Anyone know how I can rotate my picture? not sure why it is doing this.
I downloaded your image to my computer and then used Windows (10) utility to rotate it and then uploaded the picture here.
Was your photo sent here by a smart phone? Brady
Bear with Me fruited some Hollywood plums in WA state and said they were good. He hasn’t posted in a while.
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Yes it was, i had never had an issue until the last two times i have posted photos.
Now that’s a beautiful thing to behold. Green. Orderly. Don’t ya wish it would stay that way all summer, LOL.
Looks great Phil. As for the rotate, I’m not sure why it does that but it did that to me the other day. Since I bought a new phone last week it’s rotating some pictures. My previous phone never had a problem with this but the new phone image sometimes get rotated. Weird. It appears to only rotate pictures that are taken in landscape orientation and it posts them in portrait.
Tomcot apricot harvest is going strong now. This is this morning’s haul (I pick fruit from the tree twice a day on average).
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Impressive! Looks like your are using some sort of cable instead of wires. What kind of of anchors are you using? I have not been using anchors because of the mowing issues. Guess you use a weed-eater for that. Wish I could be that neat.
One last question. What are the posts sitting in?
Very nice, how is the flavor this year? Have you had any others to try yet? I recall you had Tilton as well as some others.
Flavor of Tomcot is consistently very good (also, one of many advantages of growing fruit in California — no rains during summer, so flavor is never diluted). While Tomcot is not my top apricot flavor-wise, it’s not far from the best ones in that department; together with its reliable productivity this makes it a favorite in its ripening window.
This year I also have already tasted Orangered, Gold Kist and Nicole.
I top-worked most of the Gold Kist tree this spring, so only four fruits remained on it. They were big and very juicy but kind of bland. A bit better than I remember from the last year (which was that tree’s first harvest) but still average at best.
The second-leaf Orangered tree fruited for the first time and produced only three small fruits, one was stolen by birds, and I and my wife got the remaining two. Not too much to taste, but I think it was quite good, juicy and rich. I need more experience with this variety but I think it has great potential.
My Nicole tree is also second-leaf, it was bought and planted with Orangered, but grew better and had a strong fruit set for such a young tree. Fruit was of good size (after thinning) and nice looking but flavor was disappointing — low on sugar and a bit bland. I hope the flavor will improve as the tree matures, if not it will be top-worked.
Harcot and Afghanistan are next to ripen (still a few weeks away), and then Tilton and Moorpark in July.
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Picked my first ripe peach today off my mystery tree I love so much. It was GREAT. On the negative side, this is the first time I’ve ever had brown rot and it is SEVERE. I’ve only sprayed for bugs except my copper/oil before bud break, so I didn’t do anything to fight it. Next year I suppose I have one more enemy to fight! Its on over half my peaches. ITs heart breaking. At least with winter kill and even most insect damage, you know early on that you’re screwed. Brown rot- at least on my trees, doesn’t show up until right when the peaches are almost ripe. Makes it hurt even more! Its even killing the limbs on some of the hardest hit peaches.
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It’s why when I looked at MSU and they told me brown rot would be a problem, I started measures against BR the first year I had trees in. Like any fungus, once there, good luck getting rid of it. Inoculate is all over. So you get it off your trees and spores from the infection just reinfect it. It can’t be avoided and I may have bought myself a few years of excellent harvest, it’s going to be harder for it to make any foothold here. I suspect it will eventually. Black Knot made it. I’m on top of it though.
I don’t want it to get any foothold the whole scaffold was removed. I’ll grow out another.
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Some trees are more predispositioned than others to disease. Brown rot has knocked the heck out of my peaches. I eliminated black rot on my grapevines completely but it took several years. Don’t even need to spray them anymore. Rust is my new problem on pears.
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It never ends… I have not seen it in 5 years here. Although it is here for sure. I use about 4 fungicides that help. I could still go bigger too, but have not yet.
I spent most of the day yesterday reading about Brown Rot and it sounds like you’re right, @Drew51, once it’s here it sounds like it can hide in a lot of places. I can get rid of mummies and dead limbs under tree, but I read that it can still hide in various injuries/wounds in limbs so small you can’t see them to cut them out. Also, some sources indicated that it likes to live in mulch and I have mulch under all my trees. In short, I guess all I can do is add it to my spray rotation. WHEW! Every single year in the 4-6 years I’ve been growing fruit, I’ve had some new problem (new to me I mean) show up for the first time. This year it is Brown Rot, Black Rot (had a little last year, a LOT this year), and DEER. It really is ALWAYS SOMETHING! I guess if fruit growing was easy everyone would do it.
@clarkinks Glad to hear you got rid of black rot. I had it last year for the first time and this year it hit me HARD. What is funny about it is that I have one grape vine about 150 yards from all my others. Its only on its 3rd year (they are 5 years old) and there isn’t a single black rot spot on vines or grapes and I didn’t spray them at all. Obviously it will migrate over there soon, though. Pear rust is one thing I haven’t had yet, but I have no doubt it will come too. BTW…one of these days I want to get you to help me learn how/when to pick and store my Bartlett pears. I have 1 giant pear tree that looks like bartlett (who knows) and it produces like CRAZY. But all the pears go from a green, rock, hard stage to a rotting stage almost over knight. If I pick them at what I think is the almost ripe stage and put them on my counter OR in a paper bag, they still seem to go from green to rotten almost overnight at some point. OH well…we can discuss it later and I’ll provide you more details and photos and maybe you can help me be able to actually use some of these pears. thanks.
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Those pears are not bartlett. Bartlett ripen on the tree and keep very good. Most pears you give the tilt test when it comes to determining when they are ripe. Some grapes such as seedless concord are more resistant to black rot. Red canadice is a black rot magnet but I still grow it.
I don’t doubt for a minute that they aren’t barlett…maybe you can help me figure out what they are later. The tree is a giant (like 50 ft or more tall!!) and produces stunning amounts of fruit every year. I’ll get some photos later and hope you can figure it out. It is one of 3 trees that were here when I bought my place, so no telling what it is. Thanks.
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Those are beautiful!!! I have netted an entire Tomcot tree to preserve just 1 darned cot! Cannot spray till friday. As of tomorrow, two more days of rain. My lawn people are out in the yard now, and I would never spray with them here. They love the orchard. I’ll take pics of what they have done! The privet and all shrubs are trimmed and pruned! Fab! 
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I had my Orangered tree netted with two fruits on it (If I netted it earlier I would have one more fruit 
). Fortunately, no need to spray apricots here.