Hello from Tavistock, Ontario, Canada

Yes, pest free is a huge challenge with fruit trees. So, that's what the vinegar bottles and the tennis balls are for - to catch pests. Tennis balls are coated with tanglefoot or whatever it's called and the vinegar bottles have a water, vinegar, sugar, banana peel concoction. Tonight I strained out a fermented horsetail mix to spray on the fruit trees. My apple tree usually looks awful at the end of the season with dead leaves - eaten, cocoons etc - and only apples hanging on. So, lots of fun for the organic fruit tree owner.

To feed the fruit trees even more (they are planted in wood chips already), I'm putting the compost in place rubbermaid totes beside the trees - yes, I will have to take a photo or two when I get them in place.

I have identified some branches that I'll have to take off my apple tree, they are way too high for me, I've been keeping my trees to a reachable height for me using the "Grow a Small Tree" method.

Oh, Linda! I just read about this last month or so about that tanglefoot stuff. If you can make some kind of wire cage for the tennis balls so that the insects get in but the birds can't, it would accomplish the same thing and also save some birds. Apparently the birds see an insect, don't realize it's stuck in gooey stuff, snag the insect with their beak and, if they dont end up getting their own beaks stuck in the process, feed it to their chicks, with disastrous consequences. A gruesome picture, and I hope my bringing it to your attention helps you reconsider. I love(ed) that tanglefoot stuff. We'd put it on our helmets when bicycling so the deer flies would get stuck in it and leave us alone. But after I read that article, I'm not sure we're going to use it again. We'd often leave our helmets just hanging outside, after a ride, but now that we know, we're reconsidering using it at all. It's amazing how everything is connected to everything else.

Wow, that's interesting! I'll do more research. Hard to get it right these days.

And... I'm back... well, no reason for not being here, except, maybe for winter!

I've ditched winter sowing in favour of raising my baby plants indoors. I also have a garden in the basement - after a battle with aphids, I got a recipe to spray those nasty little critters and they are down to a very low level now. Recipe is as follows: 1 tsp dish soap, 5 drops each of Rosemary, Clove and Peppermint oil in 1 litre or quart of water.

Also, I went to prune my young apple trees, only to find a rabbit had beat me to it...sigh... I was too distraught to document with photos. Thankfully, I do have 6 apple scions to graft in soon, but not many branches left to graft on to! Then I realized I also have a tree full of scions - my front yard multi apple tree - now I know what to do with the branches on that branch I have to remove... 

So, any favourite grafting techniques for grafting onto a fruit tree that has had most of it's little branches chewed off?

I also got an apricot scion (Debbie's gold) and a couple of peaches - I'll graft them onto my nectarine rootstock that came back. Side note: bunnies don't like stone fruit or pears nearly as much as they like apples! 

Hubby will put wire cages around those apple trees this fall. 

I did fall 2 weeks ago (no tread on my shoes and a wee bit of ice), didn't break anything this time, but have one swollen finger and my left arm got well and truly wrenched. I'm having fun watching SFG videos etc.

And back to what to do about bugs...I was told that if I put up the Japanese beetle traps early, like soon, they are very effective, so I'll put up a few of those...

Hi Ivanderb, Are you going to plant the seedling you have growing in the basement?

SFG is dedicated to growing food in raised beds, so you may find more help on a site dedicated to fruit trees on Facebook.

Thanks, I was just moaning about my trees in the hope that I'd get some sympathy/empathy.
I do have 3 raised bed gardens that are currently frozen and covered in hay. I've started broccoli and parsley so far..