2020 fruit gardens

[SwampDonkey]

Grapes are going gang busters, hope to tie them up as they elongate. Lots of blossoms coming on.












Wild plum (prunus nigra) for jelly.



rhubarb



New butternut seedling, transplant.

[SwampDonkey]

Unfortunately, the frost last night killed the new shoots and flowers on the grapes for this year.   I had them covered to.

[randy d]

As a gardener I feel your disappointment. We gave up on growing Grapes because we live an area prone to frost we now grow Aronia berries as they are more frost tolerant. Randy

[SwampDonkey]

Yes, an unusual heat wave for 4 days brought them on too quickly and then 4 days of cold with frost in 2 of them gave them a going over. The first frost never bothered them, must not have been as cold. The floating fabric was not enough to protect them. :-\ Sometimes you can save plants by sprinkling warm water on them before the sun hits them.

Perhaps some shoots with flowers will emerge from the mulch. I do have another patch protected by trees that I don't think were burned. But I mow that area about the time the fruit is beginning to ripen. Not as much sun there, although I have had a lot of grapes come on them before. They are sure a lot more tender than raspberries and elders to frost.

[Texas Ranger]

Oranges have set some the size of the ball of my thumb.

[Wudman]

Unfortunately, the frost last night killed the new shoots and flowers on the grapes for this year.  I had them covered to.

We had a hard freeze about three weeks ago that got my grapevines.  They have leafed back out and I hope will still be able to produce something.........if I can keep the deer out of them. 
Wudman

[SwampDonkey]

That's what I'm thinking to. I have had these grapes for over 30 years by-the-way. Same stock, never added to them. All I did was move them. I may put up a cedar hedge along the north side some day. Sometimes that is all it takes to deter frost, as long as it is not a ground freezing frost.

[SwampDonkey]

And a little walk by the grape beds, and I see new growth coming after the frost. As I said before, I've had these grapes for at least 30 years. They are resilient. ;)

[SwampDonkey]

come back...

[SwampDonkey]

Plum set

[SwampDonkey]

Blackberry buds, all the canes are loaded like this.

[Banjo picker]

Here is my blackberries.

We had a late frost the last of April that killed over half of mine.  They are Natchez thornless. I got a few raspberry's I been enjoying for a couple weeks.  Put a handful in the pancake mix and man they are good.  Banjo

[SwampDonkey]

I'll have to get another photo of the blackberries in bloom today. They are blooming like crazy and crawling with pollinators, some of which are European honeybees. I don't know who has them here, the neighours tried them one time I think and maybe still have some. They're not coming from too far away. I just hope they stay out of my chimney. :D And yes, they was in the chimney of my old house and later in a yard maple.

Plums are still growing, and even the new growth is already 16" long.

[SwampDonkey]

Honey bees





Wild bees

[Banjo picker]

Ours are getting ripe.  To get the sweetness they have to be fully ripe.... they look like the little fellows are gonna explode.  I planted ten of them two years ago.  I have cut the top out of this years canes already they are 6 or 7 feet tall now.  Thornless to boot.  Banjo

 

 

[SwampDonkey]

Yep, gotta be good and dark to be ripe for sure. Dad had some thornless ones in his garden, but they never bore much fruit for him. The voles always girdled them to. I like the thorn armed because it deters the coons and bares lots of fruit. And yes they do get taller than 6 feet to. They aren't ready up here until August-September. Takes a long time to mature compared to raspberries. Like everything else though, they need water and it is terrible dry here.

[Banjo picker]

I have 3 raise beds.  The blackberries and strawberries are growing in 100% composted horse manure.  4 of my 6 muscadines are in another bed that is about a 50-50 mix of composted horse manure and sand.  Muscadines are starting to put on small fruit, and my strawberries have been producing for a couple weeks, but I am just now getting some for ourselves... there was a raccoon raiding the patch every night.....until I caught him in a live trap baited with marshmallows.

 It's only a ten x ten bed of strawberries not enough to share with a hungry raccoon.  Banjo

[SwampDonkey]

Looks good. And no, the coons can go find some wild ones. :D

I'm not growing many black berries, but now that they are established, the new growth this year has stalks of over 1/2" thick at the ground. Sure wish we had rain or everything is going to be stunted and start to abort shoot growth.  : :

I use rotted sheep manure on everything  here. I also have some soil supplement on and also use mulch.

[Banjo picker]

I have a buddy that has 3 hives of honey bees on the place and they help with some pollinating, but my muscadines flowers are too small for them.  They need native bees.... sweat bees and the like to do them so I built this bee house.  It's been up for about 3 weeks and has a few holes filled.  I hope it helps.  

Banjo

[btulloh]

Nice Banjo and a good plan to provide habitat for the locals.  Didn't know that was a thing to do or worth doing.  I hope it improves your pollination.  It looks nice and it's interesting.

Maybe if I made something like the mud daubbers would stop filling up every air fitting, pipe, tube, and hole in my garage.

[Banjo picker]

Thanks, at the end of summer I will know which holes have the most tenants, and I will build some more with the needed sized holes.  Leaf cutter bees like either 1/4 or 5/16 inch holes.  Banjo

[SwampDonkey]

On my plum bushes, the bumble bees did most of the work during the daylight. Anytime I walked around it, it was bumble bees. Same with the apple trees, loaded with bumble bees. We have a lot of bumble bees this year.

[SwampDonkey]

Grapes so far, tied them up the other day.



Blooms

[SwampDonkey]

Black elders with flowers coming on. Going gang busters this year. Didn't know if they would be frost hardy. Seem to be fine.

[SwampDonkey]

Fruit are setting on the blackberries. Lots of new shoots for next year coming up.



Raspberry rows have lots of new shoots, hopefully will fill out the rest of the rows for next year. The plants were stunted last year from drought. But I have 80 gallons of creek water on them this week. ;D



Plums developing right along, they got 10 gallons of creek water to. Makes beautiful jelly. ;D