North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Donna &/or Kieran" <holycow@cookeville.com>]

Woo woo, I like the idea of an IPM organization!!!  You know, all it takes to move the huge agribusiness behemoth is sufficient competition and publicity given to that competition.  Were it not for Braeburn apples shipped from Australia breaking the PNW monopoly, we'd still be seeing just RD and GD apples in our groceries. 

 

Karen wrote:  "but i have a great deal of respect for folks like alan, ginda, dennis and donna, minimizing their need to spray because they are also integrating organic and holistic methods of soil and fertility management, cultural practices, varietal selections, etc, into their fruit growing decision making" 

 

Thank you Karen, it sounds nice but I think my basic technique is to plant everything and see what doesn't die.  I hedge my bets by grafting or digging sprouts from successful plants that Tennessee hasn't managed to kill off yet.  "Varietal selection" doesn't seem to have worked all that well yet, rather I attempt to ID what I have found and eaten from.  As for improving soil fertility, I like to eat and the garden MUST produce, no matter how bad the original soil.  But I do like the complications of considering soil chemistry, it is so much more interesting than applying Miraclegro.  I also really really like bugs, they are one of the great joys of organic gardening.  Japanese beetles, blister beetles, and borers are not included in my list of bug friends of course.  But oddly enough, bean beetles seem to be a thing of the past, haven't seen them in years. 

    I confess here and now to having finally broken down and bought a bag of fertilizer while in McMinnville this spring, the stuff the tree nurseries use.  I've got to get the damned trees to GROW before I can suffer the misery of losing fruit crops.  Once they get some size to them, I won't need it.  Even my husband sympathizes, and he's the one who says that our houseplants HATED the Peter's fertilizer when he used it on them.  I was working at a nursery at the time and brought home all kinds of interesting broken bits, and the fertilizer.  He said the plants grew like crazy and looked good, but that they were unhappy.  When I asked about the yellow blackberry leaves last weekend, he said they would like some zinc, but he said they would like some of the fertilizer too.  ( I have a bit of chicken manure for them.  Incidentally, the fertilizer contains trace minerals.)     Donna