NW Michigan Horticultural Research Station Open House & Equipment Show

The NW Michigan Horticultural Research Station Open House & Equipment Show will take place on Thursday, August 28, 2003. The equipment show is sponsored by the Leelanau Horticultural Society. 

The educational program will address four topics, each discussed by the researchers concurrently from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. Topics include tart cherry IPM, new sweet cherry varieties and management techniques, grape management, and turf grass evaluations. 

The afternoon events will be followed by a social hour with wine and juice tasting, and then a dinner sponsored by the Leelanau Horticultural Society. The Paul & Frances Johnson Foundation has donated a pig from the 4-H Fair auction and it will be used for door prizes. The menu for the dinner will feature beef catered by Cedar Valley Ranch. The cost for the dinner is $10 if purchased in advance or $15 at the door. Tickets may be purchased by completing the form below and mailing it in with your payment by Monday, August 25th. Following the dinner there will be a short awards program and a tribute to Gary Thornton. (Gary is leaving MSU Extension after serving for the past 11 years as the District Fruit IPM Agent). 

We hope you can join us for all, or a portion of the NW Michigan Horticultural Research Station Open House and Equipment Show. The program schedule is as follows:

1:00-2:00  Visit equipment and vendor displays

2:00-3:00  Concurrent educational programs – attend the program of your choice:

Grape – Vine recovery and management strategies; Duke Elsner
Sweet Cherry – What's new in varieties and managing processing 
                              varieties on dwarfing rootstocks; Jim Nugent, Greg Lang
Tart Cherry – Current and future pest management research; Dr. Mark Whalon, 
                           Dr. Larry Gut, Dr. George Sundin
Turf Grass – Evaluations; Andy Norman

3:00-4:30  Equipment demonstrations

4:30-5:00  Organic Cherry Permaculture Orchard Walk; Dr. George Bird

4:30-5:15  Visit display area

5:15-6:00  Social time – wine and juice tasting

6:00-?  Dinner followed by the Leelanau Horticultural Society annual meeting & 
              "Tribute to Gary Thornton." 

Dinner Tickets Form - NW MI Hort Research Station Open House & Equipment Show

Name: _________________________________ Phone: _______________________

# Tickets _____ x $10 = _________ 

Predicted Harvest Dates 2003

Apple maturity for 2003 is expected to be later than normal for most areas of the state. The maturity at harvest is expected to be mixed as well. This is due to cool spring weather. Predicted harvest dates are similar to 2002 dates.

Fairly warm temperatures this spring advanced bud development and in the southern areas of the state bloom were slightly ahead of normal. Then cold weather set in and for the next thirty more days the state was gripped by a long period of below normal temperatures. This slowed bud development and delayed the bloom in the rest of the state. Bloom opened up slowly and remained open for a much longer time this spring in some areas. Cold weather continued to occur after bloom and throughout the thinning season into June.

The delayed bloom and cool weather gives us predicted harvest dates of behind normal. In the southern areas of the state predicted harvest dates will be from 1 to 5 days behind normal and in northern parts of the state as much as 7 to 10 days behind normal. A mixture maturity is also predicted due to the long extended bloom in most areas of the state. Early bloom that opened on older wood set up to 3, 4, 5 days ahead of bloom that opened on 1 year old wood and set. Also, because of the extended bloom it is somewhat difficult to predict when the fruit actually set. Therefore, this year we have a lower confidence in our predicted harvest dates that normal.
 

2003 Predicted Apple Harvest Dates
Full Bloom Date				Predicted Harvest Date
Station	McIntosh	Jons	Reds	McIntosh	Jons	Reds	Observer
NWMHRS	24-May	26-May	27-May	22-Sep	11-Oct	17-Oct	Thornton

Please send any comments or suggestions regarding this site to: 
Bill Klein, kleinw@pilot.msu.edu

Last Revised: 8-18-03