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I recently wrote a post on Growing apples organically, but wanted to do a follow-up today. I get a lot of questions from readers about how to do this, so I wanted to clarify a few things. Last week, we decided it was high time we thinned and covered our young apples to protect them from the apple codling moth, […]
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This apple tree probably looks like it has a horrible case of powdery mildew. I’m happy to report it doesn’t! What you’re seeing are leaves that have been sprayed with kaolin clay. My husband, Bill, and I have been growing apples organically for several years now, and this is one of the tools in our arsenal to keep the dreaded apple […]
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Happy Spring, everyone! Are you familiar with anthocyanins or am I making you scratch your head? They are pigments that give purple, red and blue hues to different species or varieties of plants — whether it’s in their leaves or flowers. And they’re very healthful, although scientists haven’t completely figured that part out just yet! It just so happens that […]
Read moreHere’s a link to today’s column in The Spokesman-Review: Traps, sprays help keep fruit free of pests. It’s about a topic that is near and dear to my heart: organic orchard practices. Cherries, apples and pears are the most challenging tree fruits to grow. So those are the ones I focused on. I also pointed out how my husband, Bill, […]
Read moreLast week, I worked a shift in the Spokane County Master Gardener plant clinic. That’s where we identify plant diseases or insects, or make plant suggestions for specific settings, and so on. Two clients came in with the same problem and it was something I’ve noticed on my own raspberry plants so had planned to research it. Do you see how […]
Read moreThese blackberries have been frozen individually. Are you growing berries in your garden? We grow strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. While I enjoy making jams and jellies, it’s nice to freeze some of the berries for those winter fruit cobblers and crisps, too. Freezing blueberries is a piece of cake: you just pick them, wash them lightly, pop them into […]
Read moreI thought you might be interested to hear how things went in our quest to grow cherries organically this year: We have four producing cherry trees at this time. Two sweet cherries (‘Bing’ and ‘Rainier’) and two pie cherries (‘English Morello’ and ‘Montmorency’). We also have a young ‘Montmorency’ that isn’t producing yet. In the spring, my husband Bill hung […]
Read moreI wanted to do a follow-up to my July 13 post (“Keeping the birds out of the cherries“) so you’d know how things are going. You’ll recall I recently purchased some 2”-wide holographic bird scare ribbon in an attempt to keep birds away from the ripening cherries. Well, it has worked great! While it hasn’t completely kept the robins out of the […]
Read moreDon’t you just love fresh cherries this time of year? I’m crazy about them but, unfortunately, so are the robins, magpies, starlings and sparrows. We have 5 cherry trees and it’s a battle to get any amount of fruit off of them. A couple of years ago, we tried an experiment of covering the trees with huge sheets of floating […]
Read moreSpotted Wing Drosophila: Photos courtesy of Beverly Gerdeman, PhD, WSU Research Associate and WSU Whatcom County Extension. Even if you can’t pronounce the name of this dreaded insect, you need to know about this — especially if you grow fruit trees or berry plants. The Spotted Wing Drosophila (or SWD), Drosophila suzukii, has been found in Spokane and it is […]
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