8 Small Fruit Garden Ideas

Whether you like big, beefy tomatoes or tiny cherry and grape types, these heat-loving tropicals are simple to grow in large decorative containers or veggie plots. Plant cages help keep them healthy and make harvests easier. Just follow these easy steps to grow your own tomatoes. How to grow blackberries and raspberries, including how to prune.

Netting is required to protect the bunch of grapes from birds (Figure 14–41). Voles feed on the roots of grapevines and can be disguised by mulch. Monitor the vines regularly for any evidence of root-feeding mammals. See chapter 20, “Wildlife,” for more information on protecting crops from wildlife. Keep an area 1 foot to 2 feet in diameter around each vine free of weeds by practicing shallow cultivation for the first two years. Avoid mulching materials such as compost or grass clippings that release nitrogen late in the season and cause increased susceptibility to winter damage.

How to Plant, Grow and Harvest Cucumbers

You find links to several articles that discuss a fly called the spotted winged drosophila , or SWD. It is one of the few pests that can bother soft-skinned fruits such as strawberries, blueberries, and caneberries. Female SWD lay their eggs on ripe and ripening fruit. This is unusual because most Drosophila species lay their eggs on rotting fruit. The larvae that emerge damage the fruit by feeding on it and may be present when it comes time to harvest. SWD has caused the most damage with caneberries, but it has also been occasionally found in figs, peaches, grapes, and other fruit.

In December when the night temperature drops to 20°F, broadcast pine needles or grain straw in the row middles and around the plants to protect the crowns. At high elevations, cover plants with 2 inches of mulch. Remove half of the straw in the spring; rake the excess straw into the row middles (Figure 14–3). Place the 6-foot square on the ground and fill with good garden soil. Use a 2-inch by 2-inch stake in each corner to add stability.

Best Fruit Garden Ideas to Trade for Store Bought

If you opt to grow honeyberries in containers, you will need to upgrade the size of the pot every three years. For a home gardener, ground cherries are one of the easiest fruits to grow. They take up the same amount of space as a pepper plant, and they grow with little maintenance.

When appropriate, orient the lateral shoots or cordons horizontally on the fruiting wire with one cordon in each direction. To support the cordon, at most, loop the shoot 1.5 times for every linear 3 feet of fruiting wire. Once the cordon has filled the allotted space, allow the shoot tip to drop below the fruiting wire.

• With proper care, the dwarf or mini variety of fruit trees, such as apples, cherries, and peaches, can last for several years planted in a container.
• In this system, plants are set on a 12-inch staggered span in 3-foot-wide raised beds.
• They can be grown in the North Carolina coastal plain, piedmont, and in the mountains at elevations below 2,500 feet.
• Marie Iannotti is a life-long gardener and a veteran Master Gardener with nearly three decades of experience.
• Bushes are fully mature by year 8 and can remain productive for 20 years or more with proper care.

The first fruits I ever grew in my backyard were strawberries. We added a small strawberry patch to our backyard, and each year, it seemed to grow larger and more prolific. When we moved, I felt sad leaving behind our little berry patch. A practical system allows for establishing permanent cordons that can be easily reached for the required annual pruning (Figure 14–37). This requires training the cordons to single strands of high tensile wire . A single wire 5 feet to 6 feet above the ground is the easiest trellis to construct and maintain.

With Small Fruits in the Home Garden, you, too, can easily manage and enjoy small fruit growing. Find a wide variety of fruit seeds and plants on the Burpee site to get your garden started. Some fruit plants, like melons, do best when directly sown in the garden outdoors.

Prune the plant to leave only the strongest three or four shoots. The plant has the best chance of survival and subsequent development if two-thirds of the top growth on bare root and one-half on potted plants is removed. Also, after planting, remove all flower buds to stimulate good shoot and root development (Figure 14–22). They produce new shoots from the crown of the original plant and from buds on the roots .