SMALL FRUITS & FRUIT TREES

Spring is the best time to prune your fruit trees, grapes, raspberries and blackberries! It is also the best time to plant small fruits and fruit trees!

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IN STOCK AT VINEYARD GARDENS:

• Bare root strawberries just came in

• Strawberries

• Raspberries & golden raspberries

• Blackberries

• Blueberries

• Fruit trees (many kinds)

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STRAWBERRIES

Spring is the season to plant strawberries. There is a small window of time to plant them, especially bare root ones. Strawberries can be grown in garden beds, containers or hanging baskets. Strawberry flowers attract honeybees and butterflies who pollinate the flowers and ensure fruiting success. This year we are carrying 4 potted varieties, 3 bare root varieties plus the alpine strawberries Fragaria vesca.

• Our bare root strawberries just came in yesterday! The bare root varieties are Sure Crop, Cardinal and Ozark Beauty. Sure Crop and Cardinal are June bearing and Ozark Beauty variety is an Everbearing.

  Planting Bare Root Strawberries

  • Bare root strawberries come in bundles of 15.

  • Gently pull them apart, pulling on the foliage to separate them

  • Then plant them into rich well drained soil and watch them grow

• The 3” potted strawberries we have are the June bearing Honeoye variety and for the everbearing strawberries we have the All Star, Ft. Laramie and Quinalt varieties. Honeoye bears heavy yields of large fruit with a rich color.

  Growing Strawberries

  • Provide well drained soil with medium moisture. Amend beds in spring and fall with quality Coast of Maine Lobster Compost or Fafard Premium Compost (we carry both!).

  • Strawberries are heavy feeders- feed with organic fertilizer from spring to mid summer.

  • Mulch beds to retain moisture, keep down the weeds and to create a nice clean place for the strawberry fruits to lay on.

  • Thin beds every few years, favoring the strongest runners.

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BLUEBERRIES

We have a wonderful selection of early, mid season and late variety Blueberries. Now is the time to get them in the ground!

• This year, for the first time ever, we brought in some bare root blueberries. We have 2 cultivars available bare root, Jersey and Northland.

• For blueberries, we recommend planting an early bearing variety, a mid season variety and a late season variety to extend your blueberry picking season.

  Blueberries must be planted in early spring!!

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GRAPES, PEACHES & FRUIT TREES

• GRAPES: Grapes should be pruned as soon as possible on cool days. If pruned much later they will “bleed” sap, much like a maple tree when its tapped for making maple syrup. Pruning for grapes and most fruit trees involves limiting the number of fruits produced as the tree or vine will try to make many more fruits than the tree has the energy to fully mature. Often excess fruits will fall off and the ones remaining may be smaller than on a tree properly pruned. This is also the best time to plant grapes!

• PEACHES: One of the most important sprays for peaches is a lime sulfur mixture to prevent peach leaf curl, a very common disease of peaches. As the name describes, the leaves turn red, bumpy, curl up and then most of the leaves fall off weakening the tree just when it needs the most energy to produce fruit. This is an organic spray and should be done before the leaves begin to emerge.

• FRUIT TREES: We carry apple, pear, cherry, peach and plum trees .Spring is the great time to plant them!

  • Pruning apple trees: When you are done pruning an apple tree there is usually more on the ground then left on the tree.