His apple book was excellent.

Amazon has his new book:
http://www.amazon.com/Holistic-Orchard-Fruits-Berries-Biological/dp/1933392134/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325550082&sr=8-1

Thanks for the heads up!

Yea, I can't wait to get the book. I'll be sure to get it signed by the author when he comes to the Midwest Organic Farming Conference in Lacrosse, WI this feb. He's doing 2-3 workshops there!

Has anyone looked at this new book yet?

The Fruit Gardener's Bible: A Complete Guide to Growing Fruits and Nuts in the Home Garden
Lewis Hill and Dr. Leonard Perry

It was published in November but I just got an amazon.com notice about it this week.

Anyone have it? Thoughts?

Here is a link that might be useful: The Fruit Gardener's Bible

Bart-

I got that book for Christmas. I've skimmed it a few times. Really nice pictures, but really nothing new to me. Its like a hot girl with no brains :)

Forager-
I've got to attend this year. Do you know if they have any scion available there?

I just got my copy from Amazon today. I plan to start reading it tonight. It is a substantial book and looks like it has the makings of being the best thing out there for the beginning fruit grower who does not desire to use synthetic chemicals.

Frank,

There will be an informal scion swap after the Organic Fruit Tree Assoc. meeting on Sat. Feb. 24th at 5:30pm. I checked the newsletter and they will have Michael Phillips new book at the meeting for sale and he will be there to sign copies. Hope you're going to bring some wood to swap! I'll bring some stuff too. The swap seems to be gathering more steam every year. This should be a good one!

Hope to see you there,
Little John

I am reading the first part of the book now, it contains a great summary of the permaculture/deep organic/holistic/whateveryouwanttocallit philosophy of growing fruit. Unfortunately there have been few scientific studies of this stuff and while some of the ideas have been tested, others seem quite speculative. The bottom line is pretty clear however: we need to think about trees as more than N/P/K/sun/water sinks -- get deeper into the biological processes that make trees healthy, and feed that process.

Scott

oh Scott, I wish there was a "like" button to click on comments here.

We also need someone who writes as well as Michael Philips with a more hardened hands-on and practical viewpoint, IMO. I know this is just opinion, believe me, but Michael is more a book writer than food producer at this point and he seemed to idealize his own operation in his first book (perhaps at the behest of the publisher).

We need true believers and they can be a great source of inspiration, but the food production sustainability movement will have to deal with the realities of feeding the billions in as efficient a manner as possible. The constant (liberal?) media embrace of equating organic with sustainability is naive and dangerous and M P is one of the voices that strongly pushes this propaganda, IMO.

Hman, I agree that there is too much idealism in the book at the expense of practical advice, but thats pretty much the way every fruit book is today. On the plus side he does raise many points that other fruit books don't even mention, for example he goes in depth on the problems squirrels can cause and discusses solutions to that.

My main concern is that novices, especially people in the lower east and midwest where the pest pressure is much higher than where Michael is, will use the methods of the book and be sorely disappointed when things prove so difficult. My biggest negative so far is the section on nectarines where he claims that they will be no problem to grow with his methods; then to add insult to injury all the pictures are of perfect but completely non-organic fruit.

Scott

Scott,

I had the same reaction regarding nectarines: He's got to be kidding!

I don't think nectarines are possible where he is- isn't he in a Z4? He doesn't even have plum curculio in his roster of insect villains up there, by his own admission.

Most garden writers have to spend much more time writing and promoting themselves and their books than actually gardening.

Even before Michael's first book he only could tend his trees on weekends. I wonder how his time is divided up now. I'm not intending to disrespect him- as I've said here before, his first book is, by far, the best on organic fruit growing I've ever read.

Does he have anything new to say about squirrels?

There is nothing new on squirrels but he does mention havahart, Kania, and bonbon methods which is more than any other orchard book.

I think he may be trying some hardy peaches now but not nectarines. In the interests of full disclosure I should mention that I helped him a bit with the variety selection of peaches in the book. I did try to point out the problems with some of his picks such as nectarines so I am personally a bit frustrated about what he put in there. I think he does have curculio in his plums at least, there is a mention in the book about how Surround has allowed him to keep them at bay and finally get a good plum crop.

On the plus side, the descriptions of soil structure and the use of mulch and cover crops to maintain that structure has some great stuff in it, he is at the leading edge of adapting ideas of deep organic etc movements from other crops to fruit trees. The part I am reading now talks about how grasses put out more CO2 which the tree roots don't like and it drives them lower and into less high quality soil. Plus many other such topics. I am less sold on his use of neem, EM, and other "holistic sprays", I'm not sure they will help enough in my more-pest-ridden climate, but I am going to continue to experiment with some of these ideas.

Scott

Methods are either research based or not- if he's promoting methods not research based with the same confidence as those supported by research, he may have made a step backwards from his first book. Especially if it isn't even based on a lot of direct experience and comparison. But then, I really should read the book before I criticize it.

In his first book he specifically stated that plum curculio was not present in his orchard because of the short season- he had another, less destructive weevil, apple curculio as I recall.

Hman, I'm going to join you in bashing him. I noticed that he quotes someone in the nectarine section about "the fuzz is your friend.." -- basically he is quoting someone about how fuzz makes peaches easier to grow than nectarines -- and he proceeds to make fun of this view, in spite of having no experience whatsoever with nectarines himself. The remark "fuzz is your friend" seemed familiar, and it turns out he was quoting my words there (see the link below which has my original quote in it) - ! Anyone who has grown peaches and nectarines knows that cracking, cat facing, curculio, OFM, rots, and peach scab are all generally much more challenging on nectarines. Sure, its possible to do and I have half a dozen nectarine varieties, but they are not easy at all. In general he seems completely oblivious to the fact that some fruit trees just don't like certain climates and may just be best avoided there (other than for cold hardiness and chill issues which he does address). Instead, he has a delusion that any obstacle can be surmounted with enough herbal teas, Effective Microbes, etc. If there were a single example of anyone having success with nectarines in a hot and humid climate with such techniques I would be more convinced, but I have never heard of any.

Scott

Here is a link that might be useful: The fuzz *is* your friend - !

Scott, welcome to show business.

Scott:

I have no doubt you could write a better book for eastern growers than Phillips. Get some input from a few others here and it would be a lot better.

Scott does get input from others, as I'm sure you know and just mean that he should use that access in the hypothetical book.

I've never found a book about home orcharding that was any where near adequately researched. Some writers, like Lewis Hill, rely mostly on their own limited experience (at least in his previous books) and some like Lee Reich rely mostly on interpreting research made for commercial fruit production(he does grow a bit of fruit). Stella Otto is a green market grower which gives her writing a certain level of legitimate practicality but it is still different than home orcharding and her experience is regionally limited.

I've not seen any book that used the kind of information base that is supplied on this site. Why none of these people participate here is a mystery to me. Michael Phillips has participated briefly on the Nafex lists site and Lee Reich used to regularly, but never here. A year and a half ago when I met with Lee on a site I manage he was extremely surprised that I thinned the plums- he'd never heard of such a thing.

I'd try to write a book if I had the time, but the pay is probably better doing what I'm doing and the pay is right there. Unless you are Michael Poulen, it's pretty hard to make a living writing garden books- but then his books aren't how-to's.

I agree that Scott could probably write a great book on the subject- he's definitely got the chops and projects a very likeable personality. He could be our star.

If he doesn't do it maybe I will when my body is too tired and broken to tend the trees anymore. Might be too late by then, though- my mind may be going quicker than my body.

Thanks guys. I vaguely thought about writing a book once, but I don't have the time or the breadth of knowledge to do it on my own. One idea I have in the back of my head is to do a "community book" where several people are involved. This is not like the wikipedia model, its like the Linux model -- I am in the computer field and many projects such as the Linux OS are authored by communities. Unlike the Wikipedia model there is some official division of who is leading what parts etc. Linux is now running about half of the commercial web servers in the country, so it can't be all that bad of an approach :-) In this book we could have fruitnut in charge of greenhouse and potted growing, harvestman in charge of pruning and conventional spray regimens, etc -- would that rock or what?

Getting back to the book at hand, I have been looking into his holistic foliar spray ideas more and some of his points there are good ones. For those of you not having read the book, the idea is sprays that improve health and include seaweed, neem, and various herbal sprays plus this mix of microbes you can buy called "Effective Microbes". I have been using seaweed pretty regularly, and there is good evidence that it helps, but I am less sure about the other things. I have used raw neem in the past but have not noticed much effect, but I did not do an extensive spray program of it in any season. While it is clear that neem has positive effect on many things, I am doubtful it has enough "oomph" for more serious diseases/bugs in a hot and humid climate. The use of EM on fruit trees seems to be his idea and there has been no study of it. In fact the only US study of EM of any kind that I could find, on spinach, showed it had no effect at all. So I am somewhat doubtful of that.

Scott the chemical-based fruit advisor (Michael says it so its got to be true, right?)

At a NAFEX meeting in NH several years back I attended an Alex Shigo lecture in which Michael performed a starry eyed and worshipful intro for Shigo. Shigo proceeded to demonstrate that he'd either become slightly unhinged or he performed all his great research and came up with so much important information about trees while under the lunar influence.

I've forgotten most of his outrageous assertions besides him saying that providing additional N. to fruit trees leads to their premature death. He went on and on about what was wrong with conventional fruit production without demonstrating an iota of actual knowledge on the subject. I already knew he was a true believer- in himself- as in all his books he only referred to his own research which was actually surprisingly limited as far as breadth of species amongst other things- but it was all he was interested in. In spite of this (or maybe inspired by this) his contributions to how we understand compartmentalization of wounds in trees is huge.

My only point is that Michael seemed utterly enthralled with this man and from what you are telling us he's living in a bit of a faith based reality himself. Seems like there's a connection here.

On another note, a joint effort for a book on home orcharding might be a good idea, but I think there might need to be someone central to managing the whole. Anyway, I'm open to the discussion via e-mail.

Scott-

Skip the book and do videos on Youtube. I really like what the peach guy in South Carolina (Desmond Layne) does on his weekly videos. That would be so simple to do today. Most digital cameras have either 720P or 1080P high def video option. We have a Canon hiDef camcorder and the video it makes look better then what I watch on TV. Hardest part is finding the time.

I'm happy following the advice on the Dave Wilson Nursery, Four Winds Growers and UC Davis California Backyard Orchard sites. This holistic book would be good for the sake of just having something new to read, likewise what this forum is good for. Similarly I wouldn't change how I currently do things based on either source. Hopefully this book will be available soon for Kindle.

An Open Source book written by the members of this forum would be an interesting read as well. You could start by just writing some FAQs. I must say that the thought of having this group come together in agreement on any number of subjects would be very compelling. :)

You more experience fruit folk seem to find good & bad in most orchard books.
I for one love Lewis Hill,Margaret Tipton Wheatly & Ortho books Fruit & Berries.
But you have done more in the orchard in the last 12 months, then I have in my whole life.
Please let us know when you write a book, until then what is the best fruit book out there?

I just got a nice note from Michael apologizing for any unintended remarks, it sounds like he may have gotten his notes mixed up. Whether you like his views or not, my longstanding opinion that he is a very decent guy has been fully resurrected.

Scott

I think the response to this book has been a bit unbalanced in a negative direction. The book is rather optimistic about the possibility of growing fruit without sprays for insect and fungus pests, especially for those of us in the mid-Atlantic states, and at times espouses as truth views popular in the permaculture community but that have not, as far as I know, been experimentally verified. On the other hand, from what I've read (I'm half way through), the book also contains a lot of valuable, detailed and interesting information that you will not find together in other books on a range of topics including the soil-food web, planting, pruning, selection of fruit, and so on. Here's a plan: get the book and then follow up on Garden Web with searches to get some alternative wisdom on some of the more contentious parts of the book. Those in the mid-Atlantic might find the posts by Scott Smith, Harvestman and Jellyman (who alas is no longer posting), particularly helpful (I apologize if I've left anyone else out here, but these are the three posters I've found the most helpful for my conditions here in Maryland).

austran:

Is he really saying you can grow fruit in mid Atlantic without spraying? Not even organic sprays? Does this include stone fruit?

I don't know this guy and haven't seen the book. But to believe what he's selling I'd like pictures of the fruit he's grown and an objective measure of eating quality like brix.

I'm suspicious of anyone selling me something, and he is selling a book. Why doesn't he post here?

I would not say that he is claiming you don't have to spray, but there is the clear suggestion that if one follows 'holistic' orchard practices, the spray regimen for pests can be drastically reduced and needed only in times of exceptional pest pressure. The problem us folks in MD have is that all times are times of exceptional pest pressure. So I think that the book will give the newbie a very inaccurate impression of just what organic fruit growing in the mid-Atlantic involves. (And even organic fruit growing here with sprays for pests and disease is a major hurdle. I have basically given up on it for stone fruit and now use some synthetic chemical sprays on them.)

I should note that despite the idea of taking into account the broader ecology of the orchard, there is a lot of talk of spraying beneficial concoctions to assist these natural processes and improve pest resistance, plant health etc.

austransplant:

Thanks for the quick balanced response. I hope the book proves helpful.

In Michael's first book he pretty much stuck to proven methods. Are the ideas in his new book for the most part devoid of any scientific analysis as far as doing controlled studies? Is it more religious than scientific, in other words?

Scott, you mentioned sea weed extract and studies that verified its usefulness. Could you direct me to them? I was under the impression that beyond the known nutrients in seaweed no special results come from application.

Hman, one seaweed study I found is below - it is a study on pears. I have also seen many studies that show neem as at least some effect, but the oomph factor is always on the low side.

For the Effective Microorganisms, it is well-known that having other microbes on the leaf surface will give the bad guys more competition and lessen disease impact -- thats the simple idea behind EM and it makes total sense. What has not been studied much is whether spraying on more microbes will appreciably help tip the balance. I spent a lot of money and time dipping my fruit tree starts in mycorrhizal fungi, but proceeded to not notice much difference and subsequently learned that most of those microbes are already in the soil. So for that reason I am somewhat skeptical of the impact of EM sprays.

I just did some Googling and there are more studies out there than I had found last time I looked - I think I used wrong keywords last time. Here is a study which shows that both foliar and root applications of EM helped persimmons. This study was done in Egypt; in general nearly all of the EM activity is outside of the US. Hey here is another positive study, on roses from Poland: study. This latter one looks to have somewhat better methodology than the Egyptian one. Another one from Laos: study -- there is only a brief summary and apparently some EM formulations helped and some hurt tropical fruit trees. Here is a negative study on Taiwan cherry seedlings (whatever that is). Here is a study from Austria which shows EM had significant positive effects on apple tree growth as well as decreasing scab incidence -- see Figure 1 for the scab data. Here is an interesting pro/con viewpoint.

Overall I have to say the pro-EM case looks stronger to me after having read these studies, I may give it a try this year. It is far from conclusive but there is a glimmer of some pretty good stuff.

Scott

Here is a link that might be useful: pear seaweed study

Addendum: I looked again and found a recent study (below) with significantly better methodology than the above. It is also published in a leading journal which cannot be said for the above papers. This study was not for fruit trees but they carefully tried many variations such as sterilizing the EM vs not (sterilization should inactivate it so if EM is really working the results should be worse with sterilization). The results show that sterilization has no effect, which is pretty damning evidence against. They also show that the EM+bokashi version, this is EM plus molasses or similar to make a living compost, did have some positive effect which they attribute to it basically acting like a compost spray.

So, it seems like this paper is stating that the effect of EM is about the same as a compost tea if you do the brewing with molasses step which is a positive effect, but you could spare the $$ on buying the EM and just make your own compost spray.

All clear as mud, eh? In such cases where there is a product that people are making $$ on that is proprietary, as is the case with EM, my default position is to be skeptical. It does also seem to be further evidence on the positive effects of nutrient sprays like seaweed, compost tea, etc, not for the living organisms in the sprays themselves but for the nutrients they supply to the tree and to the microorganisms already on the leaves and in the soil.

Scott

Here is a link that might be useful: four-year study

I would like to add to the chorus of people seconding the idea that it would be great if Scott put his hard-won knowledge on fruit-growing in the mid-Atlantic region into some kind of printed form! People want to know what works here and now.

I am so grateful to have found the Fruits and Orchards forum before making any big decisions about what to plant in my backyard in Maryland. This format is great for getting questions answered and finding out about great new cultivars . . . however some kind of organized format would be awesome.