Cold Killed Half of Washington's Cherry Blossoms

[ninnymary]

My peach and nectarine bloomed beautifully. But the plum only had a couple of blossoms and it looks like it will be the same for the apple tree. I prune all my trees on the short side. I wonder if I pruned them wrong? I generally remove any crossing branches and prune for a good shape.

Mary

 

[TearmannGlas]

They're still projected to be pretty spectacular even with the recent cold snap. We are gonna pop in to see them this weekend since the weather is supposed to be in the 70s on Saturday (yay!!).

 

[TearmannGlas]

This is pretty cool if you want to peek in on the blossoms and see how they're doing!
http://www.earthcam.com/usa/dc/cherryblossoms/

 

[Nyboy]

If you do pop in take photos and post them

 

[ducks4you]

My peach and nectarine bloomed beautifully. But the plum only had a couple of blossoms and it looks like it will be the same for the apple tree. I prune all my trees on the short side. I wonder if I pruned them wrong? I generally remove any crossing branches and prune for a good shape.

Mary

I submitted an email a couple of years ago to "Mid American Gardener," a weekly PBS tv program out of the University of Illinois AG department about pruning my fruit trees and one of their AG Professor Emeritus gave a 10 minute lecture on pruning fruit trees. To sum it up (and the reiteration from answers to email/phone calls after that):
1) prune no more that 1/3 of LIVE wood
2) If you haven't kept up with pruning, prune no more than 1/4 of LIVE wood
3) prune any dead wood
4) prune ALL suckers
5) prune waterspouts, careful to not exceed the % of live wood
6) where branches cross, select one to keep and one to prune
7) you are not necessarily pruning for shape, more to open up the middle of each fruit tree to sunshine
8) make clean cuts where the branch begins at the trunk of the tree so that it will heal well and prevent insect invasion
9) prune cherry trees very sparingly
10) CAREFULLY prune peach trees, bc they will NOT regrow where you have pruned, but continue to yearly prune them bc they DO benefit from pruning (Apple trees will come back hard and regrow close to where you have pruned.)
I watched a recent gardening program where they interviewed a nursery that grows fruit trees. The owner said that if you do NOT prune your fruit trees at all, they will wear themselves out prematurely producing fruit.
Last year (2016) we had a hard freeze after blossoms had appeared. I was convinced that my peach tree would have NO fruit. In August, my DH was mowing and told me that I had peaches high up on the tree.
Last year we had some illness and I didn't prune any trees, including this one. I harvested 8 HUGE and perfect peaches, which jives with all of the advice about pruning the limbs in the dormant part of the winter/early spring AND pruning the fruit blossoms to force the tree to spend energy on few blossoms, but bigger and healthier fruit.
I AM NO EXPERT!!!!!!
I almost lost my Bartlett pear tree, which produced 50 pears in 2015, but developed blight in 2016. (Blight fungus enters the tree through the fruit blossoms.) I took to the Internet and found several articles suggesting pruning back the dying limbs and smaller branches to 8 inches beyond the dead wood. I hacked all of the dead wood down past 8 inches, collected all of the dead leaves and burned ALL of the dead wood and dead leaves. I thought I would lose it. It's still alive and has green branches. I lightly pruned it this Spring, anyway, and I may take off a few more waterspouts.
If you get on the Internet there are many articles about pruning. The more you do it, the less you get the heebee-jeebies about cutting on your fruit trees!

 

[ninnymary]

Thanks Ducks. That's pretty much what I do each year. My son though tells me that I keep my trees too short. I think he's right and next year I will leave them a foot taller. If I remember!

Mary

 

[Beekissed]

They made it!!! The one on the left lost a good many blooms in the frost but the one on the right did well. Even the blossoms that got frosted were being worked over by the bees, as their stamens were intact, even when the petals browned and fell off the bud.

 

[Nyboy]

nothing prettier in spring then a fruit tree in flower

 

[lcertuche]

We never get that much cold weather but somehow it seems that it happens after the fruit trees bloom.

Last year we ended up with two apples and they mysteriously disappeared after my sons and grandson noticed them.