Fruit in Your Garden
One of the ‘fun’ things to do is to grow your own fruit. And whilst there is probably no need in the average garden to put it all down to food production, ‘Growing Your Own’ can be very rewarding and the source of a real sense of achievement and pride.
However, Mother Nature has a tendency to make us work for what we want, and sometimes things don’t always go the way we would like them to go.
But, as the saying goes – prevention is better than cure.
So in most cases, and before you dive in and buy 2 fruit trees and 6 fruit bushes, look into the potential problems that you might encounter with the choices that you would like to make.
Many of the diseases that can plague our fruit trees and shrubs are airborne, be they fungal spores or insects and therefore often arrive unseen, and can be extremely difficult to filter out.
Take this for example. This photo is of a condition called ‘Peach Leaf Curl’. Quite a common problem in peach trees when grown outside.
Spores from the leaf infect the twigs and buds, overwintering there until the new buds open and are once again infected by the spores. A never ending cycle which can only be broken with the right knowledge and active ingredient.
Anyone wanting to grow peaches would be best doing so under glass where their environment can be better controlled, and any preventative sprays can be more accurately administered.
This time, where the fruit or the tree itself is likely to be attacked by insects which climb up the trunk rather than fly, a simple physical barrier like a grease band can be quite effective.
