My dh is from Shelton so we go there a few times a year when grandma is not working or being a snowbird. 2009 is when I took out the lawn and put all this in (not quite a year ago) but we did still get 1 cherry tree. I think if you amend your soil well and put the tree in a nice dry sunny spot you should be able to get cherries. My next door neighbor has an amazing cherry tree that is a cross between a Bing and something tart and so far each year his tree has done great. The neighbor kids all scale the fence to pick them with his permission so hopefully we won’t have that issue too (minus the permission).

Last year I froze 1 gallon, pickled 1 pint, canned 4 1/2 pint and dehydrated what turned out to be 2 pint jars which I shared with him. Plus what the racoons, birds, kids, other neighbors and he ate. It’s a very established tree though, I’m not sure how old it is.

I live in Mason County (basically west of Seattle), and am looking at fruit trees right now – have you had much luck with cherries? Pie cherries are hard to find, and growing them would be wonderful, but I haven’t found anyone growing them here. Something about first hand stories of success is so much more encouraging!

The weeds you’ll get will likely be windblown unless you are planting over morning glory or blackberry so having raised beds probably won’t help much there. For me I wanted to bring in good dirt because mine was solid blue/green clay. Otherwise you can simply mark off a patch to work and put down wood chips, straw, cardboardd or recycled cofee burlap bags from a roaster where you want your paths to be. I think that type of garden looks much more natural, is faster to get in and easier to change around later.

I think the patch where I will be planting veggies this year has good soil but I want to try raised beds which I think help keep the weeds in check, yes?

With my kids being so young we probably go through more fruit than you do too – lots of apples for sauce, grapes for juice, etc. Stuff I wouldn’t do if it were just me although it’s nice to have for treats.

In the garden area we have; bush pie cherries, rhubarb, two big strawberry patches, a raspberry patch, cranberries, blueberries, and a small blackberry patch that we allow to grow but keep machete’d back to keep it from taking over the garden beds. We do not have tree fruit because we just do not have any more room on the property that get’s adequate sun and I don’t want any trees near the garden to grow up and block sun there too. I do have an asparagus patch as well (not fruit but a perennial producer). So we grow mostly berries and with last years addition – cherries too, but purchase apples, pears, plums, peaches from regional growers when in season or as gifted to us by neighbors and family who have trees with fruit to share.