Help out a gardening noob.

[SamiPolizzi]

I grew some tomatoes and peppers last year, but it must have been a fluke or something because I had no idea what I was doing. Other than that, I have no gardening experience. I read Square Foot Gardening and it sounds easy enough that even I can do it. However, I'd also like to grow some fruit. I definitely want raspberries and I just read an article about blueberries and gastrointestinal health that made me kind of want to grow them too. I wouldn't mind some kind of fruit tree either. Peach? Pear? Apples? What's easiest to maintain?

[philomom]

Blueberries are good for beginners. They like sunny spots but wet feet if you can manage.

All fruit trees have to sprayed, pruned and fertilized at regular intervals. You can get around some of that by using drawf and semi-drawf trees. Ask the nursery to pre-prune them for a good start. Then, ask a good gardening friend to help you shape them in a couple of years.

Stay away from cane berries like the rasberry for now unless you intend to do some serious studying about them. They have to pruned a certain way because they make berries on this year's shoots next year. So the branches have to be tagged a certain way so that you don't cut the fruit bearing ones for next year by accident.

[HipGal]

I'm thinking about the same thing. We had tomatoes & basil going last summer. A few other things died right away (green beans, corn) and a few lasted a short time (strawberries, sunflowers, potatoes).

We have a lemon tree we planted 7 years ago that is doing well. I was thinking of doing more citrus or other fruit - maybe plums or maybe cherries? Did you know there are trees with more than one type of cherry grafted onto the same tree? I thought that was interesting. I wonder if the blossoms look different?

Anyway, I'm interested in what real gardeny people have to say!