How did I miss this post.... Winners: Red Haven Peach - Still my favorite peach so far Muscadine grapes (All of them) Blueberries (All of them) Violette de Bordeaux fig (Always delicious).. but it dies back to the ground each year.... Black mission fig (Always delicious) American plum (Magically delicious jelly) Yates apple Horse apple Loosers: Brambles - Bitter.... All of them (Black, Rasps, Boysens, etc..) 2013 is going to be their make or break year.... Sugar queen peach - Worthless rotten ball of bugs.... Dug it up. Esophaus Spitzenberg apple - Fireblight destroyed it. Still on the bubble: Rebecca's gold Pawpaw - 3 years old and 12" tall... It's going to go away next year if it doesn't kick into grow... Pakistan mulberry - This is going to be it's last year if they don't taste better.... Concord grapes - I think it's too hot. Don't get reliable ripening. Fuzzy kiwis - 3 years old and no flowers... Roadside dug up peach - Small, green, and very bitter/inedible fresh till it's fully 100% ripe... but bugs and rot don't bother it... Ripe flavor is getting better every year.... "Elberta" peach - I don't think it's actually an Elberta... No fruit this year. Methley Plum - Reliable, but I'm not real enamored on it's flavor... I classify this plum in the "A bird in the hand" category so to speak... Italian prune - Too hot in full sun. Transplanted to the shade and it seems to be recovering. 2013 is it's make it or break it year... LSU purple fig - tastes "Grassy" until LATE in the season, then it's barely on par with all the other marginal figs... I don't like it - except that the kids like eating fresh figs off the tree early - and this gives them some fruit.... Thanks

Hi all Interesting thread. Nothing brings out more discussion than the subject of the weather. Having lived in Alberta and mainly northwestern Alberta most of my life makes me think of some of the coldest weather that I have experienced. One of the coldest winters I can remember is the winter of 1968-1969. It was about plus 7 or 8 degrees C on December 30 or 31 and raining. By midnight the temperature had dropped to -10C and by morning the temperature was about -30C. By mid week it was down to -40C at night and would warm to -30 during the day. It stayed like this for the next 6 weeks. The coldest day that I remember was in 1964 when it was about -35C with a 30 mph wind. I remember helping dad feed cows and picked a woodpecker off the slab fence. He was digging grubs out of the bark on the slabs and was so cold and hungry that he didn't fly away. I think the temperature has definitely warmed since those days and we are getting far less snow. I hav noticed that the amount and severity of the winter storms is less than it used to be. Being a snow plow operator it seems that we don't even get as many storms during the winter and we are getting more freezing rain than we used to. Some winters we don't even get any snow. I find that plants that go into the winter with a early snow on them (the more the better) seem to winter better than those that just freeze in before the snow comes. The snow tends to insulate the plants and sometimes the ground freezes very little if there is lots of snow. I think that when there is no snow and if there is lots of moisture in the ground the action of the frost lifts the crown of the plant and breaks it. Also freeze thaw cycles in the spring can be deadly to plants, as a warm spell will start them growing and then a cold snap hits them and either sets them back or kills them. I lost a Morden rose this way this spring. It started to grow and then in early May the temp dropped to -6C which killed it. All my other ones were fine and the only thing that I could find wrong with this one was that it was in a area that gets more wind and some of the soil around the base had blown away and the roots were exposed. Anyway this is my addition to the cold temperature thread. Cheers Al

A tree that is ringed (or girdled) is going to die. Nutrients go up the core to the leaves and travel down the bark to the roots. I ringed an annoying big poplar 3 years ago and the silly thing is still alive but it will die. Get new trees.

A mulberry that didn't survive? Wow. Was it a red one? Those are naturalized here. Are there mulberries in wild areas or neighbors' yards around you? Maybe you have a microclimate that's unfavorable, or perhaps you just had a dud. As for the blueberries, do you find you need to acidify the soil every year, or just upon the initial planting? I'm considering planting them near a cedar tree, hoping the droppings will provide some acidification, though I'm not entirely confident about the science of that. I know pine acidifies- not sure about cedars, though they seem they should. Theresa 2, can you remind us what dioecious means? Athenainwi- what variety of plum do you have that you have to bag? I was hoping for something a bit more self-sufficient, but still reasonably edible. Found it interesting that you use nylons. I wonder if cotton or muslin would work too. It's popular to use plastic bags, which doesn't at all appeal to me at all, for several reasons.