Tuesday, June 4, 2024
Q&A in the Garden: What Fruit Can I Pick in June?
What other fruits mature after strawberries but before brambles or blueberries? Even the first summer berries I expect will take several weeks to ripen; thus, I'd like to create a garden with essentially constant harvests.
A: If you have the room, Serviceberry might be a good option. Juneberry is another common name for these native plants, referring to the month when the fruits usually ripen. Their fruits have a distinct, mildly sweet-tart flavor and resemble blueberries in size. Ripe fruits are dark purple in color, and the seeds are slightly larger than those of blueberries but still edible.
In Maryland and the eastern United States, a number of serviceberry species—all belonging to the genus Amelanchier—grow naturally. Any species or hybrid you're likely to grow in your home landscape should be plenty for domestic use, even though at least one of the species bred for exceptional fruit flavor and quality is not native to your area. The berries can be cooked like blueberries, turned into preserves, or consumed raw. I've eaten a handful of them raw and successfully added them to a scone recipe.
For basic growing advice and care details on this berry and other native and non-native fruits such as kiwi berries, Asian persimmon, black chokeberry, elderberry, and currant, visit our new website, Less Common Fruits for a Home Garden.
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Aside from their stunning spring blossoms that benefit pollinators, serviceberries are also an excellent addition to gardens because of their thin leaves, which don't heavily shadow companion plants below, and their gorgeous fall foliage, which is typically reddish-orange. Mature plants can be either large shrubs or tiny trees, growing to a height of around 20 feet, and they can have one or more trunks.
Q: This spring, something killed my Euonymus shrubs. The foliage has disappeared. I'm not sure if the caterpillars are to blame for the insect problem on the shrubs, but I noticed a lot of them scuttling around the yard that I hadn't seen previously. Can you speculate as to what transpired?
In this instance, I believe the caterpillars to be most likely at fault. You're right—scale insects are the only thing that annoy Euonymus, and they don't typically have missing leaves. This year, we've gotten more Ask Extension inquiries than normal concerning a pest known as the aptly named Euonymus leaf notcher. Maybe after being discovered for the first time in northern Virginia almost 20 years ago, they are multiplying today.
Fortunately, this pest—a non-native moth caterpillar—only consumes the leaves of Euonymus (Euonymus) and its relative, Bittersweet (Celastrus). of our location, the majority of plants of either genus that are found in home gardens and natural places are either invasive or non-native. Our forests are home to a few natural species of Euonymus shrubs, which are deciduous, and a native species of bittersweet, but the latter are harder to come by because deer adore them.
Fortunately, this moth only produces one generation each year, so you're safe for the remainder of the season once the feeding damage occurs in the spring.
Look for egg clusters that the adult moths lay in the fall on twig tips (or beneath the leaves of host plants) and squash or clip them off to avoid the issue in subsequent years. An application of a biologically-derived pesticide using the chemicals Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis, a naturally occurring bacterium typically found in soil) or spinosad might stop an early-noticed caterpillar population while they are still young and tiny. You may also use a topical spray, such as horticultural oil or insecticidal soap, but it needs to come into close contact with the caterpillars in order to be effective.
You may prune the entire mess back quite a bit to allow the Euonymus to leaf out once more and rejuvenate its look if a row of bare plants is too unsightly. In either case, you'll still need to wait a few weeks for regrowth to add some fullness or size, but at least then you'll be able to control their size concurrently since "Manhattan" grows quickly and can reach heights of up to 10 feet.
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