What's happening today 2020

Made a video comparing a triple crown blackberry to a prime ark freedom.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjCLNmW2ilQ

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YIKES is right! How big was it?
We have very small black bear ‘around these parts’. They are seen more often when the corn is growing. People see them crossing roads all of the time . . . but in the almost 40 years we’ve lived here I have never seen one. And I’ve never heard of them causing any dangerous problems. Just scavenging - like your cat food.

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Yep, you have a bear! We have one again this year too, but it’s our fault for continuing to feed the birds through summer. “Wendy” has raided our seed can a few times, and she’s a BIG one this year (likely a he, long story, our neighbor named her). Watch your trees they’ll snap the branches to steal the fruit.

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Good Lord I hope not. Well, since the freeze wiped out our tree fruit, I don’t have to worry about that. But we do have bumper crop of blackberries, and they don’t seem to be bothered, other than by birds.

I’m not sure, I’ll have to read the story again. It was on my wife’s Facebook page. I don’t have a FB account, even tho she insists I get one of my own.

We’re growing corn, beans and tomatoes in large amounts, well the corn has been coming up sporadically. While the beans have been browsed on by deer, there hasn’t been much more damage. Our real farmer neighbor next to us is growing field corn, so I ought to have a chat with him.

I’m not saying the damaged cat food bin wasn’t done by a bear, but based on what I’ve seen with our other crops, I’m still not convinced. Plus, we have a large trash bin down by the road that gets filled up every week, and no raids there either. Yet.

Nice video. I’m growing both also. We’ve had a huge Triple Crown crop, but the PAF crop has been sporadic. To be fair, we have a row of TC, originally 5 plants planted in 2018, there was just one PAF plant. TC has shown to be more winter hardy here.

Anyway, our first few TC fruit were huge, about the same size as PAF. On the whole, if picked at the right time, TC tastes better, not as tart, and sweeter. I wish we could get more PAF to sample, though. I have some pics of the TC harvest on the 2020 berry harvest thread.

I’ve noticed that after I’ve tipped the PAF primocanes last month, they’re starting to set fruit buds, so we ought to get a good late summer crop.

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It was national icecream day on 19th July. We ordered an icecream maker on the 4th of July sales. We put it to use with the Triple crown blackberries

Icecream before freezing (after churning) and after


It was really good, had a nice berry flavor on top of rich vanilla

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subdood, my sister (her husband actually) went outside in the night to smoke…
and seen a bear destroy the bird feeder…
he got the shotgun…
but it misfired…
?:frowning:

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Bananas in Bellevue,WA!Okay,maybe not the fruit,but they do add a tropical look to a customer’s yard.They have two clumps,with one almost twice taller than the neighbor nearby.The owner said,that the soil mix is different,between the two.bb


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So, I think this is kind of neat. 5 years ago I had an extra grape plant (not sure what type, its a sweet green one) and decided I would plant it at the base of a guide wire for a light pole that is by my orchard so the grapes could cimb the guide wire. I also ran a wire horizontally at about 5 foot that goes from guide wire to the pole. Every year the grape gets a little higher. This year its almost 20 feet tall!!!

Here is a photo showing how tall it is and how it has climbed the other line back to the pole. Remember, this is just one plant that is at base of the guide wire.

image

Then this one shows how productive the grapes are up high! Problem is I need a ladder to pick them!

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I’m sure your power company is in love with you.

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THat is a great point, and I actually thought there was a pretty good likelihood they would cut it down. Shockingly, they did just the opposite about 4 days ago…they actually came to do some work on that very pole and they went to great lengths to work around the grapevine and they actually even installed a second guide wire because the one the grapes are on is fairly loose. If you look in the photo, you will see there are two separate wires (each inside the yellow guard). One of this is brand new and they left the other for my grapes. I was very surprised at their cooperation!

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Okay. If deer eat your pears do they not leave any pieces/parts of them lying around. My tree that was dripping with almost ripe pears. The tree has been stripped from 5-6 foot and down. 3/4 of my pears. Deer? No evidence left. Ground is too hard for footprints.

Oh no! Sounds like deer. Ate as high as they could reach, I suppose.
(Or very tall raccoons.) :astonished: But, seriously . . . that is a drag.

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@Phill_Boise_7a Great video! Very nice looking blackberry plants! Lovely well maintained orchard. Please make videos of your cute dog trying to play with the bird on the other side of the garden :grinning:

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Today I found a melon vine pulled up by the roots and all the way out of the garden, tho the varmint couldn’t seem to get the unripe melon out of its bag.

Today I pulled my potatoes - the russets were the size of fingerlings, the fingerlings the size of peas

Today I got even more confirmation that tearing out my vegetable garden is the right move.

Summer pruning done on the summer-bearing trees, whether they bore or not.

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The temperatures here don’t get real hot this time of year,but today is an exception.bb

Redmond, WA Weather

as of 2:55 pm PDT

99°

Sunny

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Damn squirrel got my nectarine.

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The heat was so bad this time. We have AC, but places up north like where my son stays don’t.There are many brush fires so I was out cleaning some of the dry leaves. Even the squirrels don’t show up until late in the afternoon.

Young trees, I only had a grand total of 2 apples from 1 tree last year. Have about 30 across 3 trees this year. Would probably have been more if not for that late spring freeze.

Only 1 remaining apple on a Wolf River tree which I couldn’t easily get the plastic zip-top sandwich bag off of to photo it. It’s pinched tight between the apple and stem and I didn’t want to force it :slight_smile:

Stayman:

Jonathan:

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