Your best bet is to get to OSU's Exension web site, or contact your local MG's to talk about a spray program for your plum that will fit your area. However, looks like OSU's Extension web site is down right now. Your local MG's will be able to give you the very best and most appropriate advice as to a spray program that is best suited to your exact area. I've included a link, but none of the links are working for me right now. I can get the OSU Extension Store link to work, and here are books appropriate for your plum tree: http://estore.osu-extension.org/searchproducts.cfm

Patty S.

Here is a link that might be useful: Cuyahoga County Master Gardener's Program

If you got plums last year you just might be in an area currently free of pest pressure affecting J. plums.

I don't believe extension agencies are very useful for spray programs and are sometimes flat-out irresponsible, such as when Rutgers recommends Malathion on 10-14 day intervals to control peach pests when it loses potency in 3-4 days.

That isn't to say there isn't a lot of useful information in the mix but extensions tend to be careless about advice given home growers- the primary focus of landgrant universities is commercial production and advice to commercial growers tends to be solidly researched based. However commercial growers tend to be under much more pest pressure than someone growing just a few trees- and they need perfect fruit.

Here in southeastern NY I can usually get SR plums with a 2-spray program starting at petal fall and finishing 10-14 days later. No way I get that info from my local CE even though I have a lot of respect for both of its horticulturalists.

To have any hope of getting away with so few sprays you need something potent like Ortho's "Once and Done" which contains a synthetic pyrethrin (pyrethroid).

I can also usually succeed with Surround (the organic approach)- 4 sprays at 7-day intervals, also starting at petal-fall. Petal fall is when flowers have lost most petals and bees are not longer active in tree. Surround not only requires more applications but is twice as hard to apply as coverage must be very thick.

Whether you can get away with so few sprays in Cleveland is unknowable without experimentation. I wouldn't spray anything until I was sure I had to- even if it meant losing a small crop.

Maybe there's a grower reading this who is situated close to Cleveland who's experimented enough to know what's really necessary for J. plums in a home orchard situation there, but it's unlikely your CE will.

Often if there is no one in the neighborhood growing a particular crop or fruit, there is no local population of pests. So the first year's harvest is disease and pest-free and the grower rejoices, thinking there is no need to spray. But the nasties will show up later. First one, then their relatives.

True, but also some locations just don't have as many pests- and J. plums can be relatively easy even where there are some.

Years ago I remember picking perfect Bing cherries from a terrace in an apartment in Manhattan. The tree was growing out of a tiny yard and was never sprayed and never discovered by insects, birds or even fungus. Asphalt and tall buildings don't have much to offer them.

I live in the middle of the city a mile or two from downtown so there aren't many orchards around here.

I suppose I will just let it flower and do its thing and see if any bugs bother it. The main reason I got it was for the flowers and a few plums here and there so if the plums get ruined this year I can live with it.

I suppose it is good for the first year to see if there really are any pest problems, right? Before just instinctively spraying.

That is how I learned and I still believe it's the best way to get a practical understanding of what's necessary at any given site.

I strongly agree - wait to see the pest and then figure out how to deal with it. Unless your neighbor next door already has fruit trees and problems. Do regularly monitor, because the earlier you catch something the easier it is to contain. I have not been so good about that, a few bugs or bits of a disease appear and I think "well I only got a bit of it" but that often means that the next year you are up to your ears in it if action is not taken.

Scott

Wow, harvestman, that is certainly NOT the case with California and our extension services (UC Davis and UC Riverside and our extensive MG programs), nor in N. Indiana (Purdue). The Master Gardeners' division of the land grant extension colleges' focus is exclusively the home grower. So, what might be recommended to commercial growers from the extension office proper is adjusted or actually quite different than what the Home Orchard grower gets as far as advice. And the advice stresses organic approaches, first. We rely pretty heavily on UC Davis "The California Orchard" web site, which they're completely redone. And, they have a really wonderful book called, "The Home Orchard: Growing Your Own Deciduous Fruit and Nut Trees", Pub. 3485. In fact, when I went through my MG training in Indiana, a state with a hugely active extension service, as Indiana is a big ag state, the MG program actually covered both commercial approaches - since many MG students were also farmers - as well as "now, here's how we do it in your backyard" approach. It was very informative. And, the more organic approaches and some of the cutting edge IPM management were coming out of the home grower's backyards. Sorry Rutgers is not providing the home orchardists more appropriate information for you all. And, we know with a state as large as California, and with as many micro-climates as we deal with, the best advice comes from somewhere quite local. So, we contact our local MG program, or our local CRFG association, which is an excellent organization to belong here in California, if you're interested in growing fruit trees at home. You've got to start somewhere, and then make adjustments for your very specific conditions no doubt. For example, here in Calif. we have issues with the Citrus Leaf Miner. The general recommendations being put forth from our extension offices and MG programs is don't worry about it for the most part, as the damage is really just cosmetic. However, for me, with all my very new citrus, and that I live right up against an abandoned 80 acre citrus orchard that is not being managed, the CLM is so severe, it is affecting 100% of my new trees and their new growth, so it IS impacting the health of my new little trees, so I have to treat. I found this out on a personal basis, and also by talking with my local orchard supply store (WEALTH of information), and my local CRFG buddies. Yes, personal experience is the best teacher, but if you're brand new, you need to have some beginning guidance to go by to get started, and for us, our local MG's and our extension services for home orchardists is a good place to start.

Patty S.

Here is a link that might be useful: UC Davis Extension: The California Home Orchard

It depends on the state. From what I gather, a place like CA has a strong emphasis/interest on urban fruit and veg. gardening, so one may get some good help from the Ext.

Here in KS, we have a great extension service if you have livestock, or row crops. In the urban areas, the focus of extension advice/MG is almost exclusively landscaping.

Likewise last time I checked the MO extension info. for home orchards, it looked like it hadn't been up updated for 20 years.

Not trying to be cynical but the extension/MG info. for homeowners around here is no better than Google.

When I went to our local extension office to ask them to order the test to add orchard to my pesticide lic they didn't know there was one. They called 4 days later to tell me the test was there when I went in to take it they had a bundle of info for me about local pests and sprays and timing. If I had asked about Maine wild blueberries or potatoes they would have given me app rates for soil types ect. I look at that 2 ways #1 I have a very good agent #2 Jobs are hard to come by and she did not want a bad mark from her boss. I am hoping #1 if so she will be a lot of help as my business expands.

Patty, how long have you been growing fruit?

I do have to wonder how these extensions can all have such great info sources when there is no mandate from the gov. to research best methods for the home orchard. Who is providing the info and how is it evaluated and how are they getting funding to do this?

Home orcharding is not significant enough to have important economic impact for the nation as a whole, I expect, and politicians aren't going to divert scarce funds to make life better for us hobbyists.

There's lots of info for home orcharding available from Cornell but it is filled with inaccuracies which I'd be unaware of if I hadn't as much experience as I do.

Maybe you have the experience to evaluate the info you're talking about and maybe these states just have really great volunteers that are doing great work. I don't know.

One problem with relying on advice intended for commercial growers is that a lot of the products they recommend aren't readily available to us backyard growers.

Harvestman, I've been growing some sort of fruit or veggies since I was a kid (my mother and my grandfather were both very avid gardeners), but still pretty new to stone fruit (lots of citrus experience of course!) UC Davis in conjunction with UC Riverside does a LOT of research within the home orchard arena. So does Texas A& M as well (I'm actually going to be part of an extended, nation-wide home orchard program with a brand new Texas table-grape variety that appears to actually be immune to PD). If you go to UC Davis and UC Riverside's web sites, you can find research there done on the home orchard level. As far as Indiana goes, can't tell you, I'd have to look carefully at Purdue's extension web site to see, but they have a renowned MG program, and the MG programs there in the state of Indiana have a very strong focus on home vegetable gardening. So, I guess I am spoiled from two states. And, not sure if the government "mandating" research in the home market will ever happen. Government monies are most likely not going to go to home orchard research, but directed to commercial orchards where the research would have significant financial impact. It's up to extension offices, land grant schools and MG programs to see the value in doing research on the home orchard level, I think. I found it very interesting, that for a state that places so much emphasis on both residential gardening as well as commercial agriculture, California actually has no more county extension offices. If a homeowner wants to get info, they either need to go to the UC Davis Extension website, or contact their local MG department. I found this somewhat disturbing, but considering California's broke, I suppose this is no huge surprise. In Indiana, the MG Program's are frequently housed right in the county extension office (mine was in Elkhart County).

Patty S.