It is March, and in my garden the cherry bushes are in bloom, two delicate sprays of white against a yellow-brown landscape. On my peach tree, too, the buds have reached that stage that orchardists call “first pink,” when they swell to an almost unbelievable size and show hints of the electric color of the flower-to-be at their tips. The tree will be in full bloom within days.
It’s too early for this.
All fruit trees in the genus Prunus—cherries, peaches, plums, apricots—have this tendency to burst out of winter dormancy and into bloom at the slightest touch of spring warmth. This optimistic habit leaves them vulnerable to a loss of the crop if cold temperatures descend again. Peach buds at first pink can take down to 25 degrees without significant losses, but once the flowers fully open they lose 2-3 degrees of hardiness, according to the Penn State Extension Service. Cherries possess a touch more frost resistance, but temperatures in the mid-twenties will still mean a loss of fruit.
And there’s no restarting the process of fruit production if a freeze kills the blossoms. It’s just a year without peaches. Better luck next time.
Growing Prunus in Missouri can seem a bit quixotic. If our plants bring a crop to bear past these fluctuating spring temperatures, they are just as likely to fall prey to fungal diseases later in the year, fostered by our humid climate. It’s for good reason that you’ll find no significant peach or cherry industry in our state. I wouldn’t stake my livelihood on these plants in this location, but I can’t help trying in my backyard garden. And since I’m trying, I can’t help caring.
We’re still a month away from our average last frost date. Nothing in the ten-day forecast looks like a threat to my burgeoning crop, but I’ll be checking the outlook and figuring up the risk each day nonetheless. It’s not that I can do much about it—you can’t really frost-proof a mature peach tree—but I monitor the situation anyway. I refresh my weather app, reassure myself about what will or won’t happen. It gives me some illusion of control.
Last year, we had a hard frost on April 24. The night before the forecasted low, I tried to prepare. My fingers numb in the rising north wind, I hooked up a hose and drenched the large trees and the mulch around them, on the theory that evaporating water (or a layer of ice) might provide some insulation. I wrapped my smaller shrubs in quilts, wincing as the boughs bent under the weight and petals fluttered to the ground. Unhooking the hose, I went inside and slept fitfully, hoping what I had done would be sufficient.
None of it worked. My harvest of Prunus for the year totaled two peaches and four cherries. Better luck next time.
So here I am again, with blossoms emerging and the frost of Damocles dangling over me, unsubstantial, not yet realized, yet all too present in my thoughts. How to cope? Should I—can I—stop checking the forecasts, quit reading about frost tolerances, abandon my anxiety and accept my lack of control? Take the cherries life and the weather gives me? Or: keep myself informed, monitor the situation, reassure myself about what will or won’t happen.
Every gardener faces such situations from time to time, and it appears we’ll all confront them more often as our weather grows weirder and wilder. Cultivate and manage our gardens as we will, so much lies outside our control. I did my best to protect my trees against late spring frosts, to no avail. I have planted dozens if not hundreds of trees and shrubs, but all the carbon they will absorb over the course of their lives counts for little against that pumped into the atmosphere every day by industry. So how can I cope? Monitor the situation? Give up control? Knowing that there will be no better luck next time, how should I proceed?
I have no answers for these questions, any more than I know how to put the cherry blossoms back in the bud. Of course, I make my little attempts at living responsibly, at reducing my consumption, but these too often feel like hooking up a hose with cold fingers. Unpleasant, and probably pointless.
I am not going to live my life, as a gardener or a human being, without facing catastrophe. If I ever thought that I could, the more fool me. The heartbreak of first pink will come. I am not ready. I am not ready. But let it come.