How do you rate 2022

For me a definite flop, big time! 2021?, mediocre, 2020?, excellent. Sure glad to have different sources to offset. So, what now? Well for one thing getting smarter for 2023. My pepper/tomatoes efforts, a total flop. Will try to save some of them and continue to grow them in my Greenroom. Paw paw a total mess, persimmon?, still on the mend from the Polar Vortex, except just a few that came through unscratch. My 800 gl rainwater supply almost gone, high nineties, one hundred plus not good for paw2 and anything else, except citrus.
How about yours?

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Rough year. Spring was on again off again and late, almost no fruit set on apples and pears, even Nanking cherries, and tomatoes took forever to set fruit. Spinach sized up but bolted right away.

It was good for lettuce, kale, garlic and shallots.

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Excellent so far.

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Not great. Got nice but small crop of white cherries. Saved some cots from the squirrels. No nects set. Apples look horrible. Might get some prune plums if I can net them away from the squirrels

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late wet spring here too. had some damage on my monty cherry and nelson blackberries from -40f we had last winter. dang crows discovered my honeyberries finally but instead of eating them from the ground they landed on top of the bushes breaking much of new growth. shot several saving half the crop but the damage to next year’s crop is yet to be seen. unlike 20’ and 21’ at least this summer our rain was normal. no drought so everything is growing well with little input from me. did have some raspberries die from root rot in the low part of my yard from all the rain.

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It has been average here. We had 19F in the spring which look out about 80% of my apricot crop and some of my plums. Since then it has been OK, the usual heat and rain stuff. The main problem has been deer damage in spite of all my fencing etc. Squirrels are relatively well under control, I think I may have finally found a groove after 20 years looking for it. The key has been massive numbers of traps (12), using three different kinds of traps (Kania, Squirrelinator, tube), and regular baiting with a smorgasbord bait (corn, sunflowers, walnuts, pecans, peanuts) and leaving out plenty of mast.

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Im hoping that this trend of lots of rain in the summer doesnt trend to lots of snow this winter. My theory is that the East will get the water from the West droughts.

Last year i had to water things this time of the year… i havent watered things at all this year. Lots and lots of good rain and good sunshine this year… everything has exploded with growth. My corn is about 10 feet tall… berry bushes are thriving. Good year.

Very low numbers of Japanese beetles for me this year. However i have seen some horrible pictures of devastation on social media from the North.

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My big problem was high 80’s in early May, it messes up all trees in bloom. Still haven’t got a drop of rain My atv has been carrying 80 gl a trip from the lake. Not using our own wellwater.

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Can’t be a bad year, I’m still here learning and enjoying your company…!!

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Started out spring excited to have several trees blooming for the first time. We then dropped into a long cold spell that wasn’t low enough to freeze any blooms but was cold enough to stop all pollinator activity. Most of my trees dropped fruit like crazy, I’m sure they were never pollinated. To make matters worse I tried a couple new pesticides that haven’t performed well. In the veggie garden, nothing is doing well. Nights have continued to dip into the 40’s right into July. Peppers are struggling to get to 12" and tomatoes are blooming @ only 12-16". I’m getting deer in the upper and lower gardens and a woodchuck has eaten all my cucurbits (pumpkins, squash and cukes) and now he’s starting on my beans. 2 tractors need repairs and one needs a top end rebuild. And transplanting from the nursery bed to the orchard remains delayed because of wet conditions in the spring and fall.

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Fruitnut, you got any property for sale right next to your place? Like to sneak to your place and help myself.

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@scottfsmith , TNHunter got things right, he sees a deer, the next thing it’s in his giant freezer. Talking about his setup, the family live of the land to perfection.

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You forgot mentioned your figs and citrus!

It’s been a pretty good year considering that everything was planted in 2021.

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Lost one tree, Evans cherry (again)

Probably lost a Redfield apple, seems to be on its way out.

Lapin cherry on its last leg, it has been dying forever, i was pushing it zone-wise anyways.

Figured out that plum larvae or similar was attacking my Saskatoons. Last year i lost most of the crop to what i though wad drought but it was to those (mummified husks) i lost a similar amount this year but now i know better and I’m ready for the next.

Cherry production is still meh, the promised big crop of Juliets is still not happening. The montmorency is trying but it is still a baby. The other five bushes and one tree are still small. In a few years i should get more cherries than i can shake a stick at.

Added 20 new species/varieties to my orchard (10 were hops, 4 nagoon berries). That bumps the count to 69 different things that I’m growing. I like to see my orchard as an in ground plant library.

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A year to forget for sure. Late frost killed all of the fruit buds on my figs. Only my in-ground fig is fruiting because it emerged after that frost. Deer ate the fruit off of my Pineapple quince, Italian Prune plum, and Royal Ann cherry. Deer killed a couple young grafted apple trees and stomped on a young Seaberry I waited 5 weeks for and killed it.

My new Canby raspberries and existing raspberry floricanes all died off from root rot, but most of the existing raspberries still have primocanes going strong so I got some fruit at least. My hardy kiwis also were dying back from root rot (too much peet and mulch in their mound I think) so I dug around by hand and worked in a lot of sand and they have bounced back but are far behind and then either a deer or rabbit eats half of the leaves.

I decided to plant everything in the garden after the last frost date and sue to overcast skies and mild temperatures everything had a very slow start and then suddenly we were hit with weeks of 90F+ and many of the young seedlings dried up because it was too intense and I had to go to a nursery to salvage some of my efforts back.

My two young peach trees had fruit. One had three and the other ten. High winds on a couple occasions knocked all 3 fruit out of one and 7 out of the other and then raccoons took off with the other three that were remaining. My mature peach tree gave me 250 peaches of small to medium sizes, but the deer/squirrels/raccoons/high winds claimed about 40 of them and then about 150 were infected by curcurlio bugs because every time I sprayed it rained a day or two later. I just cut them up by hand and composted all of the bad parts but still ended up with several freezer bags full and a few jars of jam.

My blackberries did awesome. I sprayed with neem at just the right time and only one bush got infected with sawfly larvae. I left that one for the birds and after their share I still ended up with several freezer bags full.

I planted several of my arctic raspberries at the feet of my blackberries last year and they hung in there. They emerged this year looking sparse because of all of the oak leaves that blew on top of them. When they emerged they went strong for a couple weeks and then the heat hit and combined with the fact I do not water my blackberries…they all dried up and died. Luckily I have others planted in the shade that does get watered, so not a completely lost cause.

My highbush cranberry just suddenly died last week. I checked the soil and I hear they don’t mind wet feet so I think maybe the pH was too high.

All of my lingonberries completely dried up. It was my fault because I planted them in full sun between my young blueberries and they just could not handle the heat.

My three northern spicebush seedlings I ordered from two different nurseries all died and only one even attempted to leaf out. I have no idea what happened. They only got morning sun and evening sun so I truly have no clue.

Two of my four young osoberry bushed suffered winter damage (bark was cracked) and died shortly after leafing out.

One of my salmonberry bushes completely dried up after going two days without watering in this heat and the other has half of its leaves fried but it is rebounding.

That is not all but enough is enough….

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At my home base–> tomatoes and peppers doing good. I was reluctant, but I went ahead and sprayed my cukes and watermelons with sevin a few times early to fight off cucumber beetles. Seems to have made all the difference. Finally have watermelon and cukes thriving. Grapes above average. Apples and plums average or a tad bit less than average. Peaches well below average, but I didn’t thin enough last year. Curculio bad as usual. Japanese Beetles horrible.

Planted 25 grapes in grow tubes on my other hillside property. An hour away, no water available yet, but they seemed to be doing good. Planted 20 fruit trees also. Was only able to hit them with deer repellant about once a month. Not enough. About 10 small bench grafts were destroyed. 5 medium sized trees were hit hard and have only a tiny bit of small green leaves left, 5 others were tall enough to send good growth above the browsing line. Finally got stuff caged last week, and finally getting some rain so hopefully the 5 mediums will pull through. If I get a well drilled I’ll go nuts next year and do it right. Happy about the grapes, though.

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jeremybyington, as they say experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want. It is still all worth it; nothing drive the lessons home like watching something fail.

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This year is not a good year for us. We had a super late snow the last week of May nearly a month after our supposed final frost date. Extreme sun fallowed most of June. July has had heat fallowed by showers and being cloudy in the afternoon every day. We are constantly spraying stuff to repel deer and rabbits but it does not stick because of the rain so we have major deer issues. We also have major insect issues. I have not seen the amount of aphids I have gotten for years if ever. It seems like every plant I have has or have gotten aphids this year.

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Here it’s been pretty disappointing, hardly any plums or peaches have pollinated, most veggies including tomatoes and squash all growing very slowly. Nights have been unusually cold so even when daytime temps are 70-80’s the cool night seem to stunt everything we grow. It has been a good spring for grafting as my success ration is vastly improved, so hopefully next year we can see a better start.
Dennis
Kent, wa

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