Interested in knowing what fruit trees birds like to eat from. Also what fruit trees are ripening at this time of year?
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Birds live to destroy anything that brings you joy. This time of year most stone fruits (besides cherries which are probably all done by now; I’m not really a cherry person) and the earlier apples and pears are all ripe/starting to ripen.
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How big are your trees?
Most of them went in last year, so the tops of the tallest ones are ~9.’ I’m trying to keep them to ground reachable height.
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I stopped growing cherries because the birds got the vast majority of them or pecked the ones they did not eat. I have some issues with bird peck on peaches. Some of my apples , the really red ones, get some bird peck as well.
The fruit trees ripening at my place right now are Redhaven peach, Monark apple and soon the Contender peach. All three fruits are really red this year.
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Very interesting netting system. Thanks for the link. Looks like it takes a while to actually set it up. Of course if you want to save your fruit it could be worth it.
Nectarines, peaches, plums and apricots. Anything that develops any shade of color other than green. They are eating Flavor Grenade that’s 2 months away from harvest, and are very pale yellow!
Everything. In order of their priority – mulberries, blueberries, caneberries, goumi, figs, peaches. I can shoot them with a pellet gun, but there are dozens. Or I can net them. So far I have nets only on the blueberries and goumi but more are coming eventually.
I don’t have much bird damage on apples, pears, and persimmons…
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That’s not bad and like you mentioned once you get the hang of it then it probably isn’t too bad to do. Better than losing all your fruit right when it is getting ripe. Thanks for the update.
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I originally planted mulberries as a ‘trap crop’, to divert bird from the cherries we planted in the first wave of orchard development. But… everyone in the family prefers mulberries over cherries, so when the cherries died off, we did not replace them.
Mulberries finished way early this year, and the birds have taken every blueberry as soon as it began to show any color. With 30+ mature bushes, in the past, they could eat all they wanted and we could still pick 2-5 gallons every couple of days for weeks at at time… but not this year.
They’re also picking off every elderberry as soon as it goes from green to purple.
I’ve threatened to ban my wife from feeding the birds, but it seems that those stealing the berries - mockingbirds, brown thrashers, robins - are not the ones frequenting the sunflower seed feeders.
Got a cat in the backyard this year. The Bluejay don’t feed on insects anymore in the back, nor they hang out there. However, it couldn’t resist the nectarine and it was in short supply. In addition, I have a ton of loquats that I couldn’t finish, but the birds was late to show up and most of it dropped.
Birds are pecking on all my ripe peach trees.
They are about 12-15 ’ tall. Even the fruit at lower levels are getting bird pecks. They can have some and leave me the majority of the fruit. The birds peck them and then the wasps and bees enjoy those same fruits. So when I pick the peaches I just leave the pecked ones alone and leave them up on the tree rather than on the ground and not trying to sting me.
I may just end up getting one. I have been wondering how to fix this problem with birds and raccoons. That net may solve those problems.Thanks for the suggestion.
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@JosephH, I don’t see why you need to use an expensive setup like that umbrella frame for netting a tree. I just toss a big net over my cherry tree, and it works great. Having the net touching the top of the tree results in a few losses of cherries growing right at the top, but that’s minimal. You can’t leave the net on for too long, because new branches will eventually grow right through it, but the net is only needed while the fruit is ripening. I’ve also used floating row cover material ove a big cherry tree, and it works even better because nothing can grow through it and the birds can’t get at the fruit just under the cover.
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Yea I have problems with raccoons, rats, and squirrels too. But the birds do the MOST damage because they come in packs and just wipe out a few days of fruits and mess everything up with pecking.
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My tree is currently about 10 ft tall and 14 ft wide, but it was at least 15 ft tall before I started reducing its height a few years ago. My floating row cover was large enough for the 15 ft height. I agree that anything over 15 ft tall would be hard to cover without some assistance. I managed to cover the 15 ft height by rolling the cover into shape that unrolls easily from the center of the tree and then climbing up to the center of the tree to apply it.
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True, they come in groups and can do a lot of damage in a short time. You scare them away and they come right back. Endless. You can only stay out there so long.
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Birds have eaten almost every last fruit off every one of my 25-30 trees. As stated here by many, a bird - usually a woodpecker or a jay - drill an exploratory hole on the ripe side of a half-done fruit. Then the wasps and flies come and it’s over. I have tried bagging, and they simply attack the bag (even the Clemson paper ones). I have tried selective netting, but there’s just no way I can get a net cleanly over a semi-dwarf tree, or even part of one. Even my dwarf trees are almost impossible to net. Even when I do, the birds just land somewhere and peck through the netting.
I have been growing fruit trees since 2011, been on this forum (mostly lurking) for years, sprayed according to Scott’s schedule, put hundreds of hours of labor into it, and with all my trees this year - with hundreds of fruit - I have probably gotten to eat two peaches and three plums. Now I can see they’re going after the apples, and there’s no way they’ll make it to October.
It never used to be this bad. I could have my Bubblegum plum with 40 fruits on it, and make jam, etc… now, nothing. Not sure how or if to proceed. Pretty demoralized.
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Same problem here this year. Even have to cover my tomato plants. Putting single fruit in small bags hasn’t helped much. Larger bags, 1ft, 2ft and 3ft long that can cover a branch or part of a branch works best. I even have some 3x5 ft bags.