Posted: 6/14/2026 10:45:50 PM EDT
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NW Montana, zone 4B/5A. Semi-arid with basically no rain in the later part of June and almost all of July & August. In previous years I’ve had water barrels set higher on the hill than the trees and just put a hose on each tree for a couple minutes, giving them a few gallons a week each. This year I’m setting up actual drip irrigation and just got the 1st set of 7 apple trees hooked up today with a 4GPH dripper running off my yard hydrant. Fruit trees are all 0-4 years old with the younger ones being bare roots I acquired this spring. It’s a total of 25 trees at this point and they’re doing really well overall but as they get a little bigger, I want to make sure they’re getting enough water before they potentially start showing signs of stress. My current orchard consists of: 11 apples 4 sweet cherry 3 peach 3 plum 2 pear 2 sour cherry I’ll be adding at least 1 more pear and 3 more sweet cherries by next spring and I can add either 3 more apple up in the front yard area or do something like apricots in that space. |
Liberal: Give up your guns to prevent murder.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.
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Bump for insight. I'm zone 8b and I know the answer is "a lot more". So I get small, very hard peaches and pears. At least the pear trees did start fruiting this year, 2 years after the peach started. |
I would like to remind everyone that disorganized violence is never the answer. - John Carter
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Originally Posted By mPisi: Bump for insight. I'm zone 8b and I know the answer is "a lot more". So I get small, very hard peaches and pears. At least the pear trees did start fruiting this year, 2 years after the peach started. I hear pears can take longer than most fruit. My two pears came to me last fall when ACE Hardware in town was blowing out all remaining nursery stock in Sept. I waited for the 75% off sale and got (2) 3yo pears, 3yo Honeycrisp and McIntosh apples, a 3yo sour cherry, 3 yo Pipestone plum and a 4 YO Honeycrisp for stupid little money. Something like $140 for all those trees. I actually got pear flowers on one of those newly planted trees this spring. Nothing from the other one so no pears for me this year. |
Liberal: Give up your guns to prevent murder.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.
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Added the rest of my apples to the 1st zone/system yesterday and dug trenches/prepped the area with the pears, plums and peaches for a 2nd zone after dinner last night. I’ll have a 3rd zone for all the sweet cherry and sour cherry trees along with a few sugar type maples I planted a couple years back. The 1st zone performed flawlessly at about 60gph output which says something because my mountain well only produces 5 gpm without a ton of PSI. I’ll be keeping the zones and GPH pretty low overall to make sure I’m not stressing the system too much. |
Liberal: Give up your guns to prevent murder.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.
Gun Owner: Cut off your penis to prevent rape.
Liberal: I'm not going to rape anyone!!!
Gun Owner: Thanks for proving my point.