Yes that’s what i used
@scottfsmith or anyone: Does Surround deter Oriental Fruit Moth and Codling Moth (in addition to PC)? If one month of Surround gets me past PC, OFM and CM then maybe I can skip bagging at nickel size? Would save a ton of work.
That wouldn’t address stinkbugs- do they usually threaten a small % of crop or can they ruin a majority of crop? I don’t know much about them, not sure I’ve seen them in my orchard.
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Surround does slow them down, but it will not solve the problem. Also they have multiple generations so even if you take care of nearly all of the first generation if you don’t do anything you will have a mess by 4th generation.
This year I bought a bunch of the new low-impact chemicals to try out (Madex, Grandevo, and Venerate), we will see how they work. I had to buy big quantity, PM me if you want to buy a share.
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That settles it, thanks. Will bag again at nickel size and wait to hear how your new sprays do. Trying to stay organic but each year bagging gets more tedious and extensive as trees grow. Hoping Surround cuts down on last year’s 80% apple drop from PC.
Somehow going to squeeze in Surround between rains but looks futile over next week.
Another tactic I’ve read about: bag twice- first bag whole clusters before PC start then once nickel size go thru again and bag just one apple. What fun.
I wanted to make a note about the low impact spray schedule and ask a question.
First the note… This year I did four sprays to my peaches and plums. The first spray (5/4/20) was surround, spinosad, Serenade, sulfur, the second spray (5/12/20 was surround, spinosad, oil and seranade. Third spray (5/24/20) was surround, BT, spinosad, and sulfur. Forth spray (6/6/20) was surround, BT, spinosad, sulfur and seranade. I started picking the plums around July 6th, 2020 and started picking the peaches 7/21/20. Today I picked the last peach and I’m not sure when I stop with the plums. I had NO brown rot on any peach or plum. I had, as far as I can tell, no plum curculio damage after thinning the few plums that were obviously damaged (ripened and fell from tree weeks before other plums were ripe). This regime from Scott gave me an estimated 750 organic plums and 125 organic peaches. The peaches did have some Oriental Fruit Moth damage, but if you cut around the holes on the outside of the peaches, they were still fine to eat. It should be noted this was a very dry year which may help explain why there was no brown rot at all after having it moderately last year.
Question…
Moving forward, I still have Elberta peaches and Victoria peaches on the trees. Those along with the apples received the same spray program on the same dates, with the exception of adding Immunox with the first two sprays to control CAR. Do I still need to be concerned with the brown rot on the peaches or would I have wiped that out with the first four sprays? Same for the apples, do I still need to spray fungicide for the summer rots, which I had last year, or would those spores have been killed already? I don’t see too much insect damage at this point and the apples look the best they ever have after not getting CAR.
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Glad to hear it is working for you so far!
Brown rot often shows up at ripening so I would keep my eyes out for it. Especially because you are not using any synthetics it can really come out if we get a lot of rain. So, I would definitely keep spraying for it.
Apple rots usually show up later, I often think I am clear and neglect to spray and get some rot. Which reminds me, I should spray my apples again soon. I have only done one spray since mid-June. They only need one more spray; I will also hit the later peaches and pears at the same time.
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@scottfsmith
First, let me say thank you for this really through spray schedule.
I’m a new backyard fruit gardener and I’m putting together the sprays for this schedule. Unfortunately serenade has been discontinued and I’m having difficulty finding it.
Is there a substitute that you would recommend for serenade? I’d love to find something that is organic and affordable from a backyard gardener perspective.
I recently discovered serenade was recently discontinued. Used it last year and was happy with it. Doing research on Seven Springs webpage, they recommend the product Cease. I went to purchase it last night but they were sold out. I googled it and found it for sale elsewhere. I can’t vouch for it because I never used it but I can vouch for the low impact spray schedule.
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I might characterize this in the future as ‘Low Impact Spray Schedule in the Eastern US’ or some other caveat where the pest and disease pressure seems much higher.
I found this while searching for something along the lines of ‘minimal spray schedule’ and now feel much better about my existing practice in Utah, where fruit seems easy by comparison…It’s not all perfect and blemish free, but for home use, it works.
Everything gets horticultural oil once in the spring, otherwise…
Plums - nothing
Cherries are spinosad once a week for 3-4 weeks for worms in June while they ripen.
Peaches are Spinosad for peach tree borer during season and earwigs at the end of the season, and pyrethrin for Greater peach tree borer on the lower trunk once a month.
Nectarines - maybe Spinosad for earwigs during ripening
Apricots - I’ve given up because of late spring freezes.
Apples - a perfect apple is a rare thing with codling moth without a serious commitment (though you can alway just cut the bad part out), otherwise fire blight and powdery mildew.
Blackberries - no problems or treatments
Pears - codling moth and fire blight.
If others have suggestions, I’m open to them. Maybe I’m just lucky or am dodging bullets I don’t know about…I’ve been growing for 11 years now at our house and am still harvesting from the original trees I planted for the most part.
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Yes this does not apply all that much for you. I give a big, bolded caveat to that effect right at the top.
Basically anyone in the US that is not in the northern or western tier needs to follow something like this so it is not easy to add a geographical qualifier to the title without making the title take several lines.
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Scott,
Could you please let us know how Madex, Grandevo and Venerate work out for you?
Thanks.
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For stonefruit I can make that a month usually and two weeks reliably for everything besides cherries. However with all your multigrafts and range of varieties, I can see why you would settle on a week.
Nectarines are the only “peach” that has rotted much in the last 3 seasons after receiving one timely summer fungicide spray. Just one- and those have all been reasonably wet seasons, just not very hot. I have harvested fine early ripening nects with the single summer spray. Understand that I didn’t focus on timing for every variety and it is possible that even later ripening nects could have been protected, with a perfectly timed single fung. spray, especially when un-cracked.
I do include fungicide in any spring sprays I do, which may reduce the inoculum in the summer.
Last week when we had several days in a row with temperatures in the sixties (F), I discovered I had no dormant oil left over from last year. We only go into town once a week to do shopping, egg delivery, and other errands, and yesterday I bought some, but only after turning back part of the way home. So today was going to be the day. Forecast yesterday was for today being mostly to partly cloudy and a high of 45°F. Today is actually rainy with a high so far of 37°F. Tomorrow is supposed to be breezy and cold, but for sure I can get back on the spray schedule Saturday.
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Apologies if reviving old threads is not cool here. I’m sure these are very newb questions as well.
I’m just learning about spraying for disease control and prevention - and still confused about timing. Is “bud swell” referring to vegetative bud swell or flower bud swell? Flower bud swell is happening well before that right? So is it okay to spray once flower buds are swollen and getting ready to open or is it too late?
I am looking to spray copper octanoate on my apricots, peaches, apples. On peaches for prevention, on apples hoping to help with a leaf rust that’s been a problem, and on apricots hoping it will help with bacterial canker (I’m aware it’s a fungicide but I read that somewhere…). I’ve heard peach borers are a problem here - so am I right in thinking to spray dormant mineral oil after the copper? I may try painting the lower tree with neem oil as I’ve been told that’s effective here.
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My simple rule is spray before the flowers open. Easy to remember and it gets the dormant spray in about as late as you can which is better.
For borers I found only the neem worked… that and digging them out by hand.
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Thanks Scott! I’ll get on it right now then. And for the neem do you concentrate it on the trunk mainly? Spray or paint on?
I just paint on the lower 4" or so, pure neem no dilution.
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I have gotten excited about Regalia spray after reading this post and more on it, and I got a quart to try out. I’m curious if you use full PPE for spraying this. I generally follow the labels, and I use goggles, respirator, and gloves for copper spray - so probably will for this too. I was thinking it’s probably less noxious than copper due to the nature of the product, but not knowing the other ingredients who knows.
I work with Japanese knotweed root (not the same plant in Regalia but closely related) in my work as a Chinese Medicine herbalist and I was thinking of trying to make my own extract, but I have no idea what concentration, extraction method, or even which plant part they are using so I decided to try Regalia first. But I may have to do an experiment in the future. I’m sure that making a pure root extract would be benign enough to spray without PPE, but maybe not strong enough to do the job.
I don’t think this stuff is very toxic. The label only suggests to use full body covering (long-sleeve shirt and pants, eyewear, etc). That is all I ever do.
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Scott, have you found there to be any neem dilution that’s acceptable for paining on apple trees? Or best avoided altogether? I finally got my trees latex painted (yay!) but in the past few years I allowed some sunburn to occur and some of my apples have suffered some borer damage.