Honeybee swarm. 4.25.15

Honeybee swarm.  4.25.15

 Ning got excited when the honeybees were swarming.  Neither of us had ever seen that phenomenon before.

The swarm settled in a horsechestnut tree.  I don't know how to entice them into hives.  I sat a Warre hive and a top bar hive near the tree to see if they would be interested.  I added some crushed lemon balm leaves.  I read they are attracted to lemon grass, but I don't have any around.  A also sat a small dish of sugar water in the hive and another one near the hive.

As of this post, a few have buzzed around the hive entrance, but none have ventured inside.

Thinning and Zipper Bagging Fruits. 4.25.15

Aubique Petite fig with zipper bags.  4.25.15

Apple cluster before thinning / bagging.  4.25.15

 Today I started bagging fruits, apples and some pears and figs.  The apples are the most important. In my yard, I lose most apples to coddling moth.  Bagging early should prevent that.  Some pears are lost, but not as bad.  Figs do well.  With figs, this is an experiment to see if the bags will deter birds or hasten ripening.  Protecting them in fall would be more important than now, due to shorter rainy fall days that slow ripening, reduce flavor, and encourage mold.

Prior posts about bagging fruits.  Summary -  Easy.  Greatly reduces disease and insect damage.  May be beneficial for some bird damage.  May hasten ripening.  Very few negatives, some report mold on peaches but not so much for other fruits.

I thinned apple clusters to one fruit per cluster, and removed all flowers within 6 inches.  That is pretty severe, but most years my apples are smaller than I would like.  Thinning can help them ripen faster, grow larger, and maybe more flavor. 

This was not much trouble at all.  Puttering meditation.  Puttering medication.  Kind of disappointed when ran out of bags.

Most articles recommend bagging when fruit is dime size.  These are smaller.  I don't think that's a negative.  If they all rot and fall off, I'll know what I did wrong.

Apple singlet after bagging.  4.25.15

Zipper bagged apple bush.  4.25.15

Grafting Progress Report. 4.25.15

Ember whip/tongue @ 6 weeks.   4.25.15

Columnar apple multigraft.  8 weeks.  4.25.15

Sketch for columnar apple multigraft.

Redfield apple whip/tongue.  6 weeks.  4.25.15

 This is my little tree nursery as of today.  It's been chilly and raining, so growth is slower.  I expect it to take of with warmer sunny days next week.

Ember on Hollywood - nice growth.

2nd multigraft on columnar apple - nice growth.  The sketch shows the general idea.  These are columnar, so I am grafting one on top of the other.  Reason is for novelty and pollination.  In-ground is on old rootstock sucker that persisted from a Yellow Delicious semidwarf that I cut down 2 years ago for never bearing.  In-container is from the same, moved into container last winter, very few roots.  Doing OK and I assume rooting well, in container.

Redfield from Fedco at 6 weeks.  The rootstock seemed to be doing poorly, with result that the graft was doing poorly, but now looking better.

Deck wall tree nursery.  Some are cuttings or seedlings in 3rd or 4th year, I forget.  I moved them back into containers for TLC.  I get better young tree growth in containers with extra warmth, nutrients, and attention on the deck.

Deck Tree nursery.  4.25.15

Columnar apple multigraft, container.  4.25.15

This is a terminal whip/tongue yellow columnar apple graft,  onto potted columnar red apple graft.  The bare-rooted specimen is how it looked Nov 2014 when I removed it from the tree roots that had produced the sucker that I grafted it on to.  Apples can regenerate roots from minimal source, quite well.  I hoped that as long as there were root primordia, this would grow.  I don't think the top would be doing so well if it has not generated adequate roots by now, much more than it had in November.  This one is also meant to be like the sketch. 

Bare rooted columnar apple graft Nov 2014

Starting Seeds. 4.22.15

 I've been starting seeds for s few weeks.  Currently using 6-packs in a plastic tray with clear cover.  For germination, they are on a seed starting warming mat.  Once they germinate, I move them under the CFL grow-light system that I made in March 2014.  I have the seedlings as close to the lights as I can place them.  The two boxes of larger seedlings were just under the lights, the others are next to get the CFL light spa treatment.  The larger seedlings will go into the sunroom to grow them a bit larger before placing outside.  The sunroom is acting now as a greenhouse.

Seedlings already in the sunroom:  tomatoes, morning glories, nasturtiums, marigolds.

Seedlings heading to the sun room:  Four o'clocks, nasturtiums, many varieties of peppers.

Seedlings under the CFL system:  milkweed, joe pye weed, morning glories, French marigolds, swiss chard.  The swiss chard germinated in 2 days.

On the heating mat:  more of the flowers.

Too early for beans, zucchinis, and squashes.

I didn't have it in me to start early vegetables outside this year.  Other than snowpeas, which are germinating.

I had stratified the Joe Pye Weed and Milkweed seeds in zipper plastic bags, on moist paper towels, for 6 weeks.  Then placed on warming mat.  As the seeds germinated, I moved them into 6-packs with seed starting medium.  The milkweeds did very well with this method.  The Joe Pye weed seems too delicate.  However, there are 2 plants.  Considering this is an experiment and they grow very large, 2 plants is enough. 

The milkweed is Asclepias syriaca,  which I started for bee forage and nostalgia and novelty.  Does not grow here like it did in the midwest.  The balls of flowers are unusual. 

"Asclepiascommon" by Original uploader was Hardyplants at en.wikipedia - Transferred from en.wikipedia; transferred to Commons using CommonsHelper.. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Asclepiascommon.JPG#/media/File:Asclepiascommon.JPG

Unintended Cuttings. 4.19.15

This winter I used rods cut from tree trimmings to hold edging in place.  These are plums that started growing from the rods.  I don't know if they will continue.  The one on the right was eaten by rabbits.