The fruit harvest
To comfort you during this period which marks the end of long moments of relaxation in the garden, September is a month generous with fruit. It is therefore time to reap many fruits including:
- Apples and pears : to know if they are ripe, simply lift them with your hand, if they come off easily, they are ready to be picked.
- Figs : although they are ripe and ready to be picked, they are a little soft, which requires harvesting them delicately. Also, remember that they don’t last very long, even if you store them in a cool place.
- Blackberries and raspberries: here too, it will be necessary to harvest them delicately so as not to damage them.
- Some plums Later ones can also be harvested in September, this is the case for ‘Reine Claude tard’, ‘Valor’, etc.
- The grape : the grape harvest begins in September. If some clusters have not yet reached maturity, remove the leaves that shade them. This will allow them to finish ripening before the first frosts arrive.
For harvesting, it is best to proceed on a cool day without too much sun. It will then be necessary to store the fruits or prepare them according to your desires and habits.
Maintain the orchard
To maintain a beautiful orchard that remains productive year after year, it is necessary to maintain it well. This involves different tasks.
Help the last fruits to ripen
For kiwis, harvest time is approaching since you will be able to harvest them in one or two months, just before the leaves fall. In the meantime, it may be useful to protect your trees from birds to prevent them from damaging your fruit by pecking at it. It may also be necessary to support the most fruitful branches.
Prune your plum trees
If the plum trees are not really pruned, it is still necessary to remove the suckers which may appear at the foot of the tree, but also the poorly placed branches or the damaged bark. It’s time to clean your plum tree.
Clean your trees
Before the onset of cold weather and to avoid the proliferation of parasites, it is necessary to rid the branches of all damaged or rotten fruit still clinging to them, as well as dead leaves. This will allow you to maintain clean and healthy fruit trees. It may be necessary to water your young fruit trees thoroughly to ensure their recovery.
Monitor the possible presence of pests
Even if you have harvested all the fruit, it is important to continue to monitor your fruit trees regularly to quickly detect the presence of biting insects. As these pests weaken fruit trees, rapid and effective action is required.
For example, we can cite oyster mealybugs found on young apple trees. As soon as you notice their presence, simply remove them by hand. If the invasion is significant, natural treatment may be necessary.
Likewise, if wasps become invasive in the orchard, it may be necessary to install traps or attract them elsewhere to prevent them from causing too much damage to the last fruits of the season.
Clean the floor
In the same way that you have removed rotten fruit from the branches and always with the aim of fighting pests and diseases, it is important to collect all the fruit that has fallen at the foot of the trees. Do not throw rotten or diseased fruit into your compost!
Thinning small fruit trees
Prune small fruit bushes. For raspberries and mulberries, this means cutting off the branches that have borne fruit and thinning out the clumps by cutting off the excess branches, which are then considered “useless”.
Planting time
In September, it’s time to work for the future. Here’s what you can do to get even more fruit next season:
- Renew your strawberries: you can grow new plants from existing strawberries. To do this, select the most beautiful runners, that is to say the stems at the end of which small strawberry plants appear. Plant them directly in the ground or in pots. Remember to water them regularly. In about 3 weeks, they can be separated from the mother plant and you will enjoy new strawberries. You can also buy and discover new varieties: by opting for diverse varieties, you ensure that your harvests are spread out.
- Consider what other trees you want to plant and where. You may need to order them in advance so you can plant them when the time comes. You can also start preparing the soil of the plot of land that will accommodate them.
- Cutting certain fruit treeslike kiwi.
- As for citrus fruits, they can be multiplied by grafting. In fact, many fruit trees can be bud grafted.
These different multiplication actions will allow you to renew your fruit trees at a lower cost. However, you will need to be patient.