This Fall I want to plant as many of my trees inground as I have room so I have been thinking of different layouts and which would be best. My hill faces WSW and will (hopefully) be terraced into 4-6 rows in early Fall.

I first thought of planting them by their nationality, French figs in one row, Italian in another, Greek in a third, etc. Then I thought about planting by color; purple, green, yellow, brown, red, etc. Another thought is by the tree's average height, taller trees to the North, shorter to the south. I may do this anyway in each row.

If you had to plan your orchard, how would you plant your trees?

Sue

I would plant by skin color, personally.  planting by nationality doesn't make sense to me, because there are plenty of figs out there which are named different things depending on the soil you're standing on (think Cuello de Dama Negro/Col de Dame Noir, etc.)

Sue,  I plant all of mine by nationality funny you mentioned that, all Italians mostly, many figs are italian period, French period, Greek Period.  Also, I separate them into the regions,  All the ones from one region together, another regione together ect.   I have them in rows, but Also, I stand them intermingled by size, it is my interior/ exterior decorating that comes out as too many large on one side and then gradually getting smaller doesn't look right,  One larger, one smaller, One larger and so forth,  they like this and it looks more balanced.  Most of my Trees are Italians, but I do have  french and Greek and good old Celeste, they are in rows by themselves.  Also, some figs like more sun than others and more heat, so they are in positions that gives them their own individual requirements,  Dottato, Atreano, Vesuviana, they are in a place they get the sun almost completely all day as they need it more intense.  My yard runs South East.  Its fun to get these types of plans together, Good Luck. Ciao
P.S.  Mark your trees really, really good, so you will always know which is which, get the tags that you can press and engrave the names in, make a post and post it in to avoid confusion with varieties.

Put your favorites closest to the house. Alphabetical is another option. Make sure you label them and/or make a map of which tree is where. In the end, it really doesn't matter. If you later add or replace trees, they will not be in the same order.

You could make a map of Europe with mulch and plant the figs in thier appropriate locations.

hblta,   Ciao,  What an interesting Idea, I really like that, unfortunately I'd have to make it more of the mediterranean Region as I don't have any figs from Northern or Eastern Europe at all.  I  Like it.  Also, sue,  you are on a hill, you may be able to make it out pretty well, if you have another hill on the other side.  Cool.

I did not put mine in any particular order.  I started planting trees with convenience in mind.  I have one water source in the field.  If I had planted alphabetically or geographically or any other criteria (leaving space for new arrivals), I would be moving the 250' of hose all over the place.  Also, I'm worried I'd be too anal to plant in any order.  I can imagine the difficulties of getting 'Bagalhouse' when 'Armenian' and 'Barnisotte' are already planted next to each other.  Or when I find out the 'Genoa' is really just another 'Celeste'.  LOL

~james

I'm going to put in bubblers or drip irrigation so dragging hoses is not in my future. I'm a working girl and don't have time for that! ;-)

I also live in a sever wildfire area. Fire Code will not let me plant too close to the home as I need a fire break. The 2007 Witch Creek fire blew right thru here and burned homes one of which was 2 doors down. I don't want the fire marshal on my butt. I am thinking I may plant the dwarf varieties like Petit Negri and VdB nearer the house. That leaves me the lower acre or so of the hill I'm on to plant the remaining.

Maggie, all my trees are marked with the aluminum tags. When they go in the ground I'll mark with stakes and put duplicate aluminum tags on the stakes. I also plan to have a grid map to mark where each tree is located in each numbered row...may even go GPS. ;-)  I have close to 80 varieties and hope to get most planted.

Thanks,
Sue

PS: Jon, I did plant my Panachee near the kitchen as mentioned in a previous post. It's far enough from the house not to be a problem but I don't think I can sneak in more as much as I'd love to...

This is a great thread!  I am in the process of designing a layout for my trees too!  I never thought to plant based on the map of Europe.  Sue, I like Maggie's idea by placing the trees based on their need for sun and heat.  I have a small collection in 5 gallon containers and a few in 30 gallon containers.  I have alot of space adjacent to a creek. The problem is the moles and rabbits kill every thing planted near the creek.  My house faces North and my wife won't let me plant any trees in the front yard or near the creek.  My back yard is perfect.  I have a nice hill on the southwest side of my house.  It has full AM sun on far southwest side and shade in the afternoon.  The hill continue North towards street and my wife will let me plant there.  So, I'm going to plant mine based on the amount of sun they can handle.  And also incorporate an auto drip system. Sue, Maggie, how far apart are you planting your trees? I'm planting 3 rows and how far apart are you planting the rows?  cheers, Dennis

Sue, whatever design you come up with, it sounds beautiful to me. I can imagine that orchard on that terraced hill. It's gonna' be breathtaking. The only hills we have around here are speed bumps.

I lay out my orchard in different order every year. That's one of the advantages of having them in pots....:-)

Sue, get as many ideas as possible before deciding.
One idea is to make it technicolour with respect to the fruit colour. Place them like Black/ Green/ Purple/ Yellow/ Red & whatever available and then stagger the next line with respect to the colours so each tree will have a neighbour with a different fruit colour.

Well, what else could I think because you can't place them by the price of the tree!!!!!

Speed bunps huh Tim. If you go slow enough you don't even know they're there, so you're telling on yourself.

Sue, that terraced hillside will look great. So next time we visit and watch the sunset over steak and wine we can also look over the orchard which will not be blocking the beautiful sunsets. Good luck.

Hi Sue im with Bass well not litterally.
If i could grow inground for me it would not matter the order of things i suppose, only i would try to place the best known producers close as possible .