A big crop of greenhouse fruit

[fruitnut]

Where did you get the plastic discs you have under your grow bags?

Those are lids that come on cow supplement barrels. There used to be a lot on the ranches around here. But they now come with paper lids so our sources have dried up.

[lhreeves]

Bummer, I have a cherry and two pears in 20 gallon grow bags currently sitting on the ground and those looked perfect to get something between the bag and ground so the roots don’t try to grow through the bag into the ground below.

[btle]

These will work, but they are expensive because of the shipping cost. Check with your local stores if they have similar items that you can pick up.

https://www.zenhydro.com/black-premium-plastic-saucer-25-in-5-cs.html

Amazon.com : Gro Pro Heavy Duty Saucer with Tall Sides 25 Inch, Black : Garden & Outdoor

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[lhreeves]

Yeah that is very pricey

[Girly]

@lhreeves

Here is a picture of what I did to keep the roots out of the ground, original ideas were from @moose71 and @bleedingdirt (Restricting raspberry roots to stay in containers) Cost only a few dollars for 6+ pots.

[btle]

Those are the biggest sizes for 25 gallon plastic pots. Depends on the diameter of the grow bag it may fit in a smaller size saucer, which is cheaper. For fruit trees which can grow big, I think they are more stable when stay on the ground. These black saucers are pretty good. I have them on top of a cement slab and so far they do not crack, even when going under the summer heat wave in southern California.

[lhreeves]

They are just staying in the grow bags for a month or two until I can transport them up to my place in Michigan, then they will go in the ground. Just need something under them until then. They are 20 gallon grow bags now full of dirt so not possible to lift them up onto boards on blocks like in the picture, but I can probably get away with just putting a couple boards under them for he short term I need.

[fruitnut]

They won’t root into the ground to any significant extent in two months. If still concerned you could tilt them up and slid something underneath. Any air gap will stop roots.

[moose71]

get some pallets to put them on.

[lhreeves]

I actually have a long pallet that might work perfect if I can lift them up onto it. 20 gallons of wet dirt is heavy. I ripped the side of one of the bags trying to lift it when I was planting them. The stitched on handles were probably sturdy enough for the task, but the bag itself was not.

[moose71]

let them dry out a few extra days before you try to move them.

[lhreeves]

Definitely, but need to get mother nature to cooperate with that plan. Today is the first sunny day I’ve seen in a while.

[fruitnut]

Nice harvest today. About 9 lbs of Honey Lite. These are about 23 brix and very tasty. They will all be dried.

The Gold Dust peaches ripen at the same time. Those are 16-18 brix with pretty high acid. They are nice but I much prefer the flavor of Honey Lite. I’ll eat the GD because my experience is that fruit which tastes somewhat acidic fresh is even more acidic when dried. The drying seems to lock up the sugar.

[fruitgrower]

Those look fantastic! Our GD are still green, way too much rain this spring, most of our cherries are cracked too.

[ltilton]

That’s been my question this year with stone fruit frozen out and lots of buds gone - to wack back or not to wack back?