Sunday, March 08, 2009

More Fruit Tree Orders

Uh Oh....

Last weekend I looked online at Raintree Nursery again. Decided to order two additional trees to grow, using the backyard orchard culture method:

Surefire Cherry. I was thinking about my parent's cherry tree, and realized that I haven't had a pie made from sour cherries for about 30 years. Being into "slow food" - you can't get much slower than starting out with the a small, bare-root tree. OK, you could plant a seed to grow the tree, but I'll be dead before I get cherries from a seed-grown tree. Tree should be here in 1-2 weeks. The 'ideal location' in the backyard was occupied by a rose (Carl Brunner), so yesterday I dug it up and moved it a few feet to the former location of "Angel face", which did not survive the winter and has now joined other Angels in heaven. Well, actually, in compost, but it sounded nice. The location is ready, I added some chicken compost, and will add some eggshells when planting the tree. Some thought actually went into this selection: It blooms later than other cherries. Late frost has been a fruit-tree nemesis, so the later flowering is a bonus. Most sour cherries, including this one, are also self-fertile, so no pollinator variety is needed. They stay fairly compact, especially compared to sweet cherries, so the pruning might be easier as well. IT's on Gisela5 rootstock.

I DID say two trees. I've been developing a taste for asian pears - they are crispy like apples, but have more flavor, like pears. Not enough room for more than one, and most asian pears need a pollinator, so I ordered a multigraft Asian Pear. I won't know the 3 varieties until it arrives. It will be all but one of:

Shinseiki (medium to large, sweet, yellow fruit, late August).
Yoinashi (medium to large, russeted, butterscotch flavor).
Hamese (mid sized, sweet, yellow fruit, mid August).
Mishirasu (large, russetted fruit, late September).

They can't say which if the 4 is missing. If I could pick, I would go for the two sweet yellows and either of the russetted, but any combination is OK with me. Planning for this to go into a front-yard border, possibly in the location of the opuntia (winter did a job on that one too) or eucalyptus (also a winter victim - there is a trend here). I'll have to look at the site from multiple angles to scope out the optimal location.

We already have a multigraft European pear and a multigraft sweet cherry. Some authors are not crazy about multigraft trees, since some varieties may be more vigorous than others, but my feeling is that for trees that need pollinizers, it's a way to achieve that need in one tree. Plus, judicious pruning can keep the most vigorous in check and allow the other varieties some space as well. I've added a couple of unknown variety grafts to the dwarf apple trees, last year. If we are very lucky, they'll bear this year.

Temperature Jan and Feb 2009

Keeping track of temperature so that NEXT YEAR when I'm wondering "was it this cold/warm last year?" I can look back and see what it was like. Excel makes for easy to read graphs, here are the highs and lows for Jan and Feb.





Thursday, March 05, 2009

Early March Garden Log

What's growing and blooming?

Daffodils are about 4 inches tall. Many closed flower buds are present. Hyacinths, similar size.
Rhubarb is the first food plant to start growing. I love the crinkled red leaves and knobby buds.

Helleborus is blooming. Since the plant is short and the flowers droop, they are difficult to appreciate.

Garlic is alive and about 5 inches tall. We'll have garlic this year! I was concerned that the extreme cold this winter might have done it in.

Pussy willow is blooming, but not much. It may be too young, or not in enough sun.
Forsythia has green buds. I don't know if it will bloom - no yellow shows - again, it's on the North side of the house, so possibly not enough sun. Last year the flowers were sparse.

I planted cuttings from my Dad's forsythia from Illinois. That shrub is at least 50 years old and maybe 80 years old. Not really special, but if the cuttings grow, I'll have a bit of a keepsake from my past.

Pear blossoms are swelling. Lilac blossoms are swelling. Aprium blossoms starting to show a little pink.

The plum trees that I recently planted are starting to show life, with swelling buds. Can I hope for, maybe, one plum each, so that I know what they taste like? I did spray both with the last bit of lime-sulfur.

Finches are fighting in the feeder now.

Today was a day off. Overcast, not too cold. I did the following in the back yard:

Pruned roses. Most have about 1 inch of growth. Local authorities precaution against pruning too early, since pruning supposedly stinulates growth which can be killed by frost. Since they are growing now anyway, I don't see the difference. I have pruned as early as January, and many neighborhood roses were pruned then as well, but this year I thought I would try to follow the 'experts' advice.

Most were cut back to about 2 feet tall. Tallest was about 7 feet tall before pruning. Removed dead wood. Sprayed these roses with the left-over lime sulfur from the peaches, but to prevent leaf spot.

Still a lot of roses to prune in the front yard. Maybe this weekend.


Uncovered peaches. These are miniature peach trees. Big problem last year was leaf curl, which destroyed the crop and almost killed the trees. Last fall, I sprayed with Micro-cop and covered the trees with plastic (see links). I meant to uncover them last week but was not able. They are actually starting to grow. The tiniest is blooming. Uh-oh. So, I uncovered. I read that micro-cop doesnt work, so I sprayed with Lily Miller PolySul Summer and dormant spray at dilution C, which is for growing season. I used the more dilute spray due to concern for toxicity to new buds. This may not be strong enough for leaf curl (4 teaspoons per gallon instead of 1 cup per gallon) but compromise is necessary. Maybe the unscientific combination will be better than no spray? This is considered organic since it is just lime and sulfur, not petrochemicals. Depends on who you talk to.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Late Winter Doldrums

Not much to post about. After the flu, and heavy workload, now a weekend trip to the Midwest. Upon my return it will be time to uncover the peaches, maybe a final spray against leaf curl, and get a truckload of compost. Still too early for starting tomato seeds - good, since I still dont have the energy!

Where's the Spring tonic?

Friday, February 13, 2009

Charliebama

Getting a little carried away here. Today I'm sick as a dog. So here's my faithful "Yes I Can" companion.

Thursday, February 12, 2009

More links, compact orchards for the backyard

Thanks to contributers on the Gardenweb fruit forum, here is another link to a backyard orchard:

Tony's compact orchard

Also, below is an informative infomercial on compact backyard orchard trees from the UK. There's a bit of the "But wait, there's more" syndrome, but it's still interesting and instructive.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Backyard Orchard Culture: Dave Wilson Nurseries

Here is a you-tube video from the Dave Wilson Nursery in California. This is the method that I am trying to use in my yard as well - they call it "Backyard Orchard Culture". Backyard Orchard Culture means more trees, smaller size, so that we can have a harvest with more variety in a smaller space, extending over a longer period of time in a normal sized backyard. Trees are planted close together. That method requires more severe pruning, especially summer pruning.

High Density Fruit Tree Planting:



Also see the gardening links to the right for more information.

The trees are kept to about 5 to 8 feet tall, so no ladder is needed for harvest. The branches are kept open enough to allow sunlight into the center. Summer pruning is more effective at limiting size, compared to dormant pruning. I hope that this will be our first really good year for the 3 and 4 year old trees to bear.

Pruning method:



Fig trees may take some different variations - we'll keep working on the technique.

Thursday, February 05, 2009

Pruning Ginkgo saplings

Shaping the young tree will avoid removing larger branches, later. This seed-grown Ginkgo is in prior photos on this blog, now about 7 feet tall. I removed the lower branches, and shortened a couple of the longer upper branches so that it would keep to a single lead. It's probably hard to see what was done, but that is the idea: shaping and prevention.

Ultimately, I want the lowest branches to start 5 or 6 feet above the ground. That way they are less likely to be climbed on by kids, and as they arch upward, they are unlikely to be in the way of vehicles on the street. I don't want to remove too much biomass, however, because the more leaves that it has, the faster it grows. SO this method is a compromise.

Before, the lower branches are small but this year are likely to become much thicker.

After. Later this winter the tree will be given a nice compost mulch, and be ready for another year of growth. I think of the 6-foot stage as the threshold to really looking like it will be a tree.

After 3 years of my lobbying, my workplace will be planting a tree on the grounds for Earth-day / Arbor Day (April 22 and 25). As the fervent tree-promoter that I am, I get to choose. How predictable am I? It will be a Ginkgo biloba. Since it is in a public place, of course, my seed grown trees wont do. They have a 50% chance of being female, and females are too likely to be cut down due to their stinky seed coats. A male has a better chance for a long life among pesky humans.

Planting Plum Trees

The new plum trees came 2 days ago. The varieties are Hollywood (a more columnar shape, purple leaf, nice blooming, purple plum, partially self fertile) and Shiro (wider branching, green leaf, juicy yellow plum, partially self fertile). According to everything that I read, both should do well in this zone and region.

Other than the grape pruning, this then is the first major garden activity to inaugurate the year 2009! I am stoked!

I think that they do a great job packaging the trees. Only two tiny branches were damaged, and they were very minor branches.

Nice roots, nice branches. I've been ordering from Raintree for several years, and their products, plant quality, and packaging have not disappointed me yet.


Soak the new trees for a couple of hours. Since it may still be cold and frost, I soaked to get the trees well hydrated.

Generous holes, with the trees planted so that the grafts were 2-3 inches above the soil line. I did add a LITTLE compost, but not enough to create the 'flowerpot' effect in the clay soil. One tree is in a raised bed with retaining wall, replacing a magnolia that I moved out last fall. This soil was amended several years ago, and the soil level is about 2 feet above the original grade. This area is well drained. The other tree went into less ideal ground, but I heeded the warnings not to over-amend the soil, just adding a little compost mixed in for 'luck'.

Watering them in. After tamping the ground firmly with my feet (but not my ENTIRE body weight, please?), I poured on a bucket of water. Once it soaked in, both were given a layer of well aged yard compost as mulch.

Now planted, ready for Spring. How cool is that?

Birds at the feeder: House Finch

Most authorities recommend keeping a healthy population of birds around. During the summer, many of them eat insects.
Based on photos on the internet, these are male "house finches". House finches are vegetarian, so probably not much benefit for the gardener. But I still like them. The birds have eaten about 15 pounds of seeds so far this winter. Except the seeds that the squirrels got first.