Our Garden in 2023

Follow along to learn ways you too can ‘think like a landscaper’ when making choices in the garden! 

My husband and I recently purchased our first home and were fortunate enough to snag a cottage size home on a lot just a bit smaller than a quarter acre. As I always dreamed, we have lots of space to work with! In this post I’ll explain what I've done thus far and the plan for the year. While everyone's garden goals vary, I hope you find a useful takeaway that you may be able to apply in your own garden. 

Thankfully our home did not come with much existing landscaping, leaving us with lots of work yes but also complete design freedom

Since fruit trees take up more space than most other additions and take a couple years to establish and begin fruiting, it made sense to get the big job out of the way. We thought long and hard on what trees we’d have the most use with and settled on the following additions: A Nagami Kumquat tree, a Fuyu Persimmon tree, a Celeste Fig tree, a dwarf ‘Bearss’ Lime tree and a Semi-Dwarf Eureka Lemon tree. Now that these trees are in the ground in spots where they’ll receive the proper light, we can work around them to form a plan for adding other things like a veggie garden and ornamentals. 

So why these trees? Let me tell you about them:

Nagami Kumquat Tree

Kumquats are an orange-like fruiting tree in the citrus family. The fruits are small, just 1-2 inches long and have a thin edible peel. You can pick them right off the tree and pop a whole fruit in your mouth, the flesh is super tart and juicy and the peel is sweet with a pleasant texture. My family and I love these things! Kumquat, like other citruses, are native to Asia, where they are a symbol of good fortune and a common gift during Chinese New Years. The orange gold-tone fruits are a symbol of prosperity to come. Isn't that lovely! Anytime you consider adding a fruit tree it's important to think of how much fruit the tree will produce at maturity. Thankfully the Nagami kumquat is a naturally short, bushy tree reaching just 6ft tall and can easily be kept shorter with pruning. 

Tip: All trees in the Citrus family are self-fertile meaning they do not need to be planted in sets of 2 as with apples or some stone fruit trees. 

Tip 2: Citrus trees fruit on new growth so only prune in late spring, after all fruit has been harvested, in order to not interfere with fruit production. Only prune to shape or remove suckers. 

Fuyu Persimmon Tree

This is another family favorite! They are large orange fruits that are richly sweet with a cinnamon-like note. Persimmons are ready to pick in November and ‘Fuyu’ in particular is considered the most popular! 80% of the persimmon market is just Fuyu! A single mature persimmon tree will produce several hundred pounds of fruit in a season. I plan to keep this tree pruned a bit shorter to keep production under control but persimmon is so lovely chopped up over oatmeal in the fall!

Celeste Fig Tree

I can never get enough figs! Notice a trend here? Always plant what you want to eat! I chose Celeste because the tree is naturally smaller growing, reaching just 10-12 ft tall. I’ve never actually tasted this particular variety but the fruit is pink-tone and the taste is said to be honey-sweet. I’ll let you know my thoughts once It begins fruiting! 

Dwarf Bearss Lime Tree

This selection was made by my husband! Bearss is also called the Persian lime and this is the large juicy limes that can almost reach the size of lemons! A great addition to an edible garden space. 

Semi-Dwarf Eureka Lemon Tree

This was the toughest pick for me! I love lemons and knew that I had to have one. My mother has a Meyer lemon tree at home and so I’m very familiar with those and I almost planted one of my own. In the end I decided it would be better to have something different so that when I need to start giving away lemons she’ll still be tempted to take some off my hands! I also opted for a semi dwarf over a regular tree, which will produce lots of fruit at just around 15 ft tall mature.

I have so many plants for 2024 and I can't wait to share them with you soon! Stay tuned!