Nick Liberty

Faye Streiff wrote:Nick,
  A chicken tractor is a portable pen that is moved daily to new ground, and it moved it around both sides of the trees.  They clean up bugs, scratch up the soil slightly and leave fertilizer behind.    My husband makes a mineral mix which has all the trace minerals in it, along with the major calcium/phosphorus and potassium.  Has 3 kinds of clays, kelp, azomite and lots of other stuff.  Works miracles.  We even sell it since so many friends wanted some after seeing our gardens.  

Thank you. Do you have a website I can buy it from/do you ship it? Also to you or anyone else who may know....due to the way the leaves are looking I am wondering if my issue ir over or underwatering. Noticed the leaves are all curled. Also I have not transplanted this yet and it is still in the big planter it came in. Thank you

Faye Streiff wrote:When I bought the farm I now live on 21 years ago, all the fruit trees, especially the pears, had fire blight.   I put minerals around all of them and built a small chicken tractor which was rotated under all three pear trees.  I pruned off the dead or dying branches and what grew back was simply amazing.  Much healthier trees and plenty of fruit.  Fire blight did not recur until two years after I stopped doing the chicken tractors there and neglected putting out an annual application of minerals.  

What do you mean by chicken tractor? And what minerals did you use? Thank you!

I got it from Home Depot (probably my first mistake) actually just brought another variety pear tree from a different home depot because of fire blight and traded for this one a week ago.  We could have had a frost a couple weeks ago while it was sitting outside there. The flowers were mostly bloomed when I took it home a week or so ago. Not sure how long the blooms last but my apple tree blooms seem to be doing fine. I just pruned a small branch off that had a black end but nit was all green on the inside and not dead like I thought it may be. I'm going to spray it with tbe vinegar mixture again. I dunno....

Hello all...I recently bought a Bartlet Pear tree around 8 feet tall. It was blooming when I bought it but now a week later the blooms are looking like this. Is this fire blight or from a lack of water? If its the former what do I do? I sprayed it with organic apple cider vinegar diluted in a gallon of water once when I noticed it happening. By the way I am in zone 5.  Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Steve Thorn wrote:Welcome to Permies Nick!

Those don't look like canker to me. It looks like the tree is just trying to heal over possibly from a damaged branch or where it was possibly pruned too far from the tree.

I would prune it right close to the trunk and I think it'll heal over nicely.

Best of luck!

Steve

Thank you Steve

Hello, I am new to fruit trees. This is one of my apple trees, a Gala. I am not sure the exact age but I would say maybe 2 years. I noticed these 2 areas, one being on the trunk of course. My question is are these cankers and what do I do if so? If I have to cut off that means I have to basically destroy the entire tree because of where it is. Can someone please guide me on what do do next. Thank you!

Nick