Rob Drury

Thanks, guys, that all makes sense.  Henry, our exchange in terms of what the trees are actually doing (budding) can then apply to any/all trees doing same at any/all locations/seasons, it seems.  The low-chill varieties selected for zones like mine (9a/9b) are a little crazy - flowering multiple, unpredictable times through winter/spring.  I had a few plums ripen in December!  Now more flowers!  I think we can master the complexity of biodiversity and climate diversity with some persistence!

For Japanese plum (and other prunus) I read we want 3 or 4 main scaffold branches off the main trunk at between 18 and 28 inches above ground.  My newly planted 28 inch "whips" (just one small trunk, no branches yet) have 20 - 30 buds growing fast (each about an inch long).  Should I keep 3 or 4 of those buds and remove all the rest right now?  Or is there a reason to wait?  Seems a little dangerous to bet on just 3 or 4 of all those buds right now.

Probably applies to most tree types, but what if a young White Sapote tree wants to keep growing higher and you want to keep it smaller to harvest fruit.  If you just do a big prune every year will this stop it from developing the size trunk, etc, required to begin fruiting?

Seems the thing to do is contact people nearby who have proven ability to carry through a project, who want to start a bunch of seedlings now for grafting onto, and who want to graft & give them away.  This is the kind of activity we want to promote so most obviously worth looking for.  Even if you don't find someone it still puts the energy out there.

We're a couple in small town Mount Dora, FL looking for like-minded people to buy the homesteads for sale nearby. One borders our homestead on the back and the other is two homesteads away. We registered on ecovillage.org & ic.org as The Love Plan Eco-Neighborhood. We are passionate about permaculture, natural hygiene, libertarian socialism, localism, sustainability. For example, we're vegan, somewhat raw/lowfat, and plan to homeschool. We're putting in our gardens, having started only nine months ago but this will be permanent. So there are these two homesteads for sale right now and we want like-minded people for neighbors. Come one, come all.