|
Northern Spy apples are poor pollinators of other varieties as well as impotent among themselves. These intimate relationships oblige new home owners to have an orchardist identify their mature fruit trees at the outset. In most communities, a county agriculture agent is at your service, free. He may find that an old Macintosh or Jonathan that used to pollinate your other apple trees has died or been cut down, and you need a new one. Your Bartlett and Seckel pears may be fruitless because they never did have a Gorham, Bosc, or other good pollinator to help them out. Two other causes of fruit trees failing to bear are effects of temperature and timing. If the thermometer drops to the lower twenties after blossoms open, expect no fruit. Contrariwise, without passing through at least 700 hours of weather colder than 450 F. in the course of a winter, hardy fruit trees will lack the stimulus to break out of dormancy. Their spring growth, blossoms, and fruit will be delayed and irregular. This accounts for northern fruits doing poorly below Mason and Dixon's line except at high elevations. Fine apples are grown around Winchester, Virginia, elev. 725 ft., but not around Annapolis, Maryland, at sea level. |
|||
|
