I get so tired of this. Every year my apple tree blooms and about a week later it'll frost. Then I have to go out at 5 AM with the garden hose and spray the frost off of it if I want any apples at all. Stupid tree.
Avg. last frost here is May 5 ( I think) so we'll probably get at least 1 more. I just dread it. That is a cold job. I've almost cut it down but I just can't bring myself to do it. I am thinking about planting some late apples out behind the barn though.
I feel for you jlmann, where I live (near Oxford, in the UK) we can have our last frost as late as early June. Last year most people lost their apple blossom in April & May. Luckily by some fluke I didn't & had a great crop which I shared with my neighbors. This year, so far, is going well - the apple trees are just coming into blossom & the weather forcast is OK. I applaud you for getting up in the early hours to spray the tree There's no way I would do that !
Good luck with the weather & may your sleep be unbroken & your crop be huge
:rose Hattie :rose
This is ironic, because I always pray for that last big, hard frost for my orchard. When this happens, I have less worms and fungal growth for the year. Also, since my trees seem to be in a warmer swale than other trees in the area, my blossoms don't get damaged.
This makes me having the only good apple supply in the area.....this creates a demand and means more sales.
Hello all just wanted to say how wonderful your tree looks.
I planted three small apple trees last fall and was blessed with blooms this spring. Mine are so small it will take forever before they will bear an apple.
Yeah that tree is really old though. It is actually on some type of dwarfing root stock,but it's not really a dwarf anymore. It was here when we bought the place and had been sorely neglected. Now that it's in better shape it gets frosted on as soon as the blooms open up. Oh yeah thanks for the compliment - I've just been mad at this tree lately