Fruit in the Home Garden
Summer
There are a number of important tasks to undertake during summer in the orchard. The most important is probably the protection of fruit as it ripens from December onwards. If various species of Parrots regularly visit your garden it is time to net the trees you expect to harvest. Unfortunately these birds may arrive as a flock and can destroy a whole tree of fruit in an hour, Blackbirds and Crows can also do considerable damage just before the fruit starts to ripen.
Summer pruning is a useful tool and as it assists in getting the nets in place, it can also help to get more fruiting buds in place. There are a series of videos on the internet that describe summer pruning.
Apply a high quality fertiliser such as Giganic around all fruit trees in March & September and remove all weeds and grass that can reduce the effects of the provided nutrients.
During hot dry spells, especially if the trees start to need water, apply sufficient for it to soak down deeply. Citrus trees especially need plenty of water at this time of year to swell the developing fruit. If allowed to get very dry “fruit drop” will be experienced
Suggested fruit varieties for this area:
Plums: Satsuma, Mariposa (these two should be planted together as they cross pollinate to produce heavier crops). Santa Rosa is self fertile but improves if Mariposa is used as a pollinator. Frontier is another good variety.
Apricots: The old Moorpark is still a widely grown favourite, plus Trevatt, Hunter & Earlicot.
Nectarines: Goldmine, Arctic Rose and Anzac are all white fleshed and freestone. Flavortop is an excellent yellow fleshed freestone variety for eating, cooking, drying or bottling.
Peaches: Anzac is early maturing and freestone. Redhaven and Golden Queen are well proven favourites with the late season Golden Queen excellent for bottling.
Growing Citrus
Citrus varieties grow well in the Warragul & Drouin area. In fact they are probably the easiest and most rewarding of all fruit to grow.
Recomended Varieties:
Lemons: Lisbon, Eureka and Meyer
Oranges: Washington Navel, Valencia
Mandarins: Emperor, Imperial, Afourer (also known as Murcott)
Limes: Tahitian, Kaffir, Australian Limes.
Grapefruit: Marsh, Ruby.
Cumquats: Marumi, Ngami, Variegated
NOTE: Double grafted trees with two varieties can save space as can those grafted onto dwarf rootstock.
