[Zippy]

I have a half plot which I manage as a four year vegetable rotation. 

I have been offered another half plot. I don't want too much extra work planting out more veggies and I was thinking of putting this new ground under fruit.

Is fruit, once established more or less work than rotating veggies would you say?  I am thinking of rasberries, step-over apples - or a small apple tree with several types grafted in, damson and or plums, loganberries - I already have blackcurrants on my established plot; I may transfer them as well.

I would underpant these with clover as a compost plant and fill any empty corners with Comfrey and Nettles for the same use.

Anything I may have missed? Gooseberries - not sure we like them.

Strawberries - can they go in a permanent bed though? I thought they starved the ground after a while?

As fruit is so expensive in the shops I thought this would be a good use of ground, especially as I can get a lot of the fruit plants as thorow-outs from other plotholders.

[Trillium]

With fruit you don't take them up for rotation, but they do need care. Given the prices in the shops, they're worth growing your own, particularly regarding quality. Apples, regardless of method or type, still need regular pruning, some sort of early organic preventative spray, manuring & feeding, and the occasional checking for potential pests. It's not a lot of work, but must be done.
Raspberries need a bit more work manuring in spring, tying back, pruning if necessary, etc. and later taking out dying, spent canes.  I have to net my berries against birds.
Strawberries do deplete soil nutrients and are the most work. They'll stay in peak form for about 3 years then start to quickly deteriorate. You can either pull up old plants, clear and feed the soil and replant, or move the new crop to another area. And definitely net against birds and thieving squirrels and chipmunks if you have them.
Black currants need some spring pruning, but not much. Plums don't need a lot of care but if you get black knot in your area, it'll destroy your trees.

I'd be careful about underplanting with clover as strawberries would suffocate in them, raspberries would be hard to pick with bees constantly crawling over the clover flowers, stepover apples would disappear. Only taller fruit trees would do well with clover groundcover. And if you plant any comfrey, be sure it's Boking 14 or you'll regret it forever. The non-hybrid variety has roots to China.

[paintedlady]

Please do check your site rules - some allotments are a bit picky about how much ground is used up on a particular thing (someone on our site had all fruit on the entire plot and was told to remove some of it)

Other fruits to consider - red/white & blackcurrants, blueberries and red dessert gooseberries are surprisingly sweet and not as tart as you might think.  What about grape vines?  You could perhaps cover the ground especially round the fruit bushes with a good fabric weed suppressant and cover with bark chippings though this obviously wouldn't work with raspberries/tayberries/loganberries/blackberries etc.   

I planted loads of spring flowering bulbs near my fruit trees - the flowers look stunning while the trees are still bare and encourage the waking bees to the garden.  As the flowers start to die back, the fruit trees burst into blossom.  I also have some perennial herbs (mainly oregano, sage & lavender as well as borage and thyme) nearby which flower in summer which also attract bees ... bees are very important to fruit crops as you would expect so I try to make my garden much more appealling for them to visit regularly to ensure pollination.  I'm not that keen to take up bee keeping but there's an option there too? 

As Trillium said, you will still need to do some maintenance but is not as intensive as veg gardening and generally (though admittedly not entirely) done in the months from autumn-spring.   Watch out for pests such as sawfly in late spring but once bushes are established (may take a few years), I've noticed they seem to be less problematic.

[gillie]

Do not underplant fruit - you will starve the plants.  Apples on the stronger rootstocks can be underplanted once they are growing well, but that is about it.  Everything else needs a good thick mulch and pruning largely during the winter months.

Once of the best things about soft fruit is that they are so easy to freeze - none of that blanching business - and except for strawberries come out almost as good as new  (though I freeze strawberries for sauces).

Strawberries need moving to fresh soil every three years or so or the crop falls off dramatically and by this time the bed is probably weed infested.

[Zippy]

Thanks for the replies guys.

I am hoping that, as I only have a half plot and this is an offer of another half plot the committee will consider this to be 50% fruit cover on a full plot, but I take your point about checking first.

Regarding avoiding underplanting because of starving the fruit, I don't agree here as I would be growing a nitrogen fixer (clover) so the underplanting would be a symbiotic relationship; the clover fixes and passes on nitrogen to the fruit, so no starvation,  and the clover also attracts bees which pollinate the fruit flowers whereas the fruiting trees provide a growing area for the clover which will eventually be sheared off and thrown down as nitrogen rich mulch.

I've never been stung by a bee, though last year there was a wasp nest in the raspberry row and i was stung 8 times over the year!

Another reason for growing Comfrey would be the bees of course, but I take your point about Bocking 14!

[gillie]

"the clover fixes and passes on nitrogen to the fruit"

I don't think so!

 Symbiotic fungi fix the nitrogen and pass it to the clover which utilises it to grow big.  You can 'harvest' the fixed nitrogen by cutting the clover and composting it but by what other mechanism would the clover pass the fixed nitrogen to a bush?

[Zippy]

You can 'harvest' the fixed nitrogen by cutting the clover and composting it but by what other mechanism would the clover pass the fixed nitrogen to a bush?

I don't know is the short answer, but I know that HDRA and other organic organisations are doing similar trials with various outcomes.

Does anyone else know?

[noshed]

I wouldn't do too much underpanting if I were you

[Zippy]

I think the idea behind underplanting with legumes where increased Nitrogen is required for the crop plant is that symbiotic fungi fix the nitrogen and pass it to the legume [thank you gillie] but not all of the Nitrogen gets used by the legume as the nitrogen accumulates around the root nodules on the legume plant.

What is not used by the legume is freely avaiable for use by the crop; in this case the fruit trees and plants.

I think this idea is still in the experimentation phase. What I do know is that we have lovely raspberries every year from our raspberry row which is underplanted by wild-sown white clover. Having said that, I have no control to compare this against.  Perhaps I should set up a trial; one row with, one row without and compare results.

[mumofstig]

keep in mind that fruit doesn't really need much nitrogen anyway, and the traditional advice has always been to keep the area around fruit trees and bushes clear to avoid competition, and so that they can be mulched with compost.
Garden organic have some advice

http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/organicgardening/gh_fruit.php

[Fisherman]

I have a half plot which I manage as a four year vegetable rotation. 

I have been offered another half plot. I don't want too much extra work planting out more veggies and I was thinking of putting this new ground under fruit.

Is fruit, once established more or less work than rotating veggies would you say?  I am thinking of rasberries, step-over apples - or a small apple tree with several types grafted in, damson and or plums, loganberries - I already have blackcurrants on my established plot; I may transfer them as well.

I would underpant these with clover as a compost plant and fill any empty corners with Comfrey and Nettles for the same use.

Anything I may have missed? Gooseberries - not sure we like them.

Strawberries - can they go in a permanent bed though? I thought they starved the ground after a while?

As fruit is so expensive in the shops I thought this would be a good use of ground, especially as I can get a lot of the fruit plants as thorow-outs from other plotholders.

What's this underpant thing?

Sorry I've had a glass of wine and found it amusing

[gillie]

Whoops!  Legumes utilise symbiotic bacteria not fungi.  (I have been thinking about symbiotic fungi in another context, hence my mistake).

It was explained to me some while ago by an agricultural chemist that what happens is the legume 'takes' the fixed nitrogen from the symbiotic bacteria stimulating them to produce more.  So the more the legume grows the more nitrogen gets fixed.  Similarly in the autumn, or when an annual legume dies, there is gradually less demand and less fixing.  

I am therefore very dubious that there is any 'spare' fixed nitrogen compounds for the benefit of other plants.  Similarly I doubt there is much point in leaving legume roots in the soil as I suspect that all the nitrogen compounds have been withdrawn from the nodules, but it does not do any harm.

[Zippy]

Thanks mumofstig; that makes sense. so I would mulch my fruit trees and I guess they need more potassium than nitrogen especially at fruiting?

If fruit plants do not need a lot of nitrogen, why is it usual to manure them annually?  would it not be better to apply a mulch of compost?

[JayG]

I don't think there's a lot to choose between most manures and garden compost when it comes to nutrients (we've been here before, haven't we?)

I do think there's quite a big difference between the cultural requirements of raspberries and, say, apple trees though.

Raspberries are shallow rooted so not only potentially dry out more quickly but cannot obtain nutrients from deeper layers of the soil. This is why mulching is a good idea for these, although because they have to put on a great deal of new growth each year they benefit from some additional fertiliser IMHO.

I'm no expert on strawberries but I thought it was the plants which got worn out rather than the soil. 

[Nige2Plots]

What an interesting question!
 Having taken on a second plot earlier this year and finding Club Root on it, I took the decision that rather than splitting my fruit growing between the two plots I would grow predominatly Fruit on the latter as a consequence.
The plot is now fully cleared and has now a full row of Rasberries, Three raised beds of Strawberries, three fruit trees ( Apple, Plum and Cherry ) , one Gooseberry bush and I am in the process of moving the Rhubarb from plot6b onto this one. What else to grow I have yet to decide.
Having read the various posts on this thread I do not think I will be under planting beneath the trees but I will Manure the entire plot as it has not seen any for years.