How to save peach blossoms from the freeze?

Do you spray water on them ?

-- Tony Smith (Info@tonysmithphotography.com), March 22, 2002

Answers

Tony, we live less than two miles from several peach orchards. They have been spraying water on them all evening. It's suppose to be down to 30* tonight with no wind blowing! I only have five young trees so we covered them with old quilts! We'll see if it helps or not!

-- Debbie T in N.C. (rdtyner@mindspring.com), March 22, 2002.

coating them with water is supposed to keep the buds from drying out (freeze drying process) and can be successful..I have done everything from coffee cans of charcoal briquets under the trees to covering them with sheets..a lot of hassel and not very effective(the sheets pulled off more buds than they saved)..done everything from spraying to coat with ice and rising before the sun to wash the frost off..Mother Nature always wins! Ah, but that tree ripe peach!!! I have never truely given up..even with bacterial wilt.....

-- Bee White (bee@hereintown.net), March 23, 2002.

Try heaping straw on the ground AFTER the ground freezes to keep the trees dormant just a little longer. Keep the straw away from the trunk to prevent problems with moisture. Knock on wood and HOPE!!!

-- Terri (hooperterri@prodigy.net), March 23, 2002.

Here in Oklahoma at the peach orchards they also spray water on the trees right at dusk/night. From what I understand the water freezes all around the buds and creates insulation keeping the buds from freeze drying.

-- r.h. in okla. (rhays@sstelco.com), March 23, 2002.

Terri, that mulch helps some unless you get those wonderful warm spells of 70 degrees for a few days!

Anyone else like the scene from "A Walk In The Clouds" when they were fanning the heat out to the grapes in the vineyard?

I agree about sheets taking buds off and generally being a nuisance on smaller trees. I have also tried an old parachute, which was ok.

Are you talking about a home orchard? You might try planting some pines nearby to cut wind or change the frost pattern. Plant on your land where observation shows the least frost occurs. Notice where the cooler air drops into and the flow of the cold spring winds.

-- Anne (HealthyTouch101@wildmail.com), March 23, 2002.

A few more tips to ponder, heat is light energy so dark or solid "fabrics" (or plastic) hold more heat than clear ones, if you must have fruit from that tree make a green house frame over it to support the covering used, add a heat source such as a high wattage light blub, up in the branches.

-- Thumper/inOKC (slrldr@yahoo.com), March 24, 2002.