The Florida Prince peach is on the tail end of blossoming, with Earligrande and Eva’s Pride peaches right behind. The weather is much nicer than last year and so the tree was humming with bees as I was doing some belated pruning on it. We have three early peach varieties that should be attracting pollinators for what is the main event to us, our Minnie Royal and Royal Lee cherries, which absolutely need to cross-pollinate or we’ll get squat. I’m hoping this flurry of pollination will stick around for the Royal Ann and Lapins to cross-pollinate, as both expode in blossoms that dry up and fall off to reveal one or two cherries. The Southern Highbush blueberries are waking up though and we’re trying a few more varieties this year.
Stay tuned for the Anna and Dorsett Golden apple blossoms, which are warming up for a symphony of color.
There is nothing like fruit trees in bloom. My Anna opened the first bloom this week.
I am in SoCal near the coast ahev have Anna, Dorsett, Pink Lady and Adina. Would you recommend fertilizing them this month and if so, what do you recommend?
Thanks.
You can put the Home Depot composted steer manure mix in a circle about at the dripline of the tree.
However if you’ve never had your soil tested, you may want to consider that; you mail a baggie of dirt to A&L Western Laboratories (Modesto?) and they’ll email you results you take to the farm supply store, who’ll sell you what you need.
What has your experience with your Minnie Royal and Royal Lee cherries been? I’ve read that some people haven’t had much luck with them flowering at the same time and therefore not getting good pollination. Has this been your experience too? How long did it take for you to get cherries on them? What rootstock are they on?
You’ve discovered that unless they blossom at the same time you’ll get squat. This is the first year they’ve had a substantial bloom in good weather with bees flying around; I guess they need that much time (4th year) to stabilize their blooming patterns. If you’re desperate for cherries there are commercial sources of pollen packets that you can dust on yourself.
My cherries did not flower at the same time in their first year.
PS Minnie and Royal Lee
I have 75 apple trees of three years old. In the past yaers I had not done any pruning! The trees grow verticaly. these year they start fruting! next winter I have a plan to prune them properly. Any advice please?
Yes, you need to tie the branches down to stakes so that they’re more horizontal. At this point you can’t hurt the tree, so you may want to experiment with one by cutting all the branches off and training the new ones that sprout to be more horizontal and see if that increases fruiting. You can download our guide at http://www.kuffelcreek.com/GrowingApples/GrowingApplesTropics.pdf and our Tropic Apple Body of Knowledge at http://www.kuffelcreek.com/tropicapples.htm
Dear kuffelcreek! I am growing 1000 different apple trees in one hectar hotel property! the vission is to merge the magic fruit with eco tourism near Choke mountain.But no expert advice there. To your surprise i can not distingush one from the other. I want to suport my passion with skill from you. Advice, Advice and Advice. I think You have a lote to share! please brand my apple trees!
If you send photos to kevin@kuffelcreek.com I’ll do my best to identify the varieties. Lots of room for the expansion of apple growing in Africa.