Stone fruit variety recommendations for PNW, please!

Hi, I had a few trees die last summer and I'm looking to replace them with better varieties.  Two were apricots and they were about 4 years old and hadn't bloomed yet.
I'm in the middle/north side Pacific Northwest, zone 6 a/b, which in practical terms means that it rains a lot from September to June and then very little rain in July and August (you can count the days of rain in the summer on one hand).  It can be hot in the summer starting toward the end of June but cools off usually by the first week of September. Any heat before and after those dates is really unpredictable.  So very short growing season.

We have a bazillion wild cherries that are sweet but tiny with a huge pit.  Larger cherries are a gamble since the rain in the spring reliably causes them to split.  So I'm not interested in cherries...

We have plums and they do really well here.

I'd like to have some kind of peach, nectarine, apricot, etc.  You just can't get good ones at the store and the best tree ripened ones are so hard to transport.  We are a two hour drive, going over the mountains where we can get some of the best stone fruits from orchard country but I only get to do that once or twice a summer.  

My dream is to be able to go out in my yard and eat a tree ripened nectarine/peach with the juice dripping everywhere.  

Variety suggestions, please!  TIA!!!

I am down farther south in Portland near Mt Hood, but I have had very good success with Indian Free peach. It is late ripening (October) and has a cranberry raspberry overtone to it when not fully ripe. No disease, no pests (but squirrels) and no spray either.

Matthew Reid wrote:I am down farther south in Portland near Mt Hood, but I have had very good success with Indian Free peach. It is late ripening (October) and has a cranberry raspberry overtone to it when not fully ripe. No disease, no pests (but squirrels) and no spray either.

Oooh, that sounds great! I'll look that one up! Thanks!

I have good results with seedling peaches by keeping them in a high tunnel made from an old portable garage frame.  Otherwise they get peach leaf curl and other virus infections transferred on the damp foggy wind.  Mason bee house in the enclosure will assure pollination.  I am trying to get pawpaw and persimmons started but the transplanting of purchased plants has not gone well so far and it is hard to get viable seed.

found the picture on my farm page Qberry Farm

Hans Quistorff wrote:I have good results with seedling peaches by keeping them in a high tunnel made from an old portable garage frame.  Otherwise they get peach leaf curl and other virus infections transferred on the damp foggy wind.  Mason bee house in the enclosure will assure pollination.  I am trying to get pawpaw and persimmons started but the transplanting of purchased plants has not gone well so far and it is hard to get viable seed.

(source)

found the picture on my farm page Qberry Farm

I have heard that disease is a big problem on this side of the mountains. I wonder if I espaliered one against my house under the eaves, would that added protection help? I would love to have a high tunnel but the only places on my land where I can fit one turn into swamps in the winter so that would probably not be great for tree roots. But I have also thought about raised beds/hugel mounds to lift the trees up out of the winter water...

I have a persimmon and it's alive but it's still the same two feet tall it was when I planted it four years ago. 😂
I dream about paw paws... I read once that the research orchard up in Bellingham has been growing them for a while but the last I checked, they don't sell them yet. 😢 https://nwfruit.org/fruit-garden-tour-project/
They are also doing some research there for peach leaf curl resistance which would be interesting to learn more about. https://nwfruit.org/home_fruit_garden_tour_peachleafcurlresistanttrial/

Jenny Wright wrote: I have heard that disease is a big problem on this side of the mountains. I wonder if I espaliered one against my house under the eaves, would that added protection help? I would love to have a high tunnel but the only places on my land where I can fit one turn into swamps in the winter so that would probably not be great for tree roots. But I have also thought about raised beds/hugel mounds to lift the trees up out of the winter water...

Taphrina deformans, the fungus that causes leaf curl, overwinters in the soil and on the bark of trees. Protecting trees from overhead water prevents the disease organism from splashing from the bark onto the leaves. Any amount of water is going to be an issue for initiating the leaf curl infection. A fine mist isn't going to be enough to move the fungus, but a real rain will splash it up easily.

I worked a summer in pest management in the PNW (in Oregon), and heard repeatedly from farmers that abandoned peach orchards were stone dead within five years due to root rot as well al the above mentioned diseases. They do alright in the humid South, but really hate the constant damp of the traditional PNW winter. I have seen lone trees survive without treatment in Oregon and Washington when planted on a small hill--these trees didn't produce fruit, as they were riddled with leaf curl and shothole disease, but they were alive.

Copper sprays can be used to reduce the incidence of both leaf curl and shothole disease (and are approved for use in organic orchards), but will eventually cause soil toxicity.

In your position, I'd think about making a quick "addition" to your eaves by getting four upright posts, some framing, and a piece of corrugated clear polycarbonate roofing. In this way, you can cheaply get rain protection for your tree in the eaves of your house. You can also do a lower tech version of this by getting clear plastic sheeting and covering the tree religiously every time it's going to rain. If you can find vinyl with pre-fabricated grommets (sometimes used for outdoor dining weather protection), this is an easy option--though vinyl is not particularly environmentally friendly.

As for varieties, Golden Queen were always a favourite of mine. Grew great in the Willamette Valley and have skin that's really easy to peel without blanching, so great for preserving. University of California Northridge has a few suggested cultivars that are resistant. I wouldn't bother with nectarines or apricots unless you're in a favorable microclimate and willing to espalier/baby them in addition to protecting them from the wet!

M Broussard wrote:

Taphrina deformans, the fungus that causes leaf curl, overwinters in the soil and on the bark of trees. Protecting trees from overhead water prevents the disease organism from splashing from the bark onto the leaves. Any amount of water is going to be an issue for initiating the leaf curl infection. A fine mist isn't going to be enough to move the fungus, but a real rain will splash it up easily.

I worked a summer in pest management in the PNW (in Oregon), and heard repeatedly from farmers that abandoned peach orchards were stone dead within five years due to root rot as well al the above mentioned diseases. They do alright in the humid South, but really hate the constant damp of the traditional PNW winter. I have seen lone trees survive without treatment in Oregon and Washington when planted on a small hill--these trees didn't produce fruit, as they were riddled with leaf curl and shothole disease, but they were alive.

Copper sprays can be used to reduce the incidence of both leaf curl and shothole disease (and are approved for use in organic orchards), but will eventually cause soil toxicity.

In your position, I'd think about making a quick "addition" to your eaves by getting four upright posts, some framing, and a piece of corrugated clear polycarbonate roofing. In this way, you can cheaply get rain protection for your tree in the eaves of your house. You can also do a lower tech version of this by getting clear plastic sheeting and covering the tree religiously every time it's going to rain. If you can find vinyl with pre-fabricated grommets (sometimes used for outdoor dining weather protection), this is an easy option--though vinyl is not particularly environmentally friendly.

As for varieties, Golden Queen were always a favourite of mine. Grew great in the Willamette Valley and have skin that's really easy to peel without blanching, so great for preserving. University of California Northridge has a few suggested cultivars that are resistant. I wouldn't bother with nectarines or apricots unless you're in a favorable microclimate and willing to espalier/baby them in addition to protecting them from the wet!

Ah, well, maybe I need to adjust my mindset and focus on the things that grow well without so much babying. 🙁 Thank you for your clear and detailed explanation for why those fruits don't like it here. When I think about all the work it would take to keep them dry, that two hour drive over the mountains to Wenatchee or Ellensburg to get fresh tree-ripened fruit doesn't sound quite so onerous. 😜

Plums do remarkably well for me without disease. Maybe I should focus on getting different varieties of plums with varying ripening times.

Thank you for updating your location.  That tells me you get mor East wind down slope flow from the mountains; they seldom get this far across the sound.  I have one variety of yellow plum that was planted in a strip between the drive and field drainage so the roots are constantly wet at the layer of clay below and they are quite healthy.  The green gauge that were first planted on the  farm are higher in the sand above the clay and have crossed with the yellow so those are sweeter with more cling free seeds.  The grafted varieties of plums I have tried tend to like the Italian ones I mentioned tend to gradually suffer decline and then revert to the rootstock. Comice pear seems to be more resistant than the apple trees.  Others have good results with Asian pears and I should probably try them myself. Seckel pear is a good pollinator that produces small pears that have a cinnamon flavor and are good for drying and pickling.
Some trees like the persimmon and pawpaw take patience for them to reach fruit bearing maturity.  Our native understory plants, huckle berry and  Salal (Gaulthoria shallon) support a fungal soil that the trees prefer and give a variety of fruit themselves.  Other natives that prefer the wet soil are Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis) and Thimbleberry (Rubus Parviflorus) is a native food unique to the Western states with clusters of sweet red fruits, white star-shaped flowers, and big velvety leaves, make a very productive guild understory.  My trees do best where sward ferns and other forest floor plants feed the fungal network and help support the soil sponge that holds the water for our dry summer..