North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[tanis grif <tanisgrif@yahoo.com>]

Mostly apple.  The only astounding pear news is my Patten flowers had double 
petals!
 I didn't know this would happen.  I trust the scion source & I think I did 
good
labelling.  Does that put Patten in the ornamental fruiting group?

I saw richly red-striped petals on an old neglected tree.  Yes, stripes on 
insides
of petals, only about one striped petal per flower.  (Googled but found 
nothing
helpful.)  Is this a virus?  A bad one?

Saw flea-beetles feeding on leaves of a newly planted apple tree.  Tried to 
ID but
wasn't successful.  Is this a new pest, or just some incidental hungry insect
feeding on apple by default?

Saw waxwings feeding on flowers of tall apple trees.  All trees happen to 
produce
highly flavored yellow apples, but I think the trees' size & 90-100% bloom 
had more
to do with.  Don't know what kind of waxwings, sorry.  But they kept feeding 
when I
walked under trees & made noise; flew off only when I shook trees.

Saw a warbler working growing-points of an apple tree heavily infested w/
leaf-rollers.  Cool.

Ticks have not been as bad this spring.  They are usually as bad as described 
in the
earlier NAFEX string, but conditions have been very damp & rainy-- we see few 
ticks
in this.

It's been all garlic-mustard all the time this spring, but still I noticed the
above.  And of course I sniffed the apple blossoms as much as possible.  I 
would
grow apple trees just for the blossoms, even if no fruit!  (If anyone wants to
discuss garlic-mustard, off-list, yes let's exchange ideas!)

tc, s.WI, a little more than 4" rain in 2 weeks 

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com