I've never found that pots with good mix and adequate holes for drainage suffer from too much rain.

Jeff, I hear you. I’ve never had trouble with too much rain although all of mine are in 5-1-1. They always love rain and grow like crazy. I suspect they’ll be fine.

That's good news. I was considering moving the plants under an umbrella but with the weather it would probably just get destroyed. Appreciate the advice.

During my rainy season (rain almost every day), I simply remove the saucers from my potted trees; it is that simple

John, that's a really good idea. I've been emptying them each morning but it's a losing battle. I'll pull those out tonight, thanks.

I have often placed cups in the pot in question and empty them elsewhere as they fill up.

Steve

My area is supposed to get rain for the next 7-8 days. The temperature forecast is to be in the low 80's so I am debating whether to leave my trees out because with the heat, maybe the water will be absorbed by the trees. I will monitor daily how much rain we have received vs. what is coming. If it's too much, I will bring them inside. I brought my trees in on Monday evening and put them out this morning.

I just checked the forcast again and it looks like the storm will be lasting even longer now. It was supposed to snow through Saturday as of last night, now it raining straight through Monday. A full week of rain worries me for my container plants and the few in ground fruit trees I have in my yard. I've tried placing those in raised beds, at least 6-12 in above the ground, but I'm still not sure if that's enough.

Maybe I'll try adding some cups or a partial cover to my citrus to limit the amount of water the soil receives.

If I know we're having a heavy rain or several days of rain, I move them under the overhang of the house. Days of light rain is fine with me as long as its not too cold. If it is really heavy rain and wind, I'll take them in the shed or garage.

However, last night the storm kicked up so suddenly, I didn't have time and the wind upending all but one of my pots. Most of the plants ended up barerooted in the yard. I ran out in the storm and scooped everything up and repotted asap. Three weeks after barerooted and repotting into 511 and now another trauma. I think most of them didn't much notice the disruption, but it's certainly not going to help..

I've thought about putting a tarp up for storms, but it's usually so windy here, it wouldn't do any good. For me, nestling them against the house is generally enough.

Jeff, where do you live that it was suppose to snow? That's crazy

Rain has never hurt mine, even a month of it, but I would fertilizer more often since much of it can be watered or washed out of the 5.1.1 mix. If you are getting very cold temps, watch the one potted in the dense soil carefully..

Mike

Definitely meant rain, not snow. no idea how I mixed those up. sorry, no snow here in Maryland.

it WAS a very long winter....

We've had over 3" of rain in the past 5 days here in SE PA with more on the way. Once I saw the forecast, I added Osmocote Plus to my citrus to at least get some ferts in there during this rainy episode. At least at the moment, the rain is doing a good "flush" of the pots but the forecast is for a potential additional 2" - 4" more between now and Saturday (depending on where any training storms set up), with rain chances for the rest of the month. The normal monthly average here for May is ~4" (but not all at once)!

None of my container plants have saucers when outside and get propped up on a shelf or stand or some bricks or pot feet.

I do not have saucers for any of my trees outside. Jeff, I hear you about the saturation, but I really think as long as the medium is well draining, they will be fine. Silica has said many times that water does not kill the roots, it’s lack of oxygen because the mix is too compact. The 5-1-1 has plenty of air spaces so I’m not worried. When the summers really heat up here, I often water my trees daily just to cool them off. I’ve never had a problem. My trees so far are thriving with all this rain - exploding with growth.

I've been checking the container citrus each day and it looks good, no puddling or pooling of water even in the Cactus mix. my biggest concern now is a Pear tree in ground. I planted it when I moved in last year in a row seats bed but only a few inches off the ground at a very wet area. since then I've raised the bed an extra 6 inches and planted a bunch of new fruit trees and veggies but I can't raise the pear since it was already in ground.

I've gone outside each evening and the tree is soaking in a pool. I added extra mulch to soak some of it up and I'm trying to keep theulch off the trunk.

the tree has set a decent amount of pears and I'm worried it's going to drop them all. At least my Citrus are looking good though

Laura - Seems the heaviest has moved south of me and closer to you (as well as to Delaware and South Jersey) so we have a little break here for now. As it is, from the just over 3" here over the past week, an inch of that came last night. I did notice that the rain (and probably earlier sun and heat) has triggered some new leaf growth on my Shiranui (I left it in its original nursery pot and soil but plopped the tree in a 14" container to keep the black pot out of the sun and stabilize it).

What about fertilizer? Am I still supposed to water with foliage pro when my trees are being rained on every day or every other day? They don’t have time to dry out, but it’s been three weeks since repotting and I’m going to need to start fertilizing soon.

Jenny I know you said you added more osmocote, but since I just potted in fresh mix, I don’t want to add more so soon.

Alanna, why not fertilize now? I would.

Alanna - I agree with Vladimir. The Osmocote is "slow release" (in terms of the nutrients needing to be extracted out of the beads into an aqueous solution formed when watered or rained on vs being "instant" like Foliage Pro). So when conditions are right, the tree will uptake what it needs and any excess will just wash through with the rains.

In my case, I have been generally fertilizing with Foliage Pro (any Osmocote I added last year is long gone). I don't normally add Osmocote to fresh mixes for potting. If you had Osmocote already added to your fresh mix then you should be okay for now.

It looks like I've made it through the worst of the rain. The amount of precipitation is pretty low for the next few days compared to the last and it looks like the temperature is going up as well. I haven't seen any new growth sense moving the plants outside but they've stopped dropping small fruit and the fruit that's left is starting to get sizable or all 3 trees. Maybe May Showers were just what they needed to plump up!

Thanks for all the advice, I was worried once the forecast called for a solid week of non-stop rain.

That’s great Jeff! I’m sure they’ll be fine. Alanna, before this rain started I purposefully added oscomote plus to all my trees. I figured they’d get a steady dose of food with all the rain.

Zone 7B NYC here, garden at large: the rain has had a mostly cleansing effect and April showers are in May, New shoots and fruit on the Citrus and the deciduous, hard pruned trees (plums) that woke too early - no fruit, frost damaged, but coming back.....I may add compost to my 5-1-1, knowing I have to repot at miniumm with new soil in October

Beautiful trees Laura!! All of mine looked like that when I got rain almost every day a few years back. Great job

I don't understand...what is this "rain" you speak of? ;)

I know I'm not helping, but since i have a pail in my kitchen sink to save all the rinsing water to use for my plants, I had to tell you how I'd really appreciate a little rain here!

KC

There is a lot of scattered storms going north from FL which have been hanging around for the past week and in my area, they are going to be here for another week.

KC - Don't worry. Your "Gray May" and "June Gloom" are on the way (or so says the Weather Channel). lol

Looks like it's round 2 for torrential rainfall on the East Coast. I took some of your advice and pre-fertilized my trees before the rain started.

The forecast shows another heavy rainfall over the next week, hopefully this will help my Meyers finish sizing up. It's barely grown at all since I've taken it outdoors but the fruit is looking great. I'm guessing all the energy is going into the existing fruit and new growth is taking a back seat.

Jeff,

Feed your Meyer more... don't tell me how much you feed it now... with maturing fruit, it is almost impossible to over feed.

That last bout of rain pushed nice flushes of new growth on all my trees. Hopefully this week's round 2 isn't too much of a good thing!

Hope everyone in the rain zone is doing ok! Watching the news about the rains in Maryland and other places, and hoping you all (and your citrus) stay safe!

Last October Florida had a hurricane. I saw on the news recently farmers cannot harvest crops due to flooded and muddy fields. I cannot imagine what the orange orchards look like with all the additional water this spring and more coming this week.

I have been putting lawn bags on my trees's pots to control the water in my pots. So far it has been 2 weeks of off and on rain. Now Alberto is something I have to contend with and it has been predicted another week of rain.

Alright John, I took your advice. Just poured in some more fertilizer.

Jeff, I hear you again about the rain. My trees are so happy and green though. I am going to sprinkle Peter’s fertilizer on the top of the mix tomorrow to prepare for the rain later this week. I also added Oscomote plus to all of them a couple of weeks ago. How did your in-ground trees do? My goal for tomorrow is to finish potting up a couple off trees before the next rain, but I ran out of lime. I have also been battling scale on a few of my trees so I sprayed them today with HO. I hope the rain does not wash it all away before it can kill the scale. Stay dry up there in Baltimore!

The in grounds were a mixed bag. New Pluot Tree is just growing like crazy. The Persimmon looks great but the rain seems to have drawn out a ton of ant which are starting to cover the tree.

But my biggest concern is the 2 year old pear. Thats the tree sitting lowest and exposed to the most water. The tree hasn't grown at all this year and of the 20-30 new fruits that originally set only 6 have made it through both storms. Not sure if the weather's to blame or my lack of a 2nd Tree to pollinate... I doubled up on the thickness of the mulch to act as a sponge so maybe that will help!

Pollinators for pears are not a problem. Every cross bred Bradford pear will polinate most any other pear and there is a trillion of these brad/crosses out there

Is that really true? Bradford peara will pollinate fruiting pear trees? The only thing I can find online about Bradford Pears are 100 reasons not to plant them.

It is the other way around. They are called Callery pear trees. They crop up all over the countryside.

Giant Turnbull with pear on Callery rootstock grafted 25 months ago.The pear at 1 inch diameter

Maxine delicious on Callery rootstock grafted 13 months ago. No fruit yet.

Sweet cherry on weed cherry roots.

Steve

In general, how often do you guys with 511 add additional Osmocote? Assuming, you aren’t expecting extended rain that is. I fertilize with foliage pro when it’s not raining and I included osmocote in the mix. But often often should I replenish it?

I think in the summer it may last about 3 months with the heat and rain. I replenished mine 2-3 weeks ago.

Osmocote lasts 4 to 6 months, depending on the temperature. I believe there is a chart on the label that tells how long it lasts at various temperatures.

It's pouring here, AGAIN. Have only seen peeks of the sun for days and days. Everything is waterlogged. So far the citrus are happy and pushing new growth and buds, but the tomatoes are definitely not enjoying it.