David Hare-Scott wrote:
songbird wrote:
....
me guessing figures that if the flower
gets pollinated then the petals of the
bloom don't matter nearly as much as the
central part of the flower that carries
the pollen tubes down to the ovaries. a
light frost might damage the flower petals
but might not do that much to a more hardy
structure.


A light frost would probably be OK at this point.

i'm hoping so for tonight.


so what do you fruit experts think? or
what have your experiences been with peach
trees and frosts during bloom?


I am not an expert. I have three peach trees that bear at different times
but luckily so far they have not had the false spring and subsequent hard
frost that interferes with fruit setting. The early one has survived light
frosts and set fruit OK.

good to know.


of course i told her that she could
protect the tree by covering it or putting
a smudge pot by it, etc. it isn't so large
a tree that it could not be somewhat
protected.

With one tree you could easily cover it if frosty conditions were likely and
uncover it the next day without this becoming too tiresome. I would favour
this to reduce radiative heat loss. As the blooms are well up off the ground
a katabatic flow would be less likely to freeze them.

David

thanks David,

this is a smaller tree so the blooms are not
quite as high up as a full sized tree, but that
will make it easier to cover.


songbird