A Brand New Day

A Brand New Day

I took these photos this morning, Saturday August 22.

 

 Snow Princess peach above and below

 

Solar Flare apricot at budburst. below

Candy Giant plum at budburst  below

Stage of budswell on cherries

Empress below

 Royal Hazel below

Royal Lynn below

Royal Dawn below

 Photos below are taken over the last month.

Some newly planted cherry trees.

 Mark on the job.

Some pruning shots working on some young cherries.

Rain in the forecast, budswell on the trees, a good time for fertiliser.

 A recent ray of sunshine in a cold winter, our grandson Dax and his mum and dad come to the orchard for a visit.

 Uncle Mark and Dax enjoying the moment.

Feeding the chooks with daddy and uncle John

 Planting a tree with Grandad, he had to get in and have a go at everything he could.

 Standing in the back of the truck

Kissing Grandma

Helping with some repotting.  We had a great weekend together.

It has been a busy lot of work in the last month. I guess only to get busier. 

Best wishes to all.

Snow at Cherry Dale Tenterfield

Woke this morning to this amazing winter wonderland, it gave me a child like excitement and I had to get out and take some photos.  1984 since I have seen this much snow on the ground here.

 No pruning for me today, thankyou for the day off, weather. Not often you can say that.

This is the best we could do before hypothermia set in. lol

 Delivery of some new fruit trees from Graham's Factree Victoria. This is Graham's son Patrick doing the driving and unloading. My brother Neil with me picking up his trees. 

My father first bought trees of Patrick's grandfather. 

They offer a good service.

This is Pairin's new restaurant in Tenterfield. Some may recognise Pairin from previous posts, picking on our orchard. He is an excellent chef, the meal was delicious and  Pairin and Kurt have fitted out the restaurant exquisitely. 

Well worth a visit.

Certainly has been a cold July could not ask for better as a fruit grower. Moisture in the soil, Spring around the corner.

Best wishes to all.

Winter Solstice

 

 Winter Solstice yesterday June 21

Here are a few photos taken over the past week.

Jenny in the orchard standing next to some Solar Fire apricots.

Some peach rows below.

 

The photo above shows some of the techniques used in the last season for Queensland Fruit Fly control, small cardboard pad is a Amulet Cue-lure, male annihilation technique pad used in a grid fashion throughout the orchard. Approx 16 per ha.

Larger vinyl piece is used for splash baits for the female Queensland Fruit Fly. Natralure was used (the vinyl avoids a phyrotoxic burn on young leaves). Once again used in a grid fashion.

 Cover sprays of the insecticide Lepidex 500 (Trichlorfin) and then Samurai (Clothianidin) just prior to harvest have been used in the last 2 seasons for control since the banning of Fenthion.

 

My son Mark cutting out some 20 year old nectarine trees.

Some Winter weed control below.

The dormant period in Winter is the only time I use Glysophate through a boom spray in the orchard.

  

 Photo above taken on Sunday, shows the dam's current level.
Photo below Jenny and the dogs at the creek.

 

Some of the plants that we propagated in Autumn to be sold in the nursery in Spring.

 Just starting to move into pruning, don't mind this time of year.

Best wishes to all.

May 2015

Saturday May 23 Slowly slipping into winter. Have had the first few frosts of the season, have had good rainfall over the autumn period. A beautiful autumn display on this weeping cherry.



 

 



Orange Arctotis This plant has been flowering since spring, tough as nails.

 



 

Rosie Rainier on colt rootstock.

 

 

 

Saw the first few of this  cherry variety last season, we let customers sample them for free, which they loved. Had good size with a lovely blush, sweet Rainier flavour, have not handled them through any wet weather yet to judge what they are like for splitting. I certainly enjoyed eating them.

 



 



 

Royal Lynn above, Royal Hazel below. Certainly are a vigorous grower with a good healthy leaf, flower early, (Empress flowering period) which could be problematic in a frosty spring. Picked a small amount of both around Merchant time. Both look like a good cherry. Also have some Royal Dawn planted and have ordered some Royal Tiago when they become available.



 

 

 



Santina above and below, these have been impressive for us in our district. They like to crop from an early age and have good size, a good eating cherry.

Photo below shows good fruiting buds on these Santina.

 

 



On our orchard we use a single 8ltr an hour dripper on young trees until reaching production where 2 8ltr drippers are used in shifts no longer than 2 hours. In our soil type any longer wastes water outside the root zone. Every district is different and every orchardist has different ideas, this works for us here through hot summers with limited water supplies.



 

It is hard to believe where the years go sometimes and the hard lessons the orchard can teach you as you strive to grow a quality product no matter what the weather throws at you. For those in the northern hemisphere harvesting cherries I hope it is a good harvest, my wife told me that she saw some cherries from the USA in the supermarket looking good  at $25kg.

Best wishes to all.