Fruit planting calendar

[MrsD'ville mkII]

I use Gardenate for monthly reminders of which veg to plant, but they don't seem to do one for fruit. As I'm a newbie with fruit gardening, so far just managing the trees and bushes we've inherited with the garden (apples, strawberries, raspberries, blackcurrants, damsons, plums, medlar) I'm looking for advice on when to plant what. We'd like to get rhubarb and gooseberries on the go and I'd like to grow things like blueberries and redcurrants if we can.

Does anyone know of a good ready reckoner for this sort of thing?

Thanks.

[Millymollymandy]

Generally you plant tree and shrub fruit in the winter during the dormant season. Strawberries ideally should be planted in the autumn rather than the spring, for a better crop the following year. If you buy bare rooted fruit trees or shrubs they must be planted during the dormant season, although container grown 'can' be planted at any time of the year but I wouldn't advise doing it in summer!

[DominicJ]

I bought some cherry tree's from T E S C O which just came in a small bag of mud, planted them straight away and they seem to be doing fine, ones a bit iffy but thats in a lot of shade, might try and move it this winter. Wouldnt advise spring/summer planting, but its not certain death
www.allotment.org is a pretty good site for advice
I've bought fruit bushes from a site called tree's online and then when they were on sale in woolies for £1

[QuizMaster]

I asked my garden centre about strawberries, they said they only have them in the spring.
But I heard you should plant them around now for next year. Not sure what to do.

[Millymollymandy]

Ours have them available both autumn and spring! If you plant them now you're likely to get a better harvest next year than if you plant them in the spring (when technically according to the books you should remove what flowers it does have that year to encourage it to put down roots and grow before fruiting the following year - yeah right )

[MrsD'ville mkII]

Thanks - must remember the Woollies thing, they do have some brilliant offers.

I must confess we studiously ignored our strawberry plants apart from some weeding and we have the most fantastic crop this year, so bumper we can hardly keep up with the picking. I wholeheartedly recommend the ignoring route!