Seed exchanges for high altitude or Colorado?

Hi,
I've been posting on here recently as I am trying to find cultivars that are better suited for my altitude (7,500') and climate (Rocky Mountains).  The problem is my local nurseries just 15 minutes away are 2,500' lower in elevation and all my trees keep dying!

I've been suggested to collect seeds from fruit trees I may find up in elevation, but they are very rare!  I've been looking on the web for some sort of fruit tree forum where I could ask others in my situation (preferably local) if we could start exchanging seeds or something.  I just can't find any info!

I'm sure others here must be in my situation with high altitude.  Can someone please help?

Thanks

have you contacted Jerome of CRMPI outside of Basalt, CO?

Hey Seth, this might be a bit farther than you want to go, but Tooley's Trees in Truchas,  New Mexico sells fruit trees grown at altitude.  They are even a little higher up than you are!  

Sandy

Also, I wanted to say - Don't give up, we are also about 7400' in the Rockies.  we have apples, cherries, plum, and the peach tree is LOADED right now .  So don't despair, there are lots of fruit trees that thrive in this climate!  One thing we do is specifically search out varieties that bloom  and fruit later rather than earlier, to reduce those late spring killing freezes.

Sandy

Sandy, do you have irrigation? How often are your fruit trees watered? Also, thanks for turning me on to Tooley's.

we dont have irrigation yet, water by sprinkler just to drip edge or tree, maybe once a week very deeply if we dont get rain.  We will be putting in a modified hugel/ditch/catchment construct to catch and retain water since our property is on a slope.  Ive been taking note and pictures of how the water is flowing when it is pouring rain, and putting up  little  wood barriers to slow the path of the water.

I have a bunch of thick cotton batts that I am going to put under the wood pile to further catch and retain the water (and dirt lol).    at this point we are just tying to keep the water  and dirt on our property. it is a struggle.
Sandy

Hi everyone.  I'm the OP and I'm almost positive I already replied to some of your suggestions, but for some reason I can't see my post?!  

I actually visited CRMPI awhile back but haven't asked Jerome recently now that I'm curious about getting some.  It's a 4+ hour drive though.  I was considering that seeds may not be ideal unless I planted a ton of them expecting many to die.  Does anyone have advice?

Thanks for turning me onto Tooley's although that is even further away.  I'll be looking into it for shipping though.  

Been a while, but this one is in my wheelhouse.

7000' with 500 fruit trees in Torrey Utah. Mostly cider apple varieties. Also perry pears, pie cherries, quince, etc. 80+ varieties of apples. And trialing some grapes.  Started planting in 2012.
We get trees from mostly Cummins Nursery in Ithaca, vines from Northeastern Vine Supply in Vermont to get acclimated plants that ship at the right time.

Now to keep them alive. We have adapted Michael Phillips' general instructions in his books for our situation. 1) we do not strip the existing pasture, just mow. 2) we get the rental bobcat and auger 12" holes 4' deep. 3) backfill with only the native soil plus 1 lb Azomite and 1 lb rock phosphate. Treat the roots with myccorizal dip to establish tree microbiota. 4) 10 gallons of water at planting. They don't get water again until our irrigation cycle, every 11 days. 5) cage or wrap to protect from voles. We only plant trees in the spring, except a few trees we grafted ourselves that needed to get in the ground before winter. They did okay, but not my preference.

We do everything with the intention of driving the roots deep before winter. I know three new growers near our altitude in UT and CO trying to establish trees on drip irrigation and they are having terrible winter kill problems. One guy had 20% losses his first year. We don't get winter kill. Maybe 6 trees in 9 years. But they are all on drip and doing it the way the consultants say. I have offered our experience, they don't listen. We don't get winter kill {shrug}. If you use drip, do it on a cycle that saturates deeply at intermittent intervals. Best advice we got was from an old-timer here: water new trees on Thanksgiving, Christmas Day and March 1. We only do it the first year, about 10 gallons per tree, but do it religiously. Second best advice: "get ahead" on spring irrigation in the fall, at the end of the season when none of my alfalfa growing neighbors want water. I've augered holes the next April that were still damp 2' down despite a terrible snow season.

Prepare yourself mentally for slower growth than the books say, simply due to shorter growing seasons. The three year "Sleep, creep, leap" cycle is more like "Sleep, creep, creep, leap" at best, until they hit the summer irrigation water table here. Then they take off. Time to first fruiting doesn't really seem as correlated to rootstock as advertised; again I suspect it's just our short growing season. Maybe if we trellised we could have sped things up, someday if I find more land/water, I can run that experiment.

There's a link in my bio to my cidery and the site has a list of the trees we are growing along with some recommendations on which varieties we think are good for homestead use. But plant everything that you want. I was told we'd never get Virginia Crab to fruit here. Ha! I will happily be harvesting our first apples from that tree for cider in a couple weeks. Good luck!

Thank you very much for this post. I didn’t notice it until now so I apologize for taking this long to thank you. You have such great information, and I know I will be referencing this in the future.

Thanks also for giving me the name of where you buy from. I’m wondering if I may have luck simply throwing a ton of seed in areas. It could be cheaper than purchasing the seedlings like you have done. That must be costly!