Acer, Sonds like you have learned some valuable lessons on freeze protection. Having gone through seven winters in my 6b/7a north GA zone, I've learned a few things myself. I have a small orchard and had only enough tarps for one tree, so I had to make a tough decision - who gets saved. I chose my Cox's Orange Pippin because after six years of growing, it finally put out a ton of blossoms. I looped together several small tarps to make one big enough to cover a ten foot high tree. Then I threw thick moving pads over the crown, actually one on the inside and one on the outside. I looped rope around the whole rig to tie it all down against the wind. I used woodworking spring clamps to close the gaps where the tarps were joined. I put a 600 watt double worklite laid on the ground and placed a digital max/min thermometer in the center of the crown on a branch and strung the probe out and attached to a pole about six feet off the ground. Results: 19 outside, 30 inside. I opened a flap during the day and the results: 45 outside, 71 inside, not to mention an intoxicating apple blossom smell when I got inside my little tent and stuck my head up in the canopy. My Spitzenberg suffered, along with the Gold Del, Gala, and Montmerency,s. But I've noticed the buds opening on the cherry and the Gala (which had flowered and petal-dropped), and they seem to be less damaged than I thought. We'll see. My pear grafting project remains to be determined, and my rasps suffered, but come hell or high water, I'm going to have some Pippin's this year! Herbert

lacanadagardener: If you knocked the soil off or otherwise disturbed the roots of a containerized tree that was in full growth, your tree is in a state of shock. Until they begin to grow in and accommodate themselves to their new situation, the roots are unable to supply moisture and nutrients to the tree. The very first thing you should have done was to remove all the fruit that may have been present on your transplanted tree -- and this is true for the others as well. You cannot expect a newly transplanted tree to seamlessly adapt to new conditions, even though it may have had fruit while still in the container. Why does a plum tree require a support stake? How tall is it, anyway? When a tree is transplanted in full growth mode, it is wise to prune it down by at least half at the time you plant it to lessen the stress of adapting to new soil conditions. No one can tell you if your plum tree will survive, but you can improve its chances by pruning it down now. It has to come alive this season, since trees cannot take a year off and come back the next. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

Lisa, Thinning refers to removing fruit, not pruning. It can be confusing because there is a term called, "thinning cuts", which refer to a type of pruning. However, when the word thinning is used in the context of fruit, it simply means removing some of the fruit and has nothing to do with pruning. Removing some of the fruit is beneficial because it allows the fruit remaining to become much bigger. It prevents broken branches because too many fruits will weigh branches down and break them. It also keeps trees healthier because it prevents over-cropping. So Jellyman was telling you to "thin-off" all the oozing peaches first (since they will be no good anyway). Then make sure there is a minimum of 6" or more of branch space between the remaining fruits. If there is not a minimum of 6-8" of branch space, then keep removing fruit until you've met that criteria. It's not unusual to remove 80% or more of the fruit from a peach tree. If you still have some good fruits left on the tree, it would be advisable to protect those with an insecticide. Triazicide Once and Done is a good choice and available at Walmart. You asked if it is OK to prune now. There may be no need to prune now, but if you feel a need, it is OK to prune now. Just understand when you prune off wood, you may be pruning off some fruit too. Naturally, any wood that is pruned, also removes the fruit attached to it. For leaf curl, you can spray either in the fall or spring (under heavy pressure) or just in the spring. For a fall spray, spray after the trees loose their leaves. Not every single leaf has to be gone, but the tree needs to be pretty bare when you spray it. Being a long way from MA, I have no idea what month this would occur. For the leaf curl spring spray, spray sometime before the buds start to swell. The idea is you want the peach trees still fully dormant when you apply the spring spray. Once the trees start waking up in the spring, it's too late to protect them against leaf curl. My guess is as soon as your winter snow melts would be a good time to get out there and spray for leaf curl. One side effect is your neighbors will think you're crazy spraying bare trees. For entertainment, you can encourage this perception by watering your trees while it's snowing. Do this while wearing a nightgown.

Hi kimmsr, I would say my soil does not hold moisture particularly well, even though we do amend it and add organic matter every year. On the other hand, it does appear to drain well. A 10"x10" hole I dug two days ago and filled with water was drained in less than 10 minutes.The native soil is clay. We live in a very dry climate east of San Diego, where we are lucky to see rain once during the summer. It did happen to rain just a few days ago, and I can already see that my entire garden loved it, including the squash, which as of today show 85% new growth. Yay! As for the pH, I have no idea. I thnk it's time to invest in a soil test kit. In addition to ants, I see some roly-polies, some white flies, an ocassional pincher bug, and some weird tiny blackish bugs that emerged from the base of one of my Black Krim tomato plants that I pulled yesterday as it was doing poorly. I know I will have to spray all the plants with Neem at the bases now as I am sure these little bugs must have moved on to all my healthy tomato roots. I also saw them on my peach tree. My garden also shows evidence of visiting spiders. I really do not like to spray my garden with anything, but Neem has been quite gentle and I do want a harvest! Yesterday I got brave and chopped off two long yellow stems from one of the squash plants. It meant sacrificing some new growth and one new baby squash but this is still a bit of an experiment, after all. I may trim again today and bury the end of one stem in the soil just to see what happens. The older squash is sort of a funny color, with yellowish tinge in spots instead of the overall nice deep tan color I am used to. I hope it still tastes good! :)