The previous posting on weeds showed weeds blooming in Summer and Fall. This posting shows weeds blooming early in the year – March, April, and May.
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The June beetles (June bugs) arrived in late April this year. During the daytime they burrow down under ground and then come out at night to eat my pecan trees. As you can see in the following two pictures they tend to attack the top shoots of the pecan trees.
Last Fall after transplanting pecan trees from pots into the field, I sowed cereal rye around the trees. The following picture shows the rye at about five feet high and towering over the four foot high fence ring that surrounds the small tree. Those trees were not affected by the June beetles. I guess the beetles look for tall trees/plants to attack.
In May, 2015, the beetles did major damage to many of the young pecan trees that I had planted the previous Fall – they completely defoliated some of the small trees. Those trees did survive and grew back leaves but their growth has been slow. Trying to prune the affected trees to a central leader in 2015 was practically impossible. But, in 2016, there was very minor damage by the June bugs. This year they are back and attacking pecan trees. This on year/off year cycle fits the pattern noted by some writers. One interesting item to note is that in May, 2016, that same field had thousands of fire flies at night and there were some dead beetle shells seen in the daytime. The weather has been cooler this year and when the temperature is 50 degrees or below the fire files do not fly around at night.
One method I am considering to combat the beetles involves useing ducks and lights. By placing a light out in the field at night with a pool of water under it and some ducks near by, the beetles might come to the light and fall down into the water to make soup for the ducks. But, it would be necessary to prevent the owls and critters from crashing the party. Although chickens go to bed a sundown, ducks can party all night long.
In May, 2016, I attempted to graft pecan scion wood onto pecan seedlings using various grafting methods. In the following picture the failed arrowhead graft is enclosed in green grafting tape – note that a limb on the left side of the stock below the graft has grown about five feet high since the graft attempt.
The following two pictures show the back with the staples and front of the failed graft after it was cut off. One flaw noted in the second picture is that the scion wood does not sit down snug to the stock.
The following picture show an arrowhead graft that started growing and then broke off. Although it was tied up to a supporting stake, apparently a bird landed on the top and broke out the graft union.
The following three pictures show a successful arrowhead graft with the bamboo support pole beside it. Note that the wood has callused completely over the staples and is starting to cover the top of the cut off stock.
The following two pictures show a successful 3-flap graft. Note that the diameter at the graft union is larger than the stock.
The following two pictures show another successful 3-flap graft. The top of the scion wood was cut off to promote healing. Note how large that the graft union and the short piece of scion wood below the cut off have grown. You can see the new growth from the scion that starts on the right side of the scion. It grew about four feet high during last Summer.
The following picture shows a failed bark graft.
The following two pictures show a successful bark graft. Again, the callus growth covers the staples and is starting to cover the top of the stock.
In the following picture the bark graft has only started to callus over. There is green wood in the tiny piece of scion, but, the future does not look good.
After one of the bark grafts failed as shown in the following picture a limb grew out of the stock underneath the graft location. Note how it first grew down and then curved upwards. Although it grew about four feet high, I wonder what I should do with it.
There is one group of easter flowers that always bloom a week or two before the others. This year the first blooms came out on February 28, 2017, as the following photo shows. Although I thought that was early, I found a picture of the same flowers from last year that was dated March 7, 2016.
And, as the following photo shows the elderberries are also leafing out.
What is your definition of a weed?
Are weeds still weeds when they are such a beautiful part of this world?
Joseph A Cocoannoeur thought there was a place in agriculture for weeds when he published a book in 1950 with the title:
Weeds: Guardians of the Soil
When I am out walking around the fields, I am frequently amazed at the beauty of the various “weeds”. The pictures below were taken last Summer and Fall and show plants (usually two pictures of each variety) that you can have fun trying to identify. I don’t think any are noxious in the county where the property is located. Although they spread from year to year, most are not aggressive “Rule The World” types.
Can you name the “weeds”? Both common & Latin names?
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All the normal maintenance tasks listed in the 2015 year in review posting continued through this year. Again this year I sprouted some some pecan seed nuts and Chinese chestnut seed nuts and grew them in pots. In November I transferred the potted trees to a straw bale fort and covered them with mulch to protect them during the cold winter months.
During October and November I planted 54 more trees from pots into the fields as follows:
– 12 grafted kanza pecan
– 6 grafted major pecan
– 25 seedling pecan
– 6 seedling shellbark hictory
– 2 grafted homewood Chinese chestnut
– 1 grafted gideon Chinese chestnut
– 1 grafted sauber black walnut
– 1 grafted sparrow black walnut
I am interested in growing cover crops to protect the soil. So, in August, September, and October I sowed mixes of the following seeds in various fields to study how they grow in different soils with different sowing methods and at different sowing dates.
– daikon radish
– cereal rye
– radish
– sudangrass
– winter peas
– hairy vetch
– triticale
Over the next few years I need to decide what vegetation under the trees will facilitate harvesting. Also, I hope to get rid of the fescue grass that robs the soil of moisture.
These last four years have gone by quite fast. But, I am still in the beginning stages of establishing a nut tree farm. There remains lots of work and lots of learning for future years.
I sowed about one acre of Daikon radish in August this past Fall as a test. The literature reports that Daikon radish grows roots down to three or more feet. And, when the the roots die they leave behind pathways for air and water to percolate down to the root zone.
Here is a picture of a radish a few days after the temperature dipped below zero on a couple of days. The low temperature has killed the green leaves and froze the watery root/bulb that is above ground.
The above radish is protected by a fence ring that surrounds a tree. Although the deer and other creatures chomped down on many of the radish bulbs outside the fence rings, they did leave a few behind as in this picture.
So, for the next few weeks or longer the aroma of rotting radish will pervade that one field.
And, here is a picture of my first attempt at making a Swedish candle.
During September I harvested eight paw paw fruit from the trees that grow along the creek bank. There are hundreds of trees ranging from a few feet tall to 25 feet tall growing under the canopy of the taller trees on the creek bank. There were lots of blooms this Spring but only a few fruit developed.
The paw paw has very large leaves similar to tropical trees.
Here is a picture of one of the fruit.
And, here is a picture of the same fruit cut open to reveal rows of seed in each half. I collected 12 seeds from this fruit. The edible part is the yellow pulp.
Here is a picture of the “paw-paw patch”.
Harvest of my first ever crop of Chinese chestnuts started about the middle of September and went through the first week of October. The trees were transplanted into the field in October, 2012, from pots. The 19 trees had about 30 burrs total which produced over 60 filled nuts and a number of blank empty nut shells.
Not all trees planted that year had burrs. The count of burrs by variety of tree is: three of three homestead trees had burrs, one of three peach trees, two of three eaton trees, one of three quing trees, and one of six seedling trees. And although the burrs have three nuts each, usually one nut is a flat shell with no nutmeat inside it. The first trees to drop nuts from the burrs were eaton. The homestead and seedling burrs were last to drop their nuts.
In the following picture you can see one burr near the top of the tree that has started to open up.
The following picture shows a burr still on the tree that has started to split apart but with the nuts still inside it.
Voilà, some nuts have dropped out of the burrs onto the ground.
And this picture shows some fully developed nuts on the left and empty blanks to the right.
After the nuts drop out the burrs will eventually fall to the ground and turn brown. Note – those needle stickers are very sharp.
And here is a close up of another burr where the middle and right side nuts filled out but a the left side is an empty blank.
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One way to cook the nuts is to bake them in a 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes. BUT, first the brown shell of each nut must be scored with a knife. The nuts will explode like popcorn if not scored. Here are some nuts that have been scored in preparation for baking.
And in the next picture you can see the nuts after baking in the oven. The thin shells have opened up along the score lines and reveal the yellow tinged nutmeat. Each nut has a thin gauze like substance between the shell and the nutmeat.
The next picture was taken after a two-legged mouse sampled the product.
