Adventures in grafting

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Adventures in grafting
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dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Sat Sep 17, 22 5:30 am Post subject:

the surviving grafts have given fruit

one is a small russet eater, the dormouse genes iirc, crisp, deep flavour, a bit rhino skinned
the other is a big, fluffy type, good flavour, sweet, nice eater, probably ideal for fast cook as well

both are no names so far, the folk at "apple world" did not know from MK1 eyeball of tree and fruit
if i can keep them going, i might pay for dna testing to see if they are listed
both are nice and should be preserved if possible

tt brought me a tom putts from one of the trees i have nursed a little

smallish crops this year, in size and numbers, good quality though

they are commercially available and a good tree for kitchen orchards so i have not tried grafting those (and the nursed ones will probably outlast me)

commercial apples as found in most shops are a shameful exercise in marketing and logistics rather than splendid fruit

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Sat Sep 17, 22 5:33 am Post subject:
ps if the russet has no name i may call it dormouse rhino, the skin needs a good blade or paleo teeth

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 15946

Posted: Sat Sep 17, 22 8:13 am Post subject:
Sounds an interesting name. I am glad to say the place I buy my fruit and veg is currently going through the early apples and also has a good range of plums. There were greengages, two plum varieties and damsons on offer last week as well as 4 varieties of early to main crop apples.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Tue Oct 25, 22 6:50 pm Post subject:
i cooked one of the type bigger ones, stored ok for a while greasy coat is good for that lots of sugar in the fruit, very fragrant, nice texture profile no idea what it is but it is a good un, as single ingredient cooked in a little water tis ace these trees need planting out

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 15946

Posted: Wed Oct 26, 22 7:25 am Post subject:

We have one wilding in the garden that produces reasonable fruit, but the other is rubbish and needs to come down. The fruit is small, pulpy and with no flavour, so not even worth putting into crab apple jelly.

I also have a whole load of quinces (the large yellow pear shaped ones) to deal with, so will make some wine, quince brandy, which is really nice, and perhaps poach a few. I have enough quince jelly from previous years to keep us going for a while, and it tends to produce well on a 2 year cycle.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Mon Apr 15, 24 1:22 pm Post subject:

not planted out, moved up to 50ltr rectangular recycling boxes(Â£16 for 3 is a bargain

)

both are in flower at the same time, tis hard to guess what group they are considering the weather, but they do it together

they are in shiny corner and need a slight shuffle and more shiny

they seem very happy and healthy, which puts off finding a perfect forever home for a while, i am open to offers on their behalf as i have no long term option to be able to care for and propagate them)

one white with pink, the other pink with white,
they look good as a pair

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 15946

Posted: Tue Apr 16, 24 7:02 am Post subject:
Are they crab apples or eating apples Dpack? Or are they just ornamental? Looking at my previous post, the poor crab apple has finally come down and I have currently made two spoons out of the timber from the trunk. Not the best apple I have carved, but the spoons are moderately pleasing but not exceptional wood wise.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Tue Apr 16, 24 7:44 am Post subject:

eater/ general purpose cooker, stores well,

splendid russet eater/cider

old fruit varieties, rare breeds ones
the other old ones i know of round here all have names, some are still well known, these are two of the trees with no known name

heritage genetics matters, york has a lot of legacy trees, some are perhaps the last example of the type
these two are the only known examples

it took a while to get them cloned, they are on 109 rootstocks which means when unleashed into the wild they will get big

for the next couple of years before that, they should be vigorous enough in the 50lt tubs to give some shape pruning offcuts to try and clone some more of them

i will book some suitable rootstocks for next winter and hopefully find the parafilm

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 15946

Posted: Wed Apr 17, 24 5:13 am Post subject:
Yes, keeping heritage breeds alive is always good. They either turn out to be useful in their own right or even for back breeding. Some unnamed crab apples were found locally here a few years ago and some were named and bred on. Must say even for a reasonable sized garden, dwarfing rootstock has advantages.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Wed Apr 17, 24 6:42 am Post subject:

dwarfing stock is indeed ideal for gardens, the grafts did not take on those, they did on the monster stock ones

15 lt round pots for quite a few years and lots of rootstock twig pruning has made them rather bonsai for 109s

it has provided time for the grafts to settle, 2 on one type and 1 on the other

now they have moved up to 50 lt rectangular the roots will develop bigly, and while they do i might get a couple of years of taking mutiple healthy scions while getting the branch shape in order before they end up in a heritage protected or one of my new orchards

10m by 10 metres is a plausible size after 50 yrs in the wild

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Wed Apr 17, 24 7:50 am Post subject:

M R , i recon you have seen the mother of the russet one

small tree just to the left of the gate going from the dormouse pub patio to the orchard bit/main road

that one has only had a few very minor snips, she is too old for major surgery to go from ball to inside out umbrella and she still gives lots of fruit, although they are smaller than my one's pot grown fruit

im glad i got a strike, the apples are really nice

the other is perhaps older and came from a different hospital heritage site

i did a bit of history re the old orchards of york, there are a few ecclesiastical ones with random legacy fruit trees, the hospital remnants are a rich source of old genetics, some sites are accessible, some less so, some are one old tree in a new garden and nobody knows it's there

most have names, many are still grown, a few are rare, sometimes as rare as only example known

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 15946

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 24 3:22 pm Post subject:
Yes, we did see that. I realised it was one of your orchards and it rather saddened me to see kids knocking the unripe apples down and kicking them around while their parents just sat and let them get on with it.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 24 6:08 pm Post subject:

not mine, i have done a bit of geriatric pruning and introduced the food bank and primary school to the place

those dormouse legacy trees are end of legacy, they are letting the grandchildren play, im cool with that(i got very grumpy about whacking them with a mower and the lack of basic health care and the waste of crop, i made that happen without lots of admin eventually)

the two new orchards are doing well, and have folk who care about them
both are "piggybacked" next to primary schools, young hearts and minds etc, and parents who can also learn

from little seeds/sticky boots and a saw etc
or a land grab and blagging cash for nice trees, fences and baskets etc

both have merit

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 46185
Location: yes

Posted: Sat Apr 20, 24 1:32 pm Post subject:
umm, i just noticed flowers on one that was considered a failure to take it needs further investigation to establish if it is a graft flower or from the rootstock it is a tangly gnarly thing, so it could be either by looking from a couple of meters away

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 15946

Posted: Sun Apr 21, 24 9:10 am Post subject:
Hope it is the graft. Be lovely if it was.

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