Apricot
If you are looking for a beautiful wide, round shaped landscape tree, one that blooms reliably, with fragrant white flowers that cover the tree like popcorn early in the spring, has lovely shiny green leaves all summer long, turns a pretty shade of gold in the fall and has striking branch structure and form in the winter, look no further than the Apricot (P. armeniaca). Add in that an Apricot bears gorgeous golden orange colored, absolutely delicious fruit that you just can’t buy from any store and you have a near perfect tree. Near perfect because they do require some shaping and pruning and pest management for quality fruit. And actually getting fruit in Michigan because of our unpredictable springs is sometimes iffy. I consider the fruit a bonus if I get any.
Several years ago, I purchased my one and only Apricot tree from the Stark brother Catalogue – variety “Goldcot”. It was little more than a 30” stick when I planted it in a large berm in my front yard about twelve years ago. The Catalogue said it would be hardy and bear fruit in Michigan, and loving Apricots, I went for it. It grew very quickly into the beautiful 25’ by 25’ specimen it is today. Last summer, for the first time, due to some spraying for insects the year before, and a cooperative spring frost wise, I had a bumper crop of beautifully huge delectable Apricots! I had so many Apricots that the ones I kept covered about 6 feet of my kitchen counter in a huge deep pile. I gave a lot away, but made several Apricot cobblers, a couple of batches of jam and butter, gave some more away, ate a bunch fresh and gave some more away. They were fantastic!!!
I highly recommend using fruit trees as landscape trees wherever you can fit them in. Most fruit trees come in standard (like my Apricot), or dwarf sizes and some come in patio sizes as well. Stark Brothers carries a large variety of different fruits for the home landscape and there are other sources as well.
