Seattle Tree Fruit Society

Check out the first flier:fall-fruit-show-083110

We have the initial plans for the Fall Fruit Show this year.  It will be on Sunday,October 31st, 10am-3pm at the Center for Urban Horticulture. 

Laure has taken the lead of Fruit Collection and the Tasting Tables.  Anyone wishing to help with this, please let us know.   Save your fruit for the show and let us know what you have.  It is so nice to see what we are producing from our gardens. 

Mike is putting together the lectures.  We are emphasizing on Apple ID lectures, but also are looking for lecturers on Container Fruit Growing and Edible Landscaping. 

Judy has taken on the Kids Creative Activities.  Since this is Halloween it would be fun for kids to have crafts and fun.  We want to make this a family event.

Please let us know if there is anything you can do to help out with the show.

Fruitfully Yours,  Lori

A big thanks to all our members who participated in the July garden tours. The gardens were beautiful and it was a great opportunity to discuss our fruit interests: varieties, insects, soils, diseases. pollination and climate!  Thank you for all your gardening work and sharing with us!

For addresses and location information email seattletreefruitsociety@hotmail.com

Garden #2 - Don Ricks - Horizonview Fruit Tree Steward 

Location: Horizon View Park 19800 47th Ave NE (198th St at 47th Ave NE)

Time: Please meet at the Park at 3:00 pm for a tour of the park’s fruit trees and Don’s caretaking.

Directions:  Exit the freeway at 205th Street NE; Turn right at NW 205th St/Lake Ballinger Way; Continue onto Ballinger Way NE for 0.7 miles; Take a slight left at NE 195th Street; Turn left at 35th Ave NE; Take the 1st right onto 40th Pl NE; Take a slight left at NE 197th Street; Continue onto NE 201st Place; Turn left at 47th Ave NE. Your destination will be on the right

“ What I would like to show is the 10 trees that I am reclaiming by pruning and in some cases cutting back from the brambles and blackberry bushes there at this Lake Forest Park location….it is near my home and very near Lori’s…….I am also putting foot sox on some of the apples and trying to discover the varieties…..the thing that may interest some of the STFS people is that I put different colored foot sox on at different times….all the way up to mid-July to see what will work at what times to protect against the flies…..this park is at a high elevation and the apple maggot flies seem to be late there…..so I am interested in the results….the question of how late we can apply the foot sox (or spray) should be a question of interest.” ~Don Ricks

Garden #3 - Lori Brakken

Time: 12:00 noon to 5:00 pm (note that the Potluck Fall Fruit Show Planning starts here at 5:00 pm) 

 Lori has an espalier fence with more than 40 apple trees growing in an elevated bed., supported by bamboo trellising. She has grafted additional varieties to the espaliered trees, so she now has about twice that many varieties of pomme fruit wood. She also grows grapes, blueberries, persimmon, apricots, and plums. These are all new plantings.

QUESTION: I have noticed insect infestations in the plum trees this summer. We have an Imperial Epineuse plum tree that is covered with sticky sap and thousands of little white insects. I began to wonder what these insects are, and asked our local insect experts.

ANSWER: We canvassed the local prunus, from our two “Italian prunes” to the neighbor’s wild Italian type to some ornamental prunus on the Seattle U campus last night. One tree was infested with white apple leafhopper which took off in clouds when a branch was disturbed. These critters go thru 5 instars and leave their little white shells on the leaves. Both as larvae and as adults, their body shape is torpedo. Leaves can get that stippled look from their early season feeding. In spite of their name they will infest plums too.

A similar insect is the potato leafhopper which the experts ID by the nymphs being able to move sideways as well as forward and backward! The fruit pickers hate them because their faces are right by the leaves so they get them in their eyes, ears, etc., while picking.

The neighbor’s wild Italian type plum is terribly infested with what we are assuming is the mealy plum aphid because it has a powdery coating. But some leaves higher up and out of reach are getting quite curled so maybe it really is the leaf curl plum aphid. The undersides of the leaves are cheek by jowl aphids and the lower leaves on the tree are very sticky and shiny from honeydew. But when the tree is disturbed there is no cloud of insects. Some of the aphids have developed wings so they’ll be leaving soon. Interesting insects: after feeding on prunus from spring to summer and reproducing rapidly, they grow wings and take off for reeds and cattails up to 30 miles away in late summer and migrate back to fruit trees to lay eggs in the fall.

Guess we’d support the trees by giving them an inch of water a week, maybe running a soaker hose circling the dripline for an hour, until harvest. Spraying is marginally effective and re-infestation occurs quickly.

Dear Fruit Club Members,

One of our favorite Vashon Island Fruit Club events is almost here!  Saturday, June 26, beginning at 1:00pm, Bob & Carol Norton will host their Orchard Tour & Strawberry Shortcake Tasting party. Members only please. Join us for lemonade & scrumtuliscious berries.

We are also taking this opportunity to send out a call for extra Strawberry Fest volunteers, Friday July 16 through Sunday, July 18^th.  In order for the Club to avoid paying a $160.00 fee for our  Strawberry Fest booth, we need to provide the Chamber of Commerce with 10 hours of volunteer time. This can be 5 people, each for 2 hours. Place & times needed: the Micro Brew Beer Garden. Possible jobs to include set-up, ID checking, beer pouring, and bussing tables.

VIFC needs volunteers in these time slots:

FRIDAY: 4 volunteers from 3:00 pm to 7:30, 5 volunteers from 7:30 until 11:00.  

SATURDAY: 2 volunteers from 10:30 to 2:00, 4 volunteers from 2:00 to 5:30, 5 volunteers from 5:30 until 11:00.

SUNDAY: 2 volunteers from 10:30 to 4:00, 4 or 5 from 4:00 to cleanup time around 7:00

Please let our Special Events Chair Linda Rhodes know when you would be available by calling her at 463- 9826, or call Elizabeth Vogt at 920-7603.

We hope to see everyone at the Nortons on the 26^th, and we thank you in advance for your valuable volunteer time. After all, the club is as good as what we all put into it, the more we contribute, the more each of us gets back.

Happy Fruiting season to all of you!

Dawn Perlman - 2010 VIFC Membership Chair

Hello all,

Please pass the word about this great opportunity to take our summer fruits and nuts class from Bob Norton. Feel free to use any, or all, of the information below.

Pomology expert Bob Norton will be teaching a horticulture course on Growing Fruits and Nuts in Western Washington this summer at Edmonds Community College. Bob will cover how to get started and follow through to have maximum satisfaction with minimal input of cost and time. He will provide a comprehensive look at fruit and nut varieties, including vining and bush fruits, suitable for growing in Western Washington. Emphasis will be placed on how to provide proper growing conditions, cope with pests, and integrate these food producing plants into the landscape.

Fruits and Nuts, Hort 247, 2.5 credits*
Thursdays 1-3 PM (July 8-August 19)
Class also meets 10 AM-5 PM on two Saturdays, July 24 and August 14.

Dr. Norton, emeritus professor of pomology, Washington State University, has 50+ years of experience in teaching, research, and growing fruit plants.  After graduating with a BA & MS from Rutgers University and a PhD from Michigan State University, Bob has been teaching, researching and consulting in the Pacific Northwest. Bob founded a Chapter of Western Cascade Fruit Society (100 members) and now grows over 150 kinds and varieties of tree fruit and berries on his small orchard.

*Please note that you must be admitted to the college before registering for this course. To apply online, start at the Edmonds Community College home page: http://www.edcc.edu/ and click on Future Student. For state residents, tuition for this course will be $201.50.

Bus trip & Lunch - $20 a seat.  Now open to all WCFS Members.  If you have not heard of Tom Woods, pay attention now because there will be a STFS sponsored bus going to see his innovative greenhouses full of produce on June 5th.  We are holding the group to the 47 on the bus so that we can get close enough to him to ask questions and hear him talk.  We’ll start the day at Raintree Nursery for their 50% off Bare-root Sale, get a tour of Raintree and picnic in the orchard - Yes, and lunch is included in the $20 bus ticket.  After lunch, we’ll head over to Tom Woods for a tour of his All Season Fruit greenhouses.  It is amazing the amount of produce he grows. He assures us peaches, apricots, tomatoes, and blueberries to taste. 
 
When I receive your $20 then your name will go on the list.  First come first served.  Only 47 seats!  We’ve been to his place in the past and people want to ask questions and hear what he has to say.  Bigger crowds don’t allow that.  You can email me to expect your check and find out where to mail it. At seattletreefruitsociety@hotmail.com
 
Also, tell me if you have any food issues.
Thank you.
Lori

8:00 am  - Meet at the Park & Ride at 6810-8th Av NE, Seattle            

10:30 am – Raintree Nursery 50% Off Bare-root Sale and Tour of the Facilities

11:30-12:30  Picnic in the orchard

1:30 – 4:00 pm - Tom Woods Greenhouses Tour

6:00 pm – Arrive back at the Park & Ride at 6810-8th Av NE, Seattle   

 I volunteer for the City of Bellevue as a Neighborhood Liaison, and was recently contacted by a local church with an idea they had for the Neighborhood Enhancement Program (NEP).  Part of the church’s property is an old orchard from one of the original farms in Bellevue.  They wanted to know if the City of Bellevue could partner with them using NEP funds to recondition their orchard, and then the Church would provide the fruit to the local food banks.  Since the orchard is not on public property it does not qualify for money from NEP.  Nevertheless it does seem like a great idea.  The local food-banks get a lot of canned and dry goods but not so much fruit, especially organically grown fresh apples, which fetch a premium price on the market.  The church’s congregation is elderly, and is not physically able to maintain the orchard themselves which is why they are requesting help.  Although, the STFS’s primarily mission is to provide education, I thought this may be a project that members of the STFS may wish to support and donate some time to.   Lorine Brakken, went out on a Saturday to look at the orchard and said the trees are healthy, but are large, as most old orchard trees are.  There are a number of ways members of the STFS, with their special skill set, could help: pruning, and perhaps grafting new disease resistant varieties are a possibility.   Also, it could be the church would elect to replace the old trees, with modern varieties on dwarf root stocks which are easier to maintain.  While none of the above is currently planned, the church does have an immediate need for which they are requesting help.  They have asked for a maggot barrier workshop.  We will teach the congregation how to put on “footies”, and work several hours installing them.  Since these are large trees, anyone with an orchard ladder is encouraged to bring it. The “footie” work part will begin at 9:00 a.m. on Saturday the 22^nd of May.  Come have some fun, and do something good for the community!    Anyone willing to donate a few hours for a public service project please contact seattletreefruitsociety@hotmail.com

Maggot Barrier Workshop

When: May 22nd, Saturday

Time: 9am Lecture, 10am Footie Party Begins!  A piece of apple by and a beverage for the volunteers!

Location: Holy Cross Lutheran Church Orchard, 4315 129th Pl. SE, Bellevue, WA 98006

Learn: How to apply Surround to the Maggot Barriers, how the Maggot Barriers work, lifecycles of apple pests, and how to apply them to the fruit

Experience: Hands on Surround application to MB’s and orchard application of footies to the trees

Contact: seattletreefruitsociety@hotmail.com

Bring: Ladder for working in the trees (if you have one), sack lunch, water

STFS & FOPO ‘Meet Up’ May 8^th

(FOPO is Friends of Piper Orchard)

Potluck, Lecture, games at Carkeek Park

Door prize: Get a free entry ticket for bringing your own cup and a Nametag (you can make one if you don’t have a STFS nametag)

What is a ‘Meet Up’?  I searched the web and came up with this…

Do something • Learn something Share something • Change something

 A Meetup allows members to find and join groups unified by a common interest.

Where local community gets together to network, socialize and show-and-tell new technology.

Time:   10:30am to 2pm

Location: Carkeek Park meeting room/Piper Orchard

10:30 Lecture: Bob Norton ‘Summer Pruning’

11:30 Drawing for Door Prize

11:45  Potluck: This is Lunch.  Cake, Drinks, and plates/utensils provided.

12:15 Dessert: A Special Cake by Mike Ewanciw’s friend.

12:30 Fruit Grower’s Jeopardy Game

1:00 Presentation of heritage grape to the Piper Orchard, followed by planting of the grape and tour of the orchard.  I’ve requested an electric cart to get those up to the orchard that cannot walk the ¼ mile flat rolled gravel path.  Hopefully we will have the cart available.

We have a heritage Campbell Early (Island Belle) grape to present to the Piper Orchard.  Bill Horn of the Tahoma Fruit Club informed me that there was a Northwest heritage variety of grape from the site of the original Stretch Island Winery homestead that is now to become the Sehmel (Homestead) Park in Gig Harbor.   Local Master Gardeners heard that there was going to be construction on the site and rescued this grape.  They handed off a 5-gallon sized start of the Campbell Early grape to Bill, who handed it off to me (Lorine Brakken), and we will present it to Piper Orchard’s Andy Zaborski who is planting a row of heritage grapes in the orchard.  We will follow him up to the orchard and get it planted right away.  Hopefully everyone will get to toss a shovel full of dirt in the hole.

There are exciting plans in the making for STFS future events:

On April 24^th, 9:30am-12 noon, in the Douglas Classroom at the Center for Urban Horticulture, will be the next Member Meeting with Marilyn and Dick Tilbury as our speakers.  They will speak to us on the life cycles and controls for Apple Maggot, Coddling Moth, and the Spotted Winged Vinegar Fly.  We’ll make traps for the SWVF at the meeting. 

On April 24^th, 8:00am-9:30 before the Member Meeting, we will have a Board Meeting where we will introduce  our new Membership Person on the board.  Also, we have a volunteer to be nominated for Vice President.  We have no other nominations for VP and if you know of any please bring them to our attention before the April 24^th meeting. 

Also on April 24^th, after the Member Meeting, we will have a Membership Fruit Database meeting.   We have talked for a couple years now about coming up with a member database of the fruit varieties that we all grow.  This would benefit the club by knowing where to get scion wood for the spring shows, fruit for the fall shows, make name tags for the fruit/wood at the shows, and for apple identification at the fall shows.  A database of this information would be very valuable to the club.  We will meet to discuss the possibilities and categories we’d like to see developed after the Member Meeting on April 24^th.  We will probably move outside to a warm corner of the CUH garden for this meeting.  Bring a sack lunch. 

Grafting wax- Used to seal grafts, 4oz, $7.29+tx

Source:  Skagit Farmer’s Supply  (360)757-4055, 1276 S. Burlington Blvd. Burlington, WA 98233

TangleTrap - Insect Trap Coating by Tanglefoot, 15oz Tub $5.75+tx

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

Small Planer -Makes flat cuts when splice grafting, $7.98+tx

Source:  Lowes (425) 744-8411, 3100- 196th St SW, Lynnwood, WA 98036-6960

Rubber Splicing Tape - Used as grafting tape, breaks down faster (being rubber) than vinyl electric tape and sticks to itself more than the graft wood. $2.40/roll+tx. In the Electrical section, but on an end display.

Source: Home Depot (206) 361-9600, 11616 Aurora Avenue North, Seattle 

Yellow Sticky Traps  - 3”x 5” Sensor Cards -Used to Monitor and Catch fruit pests. $15.95+tx / Package

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

Grafting knives   $12.95+tx

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

White Plastic Labels - 7” long, $24.95+tx / 1000 on a roll

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

Aluminum Labels -  3”x 1”, $5.75+tx / box of 50

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

Industrial Permanent Markers - More Permanent than Permanent Markers, Will last longer outdoors.

$1.25+tx each (but you buy a box for that price)

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

Chip Bud Tape   -used for grafting, ½” Grafting Tape, $4.95+tx /roll

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

Calcium Magnesium Suppliment  -used as watering suppliment to add Calcium to soil for treatment of Bitter Pit in Apples, 1 quart / $14 +tx

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

TreeKote  -used to seal grafts, ½ pt/$3.95+tx

Source:  Steubers Distributing   ‎(360) 568-2626, 308 3rd Street, Snohomish, WA

Parafilm Grafting Tape   -used for grafting, ($34.35 each box of 12)

Source:  Search Online for ‘parafilm grafting tape’ from SPI Supplies www.2spi.com/catalog/supp/parafilm-grafting.shtml

Fels Naptha Laundry Bar Soap  - Used to make Insecticidal Soap Spray to kill soft bodied insects $3.00 each

Source:  Online search Amazon.com    $2.31 Each  =$23.10 (shipping incl.)/10 bars

Surround ®- Used to dip Maggot Barriers in for added control of Apple Maggot and Coddling Moth

24pound sack for  $27.86 (I was quoted $49.00)

Source:  Wilbur Ellis  (360) 466-3138, 13586 Bayview Edison Rd, Mt Vernon 98273

The “how-to” for Surround soaked footies

Need 4 quart pan, colander to hold 288 footies, another pan to catch fluid. Directions:

1. Add container of Surround® (3 T) into 3 quarts of water
2. Stir– or Surround® will not dissolve
3. Place 288 footies in Surround® + water – stir to soak footies
4. Pour footies and Surround® mixture into colander with pan beneath to catch fluid 5. stir captured fluid and pour over footies with catch container beneath
5. Keep repeating until fluid does not have evidence of Surround®
6. Dry footies by spreading on wire mesh, table,etc.
7. Apply to fruit BEFORE codling moths mate

0-5-25  PNW Fruit Tree Maintenance Formula - This fertilizer is made in the PNW, for the PNW.

Source: Skagit Farmer’s Supply  360.757.4055, 1276 S. Burlington Blvd. Burlington, WA 98233

Price:  20# bags, $13.99+tx & gas & time

It is also available in 50# bags from Skagit Farmers Supply.

0% Nitrogen (this helps to restrict excess top growth)

5% Phosphorous (needed for energy production in the plant)

25% Potassium (critical for sugar movement into the fruits)

15% Sulfur (for enzyme and protein production)

5.4% Magnesium (for photosynthesis and sugar production)

6.6% Calcium (critical for normal cell development)

0.14% Boron (for pollination and fruit development)

0.15% Zinc (needed for shoot and leaf growth)

The sources of nutrients for the Skagit Farmers Supply 0-5-25 Fruit tree fertilizer: Granulated Bone meal, sulfate of potash, K-Mag natural, Granubor and Ruff& Tuff 10% Zinc. All ingredients used are OMRI certified ORGANIC. The bagging equipment (used to package this product) is not organically certified.

The directions for fruit trees and all berries, grapes, shrubs, & roses is 1-3# per 100 square feet. To avoid getting too much Boron in one season, don’t apply more than 5# per 100 square feet per year. Peaches, young trees or trees on very poor soil will often benefit from adding some Nitrogen, such as feather meal or ammonium sulfate, in the spring.

This fertilizer, the PNW Fruit Tree Maintenance Formula, was developed by Bill Swanson (Skagit Farmers Supply) & Gary Moulton (WSU Mt Vernon).  It has been unadvertised but available for approximately 4 to 5 years now.  This is the first time that Seattle Tree Fruit Society has offered it to our members and Show attendees.