emboldened daffodils; too early to prune fruit trees?

[clothmother]

We've had a couple of unseasonably warm days here in USDA zone 7A, and the daffodils think it is spring! April 30 is our average last frost date, which, now that I'm thinking about it, sounds rather late for the daffodils - my calendar says their last bloom began March 20, 2010. But, I don't have a record of when we saw their first green, and I'm

Comments

[robby]

I don't have an answer for pruning fruit trees in your zone, but I've been searching online for info about when(zone 9b) and how to graft some orange buds onto my lemon tree. The online info and advice is so varied and contradictory! I found and followed something last fall that detailed how to cut and store the orange buds until spring, but some of the sites I've found recently suggest that I've already done it all wrong. I'll muddle through, and probably try the grafting in a week or so. One thing I've noticed is that some of the articles are written by commercial writers without much gardening expertise, who just repeat from other online sources without understanding the subject.

[clothmother]

Thanks for the solidarity, heh. I've found information searches to be kind of confusing too, and I'm totally prone to frustration over having already screwed something up!

Learning to prune my roses aggressively was a year-by-year experiment, because I just couldn't be convinced it was okay to cut them back so hard until I tried it (on only half the plants, at first!). I'm sure it'll be the same with these trees, but I'm so sentimental about them that every year I'd stand there with the shears and think, 1/3? Really? But he's just a baby! D:

[virginiadear]

Darlin', relax. Daffodils come in early, mid- and late-blooming types, and since where I live spring *weather* tends to arrive late, often after the income tax deadline, the early- and mid-bloomers often get hit with snow and even sleet and ice before the weather truly warms up. And most of the time, they get along very, very well.
Daffs *do* bloom before "last frost dates," which in my neck of the woods averages---**averages**---mid-May.
You don't need to worry about mulching them: they don't need any protecting and if you get another blanketing of snow, that will help to insulate them. They're quite sturdy.
In case you've got crocuses, those will push their colorful little heads up through the snow even before the daffodils, and the snowdrops make their showing even earlier than that.
Those spring-flowering bulbs know what they're doing.
You don't have to trust me on this, but you can trust them.

[sioneva]

This.

I remember the year in college (it was in Massachusetts) when we had snow on Easter Day in April. The daffs were in full bloom. They bowed their heads for a day or so, until the snow melted off, but they kept blooming as usual.

No need to worry about the spring bulbs blooming too early, really!

[clothmother]

Thanks y'all! I am new-ish to seasons, and far newer to.... noticing them? Keeping a gardening calendar has helped me immensely, but it's still a bit of a process learning what ought to be documented.

[virginiadear]

I suspect that what you're actually newish to is marked seasonal differences in the weather.

At home, I make a difference between *landscaping,* which is for decoration, for pretty, for visual interest, and in some instances for privacy, and *gardening.* Sometimes the line between them blurs a bit.

Take your time.
Always plant a bit less than you think you can take care of, especially while you're learning what each type of plant or each particular cultivar of some plant needs. Otherwise, it's too easy to get overwhelmed at first, not so much with the actual *doing,* but of keeping straight in your head what has to be done, and when and how often and most importantly, *why.*
And that's an important point, I think: as you absorb the "why's" and integrate them in your knowledge and understanding of your garden (and the seasons), it becomes a lot easier to remember the what's.

(Hope that helps!)

[arborvitae1]

I'm not too familiar with daffodils. Honestly, I'd just let them do their thing. There's no use trying to play the saving game since weather is so unpredictable.

As for your trees (which I know more about!) it's generally best to trim deciduous trees when they're dormant. No buds have bloomed, no leaves have formed, and the tree looks like a mass of sticks. Trees recover best from pruning when they're not in their growing state.

Also, be careful to not trim off too much 2nd year wood and spurs from your pear tree (this is where your fruit will come from!) and I *think* it's one-year wood on peach trees. You can tell what year is which when you look at a the newest twigs. (In case you're unsure!) There should be a bud scar that looks like a dividing line where the wood looks older on once side and newer on the other. The lightest is most recent (1-year) wood. Tadah! And you can count back before that to 2-year and so on. lol... am I making any sense? Hope this all helps...

[clothmother]

Thank you so much! I think that makes sense... I will jot down notes from your comment and see if I can discern the different types of wood in today's light.

Some of my balkiness in pruning the peach is the presence of numerous fuzzy buds, but it's true that they are tightly closed and I'm pretty sure they've been there most/all winter long. So probably I should just ignore these, and cut the branches by 1/3, right?

The pear I could cut by probably half its height, if that wouldn't hurt it. It grew into a TALL narrow shape thanks to other trees throwing shade on it. We plan to remove or at least severely prune the shadowing trees this weekend though, so maybe the pear will be happier with a short, bushier shape. Certainly it would be easier to reach its fruit! :)

field report

[clothmother]

Oh cool, I can see it! :D Both trees seem to have two colors of wood, but I can definitely tell the newest apart from the greyish-brown old wood.

I guess my main concern is that, since I've totally neglected to prune for the 4 years I've had them, both are so overgrown that removing only new wood wouldn't be nearly enough to shape the tree. Probably I will have to follow the 1/3 rule for the peach, and hope the pear will be happy at half its current height.

Re: field report

[arborvitae1]

Yay! I would definitely give your trees a good, much-needed pruning. We can worry about fruit next year. ;)

Be careful about pruning too much, too. Generally the 1/3 rule is there to prevent dormant buds from sprouting into watersprouts and getting out of control when you prune. Be sure to keep your central leader branch and scaffold branches chosen before you start pruning. We can worry about pruning for fruit production later.

Good luck!

p.s. Pear trees are beautiful in bloom. *sighs* :) Enjoy.

[sb158]

Dave Wilson Nursery has an excellent site here that may answer all your questions about tree pruning. Hope it helps.

[smilin]

this is an excellent site - Thanks for posting it!

[clothmother]

Wow, thanks! That site is very informative, and I can see why it'd make sense to follow that method. And I am indeed trying to remember that "you learn pruning by pruning," because I'm definitely guilty of being too timid about it. :)

But given that I've not pruned them *at all* in the 4 years they've lived here, they desperately need it. So I expect to follow the advice of others about pruning during dormancy, i.e. right now. But maybe they could take another round in the summer, when their regrowth is out of control? Surely that will serve them better than letting the peaches weigh the lowest branches to the ground.

[rainien]

I live in southern Oklahoma (also zone 7A) and I've got several stands of daffs making an appearance. I've also got hyacinths and tulips breaking through. And crocuses blooming! This is pretty average for this time of year around here. As someone else said, just let them do their thing and they'll be fine.

This is my second favorite time of year. Sure, here in Oklahoma we're in what's considered the worst part of winter. But here we are seeing GREEN making its first appearance. It's that sign that winter will soon be at an end. FINALLY.

[clothmother]

Heh, cool, my parents live in Claremore. :) And yes, I've noticed they have very similar (though more extreme) weather patterns as we do, only it never occurred to me we'd be in the same zone.

When's your favorite time of year? "Isolated spring day" might just be mine, because it feels like such a treat to loll about in the sun on Valentine's Day!

[rainien]

My absolute favorite time of year is just around the corner. SPRING. When something new is green every day and the winds blow in from the south and there's always something to do outside (weather permitting, of course). Irises in bloom. Roses coming on strong. New plants going in. Bustling garden centers. New plants to try in the garden. LOL I'm sure I'm not the only one who could go on forever about the wonders of Spring. :D

[clothmother]

Ah yes, I am indeed looking forward to true spring. :) These delectable out-of-season tastes have really whet my appetite for light, and warmth, and all that comes with it. Noticing seasons here has given me a true appreciation for that little window of the year when I can work outside and glory in the sun, and not suffer one single mosquito bite!

Such a change from when I lived in Florida, and my favorite "season" was "winter," heh.