Apples For The Home Garden

Press, Volume C, Issue 29459, 10 March 1961, Page 15

Apples For The Home Garden

A garden without fruit trees is not a garden. Even the smallest section should boast one apple tree at least, and preferably more if the space is available. With a good choice of varieties and a good store, fruit may be > had for almost nine months of the year. Perhaps the most pressing ■ need in the average home | garden is space. No-one wants a huge tree that occupies the • whole back garden to the exclusion of everything else. (There are two ways of ! tackling the problem. The i first is to use -what the nurseryman calls “family trees” | —trees which are worked jwith more than one variety. ; so that you have three or I four main branches, each a • different variety. ( It’s a good idea, but it does , not always work, unfortun!ately. ■ If the family tree is going to be a success, then the varieties used must all be of equal vigour and grow with the same speed. If this is so. then your tree will be a success. But if one branch is a. Cox’s Orange Pippin, another Lord Wolseley, and a third Red Delicious, then you will run into trouble • with uneven growth of the (different parts. Lord Wolseley will eventually swamp the other members. A better method is to use dwarfing rootstocks for your tree. By the choice of the rootstock you can control the eventual size of the tree and also how quickly it comes into cropping. The same variety of apple may be obtained on dwarfing, semidwarfing, semi-vigorous or vigorous rootstock, according to the space you have available. In general the more vigorous a rootstock the longer it takes to come into bearing, but the poorer the soil you have, then the stronger the rootstock you need to make satisfactory growth.

Dwarfing Rootstock The most commonly used dwarfing rootstock. Mailing No. IX. is too weak to grow well on thin, sandy soils, and should be replaced there by Mailing No. TV or VII, which (are only semi-dwarfing. For general garden purposes either semi-dwarfing or semi-vigorous stocks are the best recommendation, where they will make trees from six to 12 feet in ultimate height, depending on soil and the apple variety. For very limited space the best form is the cordon, which is 'trained on a wire trellis, and planted at a 30 degree angle (down the row. Spacing is usually about 2ft Gin by Bft. If you are not prepared to erect trellis for the job, then the dwarf pyramid shape is to be preferred, trees being spaced Bft by 4ft and the branches trained round the central leader. For close planting your rootstock must be dwarf or semi-dwarf, or you will get too much growth, leading in turn to the normal reaction of heavy pruning—and no (fruit. If you intend to grass down the ground around the trees—it makes a much more pleasant feature of this part of the garden—then stocks which are not too dwarfing are used and the trees should be allowed to become established for a couple of years don't know the sorts mentioned—all standard varieties —then this is the time of year to find out what they are like Apples for Succession Irish Peach, dessert, JanuaryFebruary.

Albany Beauty (a red sport from Gravenstein), des-sert-cooker, January-early March. Cox’s Orange Pippin, dessert, before grassing is done. If it is done too soon after planting your trees will not make adequate growth, and will eventually become stunted and starved. Aim at a succession, when selecting varieties, and if you

February-April. Lord Wolseley, cooker, Feb-ruary-June. Kidd's Orange Red, dessert, February-April (slightly later than Cox). Red Delicious, dessert, MarchSeptember. Golden Delicious, dessert, March-July. This is quite a distinct variety, and is not a colour sport of Red Delicious. Granny Smith, dessert-cook-er. April-September. Sturmer Pippin, dessertcooker, April-September. Ballarat Seedling, cooker, March-August.