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Thought this was just cool!

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A mother in South Akron, Ohio, took a honey of a photo shoot recently ― with the help of 20,000 bees.

Emily Mueller is expecting her fourth child in November and wanted to honor the occasion with a photo shoot.

The 33-year-old woman also runs a bee removal service with her husband, Ryan, and decided that the maternity photos should also reflect her love of nature's most valuable insect.

"Bees represent life and death," she told Cleveland.com. "We've had three miscarriages, so these pictures are dedicated to life and death, to all of the children we've had."

Her longtime friend, photographer Kendrah Damis, took the maternity pictures. Carefully.

Mueller controlled the 20,000 bees by holding the queen of the hive in a small cage. She seems perfectly calm in the photos, but Damis admitted to being slightly concerned.

"It was uneasy, but I wasn't that scared," Damis told HuffPost. "I did have to flick a bee off my hand, and I unconsciously hunched down when they were flying around."

As buzzworthy as the photo shoot is, Mueller knows other people might not be believers.

"I know a lot of people are looking at this video, thinking, 'This lady is crazy,'" she told InsideEdition.com. "And I understand completely. Many years ago, I was afraid of bees, too."

Still, she admits, it wasn't a completely painless experience. She was stung three times during the shoot, including once when she sat on a bee and another time when she crushed one with her arm.

"None of the bees intentionally stung me," Mueller told the website. "It was my own fault. I didn't realize there was one on my arm."

Despite these painful moments, Mueller insisted her unborn child was never at risk.

"People think I'm putting my baby at harm," Mueller told People.com. "But bees are gentle, and I hope my bee belly helps people see that they aren't as scary as you might think."

Although posing with 20,000 bees wasn't completely predictable, Mueller was happy with the encounter.

"It was absolutely amazing to connect with nature in that way and to have the bees directly on my womb was so spiritual," she said.

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Ohio Mom Poses For Maternity Photo With 20,000 Bees

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A mother in South Akron, Ohio, took a honey of a photo shoot recently ― with the help of 20,000 bees. Emily Mueller is expecting her fourth child in November and wanted to honor the occasion with a photo shoot.

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LOOK HOW AMAZING!!

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July 20, 2015 - Sam Van Aken, an artist and professor at Syracuse University, uses "chip grafting" to create trees that each bear 40 different varieties of stone fruits, or fruits with pits.

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The Honeybee Conservancy/ Anthophilous is a 501c3 non-profit established in 2009 in response to the bee crisis. We engage in education, outreach, support research and build bee habitats. We are a Project of Social and Environmental Entrepreneurs.

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Growing Butterfly Bushes in the Garden: How to Plant, Grow, and Care for Buddleja, or Buddleia.

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The first key to blueberry growing success is to pick the right variety for your climate and to give it company. Blueberries produce more and bigger fruit when planted with at least one other variety to allow for cross-pollination. Planting multiple varieties with different maturity dates also stretches out the harvest season.

Before settling on specific varieties, you will need to choose the types of blueberries that are best suited to your region: highbush, lowbush, half-high, or rabbiteye. Regardless if you live in Manitoba or Miami, there is a blueberry type that will thrive in your backyard.

A second key to success is the soil. Blueberries demand soil quite different from that enjoyed by most other garden plants. For blueberries to thrive, the soil must be well aerated, moist, very high in humus, and-most important of all-very acidic. These conditions are not, however, difficult to create. Start by doing a soil test, then acidifying it, if necessary to a pH of between 4 and 5.5 by mixing in sulfur, a natural mineral, the season before you plant your blueberries. The amount to use depends on your soil's initial pH and your soil's texture, and ranges from one to seven pounds per hundred square feet. If you indicate on your soil test that you will be planting blueberries, most testing services will tell you the amount of sulfur to use. Mix it into the top six inches of soil across the area of the entire mature root zone.

(No room? No problem! See how you can grow tomatoes in the driveway, blueberries on the back deck, and peppers on the porch with Rodale's Edible Spots & Pots-get your copy now!)

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Your Guide To Growing The Most Delicious Blueberries

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The first key to blueberry growing success is to pick the right variety for your climate and to give it company. Blueberries produce more and bigger fruit when planted with at least one other variety to allow for cross-pollination. Planting multiple varieties with different maturity dates also stretches out the harvest season.

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Musa spp.

How to grow banana plants and keep them happy.

Growing bananas does not take much effort, but it does require that you get a few things right when you first get started.

Banana plants can offer many benefits:

They make great windbreaks or screens,

they can keep the sun of the hot western side of your house,

they utilize the water and nutrients in waste drains (think washing water or outdoor shower),

the leaves can be fed to horses, cows and other grazers,

the dried remains of the trunks can be used for weaving baskets and mats.

Oh, and they give you bananas. Lots of bananas!
But when I look around friends' gardens then I see some pretty sad looking banana plants growing there. It helps to understand what bananas like and dislike if you want them to be happy!
Banana plants like:

Rich, dark, fertile soils.

Lots of mulch and organic matter. LOTS. Just keep piling it on.

Lot of nitrogen and potassium. (Chicken manure!)

Steady warmth, not too hot and not too cold. (Bananas are sissies when it comes to temperatures...)

Steady moisture, in the ground and in the air.

The shelter of other bananas! That's the most overlooked aspect by home growers...

Banana plants dislike:

Strong winds.

Extreme heat or cold.

Being hungry or thirsty.

Being alone and exposed.

More detail on all that below.

Banana varieties

Cavendish is the variety that you know from the shops. It's a stout variety that produces large heavy bunches.

Lady Fingers are very tall and slender plants and have sweeter fruit.

Plantains are cooking bananas. They are drier and more starchy. You use them green like you would use potatoes, and they taste similar.

(80% of all bananas grown in the world are plantain varieties! They are an important staple food in many tropical countries.)

There are other varieties, but those are the most popular and most commonly grown.

How do bananas grow?

Bananas aren't real trees, not even palm trees, even though they are often called banana palms. Bananas are perennial herbs. (Gingers, heliconias and bird-of-paradise flowers are distant relatives of bananas. They are in the same order, Zingiberales.)

Banana trunks consists of all the leaf stalks wrapped around each other. New leaves start growing inside, below the ground. They push up through the middle and emerge from the centre of the crown. So does the flower, which finally turns into a bunch of bananas.

Here is a picture series showing how the flower looks at first, and how the bananas appear and curl up towards the light.

Those pictures were taken over the course of a few days. You can pretty much watch this happen. But now it will take another two months or so, depending on the temperature, for the fruit to fill out and finally ripen.

A banana plant takes about 9 months to grow up and produce a bunch of bananas. Then the mother plant dies. But around the base of it are many suckers, little baby plants.

At the base of a banana plant, under the ground, is a big rhizome, called the corm.

The corm has growing points and they turn into new suckers. These suckers can be taken off and transplanted, and one or two can be left in position to replace the mother plant.

Great, so now you know what to do once you have bananas growing in your garden, but how do you start?

How to get started growing bananas.

First you need to make sure that you can grow bananas where you are.

You need a tropical or warm subtropical climate. Bananas can handle extreme heat (if they have enough water), but they don't like it. They can handle cool weather for a short while, but they don't like that either. Below 14°C (57F) they just stop growing.

If the temperatures drop any lower the fruit suffers (the skin turns greyish) and the leaves can turn yellow. Frost kills the plant above ground, but the corm can survive and may re-shoot.

The ideal temperature range for banana growing is around 26-30°C (78-86F).

You need a lot of water to grow bananas. The huge soft leaves evaporate a lot, and you have to keep up the supply. Bananas also need high humidity to be happy. (Where I live the commercial banana growers water their plants two or three times a day with sprinklers to keep up the humidity in the banana plantation!)

You need very rich soil. If you don't have good soil to start with, make some. Incorporate lots and lots of compost and plenty of chicken manure before you plant your bananas (wood ash for extra potassium doesn't hurt either), and then mulch them very thickly. And keep mulching and feeding them!

And you need room so you can plant enough of them together. Bananas need shelter from wind. Growing many banana plants together increases the humidity in the middle, evens out temperature changes a bit, and it shades and cools the trunks. (You don't want to cook the flower that's forming in the middle...)

If you get a chance look at a commercial banana plantation somewhere. The outside rows, especially the western side, always look sad. The best bananas grow on the inside...

You should plant bananas in blocks or clumps, not single rows and definitely not single plants. If you have very little room you can grow a few banana plants together and grow something else on the outside to protect them. But you do need to give them that sheltered jungle environment if you want them to be happy.

Planting bananas

You can not grow bananas from seeds. Banana plants don't produce seeds.

The best way is to start with the above mentioned suckers. Know someone who grows bananas? Talk to them. Every banana plant produces a lot more suckers than you need, so people usually have plenty to give away.

Only take suckers from vigorous banana plants. The suckers should have small, spear shaped leaves and ideally be about four feet high. (Smaller suckers will take longer to fruit and the first buch will be smaller.)

Cut the sucker from the main banana plant with a sharp shovel. Cut downwards between the mature plant and the sucker. You have to cut through the corm. It's not easy...

Make sure you get a good chunk of corm and many roots with it. Chop the top off the sucker to reduce evaporation while you move it and while it settles into its new home. (Remember, the growing point is at the bottom of a banana plant. You can decapitate the sucker. It will grow back.)

You can also dig up a bit of corm and chop it into bits. Every bit that has an eye can be planted and will grow into a banana plant. But it takes longer than growing banana suckers...

Plant your bits or suckers in your well prepared banana patch, keeping two to five metres between them.

The spacing depends on your layout. My bananas grow in a block of several double rows. Within the double rows the spacing is two to three metres, but there are two plants in each position, suckers of the initial plant. And I have four to five metres between the double rows.

I also have a banana circle around an outdoor shower where I only have two metres between individual plants, and they are growing in a haphazard way. And if you have just a single clump of a few banana plants you can put them even closer together.

Keep your banana plants moist but not too wet in the early days, or they may rot. (They don't have leaves yet to evaporate water, so they don't need much.)

Maintaining your banana patch

The most common cause of death for bananas is lack of water. The most common cause for not getting fruit is starvation. Banana plants blow over in strong winds. Protect them and feed them and water them and all will be well. Other than that bananas don't need much maintenance.

Just remove any dead leaves and cut down the dead plants every now and then.

You get bigger fruit if you remove all unwanted suckers, only keeping the best one (two for very healthy, vigorous plants).

The best suckers are the ones with the small, spear shaped leaves, NOT the pretty ones with the big round leaves!

Why? A sucker that is still fed by the mother plant does not need to do much photosynthesis, so it doesn't need to produce big leaves.

And a sucker that is well looked after by the mother plant will produce better fruit and be stronger than one that had to struggle on its own...

A mature plantation is pretty much self mulching. Just throw all the leaves and old trunks etc. back under the plants. You can also grow other plants in the understory to produce more mulch. (I use cassava, sweet potato and crotolaria).

You just need to sprinkle on some fertiliser every now and then, to replace what you took out of the system when you took the bananas. Keep the fertiliser close to the trunk as bananas don't have a big root system.

Growing banana fruit

You may see your first flower emerge after about six months, depending on the weather. Leave the leaves around it, especially the one protecting the top bend of the stalk from sunburn!

As the purple flower petals curl back and drop off they reveal a "hand" of bananas under each. Each banana is a "finger".

You may get anything between four to a dozen or more full hands. Then, under the next petal, you'll see a hand of teeny weeny excuses for bananas. Those are the male fingers.

The male fingers just dry and drop off. Only the stalk remains. If you let it grow it will eventually reach the ground.

Some people break off the "bell" (the bunch of purple flower petals at the end) about 15 cm below the last female hand. That way the banana plant puts its energy and reserves into growing big bananas, and not into growing a long stalk. (Commercial banana growers also remove some of the bottom female hands, so the remaining bananas grow bigger.)

Not everyone thinks that way, though. This is a comment from one of my readers:

I never cut the flower off the bananas. The hummers (Ed: hummingbirds) love them too much. As you said, there are always enough bananas around and though I sell them I have to keep my hummers happy.

Well, and then you patiently wait for at least another two months. You may have to prop your banana bunch, because it becomes very heavy, and a bunch can snap off or pull the whole plant over.

A good prop would be a long stick with a u-shaped hook at the end. But a long enough plank or pole can do the job, too. I leave that to your ingenuity.

Bananas are ready to be picked when they look well rounded with ribs, and the little flowers at the end are dry and rub off easily.

They will eventually ripen on the bunch, and those bananas taste the best. But once they start they ripen very quickly, faster than you can eat or use them. So you may as well cut the top hands off a bit earlier and ripen them on the kitchen bench.

You can also cut the whole bunch and hang it somewhere if you need to protect it from possums or birds or other thieves. But then all bananas will ripen at once! So be prepared.

You can preserve bananas for use in cooking and baking by peeling and freezing them. Or, to preserve them for eating, peel, split in half lengthwise and dry them.

Once the bunch is picked the rest of the plant will die quickly. Cut it to the ground, throw on some chook poo, and let the next sucker grow while you process all the bananas...

Tip: commercial banana growers use bunch covers (plastic bags open at both ends that they slip over the bunch and tie at the top) to protect bananas from diseases, insects, sunburn and marauders. You can try to buy those bags at a rural supplies store, or beg some of a grower.

I used to bag my bananas (hard to get out of habits after four years of working on commercial plantations) but I don't bother any more. Even if the birds get a few, there are still more than enough left for me and the chickens and the dog and all friends and their families and freezing and drying... So why not let the wild birds partake of the bounty as well!
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Reader submission: The mystery of the missing banana bunch
Return from Growing Bananas to The Tropical Permaculture Garden

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Growing Bananas - How To Grow Banana Plants And Keep Them Happy

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Growing bananas does not take much effort, but it does require that you get a few things right when you first get started.

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How to Choose Tomatoes

Choosing tomato varieties can be confusing because there are so many, so use our Tomato Chooser to help you pick the best for your garden.

Our article "Learn Tomato Terms" explains some basic (but important) tomato terms, such as hybrid, indeterminate vs. determinate, and VFN (disease resistance).

It's a good idea to grow a range of varieties, including at least one or two disease-resistant types, since, of all veggies, tomatoes tend to be the most susceptible to disease.

How to Plant and Care for Tomatoes

Tomatoes run on warmth; plant in late spring and early summer except in zone 10, where they are a fall and winter crop.

Devote a prime, sunny spot to growing tomatoes. Tomatoes need at least 6 to 8 hours of sun to bring out their best flavors.

You will need to stake, trellis, or cage most tomato plants to keep them off the ground. Decide on a support plan before you set out your plants, then add that support directly after planting.

Give each plant enough room to grow. Space robust, long-vined, indeterminate varieties about 3 feet apart. Stockier determinate plants can be grown 2 feet apart. If growing in containers, you'll need at least a 24-inch pot for an indeterminate variety, or an18-inch pot for a determinate variety.

Tomatoes take up nutrients best when the soil pH ranges from 6.2 to 6.8, and they need a constant supply of major and minor plant nutrients. To provide the major nutrients, mix a continuous-release fertilizer, such as Miracle-Gro Shake 'N Feed, into the soil as you prepare the planting holes, following the rates given on the fertilizer label.

At the same time, mix in 3 to 4 inches of compost, which will provide minor nutrients and help hold moisture and fertilizer in the soil until it is needed by the plants.

To grow a really strong tomato plant, we recommend burying two-thirds of the stem when planting. This crucial step will allow the plant to sprout roots along the buried stem, so your plant will be stronger and better able to find water in a drought. Please note that this deep-planting method only works with tomatoes (and tomatillos), not other veggies.

Immediately after planting, water seedlings and add a liquid plant food, such as Bonnie Herb, Vegetable & Flower Plant Food , to give them a good start. Feed with liquid plant food every couple of weeks during the growing season.

You can combine fast-maturing varieties with special season-stretching techniques to grow an early crop, but wait until the last frost has passed to plant main-season tomatoes.

Cover the ground with 2 to 4 inches of mulch to minimize weeds and help keep the soil evenly moist. Straw and shredded leaves make great mulches for tomatoes.

Water regularly, aiming for at least an inch of moisture per week (through rain or watering), more in the summertime. Feel the soil; if the top inch is dry, it's time to water. If summer droughts are common in your area, or you tend to forget to water, use soaker hoses, drip irrigation, or other drought-busting techniques to help maintain even soil moisture - the key to preventing cracked fruits and blossom-end rot.

How to Troubleshoot Tomato Problems

As summer heats up, some tomatoes have trouble setting fruit. Be patient, and you will start seeing little green tomatoes again when nights begin cooling down. Meanwhile, promptly harvest ripe tomatoes to relieve stressed plants of their heavy burden. If you live in an area in which summertime temperatures are typically in the 90s, be sure to choose some heat-tolerant tomato varieties, bred for their ability to set fruit under high temperatures.

Humid weather creates ideal conditions for fungal diseases like early blight, which causes dark spots to first form on lower leaves. Be sure to remove any unhealthy looking or diseased leaves throughout the season. Late blight is a more devastating disease that kills plants quickly; the only way to control it is to protect against it by spraying the leaves with an approved fungicide such as chlorothalonil or copper, and to keep the garden clean of plant debris.

You'll also want to be on the lookout for pests. In mid-summer, for example, big green caterpillars called tomato hornworms eat tomato foliage and sometimes damage fruits. One or two hornworms can strip a plant leafless in short order! Deal with pests as soon as you spot them.

By late summer, plants that began producing early in the season will show signs of exhaustion. With just a little effort, you can rescue those sad tomato plants by pruning away withered leaves and branches. Then follow up with liquid plant food and treatments for leaf diseases or insects, if needed.

Check out our article on Tomato Quirks for more troubleshooting information.

How to Harvest and Store Tomatoes

As tomatoes begin to ripen, their color changes from vibrant medium-green to a lighter shade, with faint pink or yellow blushing. These "breakers," or mature green tomatoes, can be chopped into salsas, pickled, or pan-fried into a crispy appetizer. Yet tomato flavors become much more complex as the fruits ripen, so you have good reason to wait. The exact signs of ripeness vary with variety, but in general, perfectly ripe tomatoes show deep color yet still feel firm when gently squeezed.

Store picked tomatoes at room temperature indoors, or in a shady place outside. Never refrigerate tomatoes, because temperatures below 55° cause the precious flavor compounds to break down.

Bumper crops can be frozen, canned, or dried for future use.

Download our How to Grow Tomatoes instructions. They are in .PDF format.
Get gardening info on the go with our free app, HOMEGROWN with Bonnie Plants. Find out more, or download it now for iPhone or Android.

FAQs

Your plant tags say to plant tomatoes deep: two-thirds of the plant underground. Is that really a good practice?

Yes, we recommend this because the more plant you put under the soil, the better the root system. The buried stem of a tomato plant will sprout roots. However, this is not true for all vegetables, only tomatoes and tomatillos.

The tag says full sun, but in Arizona with temperatures reaching over the 100 degree mark, is that going to be an issue with this plant?

We recommend that you give your tomatoes some afternoon shade in summer. They need some relief.

What is meant by "maturity is reached in __ days"?

The maturity is the number of days from planting the seedling until the fruit is ready to pick. This varies a little with weather and region, but the "days to maturity" is a good way to see what will be ready early, mid, and late season.

What size cage should I use for my tomato plants?

Most tomatoes work best with a 5- to 6-foot trellis, stake, or cage. Buy the largest cage possible or make your own from concrete reinforcement wire. The vines of indeterminate tomatoes can get longer than 6 feet, but just let them climb to the top and droop over and down if that doesn't bother you. Otherwise, you'll be harvesting with a ladder!

When the plant says full sun, what exactly does that mean?

Full sun means no shade all day, but in many cases in the summer, that's too much. In hot climates, herbs and some vegetables appreciate a little shade in the mid to late afternoon.

Is it a good idea to always stake or cage my tomatoes?

Yes. Staking tomatoes helps to increase yield and prevent rotting and diseases.

Can I plant one tomato plant in a five-gallon bucket on my patio? How large should the container be for a tomato?

Yes, a 5-gallon container is the minimum size for a tomato plant. A container should be at least 18 inches wide at the top for a tomato, preferably 24 inches for an indeterminate tomato plant. Also, make sure your container has drainage holes.

What do the letters VFFN stand for in the names of your tomatoes?

These letters represent problems that a variety resists, which means that it should not succumb to the problem. V=Verticillium wilt, F and FF=Fusarium wilt races 1 and 2, A= Alternaria leaf spot. The N is for nematode resistance; nematodes are not a disease, they are tiny eel-like pests that ruin roots. There are other designations, too, which are included in the tomato variety descriptions in our online plant catalog.

Is there such a thing as nematode-resistant tomato plants?

Yes, many varieties are resistant to nematodes. Look for the "N" after the name, which stands for nematode resistance. To find these varieties, check the catalog section of our website. Our tomato descriptions list plants' resistance to nematodes and other problems.

Should I be pruning off the lower branches of my tomato plants? How far off of the ground should the lower branches be?

Pruning is not necessary, but some people do it to keep soil that might harbor diseases from splashing up on the leaves; 12 to 18 inches from the ground ought to do it.

Is it true that pinching off the flowers on the tomato plant helps it to produce more fruit?

It will not help production, but it could increase the size of the tomatoes left on the vine by a little bit.

I just planted my tomatoes and found out that it is too early. Should I put something over them to protect them at night?

Your tomatoes should be okay if you cover them to protect them from frost and cold, strong wind. Don't let the foliage touch the cover unless it is a material that doesn't transfer the cold easily, such as bonded polyester row cover, a cardboard box, or a blanket. Avoid metal cans or plastic unless it does not touch the plants.

What causes tomatoes to turn black on the bottom?

They call that blossom end rot. It is thought to be caused by lack of calcium and drought stress. One way to add calcium is to lime the soil. This will help future crops. To help the current crop, purchase a calcium solution, such as Stop-rot, that you spray on the plants.

Do I have to replant tomatoes every year, or do the plants come back when the time is right?

Tomatoes are annuals that are killed by frost. They need to be replanted each year.

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Choosing tomato varieties can be confusing because there are so many, so use our Tomato Chooser to help you pick the best for your garden. Our article "Learn Tomato Terms" explains some basic (but important) tomato terms, such as hybrid, indeterminate vs. determinate, and VFN (disease resistance).

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Fall means apple harvest time! See our tips on harvesting apples-as well as caring for apple trees, apple tree problems, and everything about planting and growing juicy apples in the home garden!

About Apples

Apple trees aren't just for people with acres upon acres of land. Even in a small space, you can plant a hedge of dwarf apple trees or an apple espalier and yield a successful crop. Spring planting is recommended in central and northern areas. Fall planting can also be successful, but only in areas where autumn and winter weather is generally more mild and moist.

Where Do Apples Grow?

However, climate considerations are very important for growing apples. As a general rule, if an apple tree is called "hardy," it grows best in USDA Hardiness Zones 3 to 5. If termed "long-season," apple quality will be best in Zones 5 to 8. Check your zone here.

Tree tags don't always tell you where the variety grows best, but many catalogs do. Also, check with your local Cooperative Extension Service for a recommendation specific to your area. Each variety has a number of chill hours needed to set fruit (i.e., the amount of time temperatures are between 32 and 45 degrees F). The farther north you go, the more chill hours an apple variety needs to avoid late spring freeze problems. Check tree tags for chill hour information or ask the seller.

Can You Grow Apple Trees From Seed?

A common question is whether it's possible to simply plant the seed of a variety that you like rather than buy a young tree. While it's certainly possible to grow an apple tree from a seed, the apple tree you get probably won't be the kind you hoped for!

Apple seeds are genetically different from their parent tree, which means that things like tree size, hardiness, and fruit quality will differ (and will usually be poorer). So, if you plant a Honeycrisp seed, you won't end up with Honeycrisp apples. Plus, it can take 8-10 years for an apple seedling to grow big enough to produce apples, so you may end up waiting a while!

Nevertheless, growing an apple seedling can still be a fun experiment.
Here's how to plant apple seeds:
Apple seeds need to be exposed to cool, moist conditions before they are ready to germinate and grow. Sow them outdoors 1/2 inch deep in the fall, and the natural seasonal cycle will take care of the seed's chilling needs for you. Alternatively, place the seeds in moistened sand in a plastic container and keep the container in the fridge for 3 to 4 months. Then, sow them outdoors 1/2 inch deep once the threat of frost has passed. Once the seedling emerges, be sure to keep it well-watered and protected from pests.

Apples Need Pest Control

Also, it's important to recognize that there are many diseases and fruit pests that attack apples, so it's rare for this fruit to be grown without any type of pesticides. Growing apples organically is much more difficult in the East Coast than the West due to incidence of fungal diseases and types of pests that aren't even present in the West. It will take much research and persistence to grow apples if you wish to avoid any type of spraying program.

Apple Trees Need Friends

Most apples need pollen from another apple tree to produce fruit. This is called cross-pollination. This second tree must be a different cultivar but also one that will flower at the same time. The presence of bees will be very important; poor pollination can reduce the number of fruit and cause misshapen fruit; some orchards rent or maintain bee hives for good pollination. Overusing broad-spectrum insecticides can reduce the number of bees.

When to Plant Apple Trees

Bare-root apple trees should be planted in the early spring as soon as the soil can be worked.

Container-grown apple trees can be planted throughout the growing season as long as they are given enough water.

Selecting a Site

As with most fruit, apple trees produce best when grown in full sun, which means six or more hours of direct summer sunlight daily.

Apple trees need well-drained soil, but should be able to retain some moisture. Light- to medium-textured soils are best. Fruit trees struggle in heavy clay soil; poorly drained soil leads to root rot disease.

Plant fruit in a location with good air circulation so leaves dry quickly after a rainfall or irrigation (or the tree risks fungal leaf diseases).

Make sure the tree will not be planted in a "frost pocket" where cold air settles in low-lying areas. Choose a higher site with a slip if possible so that cold air will flow away from the trees.

Do not plant trees near wooded areas or other trees.

The ideal soil pH is 6.0 to 6.5, but a pH range of 5.5 to 7.0 is acceptable. Take a soil test prior to planting your apple trees. Your local Cooperative Extension Service can instruct you.

Planting the Tree

Before planting, remove all weeds and the grass in a 4-foot diameter circle.

After you purchase the tree, protect it from injury, drying out, freezing, or overheating. If the roots have dried out, soak them in water about 24 hours before planting.

Tree spacing is influenced by the rootstock, soil fertility, and pruning. Seedlings or full-size trees should be planted about 15 to 18 feet apart in a row. A dwarfing rootstock might be 4 to 8 feet apart in a row. Of course, apple trees require cross-pollination; a different cultivar that blooms at the same time must be planted within 2,000 feet (preferably, nearer).

Dig a hole approximately twice the diameter of the root system and 2 feet deep. Place some of the loose soil back into the hole and loosen the soil on the walls of the planting hole so the roots can easily penetrate the soil. Spread the tree roots on the loose soil, making sure they are not twisted or crowded in the hole. Continue to replace the soil around the roots. As you begin to cover the roots, firm the soil to be sure it surrounds the roots and to remove air pockets.

Do not add fertilizer at planting time, as the roots can be "burned". Fill the remainder of the hole with the loose soil, and press the soil down well.

Most apple trees are grafted. The graft union should be at least 4 inches above the soil line so that roots do not emerge from the scion. The graft union (where the scion is attached to the rootstock) can be recognized by the swelling at the junction.

Dwarf apple trees are notoriously prone to uprooting under the weight of a heavy crop, so you should provide a support system for your hedge. You can grow your trees against a fence, or you can provide free-standing support in the form of a trellis.

See our video to learn how to plant a bare-rooted fruit tree.

Water young trees regularly, especially those on semi-dwarfing or dwarfing rootstocks, to ensure that the root system becomes well established.

Refresh mulch periodically, but pull it away from the trunk so that it doesn't rot. This also helps to prevent rodents from nesting in it over the winter and chewing on the tree's bark.

Apple trees require initial training to nurture a strong frame of branches so the trees can carry heavy apple crops. Dwarf plants must be supported with posts or trellis and trained to a central leader system. Standard (and sem-dwarf) trees should also be trained to a modified leader.

Pest control measures will be an important part of care. Correct timing is critical to avoid harming the bees and affecting pollination. When used, pesticides are applied at a specific stage of flower and fruit development, not according to the calendar. It's important to research your variety and climate to know which pests are most likely to be a problem, which will allow you to apply the right controls at the right time.

If you wish to avoid pesticides, it is possible, though apple trees are one of the most pest-susceptible fruits. For example, you can place paper bags around each apple of your tree, though this takes some time and labor. There are also organic pesticides.

Pruning Apple Trees

Pruning slows a young tree's overall growth and can delay fruiting, so don't be in a hurry to prune, other than removing misplaced, broken, or dead branches. There are several techniques to direct growth without heavy pruning. For example:

Rub off misplaced buds before they grow into misplaced branches.

Bend a stem down almost horizontally for a few weeks to slow growth and promote branches and fruiting. Tie down with strings to stakes in the ground or to lower branches.

Prune yearly to maintain size and form once your apple tree has filled in and is bearing fruit. Pruning reduces disease by letting in more light and air. Large trees may need more pruning (and a ladder!).

Prune your mature tree when it is dormant. Completely cut away overly vigorous, upright stems (most common high up in the tree).

Remove weak twigs (which often hang from the undersides of limbs.

Shorten stems that become too droopy, especially those low in the tree.

After about ten years, fruiting spurs (stubby branches that elongate only about a half-inch per year) become overcrowded and decrepit. Cut away some of them and shorten others.

When a whole limb of fruiting spurs declines with age, cut it back to make room for a younger replacement.

Thinning Apples

Apples are often grown without any thinning other than what nature provides in the annual spring drop.

However, to avoid potential disease and insect problems, it's helpful to thin after the natural fruit drop (about 4 to 6 weeks after bloom) to one fruit per cluster, or about 6 to 8 inches between fruit.

This seems hard, but this practice evens out production, prevents a heavy crop from breaking limbs, and ensures better-tasting, larger fruit crop.

Soon after fruit-set, remove the smallest fruits or damaged ones, leaving about four inches between those that remain.

Choose the Right Varieties

Look for disease-resistant trees, such as 'Liberty', 'Jonafree', 'Macfree', and 'Williams Pride', which will give you the ability to grow organic fruit or to use fewer chemicals. Maintenance is easier, too.

You need to choose a rootstock. All apple trees sold have 2 parts: a "rootstock" or foundation and a "scion" or top portion which determines the fruit variety. A rootstock can be "seedling" or "standard" (which produces a full-size tree) or it can be "dwarfing" or "size-controlling" (which produces a smaller tree for easier care and harvest).

For dwarf trees, make sure that the rootstock is specified. A Bud 9 is a common, hardy tree that's easy to train for USDA Climate Zones 3 to 5. The M9 is probably the most widely planted rootstock, though it could die in frigid winters.

Buy dormant, bare-root, 1-year-old nursery trees with good root systems. Dwarfs and semi-dwarfs will bear in 3 to 4 years, yielding 1 to 2 bushels per year. Standard-size trees will bear in 5 to 8 years, yielding 4 to 5 bushels of apples per year.

The variety of apple selected should be based on fruit characteristics, bloom time, and pollen compatibility. Consult a local nursery to see which trees are potential cross-pollinators in your area. For best results, include a 'Grimes Golden', 'Golden Delicious', 'Red Delicious', or 'Winter Banana' in your planting. These varieties are known pollinators. Crabapple trees can also be used as pollinators if they bloom at the same time as the desired variety. Nursery catalogs will provide pollination charts.

Most apple varieties do not pollinate themselves or any flowers of the same apple variety; this requires planting at least two different apple tree varieties close to one another so that the bees can pollinate. (There are actually some self-pollinating apple tree varieties if you are really short on space. However, even these apple trees will bear more fruit if cross-pollinated.)

Also, consider how you will use your apples: Do you love to bake apple pies? Or, perhaps you just want apples that taste far better than what you could buy in a grocery store. See Best Apples for Baking for more information.

A young dwarf tree produces about 1 1/2 bushels of fruit-and even less when the tree is part of an apple hedge. So, if you're interested in baking lots of 'Cox's Orange Pippin' apple pies, you'll need to plant several trees of that variety to get enough fruit.

If you have no particular culinary goal, try planting one of each different variety that ripen over the entire harvest season. Then you can enjoy regular apple tastings and still have enough fruit on hand for a "mess" of cooked apples.

Seek out the advice of local orchardists about the varieties that will do well in your area. Do the bulk of your planning from an easy chair, with a half-dozen nursery catalogs in your lap!

Harvest patiently. After all this pruning and caring, be sure to harvest your apples at their peak of perfection.

Pluck your apples when their background color is no longer green.

The stem should part readily from the branch when the fruit is cupped in the palm of your hand and given a slight twist around, then up (do not yank on the apple).

Different apple varieties mature at different times, so the harvest season can stretch from August to October.

If the apple is overripe and soft, use for cooking!

Storing Apples

Only store mid or late season apples. Early season varieties don't keep and are best eaten soon after picking. Mid season varieties should keep for a few weeks, while late season varieties will stay in good condition for anywhere up to five months in a root cellar. Apples destined for storage must be perfect, with no bruises or blemishes that could provide entry points for rot.

Store apples by wrapping up individual fruits in newspaper or tissue paper. Place the wrapped apples onto trays that allow air to circulate. You can also store them unwrapped, but the fruits should not touch. Different varieties store for different lengths of time, so keep them separate and eat those that won't store as long first.

The ideal store is somewhere cool, dark, and well-ventilated. Most garages and sheds are ideal, while attics and basements should be avoided due to either excessive heat, lack of ventilation, or low humidity. Check stored apples regularly and remove any that are going soft, brown, or rotting.

Check out this video to learn more about how to harvest and store apples.

March 11 is Johnny Appleseed Day, celebrating John Chapman, legendary American pioneer and folk hero who planted apple trees across the American Frontier.

Did you know that apples and aged cheeses can reduce tooth plaque? (Eat them together!)

A bad woman can't make good applesauce. -proverb

Does an apple a day keep the doctor away? Find the answer and learn more about the health benefits of apples, apple cider, and cider vinegar.

This fall, try your hand at making an apple head, or try one of our Top 10 Apple Recipes!

Apples are prone to insects and diseases-including apple maggots, plum curculios, green fruit worms, and codling moths. Many gardeners who swear off pesticides find they need to find, at minimum, an acceptable annual spray treatment for a decent crop.

One idea to avoid pesticides is to select disease-resistant varieties such as ' Prima', ' Priscilla', ' Liberty', and ' Freedom '. They do not require spraying for apple scab, cedar-apple rust, and other common diseases, while most other varieties require periodic spraying every spring and summer after planting. Check with your extension service to find approved pest prevention programs for your area.

You can also try an anti-insect oil, found at garden stores. Spray it in the spring when your apple trees are in the tight cluster stage: after the leaves have unfolded from the fruiting cluster, but before the buds begin to show pink.

Other pests, such as scales, mites, and aphids, should be controlled by natural parasite and predator populations if you haven't used a lot of sprays.

The apple maggot can be trapped simply enough by hanging one or two round, softball-size balls-painted red and coated with sticky "Tangle-Trap"-from a branch in June through the summer. Reapply the sticky goo a time or two, as necessary.

Keep deer at bay with repellents, fencing, or deer-resistant plants; deter mice and rabbits with wire-mesh cylinders around the base of the tree.

To keep insects away from apple trees, make a solution of 1 cup of vinegar, 1 cup of sugar, and 1 quart of water. Pour this mixture into a wide-mouthed plastic jug. Hang the jug, uncovered, in your apple tree.

Fend off diseases by raking apple leaves, burying them beneath mulch, or grinding them with a lawnmower at season's end

You can freeze apples by stewing washed chunks with a dash of water until they soften. Once ready, sieve and pour the stewed apples into containers, leaving a small space at the top as they will expand slightly when frozen, and pop into the freezer.

You can also cut your fruits into thin slices then dry them out in a dehydrator to make a deliciously chewy and healthy snack.

Planning to bake or cook your apples into an apple pie or meal? See our chart on the best baking and cooking apples in North America.

"Baked apples have an excellent effect upon the whole physical system, feeding the brain as well as adding to the flesh, and keeping the blood pure; also preventing constipation and correcting a tendency to acidity, which produces rheumatism and neuralgia." - The 1898 Old Farmer's Almanac

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See our tips on harvesting apples-as well as caring for apple trees, apple tree problems, and everything about planting and growing juicy apples in the home garden!

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Prune the Blackberry Shrub Canes

It's best to plant blackberry shrubs in the early spring or, in warmer climates, in late fall. Blackberries can be purchased either bare-rooted or containerized. If your new plants are bare-rooted, shake the packing material off the roots and set the plants in a bucket of water for several hours. This keeps the roots from drying out, which you want to avoid at all costs.

In most cases, the canes of a blackberry shrub will have been cut back at the nursery before you purchase them. If your new blackberry shrubs have not been cut back already, cut the canes to 6"-8" inches. By pruning back the canes in the first season, you will not have a crop the first year, but you will allow the plants to put their energy into developing a strong root system. The plants will be healthier and more productive in the long run.

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Prune the Blackberry Shrub Canes It's best to plant blackberry shrubs in the early spring or, in warmer climates, in late fall. Blackberries can be purchased either bare-rooted or containerized. If your new plants are bare-rooted, shake the packing material off the roots and set the plants in a bucket of water for several hours.

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1. Add links to the padlets that show the types of flowers that attract the most bees, and butterflies?
2. Why are butterflies just as important as bees in the pollination process?
3. Start researching garden plants that you would like to grow, and how to grow them? Add the links to Padlet, or summarize your research in Padlet.
a. blackberries
b. tomatoes
c. apple tree
d. banana

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1. How are bugs important in the flower's life cycle?
2.  How do the colors and the brightness of flowers help insects?
3. How do the colors and the brightness of flowers help itself?
4. Why is it important to have bumblebees and pollination?
5. How are the modern pesticides killing off honey bees?
6. What do you think would happen if bumblebees went extinct?
7. What are travelling beekeepers doing when they take their bees around the country? Why do they have to do this?

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Newsela | Study: One pesticide doesn't harm bees, but two do

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Newsela | Want to eat? Then save pollinators from extinction, U.N. report says

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Newsela | Bigger isn't always better: bees have tiny brains but are very intelligent

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Harvesting honey has been a sticky, messy job that's changed very little from the earliest days of beekeeping. But it's about to get a whole lot cleaner with the Flow Hive, an ingenious re-engineering of one of nature's most perfect creations that makes getting that golden nectar as easy as turning on a tap.

Beekeepers Cedar Anderson and his father Stuart have, essentially, hacked the honeycomb-a nearly flawless geometric and structural achievements-to make it more mechanically efficient. In a nutshell, Flow frames have a partially formed honeycomb matrix within a transparent frame. Bees complete the comb, fill the cells with honey and cap them. To harvest the honey, the beekeeper inserts a tool into the top of each frame and twists, a move that splits each cell in the honeycomb vertically, allowing the honey to flow freely. It is collected at the bottom through a tube. Presto! Honey on tap.

Traditionally, the beekeeper must split the boxes of the hive, smoke the bees to calm them, remove the frames, cut the wax caps from the honeycomb, then extract and clean the honey. It's a long, tedious process with a lot of heavy lifting, not to mention the occasional sting. Given how messy it is to harvest honey from honeycomb cells, it's easy to see why apiarists swarmed to the Flow Hive when it hit IndieGoGo earlier this week. It took just five minutes for the Flow campaign to reach its modest goal of $70,000, and the campaign has now passed the $3 million mark.

"We're just gobsmacked," Stuart Anderson, a third-generation beekeeper from New South Wales, Australia said.

The Andersons have been working on Flow for more than a decade. Cedar Anderson says the "breakthrough moment" came one morning while contemplating honey extraction: Why not use an artificial honeycomb matrix that changes shape? When the bees are producing the honey, it would be shaped like real honeycomb. But when it came time harvest, it could transform. With his father on board, the two got to work.

"I had the idea to split the cells vertically," Stuart Anderson says. That way the honey could flow out of the comb, through a tube and into a container. (Check out this video to see it in action.)

Over the next ten years, the two of them built and tested many prototypes. To their surprise, the bees accepted the frames. The bigger challenge was figuring out the mechanics to ensure the honey flowed easily with a turn of the crank. Eventually, they settled on a design in which the frames-which fit into a standard hive box-split each row of cells in half vertically. The Flow Hive is headed for production later this year.

Six hundred bucks gets you a full beekeeping system-a brood box with frames, a super, and six flow frames complete with the crank tool and the tubes. That's everything you need but the bees. Backers also can order frames and boxes in varying quantities to suit their current setup. For example, a three-pack of Flow frames costs $230.

Though the Flow frames are quite an innovation in beekeeping, Cedar Anderson says "much of the beehive is the same as its always been." This means that budding beekeepers and experienced "beeks" will still need to pay close attention to their hives. While harvesting no longer requires beekeepers to remove the frames for every harvest, they should still be inspecting the frames regularly to ensure that the hive is healthy.

Stuart and Cedar Anderson hope that Flow can help ease the learning curve for new beekeepers. While newcomers still will need to learn the ins and outs of the craft from experienced beekeepers, they hope Flow will bring beekeeping into cities and suburbs where beekeeping is space- and cost-prohibitive.

And as far as maintaining a healthy ecosystem, a booming bee population is better for all of us.

"There's more to bees than harvesting honey. Over one third of the food we eat is dependent on bees for pollination," Cedar says. Without the help of bees, our crops would suffer devastating consequences, and with available areas for natural bee habitats disappearing each year, systems that make it easier for humans to look after bees are crucial.

Having exceeded their fundraising goal by such a dramatic margin, the Andersons hope to expand operations internationally, possibly in the United States. No matter where the frames come from, though, the Andersons make it clear that they'll be manufactured with BPA and BPS-free food-grade plastic.

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An Ingenious Invention That Turns Beehives Into Flowing Honey Taps

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Harvesting honey has been a sticky, messy job that's changed very little from the earliest days of beekeeping. But it's about to get a whole lot cleaner with the Flow Hive, an ingenious re-engineering of one of nature's most perfect creations that makes getting that golden nectar as easy as turning on a tap.

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Lifecycle of a Bee (from Britannica.com)

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This video goes over the structures and functions of flowers and how they produce fruit.

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Start studying Parts of a Flower. Learn vocabulary, terms, and more with flashcards, games, and other study tools.

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Flowers and Bees Working Together