Puttering. Noting harvest times on labels. Covered bed didn't work. 1.31.14

Tree Labels Showing Harvest Times.

Plastic Raised Bed Cover Didn't Work.

Each year we lose some apples and pears because I don't know when they are ripe.  Some ripen August, some September, some October.

I don't know why this didn't occur to me before.

I made embossed labels showing the expected ripening time for each variety.  It took some time to look them up.  But now I have that info on the blog, where I can find it, and on the trees, where can also find it.

These labels don't last forever.  They corrode.  But they last a lot longer than Sharpie on plastic.

The raised bed cover collected water and sagged inward, to the ground.  The hoops bent due to the water weight.  I removed the cover, and cut a new one from water-permeable row cover.  The hoops are almost back to their original shape.

I might try again on the narrower bed.  Steeper sides.  Might need better ribs to prevent sagging.

Apple Tree Variety Spreadsheet. 1.30.14

I put together this spreadsheet for my apple varieties.  It takes time to find info about pollen compatibility, disease resistance, heritage.   Sources are mainly raintreenursery.com (RT) and orangepippin.com (OP).  Not the best spreadsheet but the program is free via google (checkmate Microsoft!)

Apple Tree Varieties
Variety	Source	Approx age	Bearing?	Bloom time (RT)	Ripe? (RT)	Potential Pollenizers	Year Introduced	Disease Resistance (OP)	Notes
Liberty	Raintree	10 years	yes	early-mid	Early Oct	sterile triploid	1978	good
Honeycrisp	Raintree	4 years	yes/no	mid-late	Early Oct		1960s	mixed
Jonagold	Raintree	6 years	yes	mid	Mid Oct	sterile triploid	1943	poor
North Pole	Local	12 years	yes	mid	Mid Sept			?	Columnar
Scarlet Sentinel	Local	2 years	no	early - mid	Late Sept		1986	yes (raintree)	Columnar.
Golden Sentinel	Local	2 years	yes	mid	Early Oct		1986	yes (forestfarm)	Columnar.
Esopus Spitzenberg	Grafting class	1 year	no	mid	Late Oct		early 1800s	poor	I grafted 3/2013
Sutton Beauty	Grafting class	1 year	no	?	?			?	I grafted 3/2013
Pristine	Raintree 3-way	0 year	n/a	early-mid	August		1994	mixed	multigraft
Rubinette	Raintree 3-way	0 year	n/a	mid	Early Oct		1964	partial	highly rated
Queen Cox	Raintree 3-way	0 year	n/a	mid-late	Early Sept		1975	partial	multigraft
Jonared	Starks	0 year	n/a	(mid)	Late		1934	poor	Jonathan sport.
Prairie Fire Crab	Home Depot	0 year	n/a	?	n/a	n/a		good	No edible fruit.
Karmijn de Sonnaville	Raintree	3 year	1 apple 2013	mid	Mid Oct	sterile triploid	1949	poor	cox pippin X jonathan

Golden Sentinel is a cross between Wijcik spur MacIntosh and Golden Delicious. 1986. Agriculture; Agri-Food Canada, in Summerland, British Columbia

Scarlet Sentinel is a cross between  Wijcik spur MacIntosh and Golden Delicious. 1986. Agriculture; Agri-Food Canada, in Summerland, British Columbia

Honeycrisp patent is expired.   Honeycrisp was developed at the University of Minnesota, in 1974.  Cross of Macoun x Honeygold.

Jonagold was developed in  1953 as a cross between Jonathan and Golden Delicious.

Pristine was developed in 1975 at Purdue, as part of Purdue / Rutgers / Illinois consortium.  Pristine has in its ancestry Rome Beauty, Golden Delicious, MacIntosh, Starking Delicious, Malus floribunda, and others.

I'm still looking for info about the others.

Fruit Tree Shipment. Raintree Nursery. Apples, Jujube, Peach. 1.30.14

 The order from Raintree Nursery came today.  I've ordered from them many times.  As always, very well packaged.  The packing is shredded used paper, so environmentally friendly.  Compostable.  Based on this and other experiences, Raintree is AAA in my book.

The trees are very nice size.  I'm very impressed.  A little taller than the box, so bent over a little.  Not injured, straighten up nicely out of the box.

The miltigraft apple is Rubinette, Queen Cox, and Pristine.  Each branch is labeled.  All are listed as disease resistant.  In this climate, disease resistant is important.

When I get them to Battleground, I'll plant them and addend this post.

The Jujube looks many-times larger than the ones I bough 18 months ago at One Green World.  Those barely grew last year, so are still only about a foot.  This will need a pollenizer, but it's a start.

Now anxious to get out and plant.  Later today.  Good day for planting, overcast, cool, not pouring rain.  Yet.

The peach is Q-1-8.  Again, bought for reported disease resistance.  So frustrating to lose peaches to leaf curl.

Packaged Fruit Trees.

I take photos of the roots and newly planted trees, so there is reference I can look back too.  It helps me remember what I've done.

Q-1-8 is listed as peach-leaf-curl resistant, tested at the Washington State testing station at Mount Vernon "A sweet and flavorful semi-freestone, white fleshed peach. Great for fresh eating. Ripens early August. Showy blossoms. Self fertile".  Most peaches are self fertile.  Not that they would say one is not sweet or flavorful  :-)

Of the Apples, all 3 sound interesting.

Apple Roots

3-way Multigraft Apple

Q-1-8 Peach Roots

Q-1-8 Peach

Progress Report. Fig Cuttings. Origins of Fig Varieties. 1.29.14

Carini fig cuttings showing roots.

 One Dominick fig cutting wilted.  It is in plastic bag.  There is a vulnerable stage for wilting, leaves about 1 inch diameter.  I don't know why that is.  A humidity bag can sometimes serve as a small intensive care unit and bring it back to health.

Two Dominicks are growing fast.  The 4th is slowly making progress.

One Carini cutting has sufficient roots to go into seed-starting medium in a juice can.  The cutting with leaves does not have enough roots so stays in paper towel.

Sicilian White fig cutting showing roots.

The 'rescue' Carini is growing fast.  Surprised me.

One Sicilian White has roots, a small leaf shoot, and an bee-bee sized fig.  I removed the fig.  Draws energy the cutting can't produce without good roots and big leaves.  This one is now in seed-starting medium in a juice can.

The others are barely showing root callous.  The are back into paper towel/plastic bag.  I'm glad I cut off the ragged ends.  I think that debridement stopped mold / prevented further mold growth.  They look clean and healthy.

MacOol might  not make it.  Neither is promising.

Hardy Chicago and Lattarula have root callous.  There seem to be several plateaus.
1 - Incubation before initial root callous forms.
2 - Callous sits there for a while, then roots form.  Then they usually grow quickly.
3 - After planting the rooted cutting into seed starting medium, there is a pause or very slow growth of the first leaves.  They putter along until about one inch diameter.
4 - After the first leaves reach that threshold, they subsequent leaves usually grow quickly.  At that point, the cutting is out of the neonatal care unit and able to do well as a little plant, drawing nutrition from its own leaves and roots.

It's just coincidence there are several in my orchard that originate from Sicily.   Must be a bit of a tribute to the Sicilian immigrants who nurtured them for generations.  If Sicilian White grows, that adds to Hardy Chicago, Sal's, and Carini as originating from Sicilian immigrant families. 

Second largest group, if the survive, is Louisiana figs.  Smith (possibly Croatian), hybrid offspring of Celeste, Champagne and TIger.

French named varieties, White Marseilles (Lattarula), Petite negri (Petite aubique).

American hybrids, Champaigne, TIger, Desert King (King).

Old, hundreds of years old, American varieties, White Marseilles (Grown by Thomas Jefferson, also called Lemon, Lattarula, and other names), Brunswick (also called Magnolia, Dalmation, Kennedy, and other names).

I don't know the origin of Atreano, assuming it survives.

Dominick is Italian.  I don't know if it is Sicilian or from the mainland.

Some of the origin information comes from Ray Given's old website from Georgia, now maintained on the Figs4fun database.  Ethnic (Italian and Greek, mainly), Dark Figs,  Light Figs.

Also from Ira Condit's vast classic monograph,  which while historic contains substantial information about individual varieties - hundreds? -  and which ones have multiple names.

Sauerkraut. 1.29.14

I need to do some fine tuning but so far looking good.

This time they are topped with a water-filled plastic bag, to keep the shredded cabbage under the fluid level.  The lids are loose to allow for gas escape.

Might still be too salty.  Next time cut back by 1/3.

Using a mandolin made for much finer kraut (green).  But the risk of sliced knuckles is very very high.  Try food processor or get a better mandolin.  This one has a handle to hold the vegetable to be sliced, but kraut is too floppy.  It would work better with a tomato. 

Home fermentation must count as a type of gardening.  I am growing beneficial bacteria.