I’ve lost 5 trees in a year from wind, black knot and a buck rubbing. That clued me into the fact that you are never done with planting trees in an orchard. Sadly, I got rid of all my deer protection, T-posts, fencing, trunk guards the previous year and all and had to buy it all back to plant the replacements.
3 Likes
Sorry to hear about your loss. I’m growing 16 trees (saplings excluded) on maybe a 1/4 acre of my 3/4 plot. Last year I killed one of my three peaches and my oldest apple is seemly on its way out. I’m holding out hope that severe pruning and top work may keep it from being an absolute loss but it seems like I’m just putting off the inevitable there. Losses are to be expected but when your numbers are so low a single loss hits pretty hard.
Now that I have varieties grafted into my trees it only heightens the pressure. My one tree is floating 9 varieties. Only 3 of which I have backups for. For both of our sakes I hope losses are very few and very far between. Good luck!
Out of curiosity, what rootstock were your wind losses on? Was it due to fruit load? I’m trying out G890 and G935. I’m hoping the combo of the Black Oxford on G890 will give me a well anchored, highly disease resistant, free standing tree to float other varieties on in 5 or so years. I’m a fan of Black Oxford itself so that helps.
1 Like
Sorry, don’t know the rootstock. Bought at a commercial nursery.
Apricot , Asian Pear and white peach. Little or no fruit on them.
Apricot blew over and uprooted in the ground. Asian pear snapped off about 2 -3 feet above the ground. White peach tree twisted like a corkscrew and had a long crack in the trunk maybe 3 feet long. It was still standing.
1 Like
That sounds like a bunch of bad luck at once. Thankfully my trees are mostly shielded from the prevailing winds. I still have concerns about what will happen if i let the fruit load get to heavy because of my sandy soil and the lean on my one tree. Deer were a big issue for me when they were younger so the form a few of them have is less than balanced.
1 Like
I lost 8 of 9 muscadines, several figs, apples, plums, blueberries and mulberries…probably 30+ fruit trees last year. 20+ mature oaks.
Late freeze last year plus drought this year was rough on them.
1 Like
I’ve lost hundreds and hundreds of various evergreen seedlings to drought numerous times.
Last year I lost 10 of 10 wild apple plugs from the U of ID to drought.
I’ve lost numerous grafts on a variety of rootstocks over the years to drought.
It sucks, but it is what it is
1 Like
Ive been losing in the neighborhood of 8-10 trees each year since i started 4 years ago. I feel nothing
1 Like
That is until i go home tonight and find my favorite pear tree girdled at the base.