Which of the following fruit and nut trees should I plant?

[Martinus]

Voted for apricot, cheery and hazelnut as each is lovely. 

[Caliga]

Strix, do your homegrown Quinces taste good?  I had some I bought at the supermarket once, but they tasted weird somehow.

[katmai]

In the good part of Kentucky.

Thank you.  Yeah, tell the ignoramuses on here that not *all* of Kentucky is 'bad'. 

It's all relative levels of bad!

[Slargos]

De-shellifying nuts is too much like work.

I prefer my orchard in the variety that simply lets you pluck the pertinent parts from the tree and get right down to the business of consumption.

Apples and peaches would be my first pick, with cherry and apricot second.

Also, while you're at it, get some Lilacs. No garden is complete without Lilacs.

[jimmy olsen]

I voted Apple, Cherry and Peach.

[Pedrito]

Voted Cherry, fig and pear.

Cherries are delicious, but you need to protect the fruits from birds: I suggest covering the tree with a net down to the ground about 10 days before cherries are ripe. And the tree is beautiful, too.
Fig is by far my favourite fruit: home-grown, ripe figs are completely different in taste and texture from those you find at the market, and are usually delicious. Moreover, you can cosplay Adam and Eve with Princesca every time you want.
Pear trees are low maintenance and fruits are good.

If you want to stray a bit from the usual, I suggest a jujube - or red date - tree: nice tree, low maintenance, delicious small fruits ripe mid september to mid october, it needs to be exposed south and protected from cold (usually planted along construction walls). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jujube

L.

[Grey Fox]

btw I voted Pears. Best Bet.

[Caliga]

Oh, I forgot... I planted an apple tree last weekend: a dwarf Fuji. 

I'll need to plant at least one more apple tree to cross pollinate this one.  I think a Red Delicious would work.

After that, I think I'm gonna do some peach trees.

Another long term goal is to get rid of the dozen fucking Bradford pears the losers that lived here before me planted, if a windstorm doesn't take care of them for me.  Their delightful blossoms (which are in full bloom right now) smell like dead bodies.   I'm thinking either redbud or magnolia trees will do nicely for replacements.

[Eddie Teach]

A dozen pear trees? How big is your estate?

[Caliga]

3 1/2 acres... and these are Bradford (Callery) Pears, not actual fruit-producting pears.  They're basically planted everywhere now because they're cheap, grow fast, and are pretty in the fall and spring.  My Bradford pears are covered in giant, bright white blossoms right now.

The main problem with them is that they're weak as fuck unless properly trained and constantly are destroyed by windstorms and especially ice storms.  I haven't lost any of mine yet, though.  I've pruned them back a bit around the base but not up in the canopy, since I'd need a taller ladder than I have and probably a chainsaw, which I don't currently have either.

[jimmy olsen]

The main problem with them is that they're weak as fuck unless properly trained and constantly are destroyed by windstorms and especially ice storms.

You have them do weight lifting, wind sprints, or what?

[Caliga]

 

Training means pruning, using branch spreaders, and sometimes tying to an upright pole to guide the central leader.  I have the apple tree I just planted tied to a bamboo pole.

[Eddie Teach]

I like Tim's interpretation better. 

[jimmy olsen]

I like Tim's interpretation better. 

Which leads to one of my favorite tropes

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TrainingFromHell

[Caliga]

Got a Granny Smith apple tree today.  May put it in the ground this afternoon.