Brrrrrrrr! On these cold winter days who’s thinking about summer harvests? Actually, now is a great time to plan for a beautiful and productive edible landscape. This year we are offering you an excellent selection of bareroot berries and fruit trees.
If you’ve walked around the nursery in the summer, you may have noticed our fondness for strawberries. We have potted plants “hiding” all over the nursery for kids to find & eat. And we are happy to offer a great selection of organically grown bareroot strawberries. ‘Albion’, ‘Cabrillo’, ‘Monterey’, ‘San Andreas’ and ‘Seascape’ will all begin ripening in early summer and could produce well into late fall. Yum!
If you have an open sunny space, you’ll be pleased with a neat selection of caneberries this year. Take your pick from delicious raspberries such as ‘Canby’, ‘Caroline’, ‘Fallgold’ and ‘Heritage’. Some sweet and safe choices for the kids (big and little) would be thornless ‘Black Satin’, ‘Chester’, ‘Boysen’ & ‘Triple Crown’ blackberries. If you’re looking for BIG & JUICY, try the ‘Olallieberry’.
And you really can’t go wrong with a couple of blueberries that are proven to be delicious, productive and quite ornamental in the Bay Area. ‘Misty’, ‘O’Neal’ and ‘Sharpblue’ are early varieties you can count on for a consistent long-lasting harvest. For larger and slightly sweeter fruit, pick ‘Bluecrop’, ‘Blueray’, ‘Chandler’ or ‘Jubilee’. ‘Reveille’ is a new early variety we will have that is known to be a strong grower in milder climates producing large, heavy crops. A BHN Staff favorite is ‘Sunshine Blue’, which occasionally produces 2 to 3 crops per year. Blueberries are one of my favorite small (sometimes big) shrubs to include in any landscape to add color, texture and a tasty treat.
Other special bareroot fruits you’ll find at the nursery are grapes, figs, kiwis, mulberries and olives.
For best price and selection, buy your deciduous fruit trees bareroot in January and February. Bareroot plants offer more than just a price advantage; they adapt more readily to native soils than container plants do. Young trees are easily headed back at planting time to create a low scaffold and a small, sturdy tree. The varieties we stock perform admirably in sunny East Bay locations. Choose from Apples, Apricots, Cherries, Peaches, Pears, Plums, Persimmons and more! Explore the possibilities of garden-fresh fruit from your own back yard.
Ask our Sales Staff for more information on these and other varieties, as well as a few planting tips. With a little planning and preparation, you and your family can look forward to many delicious dishes throughout the growing season; that is if your harvest even makes it into the kitchen.
Have Fun!
-Che
