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Volume 9 -- 2001 Healthy Fruit is written by Jon Clements, Ron Prokopy, Dan Cooley, Arthur Tuttle, Gerald Lafleur, Wes Autio, Bill Coli, Duane Greene, Bill Bramlage, and Sarah Weis and is presented with the cooperation of New England Fruit Consultants and Polaris Orchard Management. Publication is funded in part by the UMass Extension Agroecology Program, grower subscriptions, and the University of Massachusetts IPM Program. A text version can be e-mailed to you if you contact Doreen York. Please cite this source if reprinting information.

Issue 23 - September 19, 2001

USApple Memorandum on the Relief Effort

M E M O R A N D U M

TO: USApple State and Regional Member Associations

CC: USApple Board of Trustees and Committee Members

FROM: Kraig Naasz

SUBJECT: Apples for Relief Efforts - Update

DATE: September 17, 2001

America's Second Harvest has temporarily suspended deliveries of perishable food items, such as apples, to New York City and Washington, D.C. While expressing appreciation for the products they have received, organization officials report that their warehouses are fully stocked and an oversupply of produce items currently exists at both sites.

The U.S. Apple Association (USApple) and the New York Apple Association will continue to monitor the situation with the assistance of America's Second Harvest, and we will contact those groups and individual suppliers who have offered apples and apple juice in support of the relief efforts as soon as we learn of a need for additional donations.

The following excerpt is from an editorial in today's Washington Post:

"Washingtonians spent the weekend enjoying achingly beautiful weather and wondering whether it was right to do so. ...Instinctively, most people understood that, yes, of course, they needed to get on with life. Children are entitled to play their games, to pick apples -- even to grumble about doing their homework or eating their vegetables without being reminded of the greater sorrows of others. But children and adults alike also understood that picking up the pieces of daily life did not mean resuming as though nothing had changed."

In the spirit of this editorial, please extend our best wishes for a bountiful harvest to the apple growers and other industry members in your state and region.

For more information about our industry's efforts to support the relief work underway in New York and the nation's capital, please contact Julia Daly or me at (800) 781-4443.

Duane W. Greene ‘Harvest the Potential’ Report for September 18

Cool temperatures and modest rain this past week has helped speed red color development. Fruit growth is still slow in areas that have not received ample rain. ReTain appears to be working well where trees are not stressed. McIntosh and Gala maturity is close to or slightly earlier than historical norms. Harvest of these varieties is going on throughout the area. On September 17 starch iodine readings of Marshall McIntosh were averaging slightly above 6 and Pioneer McIntosh generally ranged between 5.5 and 6.  Harvest of Redcort will begin this week.

Apple Maturity Update

        Reports from throughout the state indicate McIntosh harvest is well underway, with a push to ‘wrap-it-up’ in the next week in orchards where harvest began early. The picking effort will turn to Cortland, Macoun, and Empire as the Mac harvest winds down. Most orchards are reporting good yields, generally a little better than first thought after the spring frosts. Size is good, except in orchards where rainfall has been sparse, however, good color has been slow to come. But cooler weather in the last week has definitely hastened color development.

A reminder that based on bloom date and temperature during the 30 days following bloom, the predicted last McIntosh harvest date for fruit destined for CA storage at the UMass HRC in Belchertown is 21-Sept. This should tell you that for orchards comparable to the HRC in climate and bloom date (May 6), McIntosh harvest should be wrapping up this weekend, except for fruit that will be sold immediately.
        

Here are some starch-index readings from the UMass HRC in Belchertown, collected on 18-September:

*Gala is best harvested at a starch-index reading of 5 to 6. Gala requires multiple harvests -- most orchards have picked Gala once or twice already, and are looking at their second, third, or even fourth picking this week. Background color, which changes from green to cream to yellow with increasing maturity, is the best harvest-timing indicator.

Delicious Apple Storage Scald Predictor

Although most growers won’t be starting Delicious harvest until next week at the earliest, it’s important to get started as early as possible, particularly if fruit are placed in long-term CA storage. Because earlier harvested fruit are prone to developing storage scald, a pre-storage DPA treatment is often used to help prevent scald. Research has show that pre-harvest minimum temperatures and harvest date have an effect on the development of storage scald. To help you time your Delicious harvest and need for DPA treatment, look at the ‘Delicious Storage Scald Predictor’ on the UMass Fruit Advisor.

Rainfall Update

Rainfall has been measured by the UMASS fruit disease lab at orchards in Hawley, Deerfield (NW corner), Belchertown, Sterling, and Northboro, MA. Of these sites, Belchertown had the most accumulated rainfall from April 1 -Sept. 15 (just under 20 inches). Hawley was the second highest with 18 inches, followed by Sterling with 16 inches. Deerfield and Northboro had about 13.5 inches during that time interval.

Last year the same sites during the same time interval had more accumulated rainfall: Deerfield and Belchertown with 30 inches, Sterling and Northboro with 21 inches. Hawley had no weather station last year.

Disease Update

Due to the continued dry weather, the amount of flyspeck and sootyblotch at harvest has been low.  Disease symptoms showed-up later than usual (and not at all in some locations) and have accumulated more slowly than usual.  Blocks of apple trees that received 3 summer fungicide sprays were well-protected except for a few locations where blocks were adjacent to dense woods or hedgerows with heavily-infected alternate hosts.  In those locations, trees that were sprayed had much less disease (roughly 5 % of the apples with some summer disease) than trees that were unsprayed in the summer (roughly 70% of the apples with some summer disease).  In an experiment which is testing border row spraying against full block spraying,  flyspeck penetrated to the interior of the block in locations with heavily-infected woods or hedgerows.

Note: this will be the last Healthy Fruit issue for the 2001 growing season. The UMass Fruit Team hopes the information contained in Healthy Fruit in 2001 has helped you produce a ‘healthy’ and profitable fruit crop in 2001, and we hope for your continued success during the remainder of the harvest and marketing season. We look forward to returning in 2002, however, in the meantime be sure to look into the UMass Fruit Advisor on the web () for current information and updates. Also, don’t hesitate to contact any member of the UMass Fruit Team if you have a production or marketing question, or suggestion for improving Healthy Fruit in the future.

Doreen York
Secretary for Agroecology
Department of Plant & Soil Sciences
204 Bowditch Hall
University of Massachusetts
Amherst, MA 01003
Telephone:  (413) 545-2254
FAX:  (413) 545-0260
email:  dyork@pssci.umass.edu

©Copyright 2001 University of Massachusetts Amherst, Massachusetts, 01003. (413) 545-0111. Produced and maintained by the UMass Fruit Team. This is an official page of the University of Massachusetts Amherst campus.