North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Pat Meadows <pat@containerseeds.com>]

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 08:42:14 -0700 (PDT), you wrote:

>
>I am new to growing fruit.  We put in several trees this year (cherry, 
>apple, pear, pluot) as well as gooseberry, currant, raspberry bushes.  I've 
>grown currant and raspberry before, so am okay with managing these.  Is 
>there any special preparations to do to protect the trees or gooseberry?  I 
>know the Pluot is a little more tender than the others.  We are in zone 5/6 
>(hard to tell on the maps), but our winters are quite variable in the 
>Appalachian hills.  
>

We've only had gooseberries for one year - we're also in the
Appalachian hills, btw, in northern PA.  We mulched the
gooseberries with straw.  That's all we did specially for
winter.  They survived -26 F temperatures (more than once, 2
or 3 times last winter).

We also have the gooseberries encircled by chicken wire,
because something ate all their leaves one night, when we
had first planted them.  They recovered.  It could have been
a groundhog, or a deer, or a rabbit.  But anyway, they are
safe (I hope) in their chicken-wire cages now.

Pat
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