Xtremehorticulture

Xtremehorticulture of the Desert

Butterflies Pollinating Plum Trees?

2 Comments / insect pollination, nonbee pollinators, pollinators /

Butterflies pollinating readers plum tree Q. Attached you will find a picture of small butterflies on our plum tree. There are hundreds of them. Are they pollinating our trees? The bees were here, but these have taken over. A. I have seen this before a few years back in our orchard as well and they can do a lot of pollinating when it happens. It normally does not last very long. There is usually a burst of butterflies for a couple of weeks and then it is over.             The development of the adult butterfly must correspond to the opening of flowers that require insect pollination. In some years, like now, butterfly development is perfectly coordinated with certain varieties of fruit trees.             Pollinating insects can include bees, wasps, butterflies, moths, beetles, flies and other insects. By far the most consistent pollinators are our bees and specifically the domesticated honeybee.

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Fruit Tree Not Producing? Get Rid of It!

3 Comments / fail to develop, fail to grow, flowers and no fruit, flowers but no fruit, fruit failure /

Q. I live in the Mesquite area and have two non-producing nectarines. One is a 7 year old LeGrand and the other a 4 year old Gold Mine nectarine. Both get plenty of flowers but no fruit. They are intermingled with plums, peaches, and apricots; all producers. Any idea what could be wrong? A. First of all, thank you for keeping track of the variety of fruit trees you have. I cannot tell you how many times I have talked with people and they have no idea what variety of fruit tree they planted. Selecting the right variety makes a world of difference in the quality of the fruit you produce.             I will tell you right now I have tried both of those varieties of nectarine and do not give them very high marks for flavor in our climate. I would get rid of them now and put in something better. I know Le Grand is an old time favorite in other parts of the country but there are better varieties out there.             I also had one nectarine tree, unlike yours, that just would not flower for us. Lots of healthy growth, but no flowers. It wasn’t the variety because we had five of this tree and the other four did produce. I gave it a five year chance and then replaced it. It should have gotten just three years but I felt generous. Generally speaking, if your fruit tree does not produce after three years of flowering, or you get three years in a row of bad tasting fruit, REPLACE IT.             If you want to stick with nectarines (this may turn into a regular spray program for thrips control down the road) then I would look very closely at Arctic Star, a white-fleshed nectarine or, for yellow-fleshed types, Desert Dawn, Desert Delight or Double Delight. We have given all of these very high marks in fruit quality and they are excellent producers.

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Don’t Throw Out Your Thinned Peach and Nectarine Fruit

Leave a Comment / baby peaches, green almond, pickling baby fruit, pickling immature fruit, recipes, what to do with thinned fruit /

Baby peach fruit for pickling Green almond ready for pickling or eating fresh If you have peaches and nectarines, now is the time to start removing fruit so that the remaining fruit gets larger. Remove fruit that are gumdrop sized so that the fruit remaining on the limb is at least four inches apart. If the tree is not terribly healthy then remove more fruit than this. If you thin your peaches or nectarines you will end up with “baby peaches” Pick early so they are no larger than a large olive, try pickling them and packing them in oil for home use just as you would olives. They do this in the Mediterranean and Middle East where some people do not let any fruit go to waste. Baby donut peaches You can also do this with green almonds. Harvest the almonds when they are no longer than about one inch. The seed inside should still be translucent with a white coat. If you want a recipe to try with babby If you want a recipe to start with, I found this one on the internet in the Ligurian style. http://www.aglaiakremezi.com/recipies/mezze-appetizers-and-salads/pickled-tsagala-green-almonds.html

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Make Your Peaches Larger by Thinning Enough

2 Comments / make fruit larger, peaches, remove fruit, small fruit, thinning fruit /

Readers nectarine tree Q. My 23 year old nectarine is always loaded with fruit. I sent you a picture. I usually “thin” out the fruit when they’re quite small but I can’t seem to thin out enough so they get bigger. Should I remove the flowers now before the fruit forms or wait until the fruit is formed and then attempt to thin out? I know the tree in the picture is ugly but the fruit it bears is delicious. A. I am not concerned with the looks of the tree but I am concerned that it has enough canopy to shade the branches which helps prevent sunburn on the limbs and fruit. Sunburn damage on limbs in turn attracts boring insects and increases the decline of the tree.             Since the leaves are responsible for collecting solar energy and converting this solar energy into chemical energy in the form of sugars, the number of leaves compared to the number of fruit is a pretty critical relationship if you want larger fruit. You want anywhere around 50 to 70 healthy leaves for every good-sized fruit. Peach before thinning             I know you won’t go around counting the leaves to determine the number of fruit to remove but it gives you an idea that if you don’t have a good canopy of leaves, then you will have to remove a lot of fruit.             This is why it is important for your tree to have good canopy development from proper pruning. This allows sunlight to penetrate on to leaves inside the canopy. Leaves growing in shade produce fewer sugars and may actually rob sugars from developing fruit. Peach after thinning             This is why we tell people to leave fruit spaced an average of about 4 to 6 inches apart on the fruit-bearing limbs. Start removing fruit when they are the size of your thumbnail.             I would not remove flowers as an alternative to thinning the fruit. You don’t know which flowers are going to set fruit and which ones will not. You might leave flowers that don’t set any fruit.             Harvest your fruit when they are still firm but have developed their full-color. It is acceptable that there is just a little bit of green left on the fruit at the time of harvest. Depends on the variety.             This helps avoid a lot of bird damage to the fruit. The birds like to get them when the sugar content is starting to climb. Following Murphy’s Law, this is nearly always the day before you decide to pick them. Pick soft fruit at the first sign of bird damage and let undamaged fruit ripen on the kitchen counter for a couple of days. After they ripen, put them in the refrigerator to help preserve their freshness.

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Baby Fruit Trees: Pull Off or Leave the Fruit On?

4 Comments / flowering too young, fruit removal, Mojave Desert, stress, thinning fruit /

Q. Help! I planted my bareroot Pink Lady last February 4th and now it’s flowering! I’m happy to see the blossoms; they’re pretty and smell good. This is the first time I planted an apple tree, now I don’t know what to do next. Should I just let it blossom and fruit? Pink Lady apple from the North Las Vegas Orchard A. Just be calm and take a deep breath. It is okay for your tree to flower. If you go back to some of the old textbooks on fruit trees it may tell you that some trees take six to eight years to bear fruit. Well there is some truth to that but with newer varieties bred for precociousness (early production) and budded on to dwarfing rootstocks it is not unusual to have fruit trees begin to bear fruit after only a year or two in the ground. The question then becomes is it wise to leave the fruit on the tree or remove it?             Some very good gardeners are of the opinion that all fruit should be removed so that the energy of the tree goes into tree growth rather than split between tree growth and fruit production. Others say to let the tree go ahead and produce some fruit but remove most of it for the same reason.             I am of the latter. If you have some fruit being produced then enjoy a few the first year, a few more the second until you maximize its production for its size. As it increases in size it can be allowed to carry more fruit.             Remember to whitewash the tree to help prevent sunburn. Cover all the branches and the trunk with diluted white latex paint. This is a mixture, 1/1, with water and make sure you cover the west and south sides of the trunk and tops of the branches.             Let it flower. Thin the fruit to one apple per cluster as soon as the fruit forms. Keep mulch at least 6 inches away from the trunk the first few years. Remove the stake this fall. That’s about it. I hope you get a couple of fruit this year.

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Terry Mikel Joins Xtremehorticulture Blog

1 Comment / Boyce Thompson Arboretum, puya /

Hello, my name is Terry Mikel and I had a position similar to Robert Morris’ for the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension in Maricopa County (Phoenix is the main city).  Over the years Robert and I have developed a relationship both professionally and personally.  He kindly asked me if I might help a bit while he’s off on another one of his fascinating adventures, this time in Afghanistan. In our conversations I would like to help with some with queries from the lower desert regions and maybe banter a bit with him on some of the issues that might arise.  We don’t necessarily agree on everything or how to do everything.  That might add some spice and will keep both of us honest. Additionally he thought some explanation about my ‘facename’ would be in order.  It’s pretty simple, like almost every gardener, plant person or human I have certain unexplainable favorite plants and for me the Genus Puya is one.  It goes back years to when Dr. Bill Feldman, Director of the Boyce Thompson Arboretum (we were graduate students together) called me to come out and see him.  He did not say why and when I got there we took a walk through the cactus area and off the trail to behind a rock formation.  Coming around the rock there it was, a Puya berteroniana in full bloom.  It was the first time it had bloomed and until then they weren’t sure which Puya it was.  It was spectacular and my passing knowledge of the Genus changed to a real passion for it.  They are in a terrestrial growing sub-family of the Bromeliad Family growing in the Andes Mountains from the foothill up to about 9,000′.  A cousin grows in the Chihuahaun Desert called Hectia.  One reason I like them is the one reason for most of my favorite plants, they don’t look like much and the bloom comes as a surprise with little regard for weather,  conditions or our inputs in general.  That’s what cool about Puyas for me. Check them out and see the strange and wondrous diversity of the Genus Puya and you folks in the higher desert will have a much easier time growing them if the want strikes you. Any way I am honored Robert asked me to join you all and I look forward to interacting back and forth.

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Pistachio Pollination and Pruning to Keep it Smaller

1 Comment / Kerman, Peter, Peters, pollenizer, pollinator /

I will add some photos next week. Q. My husband asked me to contact you about how to trim our pistachio nut tree and how to get it pollenated. A. You can still do some light pruning on fruit and nut trees. On pruning your pistachio I would cut back the new growth to about 18 inches above where you see the spurs growing. If this is too severe, then I would just cut back last year’s growth so that it is only about 12 to 18 inches long.       Pistachios come as both male and female trees (Peters is the male; Kerman is the female). You will need a male tree somewhere close by since they are wind pollinated. The male and female may be planted in the same hole, about 18 to 24 inches apart, but the male tree is more vigorous and will have to be cut back harder than the female to keep it under control.             If planting in the same hole and you should put a male tree on the north side so that the female, the less vigorous of the two, receives more sunlight. Otherwise you will have to rely on a male tree from a close neighbor or plant your own. http://www.crfg.org/pubs/ff/pistachio.html

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Almond Nut Drop and When to Spray an Insecticide

Leave a Comment / almond nut oozing, desert, insecticide spray, Las Vegas, nut drop, Sevin, southern nevada, timing, when to spray /

Leaffooted plant bug on pomegranate with babies (nymphs) Q. Several months ago you answered my question as to what was affecting the loss of all my almonds in my almond trees. You said I should apply the insecticide Sevin for pest control. But when do I apply the Sevin? My almonds are doing well now but they always do well now and then later I see something ozzing out of the nuts and a yellowish design on the inside. Then the nuts drop from the tree. So when do I spray with this insecticide? A. If I told you to apply Sevin insecticide I must have thought you had leaf footed plant bug in your almonds. My personal philosophy is to use pesticides as a last resort for insect control whenever possible. This would be the only reason I would recommend the use of a pesticide in almonds.             You would apply it when you see the insect present on the leaves. This insect has overwintered in yours or your neighbors landscape plants. I have seen them overwinter in our climate in these locations. When leaves emerge, this insect will begin feeding and laying eggs.    The first thing you will see are herds of the immature called nymphs on the undersides of leaves. You might see some adults as well but the babies are much more numerous. You should start to see them around late April or early May so start looking then. When you see them, begin spraying immediately according to the label mixing rate. Wear protective clothing.

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Putting Rock Mulch on Top of Composted Soil/Wood Mulch for Fruit Trees

1 Comment / covering wood mulch with rock mulch, desert fruit, desert landscape, fruit trees, heart problems /

Q. In my backyard in 2010 I planted a semi-dwarf Early Elberta Peach tree and a Katy Apricot.  I hand-watered them and left their tree wells uncovered until I completed the irrigation system around April 2011.  Now each tree has drip emitters. I put a thick layer of Dr. Q’s Pay Dirt potting soil on top of each tree well and then covered the potting soil over with a layer of the ruby red stone that I have throughout the floor of my backyard.  Both trees are doing very well and I want to be sure to do everything I can for their long-term health.             Per your View article, should I move the red stone back off the top of the tree wells to a radius of 6 feet away from each tree, and then cover each tree well with a layer of wood mulch instead?  A. One soil problem we have when growing fruit trees in our desert is the small amount of organic matter in our soils. This miniscule amount of organic matter is not enough for nearly all plants including so-called desert plants.             Fruit trees, and nearly all other plants, perform much better in our soils if organic matter (compost preferably) is added to the soil surrounding the roots. I hope that you added a lot of amendments to the soil at the time of planting, not just the surface.             I have compared two application methods when compost is applied to fruit trees: mixing it only to the soil at the time of planting and adding it only to the soil surface after planting. Adding it to the soil, not just the soil surface, dramatically improves plant growth in our desert soils.             The best soil amendments to use to use when increasing organic matter in our soils are homemade composts. Commercially made composts, available in bags or bulk and extremely variable in quality, would be next. The good ones (there are good ones out there now thanks to the explosion in organic gardening) are expensive. The cost of enough good quality compost, added to the hole at planting time, in some cases might rival the cost of the plant itself.             If trees are planted in amended soils and then the soil surface covered with rock, over time, the organic matter in the soil is “used up” so to speak by soil microorganisms. When the majority has been used up, we say the soil has become “mineralized”. Without addition of organic matter to the soil surface every two to three years, the soil slowly reverts back to its previous desert condition.             From my observations of fruit trees and nondesert landscape plants growing in our desert soils amended only at the time of planting and mulched with rock only, the soil is typically “mineralized” by the fourth or fifth years. Cacti and desert plants are much more tolerant of mineralized soils but still grow better in amended soils.             By placing wood mulch on the soil surface where the soil is wet, it slowly decomposes. Through its decomposition it adds organic matter to the soil. Through their decomposition, mulches add a lot of organic activity such as beneficial microorganisms and earthworms leading to improved plant health. Rock mulch cannot add organic matter and so in a few years none of the benefits of organic mulches will be present.             I am guessing your trees will be fine for several years with rock mulch covering the soil surface. But what may happen in the fourth through the sixth years, as the soil becomes mineralized, is that they may begin to decline in health.  The trees may become more and more yellow, leading to leaf scorch, followed by branch dieback and insect attacks such as borers.             Borers come into play due to a decline in tree health. Decreased plant health causes a thinning of the tree canopy leading to an increased amount of sunburn damage to the limbs. Sunburn damaged areas are the ideal locations for borers damage to occur.             My concern would be how you might add organic matter to the wet soil surfaces as it decomposes. If you can do this then it will probably not be a problem.  It is best for the trees if you can put wood mulch in the wetted area under the trees. In the drier areas under the tree the wood mulch will not decompose.

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