July must be peak fruit eating month with so much summer fruit ripening: strawberries, raspberries, cherries, followed by all the bush fruit.  How much better fruit tastes when it has come straight from the garden and not been refrigerated. I read somewhere that the chemicals in strawberries and tomatoes that make them red also produce some of the flavour and the scent that it is destroyed when refrigerated. Not to mention the intense feeling of smug satisfaction from eating your own produce. I’m encouraging people to think about fruit growing because it is a lot less day-to-day work than growing annual vegetables. Unless you want to try melon growing, most of the fruit I mentioned, plus apricots, plums, apples and pears are shrubs or trees.  The exception is the strawberry and they are a hardy perennial.  so it really is a case of planting and picking (and checking out how and when to prune). To be honest, the main challenges in fruit growing are birds and squirrels. If you are serious about fruit growing then a fruit cage (for plants, canes and bushes) is really the only solution. But for many people, there will be enough for to go round, with perhaps a bit of discouragement of the birds, and just enjoy what you do get. The only real exception are cherries, where unless you have a really big tree and have more cherries than birds, you will get very little of the crop. If you have a small or a fan trained tree the fruit will develop, but the birds will take the cherries when they are still completely green, way before you want to pick them. There speaks the voice of experience!

So what is the easiest fruit to grow? I would start with strawberries. Individual plants last for 4 to 5 years before the centre dies out but they produce runners so when you want new plants just pot up a few of the runners and start again. You can even grow them in a pot or a strawberry tower. The only thing you need to remember is they do need a lot of water for the fruit to swell, so you need to water them well, particularly in pots, and add a bit of tomato feed, which encourages fruit production.  Most people think initially of summer fruiting raspberries. These are fairly straightforward to grow as long as you have space for posts and wires. Cut fruited canes down at the end of the year and leave the new ones to grow on for a crop the following year.  But I have always grown autumn fruiting raspberries because they are much simpler. They do not grow as tall so need no support and you simply cut them all to the ground in early spring.   New canes grow, flower and fruit in the same year with the berries ripening from August onwards.

Bush fruit is making something of a comeback, again giving many years of service.  Do check out the annual pruning regimes though.

Currants – red, white and black currants – are all garden worthy. The one that has never regained much popularity is the gooseberry, possibly because they are very thorny but a healthy bush yields a lot of large fruits and they make phenomenal crumble.  And last but not least, blueberries.  Blueberries are popular because they have been identified as a Super Food, full of nutrients and delicious.  The thing to know about blueberries is that they are very hardy and native to North America where they grow in acid bog conditions.  This means that in most gardens, you are best off growing them in a pot.  Sandy soil is acid enough, but very free draining and so regular watering will be required.  And you will definitely need them in a fruit cage or netted from the birds. Birds absolutely are love blueberries. – who can blame them? so some protection is needed from well before the fruit ripens. You may be buying fruit this summer, but with a little thought and some preparation in the planting season this autumn, you could certainly be Picking Your Own next summer.

Happy Gardening from Alison