Spring Planting and Thinning

Organic vegetable seedlings from Peas and Harmony  are now for sale at the fruit stand.  There are healthy tomato, pepper, and eggplant seedlings, basil plants and other herbs in 4 inch pots.  We also have oranges, grapefruit, lemons, hoshigaki, eggs and honey at the fruit stand. 

At the orchard, wisteria is blooming and green persimmon flower buds are about to pop open.  Zucchini, summer squash, beans and cucumber are sprouting in the gardens.  We started planting tomato seedlings but are holding off on planting more until the night time temperatures warm up a little.  Cherries and ume Japanese plums are getting big, but the fruits are still green.  On the peach trees we've been pulling off pink lumpy leaves affected by peach leaf curl and hand-thinning the fruit.  Thinning the fruit by leaving only 1 or 2 fruit per small branch allows the tree to put energy into growing less fruits of a bigger size.

If you stop by the fruitstand you may notice a cherry tree by the house by the edge of the parking lot.  In the tree is a vinegar trap Chris made to attract and catch spotted wing drosophila (also called cherry vinegar fruit fly).  She also tied agribon around a few of the branches and fruit to see if it works to protect the fruit that was not yet affected by the fruit fly.  This type of fruit fly is a new pest in Placer County that affected a lot of people's cherry crops for the first time last year.