Phenology report, Collard Greens, Fire Blight and Busy Hands

Phenology report, 730 Growing Degree Days, base 50F. 

• The Catalpa are blooming in town and Multiflora rose is at peak bloom.
• The Bluegills (bream down-south) are on the spawning beds. 
• "Dumb bunnies' (looking out the window and there are three of them within 15' of each other), fawns, baby woodchucks and raccoons are everywhere.
• The first mulberries are starting to ripen to the delight of birds, squirrels, raccoons and possum.
• The first persimmon flowers are opening and White Clover is blooming.
• Smooth Brome Grass is pollinating.

Collard Greens

I have about 20 Collard Green plants in the ground. Bowing to the inevitable, I have them in "collars" to protect them from cut-worms and rabbits.

Being a D@__ed Yankee, I am not versed in the mysteries of Collard Greens. My impression is that they are "cleaner" in terms of bugs and bug-poop than cabbage due to their open structure; Collards are essentially a non-heading cabbage. I am also under the impression that in terms of nutrition-per-foot-of-row they might beat cabbage since all of their leaves are photosynthesizing and not all folded-up and not exposed to light.

The downside of Collards vs Cabbage is that Cabbage is compact and stores well while Collards appear to be mostly an eat-as-you-go vegetable. They are complimentary in that respect.

Getting back to harvesting Collards, does the cook typically walk down the row and pluck two-or-three leaves from each plant per-meal ensuring they provide a long harvest window? If so, I imagine they are "nearly fully expanded but not tough/mature"? Or does the typical home gardener harvest the entire plant at one time?

Fire blight vs Bacterial Canker

Coyote Ken mentioned in comments that he found it difficult to distinguish between bacterial canker and fire blight. I will answer that question to the best of my ability.

The cloudy conditions stymied my desire to take photos of the fire blight strikes. I apologize for the quality of the images. It was the best I could do.

A fire blight strike on the pear I removed

Even pears that are "fire blight resistant" will show some fire blight strikes. But they will "self extinguish" and stall-out before infecting one-year-old wood. This is a section of TWO-year-old wood on the pear variety I removed.

I think the symptoms vary by species. The strikes on the pears are as BLACK as charcoal. The strikes on the quince are green-tan-light brown.

Most fire blight strikes are on new shoots and/or fruiting spurs.

Most bacterial canker (not an expert here) are in crotches (usually narrow ones) formed by branches or in older, senile limbs and trunks.

Workie, workie, workie makes for a boring blog

I had a long day, starting at 7:30 and knocking off at 6:30. If idle hands are the Devil's workshop then I am pretty safe at the moment.

Mowing, tilling, planting, caging, cutting wire, traveling, pounding posts, more mowing.

None of the mulberry seedlings that I transplanted this spring and then grafted dore doing very well. The ones that I grafted-in-place are doing well and pushing buds. Remember "Driver's Ed" when the instructor suggested that a smart driver avoided "stacking" hazards? The instructor might suggest braking so oncoming traffic would pass you before you had to negotiate cars parked on your side of the street on a narrow, city street.

That might be a good way to think about grafting. A living plant can take only so much injury and insult in a growing season.

Maybe the mulberries in the linear brush-pile will take-off. Maybe they will die. I am 99% sure I would have been fine if I had transplanted them into a garden or if I had given them a year to establish and then grafted them next spring.