- Author: Don Bollinger
December is a slow month in The Orchard, but there are still a couple of things going on, both related to the start of winter. First up, we have had several nights of frost as well as ice on the birdbaths. That means the citrus and avocado trees are at risk. Local weather forecasts have been calling for temperatures as low as 35 degrees. Our microclimate at MCP tends to be a few degrees cooler, with the coldest air in the valley sinking into the park. Still air and clear nights are always the coldest conditions.
Sure enough, the tender young shoots on the citrus and avocado trees have been damaged by the cold. We expected this. We could have protected these young trees; the Sacramento Master Gardeners have a great post titled Frost and Protection for Sensitive Plants that discusses ways to manage frost. We guessed (correctly) that it would not be cold enough to damage the trees. If you look at the pictures, you will see that only the tender new leaves are damaged. Unless we get even colder nights this winter, these trees will grow just fine in the Spring, with no long-term ill effects. If we see forecasts below 32 degrees, we will scramble to protect the youngest citrus and avocado trees. Last winter, our trees were OK with no protection. More mature trees (like our 3-year-olds) can survive several more degrees of cold without severe damage. But be careful. Santa Clara Valley is not always safe for citrus and avocados. There will be rare nights cold enough to kill these trees!
The cold has also finally caused the peach trees to lose their leaves. That means we can now spray for peach leaf curl. The University of California has an excellent Pest Note on Peach Leaf Curl that discusses how to manage it. Following those guidelines, we applied a copper fungicide from a hose-end sprayer until the spray was dripping from the branches. We will probably spray once more, just as the buds begin to swell but before the leaves appear.
Next up, pruning, in January and February.
Photos:
- - Top right: citrus frost damage
- - Bottom left: avocado frost damage
- Author: Don Bollinger
The Master Gardener Orchard at Martial Cottle Park is a demonstration orchard developed and maintained by the Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County. As a demonstration orchard, our mission is to help Santa Clara County residents grow their own fruit trees, using the best science-based and sustainable practices. We want to teach, show and answer questions so you can grow healthy productive trees with bountiful delicious fruit.
This blog will track what we are doing through the seasons at The Orchard. Hopefully, it will provide useful and timely info to help with your trees. We'll note planting, pruning, harvesting, fertilizing as they are happening. We'll also note less obvious things like grafting, odd fruits we are growing, and changes to the watering schedule as the seasons change.
Our first resource is The California Backyard Orchard, a website maintained by UC Davis, the institutional home of Master Gardeners in California. It has ALL the information you (and we!) need to take care of fruit trees. It starts with tree selection, before you even have a tree, through planting, watering, fertilizing, pruning, picking, and managing those pesky pests. And it has specific information for each of two dozen types of trees. When in doubt, look it up at The California Backyard Orchard.
We did a COVID-safe Zoom talk “Getting Fruit Trees off to a Good Start” in January 2021. It provides a great overview, in about an hour, of everything we did in the first two years in The Orchard.
The first trees in The Orchard were planted in January 2019, so we are now completing our third growing season. We have been minimizing fruit production to focus the trees on strong growth. The wait is over, we are anticipating our first significant harvest in 2022.
You can visit us at The Orchard. Martial Cottle Park is Santa Clara County's newest urban park. “In order to maintain its agricultural history and preserve this land for future generations”, the Cottle-Lester family donated their 287-acre farm “to the State and County for development of a park that informs and educates the public about the agricultural heritage of the Santa Clara Valley”. Master Gardeners are developing 4 acres of the park as a demonstration garden. The Orchard occupies ¾ of an acre in the Master Gardener section. Martial Cottle Park is at 5283 Snell Ave.
The easiest way to access The Orchard is to park on Chynoweth Ave near Vauxhall Circle and enter the park through the Chynoweth gate. The Master Gardener section will be on your left, the entrance is about 400 feet down the park road. Once in the Master Gardener section, The Orchard is at the farthest corner opposite the entrance.
