North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Stefan Brandle <sbrandle@css.tayloru.edu>]

Richard Fahey wrote about "ritual scarification" [my words -sb] of apple 
tree trunks. This was several Pomona's ago. He discovered that where the 
apple tree trunk had been damaged vertically, the healed calous tissue 
was too tought for the critters to nibble through. He then started using 
tools to cut vertical strips out of the bark at intervals around the 
tree. These healed strips then formed the equivalent of permanent bridge 
grafts [my words again] so that if critters did nibble on the bark, they 
couldn't do a clean strip around the tree, just a partial girdling.

I don't know about other possible consequences of doing this. I am 
tempted to do it on my trees, but I've been fortunate enough not to ever 
have girdling problems (yet!) so it doesn't really seem worth while for me.

-- sb
In another month or so I'll know whether my one lone male kiwi (arguta) is going to 
bloom. The other "male" (from a different source) turned out to be female! 
Spring is definitely springing. I'm hoping that the cherries won't take the bait quite 
yet. :-)