Spring time in Bend (Portland, Phoenix: home, moving, nicest)

[Hawk J]

The California Mandarin's, Clementines i get at Grants Pass Walmart, sure are sweet & tasty...

[oregonwoodsmoke]

Of course it is snowing. It is only April.

[oregonwoodsmoke]

Originally Posted by delta07

........... I'm actually worried about my apple blossoms. They just started to bud out. Hoping this weather doesn't kill them off again, like the last 3 out 4 years we've lived in this house.

I usually get apples, pears, grapes, and cherries. Peaches and apricots are a little more iffy.

However, you can pretty much guarantee fruit if you put those old fashioned large Christmas tree lights in your fruit trees and turn them on any time the weather goes below freezing. They will produce enough heat to keep your blossoms from freezing.

I have my Christmas tree lights on a thermostat so they turn on and off automatically with the weather.

[whirnot]

Originally Posted by oregonwoodsmoke

I usually get apples, pears, grapes, and cherries. Peaches and apricots are a little more iffy.

However, you can pretty much guarantee fruit if you put those old fashioned large Christmas tree lights in your fruit trees and turn them on any time the weather goes below freezing. They will produce enough heat to keep your blossoms from freezing.

I have my Christmas tree lights on a thermostat so they turn on and off automatically with the weather.

What a great idea! As long as this thread had headed that direction, I am hoping to plant a couple of each: Apples, Asian Pears, and Pears. Can I expect decent results in the Sunriver area?

[oregonwoodsmoke]

Originally Posted by whirnot

What a great idea! As long as this thread had headed that direction, I am hoping to plant a couple of each: Apples, Asian Pears, and Pears. Can I expect decent results in the Sunriver area?

Oops. Sunriver. I don't know. It is a heck of a lot colder in Sunriver than in Bend and you will get a lot more snow and ice. You've got a lot shorter growing season.

Pears seem to be well suited, because they bloom later than almost anything else, so they will escape the early spring freezes. Then, you must pick a variety that ripens early. I usually get Seckels, but it will freeze before the Bosc are ready to pick. Fortunately, Bosc isn't bother by light freezes, so as long as we don't get a deep freeze in the fall, I still get pears from the Bosc,

Gravenstein apples are early, in fact they are ripe in the summer, and they are tasty. I get fruit from the fuji, but it always freezes just before Granny Smith is ripe. They will survive a light freeze and still be good.

Yellow delicious always produces for me. Zestar is supposed to be a good early apple, but my tree is too young to produce fruit, so I don't know how well it will do in this area, yet. Yellow transparent produces tons of fruit, but the fruit isn't good and I make dog food out of it and feed the apples to my geese.

I get several varieties of cherries. The pie cherries are supposed to be the most cold resistant.

If you have sun, there are a lot of really good grapes that are very cold tolerant.

If you can catch BiMart just as the bare root fruit trees arrive, they sell really good ones. You can't wait because the best ones are sold out almost immediately. I think their bare root fruit trees are in the store right now. They don't sell any rare varieties, but will have some good old standbys.

[Snownut]

Weather lately has been nearly the same here in VA as Bend with clear weather chilly, even frosty nights and sunny warm afternoons. Looks like the next several days that will continue.

This is my first serious following of the Bend spring weather and so far the spring time there looks fine by me.

Bend has consistently colder nights than here in VA. As for the clouds and sun? so far this year (since Jan 1st) there have actually been a few more solid cloudy days here and a few more totally sunny days in Bend. Don't care about the colder weather in Bend and doesn't appear the winter cloud / sun is much different than what I am familiar with already.

All signs point to a relocation to Bend in the next couple years... last big thing will be finding some kind of interesting job there... that will likely be the biggest challenge... maybe I should start playing the lottery? probably about the same odds a finding a good job in Bend

Hope it continues nice here and there.

[tulani]

Today was the first day we actually opened up ALL the house and not just a door and window!

We had a nice soft breeze with temps in the low 70s... same for the rest of the week.

La Pine is a few degrees cooler than Bend (most of the time), so Bend will be in the mid 70s.

The cold nights here make for great sleeping. We turn the heat down to 60 at night and it is quite pleasant.
However, it actually gets cold in the house (in the mornings) in the summer when we don't turn the heat on at all.

[whirnot]

I think spring is finally here.................

[oregonwoodsmoke]

Originally Posted by whirnot

I think spring is finally here.................

I suggest that you do not move your tomato plants outside.

[Hawk J]

Yesterday it was sunny & 86 in Grants Pass, southwest Oregon... Grants Pass Daily Courier -- Rogue River Web Cam