No one doubts this winter has brought significantly lower temperatures than usual.
Will this be a year without peaches, grapes and blackberries? There are many factors to consider.
• Variety: Not just the type of fruit, as in peaches vs. berries, but the variety of each fruit a grower is concerned with.
Among grapes, for example, the imported French varieties are generally not as hardy as the natives such as Concord or Niagara. Grape damage may therefore vary widely, and some will have a little damage, but still produce a crop.
Wine vintners may have a less productive year. Wine prices should be interesting to watch because the California drought has altered expectations from producers in the Napa Valley area.
Blackberries may survive the winter, but the new growth on which the berries are produced may collapse early in the season. Thornless blackberry cultivars expected to have good winter hardiness include Arapaho, Chester and Dirksen. Peach varieties
Reliance and Belle of Georgia are listed as very hardy. A Purdue Plant and Pest Diagnostic Laboratory paper says you start to see some bud kill on peaches at 10 degrees below zero; for every degree below that, 10 percent more buds are killed. At 20 degrees below zero or lower, there is complete mortality. Temperatures in this area have been as low as -15, so no doubt the peach crop will suffer.
• Microclimate: Even within the same plot of ground or geographic area, temperatures and growing conditions may vary greatly. Most gardeners have learned that what will grow in one spot in their yard or garden may not grow in another. The site of the planting may well make a difference in whether some or all of a crop will be lost.
A few years ago, the peach crop was fatally damaged by late spring frosts. In that year, few orchards had peaches for sale, but one local orchard had many. The growers attributed the crop to the location of the orchard (hilltop rather than valley). Frost and freezing air temperatures are different, so that may make a difference this year.
• Duration: Hardiness varies from fruit to fruit, but in general subzero temperatures need to be in place for several hours to cause bud damage.
On days when the temperature struggled to return to zero, damage would have been at its worst. Weather Underground reports no days in 2014 when the temperature has been below zero for 24 hours.
We actually can’t tell until the growing season begins whether the crop damage will be significant. It may offer gardeners a chance for new varieties but woe to those who earn from their crops.
To echo the Purdue paper, “Right now there’s nothing growers can do except stay inside, keep warm, and keep their fingers crossed.”
Source - http://www.newarkadvocate.com/
