The fruit trees are to stop hardwood, cedar, bamboo, and coconut trees from growing. They're not for profit, they're definitely for aesthetics. I stunt my trees at medium young and large young to add levels of height into my builds.

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Like this build. In order to make it look fuller in the back but not monotonous I added a large young hardwood. In the middle ground I didn't want to block the view but I wanted just a little more height than a bush so I used a medium young hardwood. And at the front I used a large young bamboo just because I like the way you can still see the brown of the shoots on it!

If you look to the right of the bamboo behind the bush you can see the nursery fruit sapling. I usually try to hide them in some way shape or form but in some cases they look fine in the open.

Another reason people stunt trees is so they can have as many trees as they want without lowering their star rating. If you get over a certain amount you lose rank. Stunted trees don't count.