Buzz....A Busy Bee

       Did you know all of those beautiful blossoms you see in early spring will turn into delicious fruit later on?  I guess we all learned this at some point during our education, but maybe never really thought about it since.

        All the blossoms that seem to popping up everywhere this time of year are just simply a blossom unless a bee comes along to pollinate the flower and turn it into something extraordinary.

       This morning these tiny little bees where busy turning tiny little white flowers into juicy delicious strawberries to be enjoyed in a little over a month. 



      You can see a bloom in waiting right next to a flower that is spent and beginning its transformation into a strawberry.  Funny how it already starts resembling a strawberry.  The center light green area will keep growing and changing until a red strawberry appears.  

    Next let's take a look at a peach blossom.  A few short weeks ago my two young peach trees were covered in pink blossoms.  You can see the faded blooms in the picture above.  Thankfully the cold snap we had back then didn't stop the bees from doing their job.

        The late frost did cause some of them to drop off, but that is ok.  Last year we had to pick some of the undeveloped peaches off.  As they were growing it put too much stress on the tree.  The leaves were turning yellow and beginning to drop.  All of the tree's nutrients were going to the fruit instead nurturing the tree itself.    I imagine we will have to do some selective plucking again this year. 





       The young peach will continue to grow out from the center of the blossom until the dried brown blossom falls off revealing the smallest peach.  Peaches will continue to grow and grow until they ripen in August.  

      Side note: Peach blossoms only develop on new growth.  So if you prune a tree too heavily in the spring you might not get any blossoms.  Often times peach trees are pruned in the fall to prevent this.

       Then there is the apple tree.  This is the first year we have had blossoms on our two young trees.  We can't wait to taste their delicious fruit in September.    
        Side note: Apple blossoms only appear on old wood, which is why it took the apple tree one more year than the peach tree to have fruit.  These  branches are two years old.  Also this means your blossoms will be concentrated in the center of a young tree. 

        Raspberries are a little different than fruit trees.  This cluster you see is all new growth this year.  The new growth will spend all year growing and not produce any berries. 

        This stem on the other hand grew last year.  Therefore it's stem looks more wood like instead of soft and green.  It will produce berries this year.

       If you look closely at it you can see the berries already beginning to develop in the center.  Raspberry bushes don't blossom in the spring.  The seed clusters appear as the leaves unfold.  Then sadly next year this shoot will be dead. 
       To keep the raspberry bed from getting too full of briars I trimmed out all the dead stocks yesterday with a good pair of leather gloves. 

       After three short years our orchard is coming along nicely.   With continued care they will produce abundant fruit in the years to come.  
       Along the way we did learn a few things.  Our orchard is in a slight low spot, which means we have to find a new place to grow a cherry tree.  They don't like wet feet.   The only reason it lived the first year was because we were in the middle of a drought.