05/08/2026
A repeat of a post from last year. I tried an original post TWICE the last couple night, but it got lost on the Facebook Airwaves!
Our apple and strawberry blossoms are at a very precarious stage in their development. They aren't fully out yet, but just on the verge. When the temperature at night is getting close to zero, there is the threat of frost damage to the blossoms. Cold temperatures can lead to fruit damage and even total loss of the crop.
There's only so much we can do to thwart Mother Nature. When it comes to damaging spring frosts, we use frost fans. Frost fans look like windmills, but they are generally used when there is little to no wind! Ours are powered by propane. They are fixed, engine-driven fans that rotate 360 degrees, protecting 10-15 acres depending on the landscape.
On cold, clear, calm nights, the ground loses heat, causing cold air to settle at the surface, while a layer of warmer air sits 35 to 55 feet above the ground. The fan draws the warm air down, and breaks the cold pocket. This can raise the temperature at growing level by up to 4 degrees C thereby preventing frost damage to sensitive fruit buds. If the temperature falls too much below zero, or it is too windy, the fans won't be able to affect the outcome.
It takes 5 minutes for the fans to rotate 360 degrees. We know this because Patrick stood at our bedroom window with his stopwatch at 4:30 this morning timing it; then again at 6 am to see if he was right the first time. Luckily, we can see one of the fans from our window. This did NOT stop him from running down to the second fan in the wee hours of the morning to make sure the second fan had started automatically, as it was set to do when the temperature was right. (Fun fact: IT DID!)
Sooooo, this is a long winded, pun intended, way to say: Please bear with us if you hear a "helicopter" in the middle of the night for a couple of hours. We are hoping that the weather warms up soon, and that we all will be recompensed with delightfully delicious fruit!
As a precaution, our 2 frost fans are set to come on automatically if the temperature goes down to 2 C tonight. It isn't supposed to get that cold, but it would be an unwise move NOT to set them and then have the temperature take a dive! Soooo, if it gets quite cool tonight, and you live by an orchard, you could hear a "helicopter-like" sound. The fans take the warm air from up high and bring it down to growing level. It is possible to raise the temperature by up to 4 degrees! This could make the difference between having a crop, and all the blossoms freezing!
