Permsteading.com

We too had the apple trees bud out way too early last year. After the blossom we has 3 frosts and a snow. Surprisingly I still got apples last year. I think the trees had enough time to set the fruit before the frosts and the snow. I was truly shocked that we got any apples, nature is an amazing thing. I always mulch very heavy around the apple trees in fall with leaves. I read some place years ago [ It might have been in Organic Gardening Magazine ] that a thick layer of mulch around the fruit trees out to the drip line can delay the bud swell and blossom by as much as a week. Around here that can literally be the difference between apples and no apples.

Pleased to meet you, Myrth! What part of the Mid-west do you call home?

Re: planting potatoes in March .... I did that two years in a row. The first year, the local deer population thought I left them a smorgasbord so I got very little return for my effort. The next year I mulched the hills with straw and laid a strip of chicken wire over the top to hold the straw in place and discourage random feeders. The crop was good that year.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,interesting idea Lolly, I have a fence around the garden that discourages the deer, but I have some plantings that I have started out side the fence, gooseberries and black berries that have seen some deer damage. I never thought of laying wire fence down on the ground to discourage them from stepping foot into the area. That is interesting.

I was thinking more about that mouthful of wire as a discouragement. I did have to pull some potatoes off the wire, but most of them did grow nicely underneath that bit of protection. I used some small limbs to pin the wire into place, whether I needed them or not! I will use the straw mulch method again this year. The one time I did use it my yield was three times (or more) what I've gotten any year the potatoes were just buried in dirt.

G'day Myrth - I'd love to hear some more about your place too.