Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

nafex - Re: [NAFEX] covering cherries, fruit bags questions

nafex@lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: "Mark Dorogi" <mddorogi@comcast.net>
  • To: "'North American Fruit Explorers'" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] covering cherries, fruit bags questions
  • Date: Tue, 6 May 2008 21:19:55 -0400

Yes, I used floating row cover last year.  My two sweet cherries are semi-dwarf; one is 10’ tall and the other 15’ now.  They usually set cherries pretty well, but between the birds and raccoons, we usually get only a few.  It is frustrating.

 

So last year I was more aggressive in trying to win the battle with nature.  I used aluminum flashing around the trunks to keep the coons out (which seems to work), I hung lots of pie tins in the trees, and I wrapped individual tree branches with floating row cover.  I have a picture of what it looked like; e-mail me separately (mddorogi@comcast.net) and I’ll send it to you if you’d like.

 

The floating row cover actually did work to keep the birds off the cherries.  However, it was very labor intense, cutting pieces of row cover, teetering on a ladder and trying to reach branches loaded with cherries, wrapping the row cover around the branches and securing them with clothespins.  There’s no way I could protect most of the cherries, but we did end up getting more than we ever had.

 

I’m not sure I’m up to doing that this year.  I’m actually thinking about building a big giant cage, 10’ on a side, 15’ tall, and just enclosing the whole tree with chicken wire.  That would keep all the birds and the raccoons out, and the neighbors would maintain their suspicion about what’s going on over here.  I haven’t worked out the engineering details of it yet, but it seems like it ought to be possible for one or two trees.  (I have two smaller balaton cherries right along the garage wall, and I’m trimming them so they can be enclosed more easily, by just putting up a couple posts and using chicken wire).

 

If your trees are small, it would be easier to cover them in bird netting.  Bugs aren’t a big deal for cherries, at least where I am, but the birds have a field day.  I have a dwarf sour cherry that I cover with bird netting (also a tedious operation) and that seems to work.

 

I bagged my apples last year (I have pics of that too) and was relatively happy with the results.  I used plain old cheap sandwich bags.  My one mistake is that I didn’t clip the bottom corners to allow water to drain, so I had to go around and do that later. Even with that, there was more condensation in the bags than I’d like, but it didn’t seem too harmful to the apples.  I experimented with perforating the bags with a wire brush to allow some air circulation, but the holes were too fine; then I made a perforator with wire brads that did the job better.  More engineering details.  Maybe I should try the paper bags, or footies.  But I used around 500 bags last year, and the plastic baggies are cheap.

 

This year I am contemplating sealing off the little space where the stem goes into the baggie with some tanglefoot or something to keep water out, and the occasional bug as well.  It would be nice to modify the baggie to remove a section of the seal, since it digs into the stem a little. I don’t think that caused any premature drops, but I could see a little mark on the stems.

 

Put the bags on as soon as you can see apples, when they are around dime sized or even less. Don’t wait. Thin at the same time.  That’s around Memorial Day here in southeast Michigan.  I spray a few times up to then and then don’t spray at all once the bags are on.  The curculio were already in action when I bagged last year, but they hadn’t done much damage.

 

I put some bags on peaches.  It didn’t work too well; I think any condensation in there is deleterious for peaches.  Anyway, the raccoons get mine every year, and bags offer no protection there.  This year, it might be electric fence time.  Or, rent-a-dog. 

 

 

Mark

Ann Arbor MI

 


From: nafex-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:nafex-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Goat Gal
Sent: Tuesday, May 06, 2008 11:55 AM
To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [NAFEX] covering cherries, fruit bags questions

 

For the first time my two dwarf sweet cherries managed to bloom after frost and have set tons of berries.  I was thinking of covering the trees with floating row cover (making big sacks) to keep out birds and bugs.  Has anyone ever done this?  When would be the time to cover the fruit ...to protect from pests like cherry fruit fly?

Also, my Queen Cox also bloomed profusely for the first time this year.  I'd like to bag the apples...when does one apply the bags?

Also anyone try bags on peaches, plums or pluots?

deb




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page