In the last few years, an increasing number of Americans have turned their yards over to such mini orchards, planting them with dwarf and semi-dwarf fruit trees, even in dense urban areas.

The backyard orchard makes sense, given the growing popularity of the local-food movement. Nothing is more local than the backyard, after all, and home orcharding, as the practice is sometimes called, guarantees freshness and cuts the energy costs for transportation to nil. Anxieties about food safety — sparked by events like last year’s E. coli outbreak in spinach — may also be contributing to the trend.

[Read](http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/garden/13orchyarding.html?ex=1363147200&en=b7c32ed99aeaea57&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss “Read the Article”) (New York Times)