Many years ago when we had a heavy gypsy moth infestation the adult caterpillars ate the vinyl screens. Also the the birds pecked through the polyethylene woven bags I used this year. Using aluminum is a good idea. I’m wondering how successful paper bags have been.
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Mamuang, thanks so much for your continued experimentation with exclusion bags on peaches.
So many suggestions - perforated bread bags, surgical (bouffant) caps etc, paper bags, footies etc - hard to know what actually works.
Last year was my first peach crop, I tried organza bags, but put them on too late, and have since read that organza is not effective for oriental fruit moth anyway.
A few questions:
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I don’t fully understand your method with the bread bags. Why slice them in half? Even with a few staples, surely the OFM gets through the gaps? Why not use an intact bag?
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I have noticed that since posting about the bread bags, you have indicated elsewhere that you will try Clemson bags rather than the bread bags. Any particular reason?
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alternatively has anyone tried using perforated ziplock bags on peaches? I have seen them advertised on the internet. My understanding is that regular ziplock bags are unsuitable for peaches, but they I find them to be a very reasonable solution for other fruit such as apples.
The bread bags were used on plums because plum fruit are small. It would be a pain to bag individual plum. With large braed bags, i do not need to use the whole bags. When I cut them in half, I still can cover the whole branches very well. Save me some bags.
I am nit sure how I should describe my stapling techniques. I grabbed two sides, lined them up well, folded the edge together and stapled. Doing it this way, there would be no holes/gaps for bugs to get through.
Clemson bags are intended for peaches. The bags are too large for plums. It would be wasteful.
Ziplock bags for apples are done all the times.
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@Auburn
Auburn/Bill has used his home made perforated zip lock bags on fruit. Can’t recall if Bill ever used them on peaches.
@BobVance, his dad has used zip lock plastic bsgs on peaches successfully.
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I hope to be able to test the bags on nectarines next year.
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I didn’t bag that many this year and I’m probably not going to rely on it as a primary protection in the future- way too much loss in both my bagged and unbagged fruit. And I hate to see so many bags fall to the ground.
The only Contender peach on my tree (the 2nd on the right may be a Laroda plum, the only one of those too):
Unbagged:
I did get 3 Bluebyrds (Euro plum)…Only those in the bags survived the PC, though not all made it. The unbagged fruit is Toka, which I got a decent amount of, even without bagging. Animals ate them before they got too ripe though, so only the first round I picked were eaten (by me).
Maybe bagging grapes to protect from birds will be worth it. The grapes in the above pics were most of my seedless harvest. As soon as anything ripened, it would get devoured. So I could never let a whole bunch ripen. 
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Thanks for the report Bob. This is valuable information to use who is into bagging fruit. Bill
Bags are made of a synthetic plastic that bleed certain chemicals, right? Synthetic estrogen is one of them, and I assume the rate is increased by sun exposure with condensation circulating chemicals in the plastic to the fruit. Are we sure this fulfills the requirements to be considered organic production. or even that it is safer than using synthetic pesticides? I doubt using these plastic bags for this purpose is a plus for the environment.
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They have to be very careful to cover fruit with plastic bags, lack of air can cause mold problems.
There are paper bags used to protect grapes or peaches against fruit fly or birds and are of different sizes, which can be used in different fruit (these paper bags are not destroyed if it rains).
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=es&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fitoagricola.net%2Fes%2Ftienda-online%2FCatalog%2Flisting%2Fmaterial-para-embolsar-las-uvas-42481%2F1&sandbox=1
I have wondered about this too- apples baking inside a plastic solar oven for many months. Zip Locks and bread bags would have to be “food grade” plastic but I still wonder about off-gassing chemicals.
Food grade plastics do bleed certain chemicals such as the synthetic estrogen I mentioned. I do not know the state of research on the subject but there are people studying this issue that believe the synth est. may actually already be having a strong effect on young men, reducing their sex drive and creating less incentive to start families- this from estro. bleeding from food grade plastic used for packaging. I’m not saying this is a genuine concern, but for those simply trying to reduce their intake of synthetic chems it seems reasonable to question the use of a method that has not been studied for possible health consequences. Day after day of sun exposure certainly breaks down plastics.
As it turns out, obtaining microperforated ziplock bags isn’t as easy as I had hoped. Alternatively, has anyone tried using a derma roller to make their own perforated ziplock bags? For example:
Any tips on what size needle might be most suitable?
I also looked into bread bags. You can buy microperforated bags about the size of a sandwich bag, to use on individual fruit (used commercially for small pies and quiches) but I could not find any with drawstrings like in Acedo’s photo. They are actually designed to be heat sealed but as far as I can tell it would be very tricky, if not impossible, sealing the tight section closest to the stem, between fruit and branch.
Leaching plastic is a sobering thought. If that’s the case, perhaps paper is the best way, but I do like the transparency of plastic, much easier to monitor.
Somewhere here is s post where Bill had a template with nails I believe to make zip locks with holes.
Ziplocks caused my grapes to rot while Organza bags did not and kept the fruit perfect. No apparent difference between the 2 for apples although the Organza bags were easier to install, allowed to tie string to branch to reduce windfall losses and looked way better than a tree covered in plastic bags. Hopefully I will have pears and plums to experiment on next year but so far in my zone 4 but hot humid summer climate the Organza bags are winning. See my post under apples as well as at the end for grapes for photos: My Backyard planting experience (Part 2) - Zone 4a/b Quebec, Canada - #3 by hungryfrozencanuck4b
Another option is these purpose-made polyethylene drawstring bags:
Not sure if they are any different to organza.
Here is another source for the polyethylene bags. They come in several sizes and are heavy duty so they should last several years. Since they are mesh they can’t keep fungus and bacteria out but they should block most bugs.
http://r.ebay.com/UDlQHc
I ate the apple before I took a picture of it, but this year one of my apples had the red imprint of ‘Ziplock’ on it from the sun. The ziplock freezer bags have a negative imprint of the brand on the outside of the bag. The effect was kind of amusing and lead me to think that if done in a controlled way could be used to imprint branding for various companies on the surface of the fruit.
Reporting back, I tried both the polyethylene drawstring bags as well as using a dermaroller to perforate zip lock bags.
The polyethylene drawstring bags were so-so. Despite the drawstring they are hard to seal and lack the convenience of zip lock bags. A bird or possum also tore a hole through one, although they designed for stopping insects rather than bigger creatures. Despite all this, they managed to save about half of my cherries (cherry season in Australia right now).
The derma roller was useless, not sharp enough to properly puncture through the zip lock bags.
My next effort will be attempting to use a sewing machine to perforate ziplock bags en masse, not exactly sure how yet, never used a sewing machine before. (I’m hesitant to puncture with nails due to the size of the holes, although I suppose with apples one cuts entire corners off the bags). Any tips appreciated.
The problem I had with punching holes with a nail was that the hole size gets smaller as you remove the nail. These holes will allow water to eventually drain out but moisture/humidity remains high in the bags. For me drilling the holes is much better at removing humidity.
Thanks Auburn, I’m willing to try it. A few questions:
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Are the drilled holes small enough to keep out oriental fruit moth? I was impressed by the posted results from bread bags, which have microperforations, but of course zip locks are much easier to work with.
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Did you still cut out the bottom corners for drainage as one does for apples?
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And how did you keep the bags together while drilling?
Sorry if you’ve already covered this elsewhere, if so maybe just post a link.
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