Pictures of fruit trees integrated into nice landscaping?

[bradflorida]

I have to work up a design for incorporating 20 fruit trees into my yard.  It must be landscaped nicely in order to fit in with the community and to get HOA approval

Has anyone here done nice landscaping around their fruit trees and have pics to share?

Thanks

Brad

[JeffDM]

All my friends who had success dealing with their HOAs did so by becoming one of the officers and working from within.
Good luck.

[Hollywood]

Jeff has the best idea. I have incorporated my trees into the landscape but fortunately I have no HOA to worry about! I haven't taken pictures because the landscaping is in its first year and therefore not nearly as filled in as I would like...but as soon as this storm blows over I will try to get out there and take some pictures to post. It may give you ideas.

[bradflorida]

Thanks jeff.   Thanks Hollywood - I would enjoy pics if you have the chance


Brad

[gnappi]

All my friends who had success dealing with their HOAs did so by becoming one of the officers and working from within.
Good luck.

I looked for a long time for a house WITHOUT an HOA but when I was in one, I ran for the board and put roadblocks in EVERY stupid thing they tried by going door to door with petitions and getting PROXIES. They HATED me because they HAD to run it sanely :-)

When I moved it went back to a nightmare of lawsuits against owners.

[sunworshiper]

I have landscaped my yard to both contain many fruit trees and to be aesthetically pleasing. It is absolutely possible! I saw no reason that fruit trees couldn't be beautiful. Botanical gardens are simply beautifully arranged specimen collections. My neighborhood does have an HOA, and I am not on the review board. The one tip I can pass on is - plan! The best thing I did was spend $100 on a landscaping software package that allowed me to try out my ideas digitally. I started by entering the 2D survey drawing of my property into the software, then experimented with placings and could preview it in a 3D rendering. When I submitted my proposal to the HOA, I included the 2D & 3D renderings out of the software. This was one of the primary reasons my proposal was approved (the head of the review board stopped by my house to find out what software I used, he liked it so much - I used Realtime Landscaping Pro if anyone cares). It made it easy to visualize my idea. And I easily recouped the cost of the software on saved mistakes. I ordered compost, mulch, and sand by the yard, as well as pavers & fill plants. The software gave me a super accurate way to estimate how much of each of those materials I needed, so virtually no waste.

Here is a walkthrough of my yard, approximately 2 years after planting. This whole area started out as grass, with 2 magnolia trees.

Rounding the corner of my house coming from the back toward the street, I have Dwarf Brazilian Bananas, Passionfruit in pots, and a Cogshall mango.





Looking back from the other direction, you can see the same mango, and an Ice Cream banana:


My side yard is the one with southern exposure, and faces the street. This view is looking out across the island beds toward the street. The large tree on the right is a peach.


Here is that bed from the other side. The stick like thing on the left is a Gefner Atemoya that is just regrowing after storm breakage. The tree on the right is a Meyer Lemon.


Here's a bit longer shot looking back at the corner.


Here's the next bed (viewed from the glider shown in the last view), it is anchored by an Emperor Lychee.


Looking out from the lounge chair, here is the next bed. It has a hong kong orchid in the center. On the left side of the crinum is an Angie mango, and on the far right corner of the bed is a Pickering mango. This bed also serves the nice purpose of blocking the view of the utility boxes on the other side, so I can't see them from my house.


Here is the same bed from the other side, with a Ponkan tangerine on that side.


And this is the view from my driveway. This bed has a Valencia Orange and a Manilita mango. As you can see from the yard of the month sign, my neighborhood likes the result=)


So there you have it - 10 fruit trees, one avenue tree, 2 banana clumps and a passionfruit vine, all in one side yard=)

Hope that gives you some good ideas. Comments and questions welcome.

[TnTrobbie]

Wow. Very beautifull sunworshiper. That's a landscape I envy and will try to emulate. Well done . I particularly like that some fruit trees and plants are utilizing space near the house- adding to it's definition. I think I've seen the original Blue Java banana tree on the gw forum a year or two back. Nice job.

[sunworshiper]

Thanks for the nice compliments. You are correct, there are a number of pics of the Blue Java is up on the gw forum.  One of the consequences of where I planted it, and my design is that I select new trunks that are in the same spot. So new ones growing over the decaying stumps of the old. This  had the effect of pushing the plant up out of the ground onto a mound. It was absolutely massive in the early summer - towering over my roofline. Unfortunately the mounding up effect made it unstable and a wind storm uprooted it. So I kept about a 6' pup, and all of the corm, re-buried it and now it is growing along again. I think this means that if you want your bananas to look neat and tidy and stay in one spot, that every few years you'll have to dig up and re-bury the clump deeper. But it is amazing that such a huge plant's roots aren't destructive. I can't bury it very deep because there is a mass of irrigation piping about 1 1/2 feet down. But the banana plays nicely - doesn't entangle itself in the piping or try to crack the pipes hunting for water. Nor does it do any harm to the building. Can't think of any other plant I could put in that spot that could get so large given those constraints. And the height anchor's the bed, making it look balanced.

[Hollywood]

Here are a few pictures of what I have done with my front yard and some of my side yard.

This is the Western side of my house. The posts have dragonfruit climbing up them. I am about to put some sort of rebar mesh across the tops.


This is several steps back, you can see the 2 mango trees, jackfruit tree (Mai-3) next to the fence and Katuk and aloysia virgata.


Then I turned to the East and pointed the camera across the front lawn. You can see that the fence continues (there is 2' of landscaping on the other side of the fence next to the sidewalk). I've got a payaya, a couple small jackfruit trees, an atemoya and some ornamental stuff. Sorry for the lack of detail, but the point is to convey the larger landscaping scheme. Anyone coming through Hollywood is welcome to come visit for more detail.


Then I walked across the front lawn to the end of the path at the East side of the yard and pointed the camera to the West, across the yard again.


Then I pivoted to take a picture of the East side of the front lawn, before the backyard gate. You might be saying, it looks weedy and palm fronds aren't an ideal mulch. Yeah, well. You would be right, but I keep weeding, mulching and in a year or two it will fill in pretty nicely. You can see one of my 2 sapodillas (Alano) and my avocado tree (Day).


Then I walked around the path a little ways to the backyard gate opening in a ficus hedge, opened it, and you can see the Eastern side of the back yard. There is a small new black sapote off to the left side in the corner but you can't see it in this picture. You can see the jaboticaba on the left and the acerola behind it. Then behind the acerola you can see a small white picket fence which houses the 30' x 30' vegetable garden. The back yard has a privacy hedge all around it. The landscaping on the right side has some herbs and edible perennials and I just put up some netting for winged bean.


Then I pivoted for one last photo so you can look back and see the Eastern corner of the front yard with both sapodillas.