the abandoned property next door we had to put up a chain link fence (recommended by the police), but still having problems (I was working on landscaping and was thinking in many years the plants would eventually cover the fence, but with more problems it was just not going fast enough) and so with a little help from everyone went with the bamboo! I would TOTALLY recommend it to everyone!! It went from sort of trashy chain link to feeling resort like and peaceful. You can still see through the fence (only a little) if you are standing within a foot or two, and one gardener suggested putting landscaping fabric behind it before putting it up. I would recommend that to anyone who wants it to be completely blocked, and think that was a good idea, although I had already started putting some up so I might go back later and do that but so far it's totally secluded feeling, especially since I have some plants in front of the bamboo. The bamboo is probably 2-3 inches thick, and it is held together with a thick metal wire (like the kind you have in a chain link fence). My husband zip tied it to the chain link with black zip ties, so you can't even see the zip ties, especially since he did those behind plants.

Also, I might mention, thinking about fruit trees, my parents have this (it must be a dwarf) plum tree, that bears so much fruit, is hacked back to about 4 feet every year (so my moms rose bushes get light), and my dad I think has had it for 40 years.

I also remember.. my rental place I lived at before moving to Angle Lake had this very old apple tree. The landlord said her mother planted it, maybe 60 years ago?? That thing produced over 200 green cooking apples. I own a daycare center, so I would have the kids (the preschool class) come and pick the apples and we would have enough apples to last a few months! (I would make apple sauce and freeze it with them). The apple tree was so old, it had collapsed onto itself, and was totally infected with some sort of bug (at the time I had no knowledge about plants). I just loved the fruit it bore! I will try and find a picture of it! Of course, the location of it was in the middle of the yard, so it got full sun (when the sun was out, and Seattle is SUPER cloudy 90% of the year). But, there was not any wind because there was 2 story high rhododendrons that surrounded the yard. I remember the landlord saying she was thinking about removing it, but I asked her not to because although it looked dead, it still produced like a champ! Thinking about it now, I am sure if someone just treated it for the bugs it would not look so dead anymore!