At our lab in Winchester, we got down to 28F for 2 hours this morning between 6 and 8 AM. I’m seeing damage to king bloom in early blooming apples, but side blooms look like they’ll fair much better. However, I’ve been hearing reports down to 25F in some orchards, with much worse damage. Sweet cherries were in full bloom, and many petals are showing damage. Peaches were past petal fall, and the trees in the lowest area on our farm are probably going to loose some fruit.

It’s going to be a difficult thinning year if we loss a large percent of the king bloom…Unfortunately, we still have about a month where we can potentially have another frost…

 Sweet cherries–more damage on the tops of the branches, than on the bottom, where there still might be some viable flowers.

Frost damage to king and some side bloom in Pink Lady. This tree was at the lowest area of the block. Unopened side bloom appeared to have minimal damage, but it’s still early to quantify the damage.

There appeared to be less damage to this Red Delicious flower with the king bloom open and side bloom still closed.