Re: Itrees Vol 2 Summer Download
Violetta Wagganer
We offer fun and energetic ways for youth grades 1 to 6 to learn about their natural world and explore the outdoors. Fall, winter, and spring camps, as well as summer camp, are aligned with Atlanta Public Schools (APS) teacher workdays and school holidays.
This has been the year of the ridiculous yo-yo: nonstop rain for the first half of the year followed by nary a drop over the last two months. The combination of blistering heat and dry soil has now started to show up in the form of generalized yellowing, wilting and some leaf drop. And everybody starts to panic when leaves start to drop, especially when they drop in the middle of summer.
The reason for this easily identifiable pattern is that it is a predictable response of what we call bottomland species. These tree species have all evolved in low areas that are typically wet all winter and spring but often dry out in the summer. The leaf drop is an adaptation that allows the trees to shed leaves in summer to reduce the potential for even greater water loss. The fewer leaves, the less water needed to keep them happy and the less water escaping from the soft leaf tissue.
To start things off, let us go over the common mistakes that tree owners tend to commit when taking care of their trees during summer. The following are things that you should avoid doing to your trees during the warm summer months:
Fluctuating summer conditions, with the rain, the hot summer sun, and the possibility of drought, is already stressful enough for adult trees. Can you really put a young tree through those conditions and expect it to survive the coming winter? The ideal time to plant a tree is during spring or autumn.
Fruit developing in the shade during the final swell will be small and soft, with poor red color and soluble solids. The primary reason trees are summer pruned is to enhance light penetration and distribution throughout the canopy. Relatively high light levels (40% full sum) are required for red color development on the fruit.
One reason to reduce shading is to maintain fruiting wood in the lower canopy. To enhance flower bud development in the lower canopy, summer pruning must be completed by mid-July. Summer pruning after mid-July will not improve flower bud initiation or development. For mature trees, remove the vigorous upright water sprouts that shade the lower canopy. If this is done early, before the base of the shoot lignifies, the shoots can be ripped out by hand with little damage to the bark. After shoot lignification, had pruners are needed to cut the shoot off at the base. Do not head these shoots or cut the shoot just above a sylleptic shoot because new shoots will develop below the pruning cut and the resulting shoot will shade the lower part of the tree, and these vigorous shoots will develop few flower buds for next year.
Young vigorously growing trees can be summer pruned to develop fruiting wood in the lower canopy and also to help train the tree and develop the scaffold system. In early June, the upright water sprouts developing from the upper surface of scaffold branches can be removed to enhance light penetration. To encourage a spreading growth habit, scaffold branches can be headed just above a sylleptic shoot that is growing outward. This same type of cut can sometimes be repeated in mid- to late-July if the sylleptic shoot that was retained also develops sylleptic shoots.
Summer pruning about two weeks before harvest can improve fruit red color development without adversely affecting fruit size and sugar levels if leaf removal near the fruit is minimized. Mowing trees to remove a high percentage of foliage in the tree top does enhance light penetration and red color development, but it also reduces fruit size and sugar levels. Therefore, mowing or hedging should be avoided because they remove too much foliage near the fruit. The only beneficial effect of summer pruning on the fruit is improved red color development of some cultivars some years, but summer pruning will not improve fruit size or sugar levels.
In New Jersey, I found that summer pruning delayed leaf drop, the onset of dormancy and acclimation to low temperatures. Therefore, to avoid reducing early-winter cold hardiness, summer pruning should be completed by mid-August.
Although many claims have been made about various responses to summer pruning, few are supported by research. Other than a moderate improvement in fruit red color, summer pruning will have little effect on fruit size or quality. My research showed that summer pruning reduced root growth and trunk growth but shoot growth the following season was never suppressed by summer pruning. So, summer pruning will not suppress the vigor of the above-ground parts of the tree. Late-season summer pruning to enhance fruit color will not enhance flower bud formation or development, fruit set or affect the time of bloom the following year. Valsa canker was not influenced by summer pruning. Cold hardiness was not enhanced but was delayed, by summer pruning.
All payments for summer program are due by May 15th. Full refunds can be granted up until May 15th minus a $50 processing fee. We will not be able to grant refunds for cancellations after May 15th. Changes in camps/schedules can be made on a case by case basis based on availability up until May 15th. Teen Wilderness Trips have a separate cancellation policy and can be viewed here.
Summer program will be held rain or shine, unless there is extreme inclement weather, such as extreme high heat index, high winds or thunderstorms. We make every effort to hold program, however safety is our top priority. Due to the nature and schedule of our summer program, make up days will only be provided if two days are missed in one week - then a make up day on that Friday will be offered. Refunds are not provided for days cancelled due to weather.
The programs that are held during the summer for visitors, campers, and locals alike provide a variety of experiences as they learn about and explore the Park. None of these programs would be possible without the support of Calaveras Big Trees Association.
I have been taught that apricots and cherries should only be summer pruned, never winter pruned. The winter pruning opens them up to diseases if there are any pruning cuts within about 6 weeks of moisture (dew or rain).
Also, if you want to see pruning videos, you can see how they do them at Dave Wilson. Here is a link to the videos about Backyard Orchard Culture. Always fun to watch before you go out and do it. It gives you the confidence to get going.
With two sour cherry trees, overgrown (plus one seriously storm damaged) and needing major renovation, would you still recommend summer only pruning? I have dealt with excessive water spouts on a couple of shade trees, so understand your point about a danger of winter pruning. But we need to reduce our cherry trees by 1/3 maybe even 1/2 total height. Is it a mistake to start the renovation this fall?
Many thanks!
Get ready to be Outdoors! We're excited to embark on a summer adventure guided by wise and wild experts. Imagine a place where nature is alive with every breath and the woods hum with secrets. This is our campus, where fresh beginnings bloom and summer learning is rooted in the earth itself. It's a place where friendship and adventure are born from shared moments of magic! This year, we're unveiling a new chapter, led by a team eager to step out on an exciting adventures, and with smaller groups, we promise to enchant and enrapture you like never before.
Will, thank you for another great tutorial. You are my best teacher and I learn so much from you. The greens are tricky but you have explained it and presented very well and easy to understand. I am going to paint again the summer photo I like and I am sure it will be much better when I use your tips.
The bio-based materials industry, which includes bio-based fuels, materials, and chemicals, is expanding and providing new career opportunities that are not well known by today's entering college students. In addition, the related undergraduate degree programs are neither gender nor ethnically representative of current U.S. demographics. A program model framework called Inside Trees was developed and tested in this project for an in-person summer camp and remote learning modules to help raise awareness and form a pipeline between high school students and future enrollment in higher-educational degree programs. To gain a better understanding of logistics, a prototype summer camp was delivered to 12 students, 10 of whom were women, 3 were first-generation college students, 1 was African American, and 1 was Hispanic/Latino. Three students who attended the Inside Trees summer camp enrolled at Virginia Tech University the following year. Content and activities from the summer camp were later converted into digital learning modules that could be used with a summer camp or as separate teaching/learning units. Review of supporting literature and informal student feedback indicates that a summer camp program that includes experiential learning, a positive experience in nature, support through the higher-educational academic program, multiple disciplines, and career opportunities shows good potential to be an effective pipeline to increase diversity in the bio-based industry. It is suggested that the Inside Trees model curriculum and framework could be adapted by other universities or organizations for achievement of institution-specific goals toward improved awareness and enrollment of underrepresented students.
Active learning has been shown to increase women and URM student interest and enthusiasm for STEM disciplines (Armbruster et al. 2009, Martinez et al. 2012, Carrick et al. 2016). Experiential learning is active learning through the integration of action and reflection and experience and concept (Kolb and Kolb 2017). Fundamentally ,students expand their knowledge of a discipline through reflection, conceptualization, and experimentation of knowledge assimilated through an experience. Therefore, in experiential learning, students are continuously engaged in active learning that expands their knowledge of a discipline through practical application. This allows students to connect the disciplinary content learned through experience and reflection to a practical application through conceptualization and experimentation. The practical application can then be connected to a societal context through an additional experience. Therefore, experiential learning allows for a more meaningful understanding and practical applicability of the disciplinary content in society that is not always apparent in active learning. The meaningful connection encourages women and URM students to pursue STEM disciplines in higher education and can be used as a tool to challenge preexisting attitudes and perceptions of women and URM students on the practical applicability of STEM disciplines (Rouleau et al. 2017). Based on this premise, a nonformal educational program called Inside Trees was developed in the Department of Sustainable Biomaterials (SBIO) at Virginia Tech University and tested as a model for a recruitment method to encourage women and URM students to pursue bio-based materials science undergraduate education programs (College of Natural Resources and Environment 2022). Inside Trees at Virginia Tech had two components: the on-campus summer camp program for high school students and the remote modules and activity sheets. The in-person summer camp program was designed to introduce underrepresented students (women, minorities, and first-generation college students) to the field of forest- and wood-based materials. Remote learning modules and activity/information sheets were created to provide information about bio-based materials, trees, products from wood raw materials, and bio-based materials careers.
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