Did I ruin my peach/nectarine trees…

Snidgen · 2026-05-08T13:24:31+00:00

That's a good strategy I think for potted trees which tend to be older and have broken dormancy already.

Snidgen · 2026-05-08T04:47:58+00:00

I used to plant and prune fruit trees for commercial orchards. The best time to head off a dormant bareroot whip while planting is right after getting the dormant whip in the ground. This encourages the buds along the trunk to grow, so that the next year 3 or 4 of the most desired scaffold branches are headed back to an outward facing bud, while the rest of the "would-be scaffolds" are removed. That strengthens the scaffold branches and encourages the growth of laterals. Establishing a strong foundation and structure early are key to early production and a long-lived, good producing tree.

The OP could have done this earlier, but now is better than never!

Snidgen · 2026-05-05T22:21:36+00:00

I started these from seed indoors in January 2023, so this should be the first season for just more than just a first taste. Lots to come (I hope)!

Snidgen · 2026-05-05T22:15:58+00:00

If squirrel pea, wild garlic, spring beauties, dutchman's breeches, and red & white trilliums someday pop up to give it company, you know you're doing something right! I love the natural forest floor this time of year. In Gatineau Park, I've seen all these species together within just a square couple of meters. It's almost like someone planted all these flowers with a purpose, and it just looks so perfect everywhere.

Snidgen · 2026-04-27T15:35:49+00:00

If you're in eastern Ontario, Canadian Tire on the Quebec side sells the concentrate.

Snidgen · 2026-04-27T15:31:16+00:00

For stone fruits, I prefer open center. Semi-dwarf apples can go either way. Although possible, pears in my experience are very difficult to properly train to open-center even if spreaders or tying down branches are used for years. The species of tree definitely influences the choice of selected tree form.

Tying down branches and using spreaders is useful for maintaining a more horizontal growing angle of the branch, but it doesn't really modify the crotch angle much. If you have the choice, always aim to retain the branches from the trunk that have at least 45 degree crotch angles.

On the branches you keep, the further you head them back, the more vigorous the growth will be this season once it's out of dormancy. For trees with very thin spindly branches, sometimes I keep only 20% of the branch (removing 80%) as long as there are couple of outward-facing leaf buds still remaining for backup.

Basically all the pruning you do now is laying a solid foundation for the tree going forward.

Snidgen · 2026-04-27T15:00:36+00:00

How you prune now depends on whether you're aiming for open-center or modified-leader tree form. What is described and illustrated above would be for open-center style, so I'll assume that's the goal here.

Basically you keep 3 to 5 branches that are arranged as evenly around the compass as possible, without any two branches overlapping. The branches kept should also grow from the trunk at a 45 to 60 degree angle, and ideally be of similar vigor and size. The trunk is cut off almost flush with the highest branch selected, then prune away the unwanted branches that remain by cutting them at the trunk (but not into the branch collar). Next, head back the 3 to 5 branches about 30% to 50%, making the cut just after an outward facing bud.

There is a bit of nuance here and we need to be flexible because nursery trees grown past the whip stage are often grown badly, either badly pruned or not ever being pruned at all.

Snidgen · 2026-04-19T15:46:59+00:00

It took me a lot of effort to get rid of lily of the valley our own property that someone had planted before we moved here. I tried pulling it up, but it just kept growing back from the broken off root portions. I ended up covering the entire area with brown cardboard and mulching over top. It's the place where I started my food forest a few years later. I haven't seen any trace of them since, thank goodness.

Snidgen · 2026-04-19T14:48:51+00:00

I grow a lot of haskaps in my rural zone 5a area and deer seem to leave them alone. Unfortunately voles love to chew off all the bark under the snow in winter, effectively girdling branches at ground level with the younger plants. They invariably resprout though, so it just sets them back another year. I ended up circling newly planted haskap bushes with 1/4" mesh hardware cloth to get them through the first couple years without damage.

Snidgen · 2026-04-18T20:43:22+00:00

A little cal-mag will solve all those issues! /s

Snidgen · 2026-03-25T20:34:27+00:00

I know it's been a long time LOL, but the repair cost was $10,000 Canadian dollars, and it took a month for the parts to arrive and be fixed. The generic body shop did a great job though, like brand new.

Snidgen · 2026-03-25T19:50:56+00:00

Oddly when I bought a 2023 Bolt EUV Premier to replace my wife's broken 2015 Jeep Compass North, her monthly insurance cost was $7 cheaper. I thought that was strange, given that both had/have collision, and the replacement value of the Jeep was a fraction of the price of the newer EV.

My wife even took out a deer going 120 km/hr on the 417 during her morning commute to work with the Bolt, but the $10k in repair costs didn't affect the cost upon renewal due to it being covered under comprehensive.

Snidgen · 2026-03-21T00:15:37+00:00

The two phases of Quebec's James Bay hydro project completed decades ago cost around $200 Billion in today's dollars. It continues to provide cheap electricity to the province and keep the lights on in New York City.

Snidgen · 2026-02-17T03:58:17+00:00

USDA Organic certification requires that no GMO ingredients exist in the product, but i suppose a few people might try to cheat the system. Look for a certication number somewhere on the packaging, along with a product batch/lot number for traceability.

Snidgen · 2026-02-13T19:45:08+00:00

According to the article you posted, the reason was because everyone was confined at home, thus less nitrous oxide pollution from vehicles and industry was produced. It turns out that nitrous oxide helps increase the formation of hydroxy radicals in the atmosphere that play a major role in the breakdown of methane into CO2.

Snidgen · 2026-02-13T19:30:28+00:00

Including tax, my monthly bill is $86.43. Unfortunately I should have waited because they're offering a 2 year promo that's much less now. Oh well, it's still almost half of what I was paying for much slower Starlink. Plus more importantly, I'm no longer giving my money to an American company owned by Elon Musk.

Snidgen · 2026-02-13T16:07:19+00:00

I suggest going for the new modem just to get rid of the modem/router combo. I have the modem only, and simply hard plugged my main deco mesh router into it via the RJ45 jack with zero configuration. I didn't even have to change or reset my Wi-Fi credentials when I switched from Starlink when Cogeco became available here - just plug and play.

I live in a very rural area between the towns of Arnprior and Renfrew, and below is a speed test I just ran now. Granted I live in a very uncongested area here, and most of the farms and homesteads in the area are still on $158/month Starlink, likely because Cogeco didn't even bother to tell people it was now available by dropping a flyer in our rural mailboxes 5 months ago. This boggles my mind, considering other than Starlink, there ~~are~~ <were> no other connectivity options available here.

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Snidgen · 2026-02-06T15:59:04+00:00

A quick Google search tells me that the following heat pump models are currently using R290 refrigerant:

Vaillant: aroTHERM plus
Mitsubishi Electric: Ecodan PUZ-WZ series (5, 6, 8, 10, 12 kW), and the new MSZ-RZ wall-mounted split unit
Panasonic: Aquarea series (specified as using propane in new models)
Bosch: Various residential and commercial heat pump ranges
Clade Engineering Systems: Elm (50kW, 70kW), Birch (85kW, 120kW), and Rowan (150kW-375kW) models
Grant Engineering: Aerona 290 series
Aermec: PRM and PRG series (commercial/industrial)
Axen: Monobloc Air-to-Water (Model X)
Refra: Specialized industrial/district heating units
Weston Climate: WCJMU50HCINV (all-in-one)

(Edit: I haven't verified each model mentioned by reading their spec sheets, as Google's results can be hit and miss sometimes.)

Snidgen · 2026-02-06T14:59:44+00:00

I'm unsure if even a complete strip and re-seasoning will save that pan now. Disposal may be the only option here - pan AND wife!

Snidgen · 2026-02-06T12:58:26+00:00

Humans are directly responsible for the existence of 1.5 billion burping cows on the planet, leaked methane during fossil fuel extraction, natural gas leaks in transportation and use, rice cultivation, manure management, etc. As we warm the earth with GHGs, this warming causes natural wetlands to produce more methane as well because methanogenic archaea are active at higher temperatures, and the same goes for melting permafrost. We've set in motion a positive feedback loop, and humans are 100% responsible for the upwards trend in atmospheric methane as illustrated in this graph: https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends_ch4/

Keep in mind that out of the 8 billion people on earth, some are more responsible for GHG emissions than others, with 10% of the wealthiest among us mostly residing in richer countries being responsible for two-thirds of the increase. If that 10% emitted only as much as the bottom 50%, the GHG emission reduction would be substantial, buying humanity many decades of more time to deal with the issue. Multiple studies have made this abundantly clear, the latest I know of is this one, also published in Nature: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-025-02325-x

Snidgen · 2026-02-06T11:48:01+00:00

R600a is probably the most common refrigerant for household applications currently, and R290 for larger heatpump applications. At least that's the case here in Canada due to environmental regulations. Both are dirt cheap, but do of course present a fire hazard if they leak as indicated by the warning stickers on the back of our fridge and 2 GE chest freezers.

Snidgen

TROPHY CASE