Hey y’all, welcome back to the blog. This week, I wanted to talk about a peach experiment that I briefly mentioned in my last blog post. These peach trees were planted in 2014, so the block of peaches is aptly named “P14”. The experiment is a rootstock trial that spans a three year period and this is the last year they are collecting data.

The peaches are planted on about five different rootstocks, such as Bailey and Lovell. Additionally, they are all the same variety: Coral Star. There are five rows of peaches in this experiment, each row being 79 trees long, with only one guard row due to some technical difficulties in orchard planning. The trees were grown in a Quad V formation, meaning that they have two scaffolds per side, creating four scaffolds.

In regards to experiment set-up, each plot of trees was five trees, and each row was a new replicate. From the five trees in each plot, only the best two were data trees.

In order to maintain good orchard maintenance, like most trees, these needed to be pruned. Megan and I were given this task at the beginning of June and worked on it on and off until the first of July, so it felt like it took and eternity. In addition, the trees are so tall, that we needed to prune them from the ground and we also needed to use the N. Blosi, which is a scissor lift platform, but with an expanding platform on either side. Needless to say, Megan and I were (very) relieved when we finished. Below, I will put some pictures of some of the cool creatures we found while pruning.

To add to the fun, nutrient samples needed to taken from the leaves and soil. To collect the leaves, I was sent out to pick fifty leaves from waist to top-of-hand height from mid-shoot from each plot. I then put them in correctly labeled brown paper bags and put them on a greenhouse bench to dry out. For the soil samples, I had to collect a sample from each tree in the plot, put them in a bucket, mix them together, and scoop about two cups worth into another correctly labeled brown paper bag. They were also put in the greenhouse to dry. The sad thing about that step was that some of the soil was too heavy for the brown paper bags and they ripped. I had to go collect more samples. It was not a good day in my book. A couple weeks later, the samples were taken up to Penn State Main Campus and they had nutrient testing done on them.

Then, on August first, we did our first harvest. The peaches were picked into correctly tagged crates and then we ran them through our grader, which counts, weighs, and categorizes them. Then, the data is collected and the peaches are packaged for sale. Our second harvest, which was our largest, was done on August fifth. Unfortunately, our grader broke and the counts, weights, and measures had to be done all by hand. It was torturous work. Luckily, I had already scheduled two days off, so I got to miss that load of fun. The third harvest was done on August ninth, Most of the trees had been stripped in the second harvest, so it was the easiest to pick. By then, the grader had been fixed and we were back in business. This completed the seemingly never-ending arduous task of P14, but it was quite rewarding in the end.

In my next (and last) blog post, I wanted to sum up my experience at FREC and everything I have learned this summer.

Hey y’all, welcome back to the blog! This week, I wanted to take a moment and discuss/write a list of all of the odds and ends kind of jobs to keep the FREC orchards running.

1.) The first task I wanted to talk about was tree training. It was the task that I feel like we did the most of throughout different parts of the orchard. Tree training was used to keep the trees growing in the correct direction. We would use a variety of different tools to get the trees growing correctly. This usually included tree tension clips, CEP tape, a thinner red tape, electrical tape, bamboo sticks, pruners, and a lot of patience. I will include a photo below of Megan and I tree training. This was also one of my favorite tasks because you could always find cool looking bugs or birds nests with eggs (and sometimes baby birds!).

2.) The next task was a real cow and probably one of my least favorite tasks: pruning trees. This was especially awful in a large block of peaches because it felt like it would never end. The trees were five years old and had been trained into a quad-V formation, meaning they had four scaffolds tied to trellis wires. The trees needed to be pruned on both side of the row because of this type of training and because they were tall, they needed done on both the tops and the bottoms. Additionally, the trellis wire was plastic, not metal wire, so it was very easy to cut and break with your pruners. Unfortunately, I did that twice.

3.) The third task that I did was also quite painful and also in the same aforementioned block of peaches. I had to take soil samples of the different plots of trees. There were seventy five plots of five trees each and I need to get a soil sample from each tree. That’s 375 samples, 375 holes in the ground. Additionally, the soil probe is ineffective in the soil we had because it was so rocky, so I had to use a shovel. Ever since I did that, I have compared every other task we did to that one.

4.) This next task was pretty fun. I was helping work on a chemical thinning experiment and I had to take the sample apples and collect data on them. I had roughly seventy apples where I had to weigh them and take their diameter. Then, I had to cut each one open and count their viable seeds. I was given a very large knife, a very small knife, and an envelope opener to complete the task. I had fun! I have attached a picture below.

5.) One of the other fun things I got to do was paint our new baby trees! We have a new block of apples of roughly 1300 Premier Honey Crisp apples and 400 EverCrisp apples. They are painted white to protect from herbicide and sun scald. We used outdoor latex paint and painted them all in a day. In addition to this, all tenth trees are painted specific colors so when you are out there it is easier to know what tree you are on. For example, every tenth tree is yellow, but the 30th is painted red, 60th is blue, 90th is purple, and 120th is orange. Any tree that is out of the study due to illness or replacement is lime green. This was done in more than the new apple trees, but also in any block that needed it. Below is a not-so-great picture of the newly painted baby trees.

6.) The next job is repainting the graft union of top-worked treed with sealant. We have a few rows of trees that have been top-worked, meaning that they grew an apple tree normally, then decided they wanted them to be a different variety, but wanted a quick turn around. In order to do this, they cut off the tree where the scion joined the rootstock and grafted new healthy buds of a different variety there. to ensure they stay, they wrap it in grafting tape and come back later with an antibacterial sealant to ensure it stays. The sealant need reapplied about once a year, so this year Megan and I got the joy of reapplying it. The sealant had the color of Kraft mac and cheese, and an absolutely awful smell. Unfortunately technology has not advanced to allow you all to smell it, but I will post a picture of it below.

7.) Another task that we did a lot of was thinning apples and peaches. However, one experience really stuck out to me, which was thinning very large Honey Crisp apples. Because they were so large, you would pull one off to thin a cluster down from a triple to a double and all three of the apples would fall off. Pulling just one off without all of the rest coming with it was almost an art form. I did find this one apple that had seen all kinds of challenges, but still managed to grow. It had grown around the clip that held the tree to the wire, around the tree itself, and around the wire. I’ll put pictures below.

There are dozens of other tasks to keep the orchard in tip-top shape, but I won’t bore you with the details. In the next blog post, I am excited to write about some other experiments I helped with!