Fruit Trees

I planted alot of fruit trees behind my house the first of February and they were doing great and blooming , then this cold snap hit and i covered them all yesterday afternoon and then removed the cover at 5:30 this morning . I hope they make it after all the freeze , i guess i will repeat the steps this afternoon as well . The trees are all about 4 feet tall and i sprayed the blooms with water before i covered them .

why did you spray the blooms with water right before a hard freeze?

Had heard if you have been in drought conditions its important to water them before covering , but i may have messed up by doing so ...dang if you do dang if you don't .

Whoops.

no chitt.

They talk about doing it to peach trees every time it freezes. Dont know if it helps though.

They do it in orange groves in Florida all the time. Keeps the plants closer to 32 with a hard freeze.

It only works if you keep spraying water and keep making ice, you cannot stop applying water until the the air temperature rises above freezing and the ice starts to melt. It's called the latent heat of fusion, when water is turned to ice it gives off energy in the form of heat, if you stop it too early you can you'll kill what your trying to save.

I had a little big of frost damage on the young tips of my satsumas, but I don't think it really hurt anything.

Mully has some tips on treating frost damage on the tips of satsumas. You might pm him.

Uh oh....what is the verdict?

No answer from the PM, the trees seem to be OK except for the tips of the new growth.

Yep...if the temp is going to be 19 or 20 degrees, encasing blooms/fruit in a coat of ice keeps it at around 32° and helps to minimize crop loss.

My trees are still going strong after the freeze