North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Joe and Ellen Hecksel <jhecksel@voyager.net>]

Alan Haigh wrote:
> How is it that the subject of poke-weed, a definite non-fruit, has 
> excited members to such numerous response and there was not a single 
> reply to my question about Asian pear frost hardiness?  I know a lot of 
> you grow this fruit and I'm wondering if any of you has some ballpark 
> figure for its' relative spring frost hardiness.

I think predicting frost resistance is a no-win situation.  We had a 
frost the other night.  There was absolutely no pattern to which tomato 
plant were leveled and which were virtually untouched.

An uncountable number of factors seem to be at play.  Elevation, local 
breeze, proximity to trees and structure, the "bushiness" of the nearby 
trees, dampness of the ground, exposure of slope and initial temperature 
of the ground when the sunset, nutrient status of the plant, 
carbohydrate loading of leaves...  Last, but not least, sites for ice 
crystals to nucleate.

Poke-weed shows up under my fruit trees.  It requires no effort on my 
part.  I consider the discussion to be on par with discussing the kinds 
of mulch most likely to produce an ancillary crop of morel mushrooms 
under my standard apple trees.

>  
> We hit about 28 degrees F. shortly after pedal-fall for peaches, Jap. 
> plums and A. pears and it seems that of these only the A. pears lost 
> their crop.  It also seems to have knocked off most of the apricots in 
> the area.  In previous years softer frosts have not caused problems and 
> we've had a good run on A. pear production here in Z. 6 southeastern NY.
>