Weeks 23 and 24 have been good! Temperatures have dropped from the high nineties to the high eighties and we have been receiving frequent rains. If anyone was following along, I apologize for no blog post last week, but life sometimes gets in the way…..
In the last post I indicated that the heat was taking it's toll: browning leaves, lower fruit production and some small berries. As the rain started and the temperatures dropped in week 23 everything started turning around. By week 24 the plants are undergoing what I would consider an explosive growth spurt.
I counted 289 canes on the top wire this morning. As a whole the hedgerow is about 6' tall with some canes arching up and over at 9' long. In the second picture you can see an 8 footer sticking out. This is starting to concern me on two fronts. First, the wind load is evident in a good breeze with the whole wall of vegetation moving back-and-forth. So far I haven't seen any movement in the posts but most of hurricane season awaits. Secondly, there is so much vegetation that don't know where next year's Primocane's are gonna find their way up through this years growth. I want to do some more research, but I may convert to a "V-trellis" with lateral reinforcement a little later.
These berry clusters are just beautiful and the fruit is so big. The average weight is up to 12 grams/berry or about a half-ounce/berry. After a slowdown last week I'm getting about a 1/2 pound per day and it looks like that is gonna jump up this coming week. I could potentially be getting this kind of production all summer and fall till the first frost which is generally around Thanksgiving. Are my neighbors gonna love or hate me?
Next week should be busy because the muscadines are starting to ripen. For the next 5 or 6 weeks it will be blackberries one day and muscadines the next. I sure am happy that I am a morning person!
Ciao.
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