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2023 Email Messages
Gil Barden
Hello Fruit Growers, Most of you have probably heard that Gil Barden died last Thursday after an accident on the farm. Gil was a great grower and a great friend to many of us. I’ve known Gil for 40 years and he has always impressed me with his apple growing knowledge and his willingness to […]
NEWA. Allium leafminer, Tomato brown rugose fruit virus
Greetings, I hope your crops didn’t suffer too much from this morning’s frost. According to weather stations in RI on Cornell’s NEWA network, it went down to 27 degrees in Scituate. There are 5 new weather stations in RI connected to NEWA. Four of the weather stations were purchased and installed by the RI Fruit […]
May 18th frost and potential damage; June 7th Apple Twilight Meeting
Hi Fruit Growers, Looking at the RI NEWA weather stations, it looks like this morning it went down to 27 degrees at a Scituate weather station. This is a separate weather station than the RIFGA weather station in North Scituate which recorded a low temperature of 29 degrees. 27 degrees probably damaged some fruit; 29 […]
Winter moth 4/14/23
Hi Fruit Growers, I know this hot weather is pushing fruit trees and berries too far too fast. It’s scary! Looking at the extended forecast, no frost is predicted at this time. I hope to visit some apple and blueberry farms over the next week to check flower buds for winter moth caterpillars. We haven’t […]
Winter moth update, April 13, 2023
With the warm/hot weather this week, I expect all winter moth eggs to have hatched by now. I had very few eggs to monitor for winter moth egg hatch this spring. That’s a good thing! I set up three tree bands in November – one tree in Kingston and two trees in Charlestown. Usually, this […]
Beech leaf disease treatment
Beech leaf disease treatment – June 2, 2022 Beech leaf disease is a new disease and there has not been time for extensive research. In Ohio, researchers have encouraging results treating American beech saplings (<4 inch diameter trees) with a phosphite product twice a year for five years. There are several Phosphite products available including […]
Beech leaf disease in RI
We are seeing a new disease of beech trees throughout Rhode Island – beech leaf disease (BLD). It’s caused by a foliar nematode and can kill American and European beech trees. The disease was first seen in Ohio in 2012 and quickly spread east. It was found in RI in 2020 in Ashaway. In 2020 […]
Twilight Meeting – in person!
Hi Fruit Growers, I’m sure you are all looking forward to the wind settling down. It’s been pretty crazy lately. I hope to see many of you at the in-person twilight meeting next Wednesday, May 18, at 5:30. The meeting is at Spencer Morris’s cider orchard at 71 Long Lane, Warren RI The UMass Fruit […]
Winter moth update April 16th
Winter moth update, April 16, 2022 Winter moth eggs finished hatching this past week. Now, and for the next week or two, is a good time to check your apple and blueberry buds for winter moth caterpillars. Caterpillar frass (insect poop) is much easier to find than actual caterpillars. I’ve seen one small apple orchard […]
Spring!
Spring is here ready or not! Some of the early varieties are showing green tissue, but McIntosh, the variety we use to measure how quickly the spring is approaching, is still at ‘silver tip’ bud stage. I expect McIntosh trees to reach ‘green tip’ within the week. McIntosh ‘green tip’ is when winter moth eggs […]
Winter moth update 3.18.22
Winter moth numbers had been decreasing for several years, but last year we saw a bit of an uptick in the population! According to the DEM June 2021 aerial survey, 150 acres were defoliated by winter moth caterpillars in 2021, and I saw many caterpillars causing damage to apple trees and blueberry bushes in southern […]
