Anyone who has grown a vegetable garden or fruit trees in Montana, especially on our side of the Divide, knows that it comes with myriad of challenges. It takes a little pioneering spirit to persevere. Some years are productive and then you may get complacent. Then we get a winter or spring like this past one, and it can be really discouraging.
I went into this spring thinking that this winter hadn’t been that bad. Sure, we had our negative 30-degree days, but I didn’t think we had had long enough stretches of extreme cold for it to cause much damage. I expected that the fruit trees would have an amazing year if the spring weather would cooperate. Last year, we had very little tree fruit due to a couple hard freezes that hit right at full bloom, which is the most sensitive, critical time. This year was going to be different.
But our trees didn’t break dormancy when they should have. Trees in Helena had been in full bloom for weeks and many of my trees were still reluctant to spring to life. The honeyberries and strawberries were in full bloom buzzing with pollinators and the promise of a good fruit crop, and yet still many of our fruit trees showed little progress. Some finally bloomed late, only to be hit by two late frosts.
