What size are they now?
Mine’s about half dollar sized with a small amount of blush.
My Tomcot are about that size. Some of my other varieties are bigger and some the same. I really don’t thin mine right away. They like to drop tons of them and then I go through and get rid of the obvious PC damage and touching fruit. They always seem to size up well.
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Thanks Robert. I was just noticing a lot more PC damage than I expected and a few more drops on the ground, so maybe I’ll let them go for a while and follow your approach. I already probably thinned about half, but as they sized up a little I realized there were a lot more still on than I thought.
I also thin cots late due to the curc. My Tomcot never sets a lot so it is easy. The Ilona often sets too much but this year it will also need little thinning. Montrose and Blenheim set way too much this year and will require lots of thinning.
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Got a nice 0.85 inches in last few days. Plants were getting thirsty.
I sprayed Sevin (zeta-cypermethrin) few weeks ago one night and didn’t have much PC damage until recently. Now they seem to be back with a vengeance on some specific plum trees as I’m seeing up to 5 bites on one fruit. It seems to love the Flavor Grenade and Flavor Punch Pluerry which were on the smaller or oblong shape/size. Haven’t seen PC damage on the the other trees with larger fruits: peaches, nectarines, apricots, other plums (FS, Candy Heart). Pears and Apples look good too. Fruit that are untouched are approaching (>1.25in.) size of a large cherry, or a bit larger than those bouncy balls kids buy in the $0.25 dispensers. Am I safe from PC?
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I sprayed today. I already have some PC damage but petal fall was not really complete until this weekend. It was also the first myclobutanil spray. Some of trees leaves have a spot or two of rust. I am hoping that is nipped in the bud
I sprayed surround again tonight, but should have got it on last night. There were quite a few new bites. The 3" of rain we had over the weekend washed most of the surround off and we had misty wet weather for a few days as well which kept me from spraying surround again, although last night was dry enough and would have saved a bunch of fruit.
I can see the advantages of spraying Sevin or other stronger options that don’t need a heavy coat on dry fruit to be effective.
3" ! looks like you’re getting all the rain you were missing out on last year.
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I’m already seeing brown rot on the bad ones. Not a good sign this early.
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By thinning my apples to one per eight inches of stem the instant they formed, I got them to size up so fast that I needed only one coat of Surround before I got them all bagged (370). Leaving crabs, Kittageskee and pears unbagged as insects seem to leave them alone. Famous last words.
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Which bags do you use?
I use zip lock bags that I cut tips out of bottom corners, and make a couple other cuts. I can put them on pretty fast. Important to pull the sides of the bag apart after putting on the apple.
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My pears were left alone until the apples peaches apricots and plums were covered, and then they got stormed by the PC. So I started doing the pears. They then switched to the cherries, so I also had to add them to the Surround regimen. It’s a pain having to now spray all the pome and stone fruit, but it gets the job done.
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So far pears are still clean.
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My PC are spreading the wealth all around … just about everything has a bit of damage by now. The sour cherry I didn’t spray too intensely as it is a huge tree, and I will need to spray it more as it got more than the usual near nothing damage. The sweets I hit like the apples and they are the only thing that is completely clean.
I am starting to thin out the damage now, it is looking like a normal year more or less, a little bit less on most things and a little bit more on a few.
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After taking out FG and Flavor Punch as mentioned a week ago, everything else has remained clean. Knocking on wood that my fruits are out of range of PC, but it could also be that the cold spell has impeded the PC activity. Maybe a little of both.
Do you think spreading those insect pellets before PC starts would help any? PC punished everything here. Cots and peaches oddly have the least damage though.
I think those pellets usually have some strong poisons in them. If I was going to use poison I would just spray it on the trees as that will be much more effective.
I would be careful about gauging damage on peaches, most peach bites are not visible and they attack them later so the fruit has not dropped yet. I was under-spraying my peaches for a few years as I kept forgetting how many peaches the curc got the previous year and I wasn’t seeing spots on the fruits. Apricots you can usually see the spots. I get a lot of damage on my apricots, they get hit the hardest of all. My guess is this year I will lose about half of them. The curc is basically my thinner on the cots, now it looks like only Montrose will need any thinning.
I am also seeing a bit of fireblight which is not surprising given the massive infection of last year. So far just a shoot or two here and there, maybe half a dozen strikes total … standard minor fireblight. I hope it stays that way…
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