Bob Purvis shipped my scions. They should arrive tomorrow. For the peach and apricot, is this forecast OK, or should I stick them in the fridge to wait for a longer warm spell?
The rootstock trees have begun to break dormancy and have some bud swell.
Pretty exciting Bryan. Hope he ships mine soon as well! Your temps look pretty good to me (but I am an amateur). Anything beginning to leaf out?
Apples should be fine - but peach (and apricot as well) are picky about temps during callousing.
Peaches have tight pink buds.
Seems like that 60 to 70 degree range is pretty good?
If you just have bud swell its too early. Wait til you have at least 1/2" of leaf showing and then start looking for a window of either sunny weather with highs in the 60s-70s or cloudy weather with highs in 70s-80s. Usually the first such window to show up is the best one, so watch carefully.
Thursday is bad though - work 9:30-7. Wednesday pm is better for me. Will the freezing actually hurt them?
I think you are definitely too early. You want warmer temps and leaves should be “the size of a squirrel’s ear” from everything I read. Of course, I’ve been doing peach grafts for years and have terrible success rates-they are the hardest for me. Good luck.
Will the scions keep in the fridge for a couple weeks?
Absolutely. I’ve had some since January in my fridge. Of course yours will warm up during transit but people here receive and re-refrigerate them all the time. should be fine.
Not sure how Bob sends them out but you may want to re-wrap in damp newspaper and put in plastic bags if they aren’t already packaged in a similar way.
Looks like steady 60s most of next week.
At this point, I’m not sure when the window will be. I’m concerned it will go from cloudy and a little too cool, to immediately too hot with nothing in between.
I’d do some next Thursday.
My peaches are not at pink yet so I’m not looking at the temps. I will start on pears and apples this weekend.
We are having a cold spell here, I think it will be next week before I do pears , then apples, then a plum then peaches
I did some mulberry, plums, apricot cleft grafts last week. The temperarture goes from 70s to 44 today. I will graft again next Tuesday.
Tony
Scions keep well bg, and unless you anticipate jumping directly into 80s/90s it is generally easier to graft too early than too late, particularly w peaches
So I’m better waiting a bit than not?
