I just walked out through my little orchard and said goodbye to my Flavor King, Dapple dandy, Spice Zee, and Lapin Cherry. Haha. Maybe they’ll be okay, maybe not. I’m just not equipped to protect them right now. I guess this is just how it’s gonna be when growing fruit in the mid Atlantic area. It’s real windy here too.
I just took a walk around to see the state of emergence of my nectarines and peaches and surprise, surprise, almost all the flowers appear to already be destroyed by the -12 treatment they got this otherwise extremely mild winter. This is usually not a very destructive low here in late Jan.
So there’s really very little left to worry about. Still have a shot at apples, pears and E. plums. They are, so far, fine.
Fruitnut,
I think research is sort of lacking in this area. From what I understand, they refrigerated portions of the trees (because I’ve read the critical temps are based on 1/2 hour at that temp (at MSU) - I think they even reduced the temps at a consistent rate for each of the critical temps.) In that case there wouldn’t be any radiant heat. I think I also remember reading they were primarily Elberta peaches.
It would seem to be there are so many variables it would be hard to account for them all in a controlled experiment, especially if doing the experiment outside where weather is so erratic, making conditions extremely hard to control or duplicate.
I’m glad the charts are science based, which is of course better than anecdotal (which I think was your point) but I just suspect all the possible variables leave a lot of room for exceptions.
Alan,
Good luck to you and all in the NE w/ the coming freeze (and you too Fruitnut). I think I lost all my apple grafts and possibly my pears this year because of multiple freeze events. Early warm weather lulled me into grafting apples and pears early.
I’m afraid a lot of my luck ran out before this particular freeze and it looks like I found out how a mere -12F can wipe out my peach and nect crop if it occurs during an otherwise mild winter. Two really great years in a row- my luck was due to change.
Hopefully the better locations of the orchards of most of my customers will allow decent crops even after the winter and this apparently challenging spring. I’ll be picking some peaches in those orchards if things go reasonably well.
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I came across this while reading about the 1996 freeze in the SE.
http://horttech.ashspublications.org/content/8/3/381.full.pdf
Contender seemed like a very good peach for fighting off early spring freezes…at least in that report.
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How did you determine this?
I already had my suspicions because my memory tells me that the flowers grow with the emerging leaves but I finally looked closer today (been crazy busy) and the flower buds appear shrunken and simply crumble from a little pressure- dry and lifeless. There are not more than a dozen live looking flower buds in any given tree.
Most of the J. plums are partially or in full bloom so the peach flowers should not only be swollen but starting to show pink.
I will truly savor them if I get an E. plum harvest this year. With the J. plums so far along I’m not expecting anything from them. J. plums, pears and apples are loaded with flower buds.
I’ll check my fruit buds again tomorrow. The peaches and nectarines looked okay the last time I looked at them. I also saw a scary polar plunge in February (chart here). It would be strange if my peach fruit buds are in better condition. Early J plums are showing white on swollen buds, so they might be toast next week.
What about vegetative buds that are opening? Can they take 10F? New plants and grafts from last year are trying to push leaves already.
It appears my peach and nectarine flower buds were all killed during a few subzero nights around midFeb, too.
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I figure the shoots will survive or have no problem regrowing if they don’t. This is new territory, though. I’ve never seen quite such low temps when trees were this far along as those predicted. Still, apple trees survive having all their leaves eaten by tent caterpillars and this happens after a lot more energy investment.
Welcome to the WASF club- first letters are for “we are so”. Sorry you had to join but it is the uncertainty that makes the reward so sweet (or so I tell myself).
We are going to have 20 and 21 F on this Mon and Tues. None of ny cherries, J. Plum, E.plum, pears or apples are in bloom but Shiro, Korean Giant and Harrow Sweet Could bloom by late next week.
Then, I read about potential bad news on another thread, Warm said next weekend could be as bad. If next weekend will be in the 20’s, too, more damage would be likely.
I am only a small backyard gardener, getting fewer or no crop is not detrimental to me ( Well, emotional yes 
). I feel really bad for those making a living from their orchards like Olpea.
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I have a a number of peach buds, that if they make it through this next snap just might squeeze through. All of my buds are still shut tight with just a hint of pink showing. Many buds have already fallen off. Not one flower yet. I have my fingers crossed as peaches are one of my favorite fruits. The buds at the top of the branches are far better than the buds closer to the ground. A very difficult time, since we were all looking forward to a nice spring. They lied!
Being by the beach you should rarely lose crops to spring or winter freeze. I don’t think it’s happened here since I started growing fruit in the east.
Alan- I really don’t want to join your club!
I’ll have to look at my peaches more closely. I went around the yard today looking at the apricots and J plums.
The current forecast is 29, 21, and 23. Then, next weekend, there is 25 and 26. I put up a couple posts today (to support tarps above a few key trees), but I’m not sure it will be worth it, if I have to keep taking it on and off so many times. I’ll keep an eye on things Monday afternoon, as I think most of the trees should be able to take 29.
The comments about the temperature sensors reminded me that I needed to change the batteries in my remote sensor system. While changing the batteries is a pain, it is pretty cool that it will record lows and highs, as well as let me check out the temps from inside. I’ll place them at various points in the yard to get a sense of the impact.
Note- while the temps are pretty close, the times are off. This is because I put new batteries in close to noon and didn’t reset the time on any of them. So, they’ve been sitting on the counter for ~9 hours, which probably contributed to their temps matching so well.
Bob,
Hope you won’t get as cold as where I am on Mon and Tues. peach buds were already gone. I am curious what will happen to almost-bloom Shiro when it hit 20 F.
Well it’s a little difficult to check the peach buds this morning. Beautiful at first light with a big flaked, still air snow smothering everything- then the wind whipped up reducing it to a coating on all but the conifers.
It is pretty easy to tell if your peach fruit buds are dead, though. If your J. plums are so far along the peach buds should be fat and obviously growing- at least some showing some pink.
I will be curious what you find as most of my customers are in your more forgiving area. Most spots in Westchester have only lost their a peach crop once in all the years I’ve been working there, and from your temp. reports you should be like them.
That year we got to -22 twice here. This year -12 may have done similar damage.
I just lost my confidence in weather forecasts. The overnight low was suppose to be 26ºF. It was 17ºF at my location. I hope Tuesday night won’t be worse than projected.
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I was planning to notch above strategic apple tree buds today, wonder if I should delay doing it until after the 32 degrees forecast in a few days? Any ideas if notching would invite freeze damage?
My nanking cherry flowers are mostly all open, forecast is 18F Tuesday night. Ugh. I was hoping I’d finally get to taste one this year.