Spring Planting

Planting new trees. Trees can take around 3 years to produce fruit and usually 7 or more to be fully productive. If they stay healthy, trees can have a life span of 25 or more years depending on many factors. One has to be patient in the Orchard business. Over the past few years we have learned much about what to do and not to do when planting new trees. When we bought the orchard we had around 2000 trees and this year after planting we will have a net 3000 trees.





2007 Planting Peaches and Nectarines.

The last three years we have planted over 1100 new trees and have learned a lot about tree survival. This year, 2010 Paul is planting 300 cherry trees and 200 peach trees this week. We tried the first year to replace trees that had died for one reason or another, disease, porcupines, voles, bears, old age, poor soil etc. So we planted 300 peach and nectarine trees in "skips". That is, we removed the dead tree and replaced it with a new tree in the same location. See photo above of Florencio and James being supervised by Lwee. Lwee finds shovels, backhoes, brooms just too exciting so he didn't stay long in the job. In 2007 Paul used the backhoe to remove the old tree and dig a hole for the new one. Even so it was quite labor intensive to refill the hole made from the bucket. We have some of the best nectarines you have ever tasted. I call them peaches on steroids. For a few years we also had a nice harvest but began to lose trees each year. The main cause for the tree demise was Cytospora Canker a fungus that attacks all stone fruit (peach, apricot, nectarine, cherry) and some pome fruit. The nectarines had already had the fungus when we bought the orchard. And then we had severe bear damage for two years and lost many peach and nectarine trees as the bears broke limbs to reach a nice ripe fruit. Cytospora takes advantage of injured trees with open wounds moved into the peach/nectarine blocks. Small branches die and around the tree one will see cracks in the trunk and an oozing sap like substance. We learned that planting skips although seemed practical was not the way to go and that it was better to establish new blocks of trees.

2008 Planting - Plums

In 2008 we added a new fruit, 4 kinds of plums and planted more nectarines and cherries all in new blocks. See plum photo. This time, Paul used an auger attached to the tractor. After planting we put down agricultural cloth to minimize weeds at the root stock. New blocks need irrigation lines run to each tree after planting. The plums really took off and we even had fruit last year but the bears ate the few plums we had although we lost most of them to frost. The apricots and cherries didn't fair so well and many of them did not take. But the agricultural cloth did create a little problem. It seems that voles (sort of a big mouse and Miko's favorite snack) like to winter under the cloth and will chew on the trees. We pulled up the cloth and treated the trunks and somehow did not lose the plums but the damage was too much for the nectarines and some cherries. Hopefully this year we will have a nice crop of plums and we can find out what they taste like.

2009 - Planting cherries and nectarines

2009 Paul got more sophisticated on planting having a couple years experience. And we had Andy who came to us as a WWOOF'r available to help and Bill who was renting our house on Grand Ave. Andy grew up on a farm in Ohio and has proven to be an excellent worker. He is back with us this year planting more trees and will help Paul build the new 6KW micro-hydro plant (story to follow in a few weeks). In 2009 we planted a new variety of cherries, Bentons, which are supposed to bloom 2 weeks after the current varieties (Bing, Rainier, Lambert, Queen Anne). We are hoping to minimize the chance of losing all the cherries to freeze. We also planted some more nectarines.. try try again. These trees got a lot of extra tender loving care. Each tree (all 500 or so) got nice little wire collars around their base to deter those pesky voles and the collars went on after carefully hoeing weeds and grass away from the stock. We were lucky that James had his friend Diana stay with us last summer and they dutifully made and attached all the little wire collars (yes, 500 of them) to each tree. No agricultural cloth and this year, no vole damage and 100% of the trees made it. We also thought we lost about 100 prime cherry trees to voles last year. The voles girdled the trunks sometime during the winter. Paul tried sealing the trunks but as the summer went on they began to wither. But.. new news, Paul said the trees are looking OK this spring so TSBD (to still be determined).

2010 - Planting Cherries and Peaches

Last Friday the new trees arrived. Paul likes to get them into the
ground as soon as possible. One year we had to wait because of rain and it seemed we lost more trees then if they get planted right away. Andy is back. The blocks need to be surveyed and laid out for each tree. After surveying he would spray the ground with orange paint to indicate where to auger. Then Paul can use the tractor to drill the hole while Andy places the tree in and covers with soil. Paul uses the other tractor equipped with a tank to water each new tree. He has found that the new trees need ample watering when planted. Paul said they are able to plant about 90 trees a day so just planting takes about 6 days. After the trees are in the irrigation lines need to be run (no small task) and then the hoeing, wire baskets and lots and lots of watering.

Every year the trees come in April. And as you can see every April is different, sometimes it is very green and spring like and this year there is still snow and dead grass. Paul said today that the apricots have begun to bloom. That's April 12th and last year they bloomed March 15th and yes we lost them all to frost. So this year is looking good.. so far.