New blooms and fruit set
Forecast low --- 37
degrees. Actual low -- 33 degrees at porch height, light frost in
the garden. Luckily, I know how to read our weather forecast, so
I took all of our
plants in to spend the weekend on the plant table (and dining
table) just in case. We also ate the first delectable asparagus
spears so they wouldn't be damaged by frost.
This may not even count
as Dogwood Winter since the dogwoods are barely starting to bloom, but
I can't help hoping we've gotten off easy. Light frost isn't
enough to bother any of the copious blooms sprinkled around our
homestead, and it might not even nip the hardy kiwi leaves. Time
for a tour of the fruit flowers!
At the top of the post,
you can see our first real apple blossoms! Last year, we had a
handful of flowers, but this year, the apple blossoms are turning the
Virginia Beauty white and pink. Lots of flowers means the tree
probably feels ready to set fruit, so now I can just start hoping none
of the disasters occur that could cause that fruit to fail.
Our two older peach
trees are already setting fruit, which you can tell from a distance by
the color of the tree. Compare the tree above --- a hazy pink
from the sepals left behind after most of the petals fell --- to the
younger peach below.
This guy bloomed
profusely, but only a few of the flowers stuck. No wonder ---
this Cresthaven peach has only been in the ground for two years and
shouldn't really set fruit until 2014. I won't turn down an early
taste this year, though, if it wants to serve one up.
The strawberries are
also starting to bloom, at long last. I was really beginning to
worry about them, since at this time last year the plants had set
fruit, a few of which were already blushing pink. They're
probably smart to wait out the cold weather this year, but I'm itching
for homegrown strawberries.
Last year, we enjoyed a
few gooseberries from our Invicta gooseberry (planted in 2010), but
nothing from our Poorman gooseberry (planted at the same time).
This year, both seem to be blooming, so hopefully we'll harvest more of
these tangy fruits. Mark had never tasted a gooseberry before
last year, but they became an instant favorite.
As you can tell, it's
been a sort of strung-out
bloom season this year, which probably is good for our bees.
Let's hope it's good for setting fruit as well.
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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I have to say that I am envious of the spring that you are experiencing. I have been working 60-72 hour weeks during all of the prep time I had, and now that it is over, I am getting a really late start to the season. Hopefully I can get the garden hardy before hot summer, and then I want to quickhoop it to extend the growth again before I plant winter crops.
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