Season 7, Episode 7 - Tree Health Management

A late April freeze might seem like a single bad night, but what we’re seeing across Pennsylvania orchards is a season-long management puzzle. Kari, Shan, and Greg outline what's important in a challenging year.

Host: Don Seifrit
Speakers: Kari Peter, Shan Kumar, Greg Krawczyk

Photo Credit: Lindsay Brown, PSU

Music Credit: “The Raven and the Swan” by Josh Woodward is licensed under a Attribution 3.0 United States License. Courtesy of FreeMusicArchive.org

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Flight Seasonalities of Main Fruit Pests During the Growing Season

Transcript

Welcome And Who’s On Today

SPEAKER_02 0:10

Alright, welcome back once again, everybody. I'm Don Seafert's the Dr. Treefruit and Don Podcast. It is Tuesday, April 28th, 2026. I'm here with Dr. Carrie Peter. Say hi, Carrie.

SPEAKER_00 0:20

Hi.

unknown 0:21

Dr.

SPEAKER_02 0:21

Greg Krochek, say hi, Greg. I'm just following. And uh the man who will start us off today, Dr. Sean Kumar. Say hi, Sean.

SPEAKER_03 0:35

Hello everyone.

SPEAKER_02 0:37

I will let you just get to it because this last week has been quite the doozy.

Elevation And Orchard Microclimates Matter

Checking Fruitlet Growth Before Thinning

Secondary Bloom And Regional Differences

Managing A No Crop Apple Block

Stone Fruit Loss And Fertility Choices

SPEAKER_03 0:44

Thanks, Don. Yes. Uh so with the we are still trying to understand the effects of the freeze event that the last freeze event that happened on 20th to 21st uh 20th to 21st April that happened last week. And uh I just wanted to start out with that and then maybe talk a little bit about what we're seeing in some orchards uh around the state. And so uh part of what I'm saying has contributions from everyone in our team, including Dr. Sarah Sarah, Don, uh Daniel, and some of my graduate students and Lindsay. So uh one unique thing about the freeze that we had uh last week was the duration of the freeze. And so uh what we noticed was around 11, 11:30 p.m. on the night of tw the 20th April, we saw the temperatures dip down to a certain level, they almost stayed there or went a little bit lower than that. Uh, and and it was cold throughout the night until 6 a.m. in the morning, and that was something unique because usually in uh uh in uh the previous spring freeze events like last this year and even last year, what you've seen is that uh the temperature slowly reduces over the night and it becomes the coldest uh in the early morning, which was still the case on the 20th, but it's just that uh it was cold right from the beginning, right from around uh 11:30 p.m. 12 noon, and with the stage at which they were at, they were much more vulnerable than in much earlier stages. So the one we got uh a later freeze uh than usual because last two years we've gotten freezes during the first week of April, uh or towards the end of the first week of April, but this was of course in the third week, and with how fast phenology has moved, I mean we are even we are one week to ten days tracking earlier than last year, and we all know last year we said that we were about a week earlier, so that translates to about being two weeks earlier in phenology, and that's just because uh we had a lot of heat units that accumulated in March, things uh sort of broke up and moved moved very quickly, uh, and and then so as you move through these stages you get more vulnerable uh to the spring freeze, and then we had a lot of up and down cycles as well uh in temperatures that reduced the cold hardiness. And so there'll be more of this talked about in the article that uh uh our the tree fruit team will be putting out, but Kerry will mention more about that. And so, talking specifically about the damage from the spring freeze of last week, I think we're still slowly starting to analyze you know what the situation is, but based on reports from different locations in the state, I'm seeing a big elevation effect from the freeze, meaning that if uh, for example, in Adams County, if you are around 700-800 feet and below, there was significantly more damage to your blocks as compared to your a little bit of the higher up blocks. Again, this is based on reports of talking with growers looking at orchards. This could vary on a farm-to-farm basis, but it does seem like there's a big elevation effect. And to sort of prove that point in the earlier freeze that we had, I laid out sensors in my blocks to try to see how different were they in temperatures from the weather station, and I was a full five degrees lower in temperature than what the weather station was showing uh weather station was showing, even though it was quite close. And so that shows you that within the orchard there's a whole lot of variation that's going on in temperatures. While the weather station can give you a give you a good idea of what the temperatures are, the actual temperatures on some of your blocks, especially low-lying blocks, uh, could have been much more, or the effect could have been much more uh from the freeze event. And so uh because of all these uh thaws and high temperatures that you've experienced this year, the trees were even more sensitive, and even though the temperatures did not go that low that you would think that it would cause so much widespread damage, we still had some widespread damage uh in all areas of the state, uh differing levels. And so when the uh freeze happened in uh Adams County, we were mostly at petal fall, the fruitlets were starting to grow, and uh so we had uh fruitlets that were uh that that had that were just starting to grow, and we saw that a lot of the kings are damaged in across all varieties in Adams County, and that is true really for most of the state, uh except for maybe some of the regions, uh some of the extreme northeast regions uh or some other regions, but in general for most of the state, I think it's safe to say that for most varieties we have lost our kings, and so with losing our kings, there is potential for a small size penalty uh because the kings are the most advanced, kings are the most uh uh able to access resources in the beginning, and so usually uh cell division, the first 30 days after bloom, that's what decides uh the size of the fruit eventually because it's it's the number of cells, and the cells expand after that to decide uh the size of the fruit. And so you could see a small size penalty, but uh it seems like in Adams County, at least, in uh at the fret location where Dr. Sarah uh measured all these uh uh fruitlets, it could see that they are currently there the many of the laterals are still alive and growing for most of the varieties, which means that's good news. Uh, and I'm assuming that there are other most other blocks around Adams County, many blocks around Adams County, you might have blocks that are harder hit, but you will also have blocks that uh do that probably lost the king, probably lost even the first lateral, but you still have laterals that are alive and growing, and you can see that because from measurements that were taken last week, the fruitlets are growing, they grew about uh three to four millimeters uh from when the measurements were taken last week, uh, which means that they're growing, they're alive, and they seem to be doing well. Uh uh and so it's important for you to really go into your blocks and check for damage and check to see whether your fruitlets have grown because that's a good indication. I mean, uh sometimes it's very easy to see when the uh when the fruitlets are about to fall off because you see the yellowing of the uh attachment to the cluster. Uh, but that's not always the case. Sometimes you can also tell when there's no uh fruit growth. So it's if you can lay if you can, for example, look at particular clusters over the over the course of this week, then it'll be easier to say whether this cluster is dead, it's going to fall off. If it hasn't grown much since you measured it, then it may most likely is going to fall off. So that'll that'll kind of give you an idea of what you have because it's very important to understand what you have uh before making decisions so that uh you're not doing both, you're not going extreme both ways. For example, you're not doing anything to not thin anything, and then you have too much to thin, or the other problem where uh you're you take out too much, and so there is still potential for uh a great crop in apple. For the most part, uh we haven't seen yet symptoms of the frost ring appear in apple. In pears, Dr. Sarah uh was able to see uh the frost ring already develop in the pears, which were slightly larger in harrow sweet pears. That she noticed that she saw a frost ring. And we have checked other orchards around the states. So far, we haven't seen evidence of a frost ring, which is good, but that it doesn't mean that it will not happen. It could happen in specific sites, it could happen even a little bit later as the fruit is going. Uh, there's definitely potential for that, but so far we haven't seen it in some of the apple varieties that that we have. And so for this week, your fruitlets for on average, your fruitlets uh are around in Adams County around six to seven millimeters in size. And uh this week's temperatures are mostly in the 50s to 40s, and so uh while usually they grow by about a millimeter a day, they might grow a little bit slower because of the temperatures we have, maybe half a millimeter, slightly lesser, depending on the variety. And uh so it'll be very important for you to go into your blocks now and then go into your blocks again after a few days to try to sort of try to understand whether some of the fruitlets you have are growing or not growing. And we'll have some pictures in the update to sort of show uh some of some of what uh uh some of what I'm explaining now. And so this week is great for you to uh take that effort to go into your blocks and check, and uh you can sort of start to make decisions towards the end of this week uh when your fruitlets are most likely going to reach the 10 to 12 meters 12 millimeter 12 sorry 10 to 12 millimeters in size or slightly larger based on your location in relation to Freck. If you're south of Freck, you're ahead. If you're north of Freck, you're probably a little bit behind. But I think this is a nice time in the sense that you have this week. It's not really good weather for uh thinning apples anyway, so might as well you take that time to sort of really understand the survival percentages in your different blocks. Take a hundred, take 50 clusters, take hundred clusters from different locations and uh cut them out to see if you see damage or not. It's usually pretty clear it's either dead or not dead, especially uh uh especially after so much time has passed from the frost, and then towards the end of the week, you can sort of make a decision as to uh whether you want to thin that block to sort of remove uh some excess fruitlets or you want to wait more uh to make sure that you have a crop before you think about thinning decisions. But usually if your fruit is still growing in Adams County in the Adams County region and nearby areas, if your fruit is still growing from now until until the end of the week, until next week, I think it's pretty safe to say when they reach 10 to 12 millimeters that those fruit are going to go through to uh unless something else happens, there those fruit are going to be carried through to harvest, especially if a lateral has replaced a king and it's continuously growing. I think it's safe to say that that fruitlet will uh continue to harvest. Uh of course, we will have some uh uh May-June drop as well, but uh and that really depends on a on a lot more factors. But uh, so that is what I think uh in Adams County we should be doing this week to taking taking the slow-moving uh growth with the temperatures we have to really analyze the blocks to understand uh uh you know what each block the survival percentage is after the freeze event, and then so that you can make some individual individualized decisions. Uh and moving on, I think that uh Burks is a little bit behind based on the growing degree days. Uh Adams County, not very far, just a little bit behind, and uh and then in central PA, we are a little bit behind that as well. But we have seen some blocks that have had extensive damage, some blocks uh not so extensive damage. And what we're noticing much more in uh in sort of central PA in some orchards that have visited, depending on the variety, we are seeing a lot more secondary bloom, like huge secondary blooms uh all over the tree in some varieties, especially gala and honeycrisp. Uh and and so with with and in these blocks where most of the kings and laterals for the primary bloom are dead, we are seeing a lot more secondary bloom. And so a lot of these resources, cargo headed resources, will be then pushed into the secondary bloom. That would not normally not happen uh when you have the primary primary bloom that is active and uh fruit set. So most of the fruits that were set in the kings and laterals of the primary bloom are dead in some of these locations, especially in central uh central Pennsylvania. But that's not to say that you will not have a crop because of how uh widespread the secondary bloom is, and uh many of those locations, uh depending on where you are, the secondary bloom could be anywhere from pink to about full bloom. Uh so in in my location in Rock Springs, we have a few scattered secondary blooms at pink. In in some in a location in Ellisburg, which is a little bit north uh from where uh we are, they're they are at uh they're at full bloom, so anywhere from pink to full bloom, and those flowers could have already been fertilized as well. Uh say, for example, yesterday or or or over the weekend. And so uh there's still potential for having a crop, so it's important to sort of look at that, understand that, and those locations you might have to wait a little bit longer to sort of understand how the set is in the secondary bloom to then sort of start to make decisions, which makes it a little bit complicated because you have a little bit of the primary uh bloom or fruit set that is left, and then you have a majority which is the secondary bloom, and they're they will probably be uh very far apart in terms of phenology, uh, especially if the laterals are alive, they're already at three to four millimeters uh this week, and whereas the secondary bloom is only at full bloom now or full bloom moving towards petal fall. So there's a big phenology gap there, and so that'll be a little bit more difficult to manage when you think about uh management. Nevertheless, it can be done. Uh, and so that is where we are at in like the central parts of the state, and in the northeast, uh, it seems like we uh or in some of the northern parts of the state, uh, we have seen that we have lost the king and the lateral, but still a lot of the primary set is still available in the form of other laterals in the tree, and so it seems like you will be able to get a crop primarily from the initial fruit set and not from the secondary bloom. And so it's sort of uh variable in the map from like southern PA to about to the northeast, and so again, this week it's really important to take care of your uh uh take take a good look and understand where your uh fruitlets are at and whether you see any damage and things like that. Now, there are some locations and some blocks where you might not have any live buds. For example, in my site in Rock Springs, uh this is this is the first year I talked to uh the uh technician who was here before Dawn, he mentioned that 2012 they experienced something similar, and after 2012, is the first year in Rock Springs where for uh for most varieties we don't have a crop and that includes primary, secondary, all blooms. And I mean there's a there's a few scattered secondary blooms, but we are at 100% crop loss. If that if that is the case, that you have crop loss, you still have to sort of do some things to maintain the tree. For example, fertilization, you can uh take a pass for the year in apples, unless you have some sort of uh uh you did some sort of a leaf test last year and there's a severe deficiency of some nutrient, maybe you can feed that micronutrient or nutrients uh that you need a little bit, but for the most part, I think you can take a pass on fertilization in apples. Uh and so uh so that's that. However, uh if you don't have any fruit, I'm expecting that the trees are going to go crazy. And uh so uh there there needs to be some sort of plan in order to maintain the vigor so that you're not jeopardizing next year's crop, uh, especially if they're very shaded, then you don't have good sunlight penetration and you don't have good color, you don't have good uh growing size and things like that. So uh it's important to think about maybe uh summer pruning as uh something that maybe you might not have done before, but maybe that's something you think about doing after the terminal buds are set, sometime in July and August, when it's not very, very hot. I think summer pruning can be attempted to sort of bring them back to size, and then of course, you can follow it up with uh uh pruning in the winter, uh winter as usual as well. And so that's one way. The other way is of course you can use successive sprays of apogee. Now, this is an expense or apogee or kudos. Uh, this is an expense, you can spray the high rate, which is 12 ounces per acre. Approximately it's about$6 to$75 an acre for one spray, and so you want to do three successive sprays in order to keep them under control. Uh, maybe this could be something you could do for your high value blocks, and then maybe you can focus more on the pruning in your uh medium to uh medium to low value blocks, and then of course, if you have access to a root pruner, uh root pruning plus apogee has been very successfully shown to control or reduce vigor, and both together combined could be the only way to control vigor in your high vigor blocks because just kudos applications might work in a medium to sort of medium high vigor, but in very vigorous blocks, uh the uh that application alone is not going to be enough. You would also need to, if you have root pruning equipment, to consider root pruning at least one side, uh, about uh 12 to 24 inches uh away from the trunk, and you can maybe consider uh uh uh root pruning as as as a factor. I know some orchards had that equipment, had that set up, and have been doing root pruning, uh, and so that is something to consider as well in order to control the vigor. As far as stone fruit is concerned, a lot of in many parts of the state you've also lost a crop due to the cold damage, successive frost events. I mean, with stone fruit, it's been it's been really multiple kicks during the season because and we had some severe winter damage as well because of the cold temperatures that we went to at the end of January, and then we had successive freeze events, and so a lot of uh peach crop or other stone fruit crop is uh is non-existent, or uh in some locations there's been severe damage. Some locations has been fine with people making taking sporadic efforts in order to protect their crop with fires or with other innovative solutions, where in some locations we still have a crop, but even if you don't have a peach crop, I think it is still very important to think about uh fertilizing your trees up to about 30 to 50 percent of your normal fertilizer nitrogen fertilization, depending on how much of a crop you have left. And this is based on work that was done many years ago by Dr. Rich Marini, uh, who showed that trees that have not been fertilized in a non-crop year they had very light green foliage and shorter shoots the following season, because the following season you know that they're gonna set a lot, and so uh so it demonstrated that we need some baseline nitrogen application in peaches, even if you don't have a current crop this year, uh, in order to maintain the uh tree health and nutrient reserves. Now, for apples, it is not as essential to continue fertilization if you don't have a crop. In fact, it makes sense to not fertilize at all unless you have some strict corrective measures that you're unless you have some dire corrective measures that you need to take from the reports that you got last year. But otherwise, I think uh you can halt, you can put a halt on apple uh nutrition if you if you don't have a crop. For peach, you might st or other stone fruit, you might still need to have a little bit of fertilization in order to make sure that they have the strength to support the heavy crop that they're probably going to set next year. Uh yeah, and uh that's it for me. If you have any questions, let me know.

SPEAKER_02 21:50

Uh yeah, thanks, Sean. That was really good. Um I'm sure folks will have plenty of questions, but we also have spring orchard meetings, and you are going to some of those. I know not all of them. Them.

SPEAKER_03 22:00

You and Sarah are splitting them, but yeah, we're gonna I'll be there tonight at Lancaster.

SPEAKER_01 22:07

Okay. Uh Gary.

SPEAKER_00 22:10

Okay. Um, just to cover what Sean had mentioned earlier um in his discussion. So um myself, Sean, Sarah, Dr. Sarah Sarah, and Greg, Dr. Greg Krofchek, we're putting out an article as far as what to do and how to manage your orchards when there's no truck, no crop in order to main tree health. So that should be coming out hopefully out. I'm I'm probably expecting tomorrow. Um, so this will kind of give an overview of what you need to do horticulturally for disease management and insect management, because as as difficult as these times are, um, we don't want people walking away from their orchards and just saying, ah, this is a year we take off. Unfortunately, we need to be maintaining our trees and and growers and growers do know this. But the uh but the idea is well, how can we do what do we need to absolutely do? What don't we need to do, and how can we do things affordably in light of what the situation may turn out to be? Uh so with that said, um, regardless of where you may be at with your fruit crop, um, there are several diseases that you still need to worry about. Number one being fire blight. Um, so two weeks ago we had two significant infection periods, and the symptoms would be showing up now. And I went out to my uh research orchard to see, and I am starting to see very early symptoms in a couple of my untreated trees where I just there was nothing on them but the bacteria. So you're going to be looking at the spur leaves where the flowers are going to be attaching to. And uh if the flower is not there, the spur leaves are most likely still there. And you would see blackening right at the base of the leaf, and that is a telltale sign of Arwini infection. Um, you also may see um droplets of ooze already on the pedicile of the flower, and so that can also be a telltale sign. Um, it the the flower may look blackened along with the leaves, and with these cooler temperatures, this is going to temper the progression, but it's not going to eliminate it. Just like the freeze last week did not eliminate fireblight infection. All it did was just temper it because the damage had already been done at that point, as far as the bacteria being able to enter during bloom time. Uh, so what can you do right now? So uh this is where prohexadione, I think, is going to be your best friend this summer, especially for those who may have low to no crop and want to want to base slow down the vegetative growth. So use that because that will also help with fire blight as far as slow fire blight down. Um, so uh however you're using it to tame vegetative growth, start now with regards to managing fire blight because fire blight's going to show up because the temperatures are creeping up again next week, and we'll be seeing symptoms very obviously uh sooner rather than later. Uh as far as continuing the discussion with fire blight. So Sean mentioned about laterals um being available in some orchards and this lateral flush coming and opening up. And so those laterals are still open blossoms. They are still an entry point, an open door, a natural open entry point into the tree. So you're going to have to be mindful about protecting those flowers from fire blight. So I will still be um monitoring fire blight conditions and will be getting out updates to folks. Um I'm watching NUA, but I'm also running Mary Blight as well, um, based on what I'm seeing here in Adams County. But I will continue monitoring and getting out the word for people so they're mindful of these conditions. Um so with that said, so speaking of conditions, so we've got uh rain in the forecast for tomorrow. So uh apple scab is still a problem right now. Um we are at the tail end of it since we've peaked with bloom, um, but apple scab's still out there. Apple scabs can still affect leaves. Uh, we can still build up inoculum. So, as far as what to do conservatively, if you still overcrop your frac threes and sevens are your best friends right now, uh, with frac seven being the strongest. Um, so there's lots of options. Um, we've got um, you know, a provia, xcalia, miravis, tesseris, luna flex, um, luna tranquility. There's lots of products out there with frac sevens. That's your strongest product right now. Um, for those who have a crop, for those who don't have a crop, you can get away with just spraying Mancazeb or maybe a Mancazeb captan mix or mancazeb and sulfur. You can just focus on broad spectrum fungicides right now. That will be enough. And that will go a long way with regards to tamping down pathogens that are lurking in the orchard right now because with it being moist and the temperatures being moderate, uh, unfortunately, you know, the fungal pathogens have not been kept at bay with these freeze events. So they're still lurking about, but you can be conservative with your approach. So mancozeb still continue the three pounds of mancazeb um through the through 24 pounds per acre is the max you can put on every year. 77-day PHI will probably not matter to many people since they don't have a crop, but focus on the 24 pounds max per year that you can put on per acre. Uh, sulfur, um, tank mixing with sulfur. Sulfur is a great tool, it's not expensive. Um, you can use the wettabil sulfur like yellowjack, but use a high rate like 10 to 15 pounds, or you can use the micronized version, you can use a lower amount, 8 to 12 pounds. Mix that with mangazeb. When we get to the point where you're switching to cap tan, tank mix it with captan. Anything that is going to keep things in check for next year, because the goal is to not let pathogens build up. Um, so another foliar pathogen that we need to be worrying about, not so much this week, but probably next week, is Marcenina blotch. Marcenina blotch, the spores are already out there, but why I say not this week, it's too cold for it. Marcenina, um, it is like a Goldilocks fungus. It needs it warm and it needs wetness, leaf wetness, so rain events. It is too chilly right now. It's in the low 60s uh around many places or even chillier. This is way too chilly for marcenina, not for apple scab. Apple scab is a lot more malleable with its temperatures, but for marcenina, it's a little too chilly. Um, but megazeven sulfur, captan will keep this all in check. Uh, and but if you do have a crop, your fractors and sevens are your best friends for that um disease. And the reason why I'm stressing Marcenina is to not forget about this disease, is this can be aggressively defoliate your trees. So we don't want aggressive defoliation, we don't want another problem to add to the problems we already have. So we want to make sure we keep those leaves on the trees for as long as possible. Uh, as far as um other diseases you need to be thinking about right now, if rust is a problem, rust galls are active. They are still active as we speak. I checked them a couple days ago and they're still happy as clams. Waiting to wait, waiting for a rainy period to basically do its chia pet nature and um you know basically spew spores from its tillia horns. So rust is still an issue. Again, you can be conservative. Um, mangazeb um if you don't have uh a crop or if you've dropped your crop, mangazeb's your best friend for scan or for rust. Um, so that is a good thing. Um, again, if you're worried about powdery mildew, sulfur. So mangazeb, sulfur, captain, these are going to cover a lot of your diseases as far as for conventional growing. And the same can be said for um for stone fruit. Um, so for I know a lot of people um knew coming into spring, they didn't have a crop because of the cold winter temperatures. Again, you want to be conservative, um, but you still want to be spraying to some extent. And sulfur is the best bet, sulfur captan um to keep things in check. Um, let's see if there's anything else at the moment. I think that is it. Um, oh, one thing for stone fruit, cherry leaf spot. I know a lot of people don't have cherries. Cherry leaf spot's still a problem. Uh, again, we don't want to be stressing out tart cherry trees by not spraying. You can still, again, be conservative. Mangazeb, sulfur, captan, your best friends right now, and just rotate them, tank mix them. Um, so you know, that's that's about what you need to do as far as keeping your diseases in check moving forward. Um, but again, the big thing on my mind right now is fire blight, just because of how intense it was two weeks ago. Uh, so please start scouting, just to reiterate that, just start scouting your orchards, especially your most vulnerable, vulnerable blocks, areas where you've seen fire blight before, uh, and then prohexadione calcium. So, right now I believe that is that is the brand kudos. If you still have apogee, fantastic. But I don't think BSF is producing apogee anymore. So kudos from Fine Americas, that still um that is available. So that is going to be your product, most likely of choice for prohexadione calcium. Uh, so those are my broad broadstrokes. And at the very end, I will before we end, I will go over the meetings. But just to reiterate, we are we do have an article in the works to talk about what you need to do with regards to low or no crop on your trees.

SPEAKER_02 32:19

Good stuff. Well, kind of good advice.

SPEAKER_00 32:24

Yeah, I guess we're trying. I appreciate I will say before jumping into Greg, Sean, that was the most optimistic um overview of the crop this year that I've heard. So I hope we can manifest that. I hope we can manifest that that optimism of the crop. So thanks. That's what I'm only telling me. Time will only tell, but I appreciate it. Um I'm I should re-record my hello at the beginning to be able to sound a little more chipper.

SPEAKER_02 32:53

That's all right. I think Mr. Bright Side's doing a good job down there. So uh and then Greg, last but certainly not least.

SPEAKER_04 33:03

Well, I don't know where to start. I want to be optimistic. However, and here we can go with the long list of potential issues. Um realize is the weather we had will have and had very minimal impact on the insect pests or beneficials that we are basically thinking about when thinking about orchard, thinking about fruit, thinking about crop. Uh listening yesterday to the call with hundred plant growers and some politicians, some administrators. I mean the picture wasn't very pretty. But again, I think Sean pointed this out very nicely. We might need a little bit more time to get a good assessment what is happening, what to expect coming June, July, August, September, and so on. It's a long season. We're still in April, and that that's the important part, and not knowing what to expect sometime might be very unsettling, but we'll see. We'll see how it goes. Insect-wise, we got basically biofixes for all important insects already happening. I mentioned that we had biofix for Oriental Fruit Moth on April 11th. We got our first codling moth flying on April 23rd. Yesterday we got our first leaf roller. Both codling moth and tufted, I think, are the earliest on the record. Normally they happen during the bloom on apples. This year they happen, I guess, at petal fall or after the bloom, because someone already talking about the size of the fruit when we just getting some moths. What it means if you have fruit, the one that you think that you want to harvest in the fall, you really have to be very careful about the timings for different insect management treatments. One thing I see already right now is and this is example for codling moth. The standard wisdom is the first cover spray, which at normal time happens about two weeks after the petal fall, is a perfect timing to control codling moth. The first application to control codling moth. Well, I don't know when we will be two weeks after petal fall, if you take into account the loss of the major fruit, the major flowers, and now talking about laterals and so on. At this moment, we are about at 58 degree days accumulation, heat accumulation for codling moth. This first time to control codling moth usually happens at 250 degree days. And in the normal year, it's about two-week time period. Well, I look at the forecast, and again, forecast is as good as. However, it seems that we will not be accumulating a lot degree days, at least in the next 14 days. Just for example, in order to accumulate 12 degree days per day, the daily high has to be 72, the low 53 54, so we will accumulate 12 degree days. At this pace, to get to the 250, we're talking almost three weeks. Almost. Again, those are estimates, and a lot of days will not reach those 72 if the forecast is correct. So the point I'm trying to make is with probably limited crop, even if you have a crop, it will be limited. You really don't wanna overspray and spend too much money, too much funding on controlling something at the wrong time. So make sure that you check with Newa, check uh your degree accumulation. I hope everyone has the trap traps for those different insects, and be on the lookout because the common wisdom from the previous years in a year like this might not really work for controlling insects. Saying this, all of this is if you have crop that you want to harvest. If you have 10% of the apples and you still want to harvest 10% of the apples, you still have to do 100% of the insecticide sprays. Otherwise, those 10% apples will not be marketable coming fall. So there is really, we don't really have Kerry mentioned that oh, yeah, you can go with the less expensive program or softer and so on. With the insect-wise, we don't have such a program. If you want to control coding moth, you have to do the most effective programs, products at the right time at the full rate. Otherwise, those 10% will not exist at the end of the season. So this is something to understand, and the and then the decision you know is well how much I care for the fruit that I will have at harvest, and how can I market them so I can recover some of the expenses. Saying this, if they are no fruit at all, some of the insects will not be able to survive. Codling moth, plum curculio, European apple sofly, apple magot, they have to have fruit to go to the next generation. If they are no fruit, though pests will just disappear. Unless they found some alternative hosts, but assuming that apples are gone or peaches are gone, probably everything around in the vicinity, all the wild potential hosts, crab apples, wild cherries, wild plums, they also lost their crop. So this is something to think about. There are other pests that actually don't need fruit and they will do well. We're talking aphids, we're talking scales, we're talking mites, leaf rollers, leaf hoppers, they don't need fruit, they can do damage. So if you are not planning to have a harvest for this group, you can use a softer program. Softer program, you know, oils, soaps, maybe BT products, something that will be soft to beneficials that will let build up of the beneficial insects, predators, parasitoids that will help you later on. With no fruit, we can afford to have some damage on the foliage and the trees will still be supported. I mean, the big thing is that leaves supposed to support the growth of fruit. If we don't have fruit, there is a lot of leaves needed to support the normal development of the trees. Sean mentioned about the extensive growth, it would make sense because we already fertilize those orchards. But think about some of those insects that yes, the orchard might not look the nicest, but actually this might not have any measurable impact on the tree health. So this is something to remember, but again, if you have fruit, then it's a different story. One insect that is really different is Oriental fruit moth. Oriental fruit moth actually affects fruit, it's a direct fruit feeder. However, Oriental fruit moth will do well without fruit. And like codling moth has to be inside the fruit, feed inside the fruit to develop. Actually, it can feed on shoots, on growing terminals. If we have a long growth and a lot of new growth, they will do perfectly well without any fruit, and they still will be there next year. So Controlling them? Well, maybe, maybe not. If we worry about it, they are sprayable pheromones and they are effective. For oriental fruit moth, you can use sprayable pheromones instead of going and applying hand-applied pheromones, this dispensers on the trees, you can go and spray pheromones. And if you control the first generation, then there's a chance that they will never really, you know, escape or explode later on. There is also another group of pests, like brown marmorated stingbug. They will do perfectly well without any fruit. Controlling them doesn't make any sense, especially that they are leaving orchards anyway in the fall, and they're not necessarily coming back the following spring. So I would not worry about stuff like Oriental fruit mauve. I wouldn't I'm sorry, brown marmorated thing bug. I would not worry about leaf hoppers. This is the same deal. So it's really complicated, especially if some of you are experiencing what Sean described, you know, the change with the elevation or the cultivar, that some blocks might need this, some blocks might need that. This might be a year when doing everything the same everywhere might not make sense for some, might make sense for the other. I'm saying all of this because I understand how expensive spraying is. When you add the cost of the pesticides, cost of labor of doing it, multiply by number of acres. A single recommendation of a single application might go into 10,000 of dollars very easily in many operations. So this might be difficult year to make a correct right decision. Are we gonna protect the fruit that we have, or there is not enough fruit? Is it economical, not economical? We'll have to react. It's very difficult to talk today without knowing you know, will we have crop? Will it be 10% or will it be 50% or maybe 30%? Or it's a normal when it's normal crop, well, then we know what to do. That's the same what we did every year. But all those other numbers with the increased cost of imports, I mean, there are no pesticides that got cheaper lately. So this is something that growers will have to consider thinking about you know the economic health of their whole operation. Uh sorry for spending time talking about stuff like this, not only insect, but I thought that this is important to mention, and basically the article that Kerry is probably gonna talk in a moment about kind of trying to address those questions too. So that's all I have. Thank you.

Spring Orchard Meetings And Closing

SPEAKER_01 47:35

Okay. Um, and I guess let's go over the spring meetings, which are here.

SPEAKER_00 47:42

Uh yes, they are. Boy, um, they're here for the next two weeks starting today. So uh today, Tuesday 28th, um, we're in Lancaster County at Masonic Village Orchard in Elizabethtown, and the meetings from 6 to 8 p.m. And so, unless otherwise noted, all the meetings are going to be from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Uh tomorrow, April 29th, uh, we're in Adams County at uh Adams County Nursery, and that's in Aspers. Uh then on Thursday, April 30th, we're gonna be in Franklin County at Harlan Hess's Orchards in Waynesboro, Pennsylvania. And then on Monday, we're going to be up in Columbia County. Uh that's going to be at OHF Orchards in Bloomsburg. And then Tuesday, uh, we're going to be in the southeastern region of Pennsylvania and Delaware County at Lin Villa Orchards in Media, Pennsylvania. On Wednesday, we're traveling out west. We're going on the road. And we're going to be at uh in Lawrence County at Dawson's Orchards in Enon Valley. And then finally, this is when the times change. So Thursday, May 7th in the morning from 10 to 12 p.m., we're going to be at Birch Farms Country Market in Northeast Pennsylvania. So that's in Erie County. And then we're going to drive down to Bedford County and we're going to be at Boyer Orchards in New Paris. And that's going to be from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. So the all the meetings are online with regards to being able to register. And I'm assuming Dawn will be able to link that link to them. So it's a drop-down menu, just so you're aware. Um, also, if folks are getting Penn State Extension emails, there have been some emails that have gone out for some of the meetings as well. So hope to see you there.

SPEAKER_02 49:34

There we go. Sounds good. I uh I think those meetings will be good. And I always love these meetings. So um yeah, with that, this was pretty pretty long. So I'll we'll just unless anyone's got anything pressing to say, we'll uh we'll let this one go.

SPEAKER_00 49:50

It's all collectively think good thoughts, right? Try to maintain some positivity. We'll try. We'll try.

SPEAKER_02 49:59

Sounds good. I will see everyone coming up. Sound good. Say goodbye, everybody.

SPEAKER_00 50:06

See you later.

SPEAKER_04 50:07

See everyone. Bye, everyone.