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Apple/Pear Trees

with this warm up we ve had can i still prune and spray dormant oil spray se iowa be thurs before i can get to trees thanks
 
That is it. I prune early,,never had blight problems until the Cicaidas made many wounds on the limbs. I have spray for the blight prescribed by an orchard. Bottom line,,you see most big orchards up north,,in cooler dryer climates!
 
I watched that segment last week, went out yesterday and did some MAJOR catch up pruning. Took the opportunity to throw down some fertilizer as well.
 
One thing I noticed on the video was the wrap around the trunks. Better to use wire, like screening for rodents. Solid tree wraps attract borers. I know,,I lost a tree doin that.
 
Its grafting time down here in KS. Looks like most all my grafts took....used the whip and tongue method with parafilm to graft some apples and cherries in the yard.

 
weed/grass herbicide mix

Skip, so you mix Plateau + Atrazine + Dual + Prowl and spray around bases of trees.....and this keeps things pretty clean for the entire season?

I'd mulch em too. Don't get it to trunk- leave little space. I haven't mulched many yet cause of time. Will be though. Friend of mine uses lime stone which is a good idea. 3 T posts around tree with regular cattle fence that's wired on really well- works great. Or some fencing with the smaller holes so no rabbits can get past is better yet even though screen covers trunk.

The residuals I'm spraying around mine- I do have a pretty darn good cocktail that covers the spectrum. I've got all these on hand from crops and native grass plantings, etc. But I do so much with trees i simply order these every year from coop & online. Plateau or Panoramic (used for native grass plantings). Atrazine. Dual or Warrant. Add one more like prowl or surflan. That's just me though. It's several things of course but every Herbicide misses some things and this seems to cover it all for me.
 
Skip, so you mix Plateau + Atrazine + Dual + Prowl and spray around bases of trees.....and this keeps things pretty clean for the entire season?

For making it a little simpler.... I would do 3 Herbicides for residual. These 3 are NOT restricted, you can order 2.5 gallons (or smaller) online all over. Hands down I'd do: SIMAZINE (Princep), Prowl & Surflan. Obviously carefully looking at your post emergent (round-up for example applied while dormant & I still am careful around tree for whatever reason). You apply a good healthy rate- you will have everything controlled from grasses to Pigweed/waterhemp to all sorts of broadleaves, etc. Great combo especially for folks wanting simplicity and not having a Restricted use permit.

Oh, pears, I do some ACN but they don't have several varieties. Might want to do a little research, here's what I've been ordering and mostly due to disease resistance and Kieffer dropping a little bit later....
Ambrosia
Delicious
Maxine
Moonglow
Kieffer (is mod resistant to FB)
Seckel
 
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Burnt Ridge is a good family nursery ,unless you want volume whips. Whatever you do plant disease resistant varieties. As I may have said,,,I lost two mature bearing pear trees last year to Fire Blight. A fungicide will not touch it either, It is a bacterial infection. If you plant in a wet,humid part of Iowa,,which is most of Iowa,,Fireblight will find you.
 
If you have a RUP license, how would you tweak the mix? (for one, I like to use Gramoxone/Paraquat instead of Roundup....much safer for the tree....just not necessarily for the applicator!)

For making it a little simpler.... I would do 3 Herbicides for residual. These 3 are NOT restricted, you can order 2.5 gallons (or smaller) online all over. Hands down I'd do: SIMAZINE (Princep), Prowl & Surflan. Obviously carefully looking at your post emergent (round-up for example applied while dormant & I still am careful around tree for whatever reason). You apply a good healthy rate- you will have everything controlled from grasses to Pigweed/waterhemp to all sorts of broadleaves, etc. Great combo especially for folks wanting simplicity and not having a Restricted use permit.

Oh, pears, I do some ACN but they don't have several varieties. Might want to do a little research, here's what I've been ordering and mostly due to disease resistance and Kieffer dropping a little bit later....
Ambrosia
Delicious
Maxine
Moonglow
Kieffer (is mod resistant to FB)
Seckel
 
Oh, I like Atrazine better than Simazine. IMO - Atrazine & Simazine work almost exactly the same except Atrazine has longer & more potent control. It's just a better herbicide. That's the only one where you need a RUP. I've used maybe 5-6 pre-emergents on Apple & pear trees. The only one NOT TO USE is Oust. But, geesh, kinda splitting hairs BUT I firmly believe you need one that's pretty brutal on pigweed for example. Prowl is great there. For simplicity, ya, I'd do Surflan, Atrazine or Simazine & Prowl. Dual/Metolachlor is a nice bonus but usually folks don't buy that commonly alone - could do Bicep II Magnum (or equivilent) which is simply Atrazine & Dual II Magnum mixed together. Bottom lining.... I've put a nice even & strong coverage of Atrazine, Surflan & Prowl on some fairly clean areas around my trees and it was clean as can be all summer long and even into the next year.
**I MAYBE want to recall my statement of Plateau or Panoramic (or Journey, all the same)..... It works phenomenally. BUT- it's pretty extreme for LOW RATE on application. On a field, the max is 12 oz per acre. MAX. Some people, PER ACRE, spray 2-4 oz. Mixed in a sprayer, it's really easy to put on way too heavy. I'd skip it. It could bite a guy easy. The others are not risky like that. Just one thing to clarify.
 
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Magnus if you want to PM me I have a SMALL number of fire blight resistant pears remaining. Need to know by Thursday though as they are all dug at this point and we will be putting any remaining trees back into the nursery beds this weekend. We would need to ship them to you as we are done with deliveries for this spring.

Chris
 
When planting dormant, store bought potted trees, would you top them like most barefoot nurseries recommend at planting?
 
Depends on the size of the trees and the pot. Biggest problem to be aware of with potted trees is root circling. It will eventually kill the tree if not corrected when planted.
 
HELP.... need 750' of fence for this years apple tree plantings. Any less expensive options people have found work other than 5' welded-wire fence?
 
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