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fruitnut_gw

Cracked Flavor Treat

Some of my Flavor Treat pluots are cracking. They usually have a few cracked fruit but this yr more than usual. Not sure why except my watering regime is different, flood now vs drip normal. Am replanting trees and will be back to drip in a yr or two.

The fruits usually hang on the tree until late September and I've eaten them as late as Dec. They are not fully colored yet but the one I harvested today tested 21.2 brix with high acid. Actually pretty good eating.

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The 21.2 brix fruit and a better colored, cracked specimen.

{{gwi:121378}}

Crimson Royale should be ready soon and no cracking here.


{{gwi:121379}}

Comments (19)

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Flavor Treat has a nice color when ripe. Usually I can't capture that in my pictures but this pic is pretty good from a previous harvest. The fruit is very sweet, large, and meaty, one of my favorites and last stone fruit of the year.

    {{gwi:78226}}

  • mrsg47
    9 years ago

    Fruitnut, your growing is so articulate. Always pristine fruit, crack or no crack, it tastes good, really good. Mrs. G

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Thanks Mrs G, the greenhouse really helps. My grapes outdoors are being devoured by birds and marred by mildew, first for that. I can't save them from the birds despite a full out netting job. Everything else is the same, disaster outdoors and near pristine in greenhouse.

    I covered the outdoor grapes 5-6 times from freezes. Still can't make a decent crop. I'm feeling like milehigh and you have at times. Is it really worth thousands of dollars to continue with one disaster after another outdoors?

  • mrsg47
    9 years ago

    Fruitnut, I will photograph my netted trees tomorrow as they are bird-proof. I do have an eye on a few racoon tracks in the orchard though.

    I do have very few apples this year, but its been worth the thousands of dollars and hours of work to see sour cherries ripen on my tree. That goes for the peaches, plums all my berries and the few apples I have. Growing fruit (short of berries) has a very steep learning curve. Why do we continue? How can we not? Mrs. G

  • iowajer
    9 years ago

    Well, if envy is one of the seven deadly sins.... (I'm guilty!)

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Mrs G:

    I just checked my grapes and decided that it's mainly a coon issue. I've only seen one bird inside. Set the coon trap. I can clear them out. So much for live and let live. It doesn't work for coons or birds.

    iowajer:

    Iowa would be a pretty good place for a greenhouse.

  • drew51 SE MI Z5b/6a
    9 years ago

    I would love a greenhouse too! I do have better conditions outdoors, but the control is very nice. Even unheated would still expand the season on both ends.
    Using a simple cold frame this year, I got a huge head start on tomatoes and peppers. I had ripe tomatoes June 20th. Most are not ripe, but all plants are about 6 foot tall now, loaded with tomatoes. i have 11 plants. many are for sauce, plan to make my own tomato sauce this year.
    Some of my peppers, the hot ones, with small fruit have 30 t0 50 peppers each. Lot's of salsa, hot sauce, dried, and smoked peppers this year. I plan on saving seeds this year. I must say a lot of fun and distracting from the difficult fruit trees. Having loads of fun with other plants.

  • mrsg47
    9 years ago

    Fruitnut, Once I have the coon in the cage. . . then what? Drown it? Can't fire a gun where I live. I don't know if I am allowed to re-locate the creature. Mrs. G

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    I shoot them. But I'm very careful and discrete. Don't want to hurt myself or anyone else.

    If you aren't allowed to shoot, won't animal control come out and take care of the job?

  • iowajer
    9 years ago

    I know next to nothing about greenhouse growing, but I know this much Fruitnut - you're right. Iowa is probably a good place for a greenhouse.

    A lot of my apples have hail damage, and for as religious as I've been on my insecticide applications, there are more bug hits than I'd like to see too.

    Was over yesterday and see the deer are harvesting the lower ones off my State Fair. They must be too green for them too, as most on the ground just have teeth marks on them, enough to get the apple off the tree it looks like.

    If I didn't fence my younger trees they'd ruin them just for sport!

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    iowajer:

    I won't recommend a greenhouse for apples or pears. It could be done but I doubt the quality would be better than outdoors. When I tried apples in the greenhouse the fruit was large but I think I didn't water enough.

    What a greenhouse would be good for is all the other fruits; stone fruit, vinifera grapes, kiwi, citrus, figs, trailing blackberry, and much more if interested, like tropicals. It's by far the best tasting and most consistent production I've ever had. It allows growing the best cultivars not those compromised by need for hardiness and disease resistance. That's a bigger factor than most realize.

  • mes111
    9 years ago

    FN

    I see what looks like galvanized wire. Are you growing espaliers or fans for these?

    Mike

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Mike:

    My new trees are trellised and spaced about 2-4ft by 6ft. They will be grown as a thin fruiting wall, fan shaped in wider spacing. In a close spacing just a single shoot. Rootstocks are mostly Lovell, Krymsk 1, and Citation.

  • mes111
    9 years ago

    FN

    Please send some photos while they are leafed out.

    How do you handle it when they start to spread onto the next tree ? Do you let one overlap the other so that there are now 2 branches per wire each growing a different fruit or will you tip prune to keep them in check??

    I am outdoors (upstate NY) and my espaliers 6,8 & 9 feet apart and seem to be getting crowded (to my eyes)

    Some are already encroaching on their neighbors and I am now trying to figure out how to deal with this.

    2-3 years ago I was just hoping that I would have this kind of problem because I was a total newbie digesting every bit of info ( some advice being 180 degree opposite from others) and not at all sure that it would work.

    Mike

    This post was edited by mes111 on Mon, Jul 14, 14 at 17:35

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Mike:

    The key is controlling growth so that trees don't crowd. Since there is no rain and the soil is low in nitrogen I can control growth to a large extent by limiting water. This also increases fruit brix.

    I also have quite a few trees on Krymsk 1 which is strongly dwarfing. Last option is to thin out trees and extend the fan in each direction.

  • mes111
    9 years ago

    I see.

    With minor exceptions for some of the pears, the filter I used to decide which varieties to plant was "the ones I can't find in a supermarket" and how they were described by others and in the catalogs. So I don't really know which cultivars will be the favorites.

    I hope that if I find a variety that I really like, it is next to one that I am not crazy about and I will let one spread more and prune and downsize the other.

    decisions, decisions decisions !!!!!

    Mike

  • fruitnut Z7 4500ft SW TX
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Mike:

    In the past I've done a lot of budding and grafting of what I like onto what I don't. I would like to get away from that to limit virus spread.

    So with my current replant I've alternated proven winners on proven rootstock with new varieties that are unproven. A good tree with good fruit can be spread a long ways to increase production. The trellis will facilitate spreading a tree without the weight of fruit causing issues.

  • mes111
    9 years ago

    Good thoughts.

    Now just to figure out how to tame my peaches and nectarines. They are growing like weeds.

    Mike

  • MrClint
    9 years ago

    Those pluots look great to me. I'd eat em up with no qualms. :)