Hey Derek,

Welcome to the area. I'm relatively new as well (to gardening and the forums. I've been using the Phoenix Urban Farm calendar and have had pretty good success. Tells you everything you need to know. Well about veggies and herbs anyway. You'll have to poke around this forum to find out about fruit trees. I have no experience with them. Yet.
Far as I can tell though, you can grow just about anything with the right amount of TLC.

See link below for the calendar I mentioned.

Here is a link that might be useful: Phoenix Planting Calendar

Great to have you here on this site.
Derek were are you located (zone 9) ?
If you want to purchase fruit trees for your area make sure you ck on the chill rate. Some places(H.D. is one) sell the wrong tree for your area. I have a early blooming Apricot and for my area that is not good. Also just about everywhere in AZ the soil is very very poor so be ready to amend.
Welcome aboard

Hi Derek, are you new to the desert? If so, it's a whole different world of gardening! I was used to gardening in CT and OR, so this has been a big adjustment for me. Jump on in, and have fun!

Hiya Derek, welcome to Phoenix and welcome to the forum. We hope you'll post lots and lots of gardening updates (good or bad, but hopefully good!).

I agree with Erik as usual, that planting calendar he posted is great. There are also a ton of great books for gardening here. We've had several threads about great books for our specific climate, so you can do a search on this forum for "books" and find several great suggestions, plus your local bookstore (independent or franchise) should have some good ornamental and edible books for this climate. It's a different world from most other climates, so do some research and reading and have fun!

Take care and welcome again!
Happy gardening,
Grant

Here is a link that might be useful: Pics, so far, from my garden September 2012

Hi again,

Here's a thread that lists several great books for our climate, just in case you have trouble finding a good list to get you started. Happy gardening!

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/azgard/msg0412082416225.html

Here is a link that might be useful: A discussion that lists good books for this climate

Hi Derek, welcome!

Hi Derek :)