An ancient fruit tree gets a new lease of life

Press, 15 June 1978, Page 13

An ancient fruit tree gets a new lease of life

GARDENER’S DIARY

By

Derrick Rooney

Recent plantings in my garden have been economic ones: gooseberries, currants, and a fruit tree or two. But one of the fruit trees is not so much an economic gestve as a romantic one. It is a medlar, an oldfashioned and all-but-for-gotten fruit that is closely related to pears and quinces (all are propagated by budding or grafting on pear stock) but differs from them in being native to Western Europe (from the Netherlands south) rather than Middle East and Asia Minor. Once upon a time, before fast transport, the invention of the freezer, and the introduction of a range of sub-tropical fruits extended

the variety of winter food, medlars were quite popular because their fruit stayed on th< trees until late in the season, and when finally harvested could be ripened slowly throughout the winter. I have never eaten a medlar, so I could not quarrel if anyone told me that they went out of fashion because they were not as good to eat as the opposition. But I have yearned to grow one for years, having been bewitched by a drawing (by, I think, Frances Hodgkins) of a picturesque old tree. The medlar is, with the possible exception of the statuesque old pear trees

seen in some early-settled districts, the most beautiful of the hardy fruit trees, with its bold framework, handsome green leaves, big white flowers, and soft russet tonings in autumn. The botanical name is Mespilus germanica — “Mespilus” from the Greek, mesos (half) and polis (a ball), and referring to the shape of the fruit, which is like a golf bail that has been sliced neatly down the middle. Like its cousins, apples and pears, and apricots, peaches, plums and cherries, it is rosaceous — that is, it belongs to the rose family; and the relationship is quite obvious in early summer, when the big white flowers appear on the leafy shoots. But unlike its fruiting cousins, it produces its flowers singly. The fruit, too, are very different to the casual eye from those of the other trees, “the five carpels not being covered and the stones readily detachable, the apex presenting a hairy disc or crater with the remains of the calyxlobes about it.” (Bailey). Translated, this means that the core of the fruit is open, so that you can remove the seed without tearing the fruit to pieces; and it has a leafy bit at the base, just as a strawberry has (strawberries, too, belong to the rose family). According to Raymond Bush, the late panjandrum of fruitgrowing, the fruit, when three-parts ripe, makes an excellent wine. His advice was that the fruit be picked on a sunny day in early winter, when it is quite dry, still creen, and untouched by heavy frost. After two weeks storage,

eye down, in a frost-proof place, the fruit should be soft and yellow — ready for use in jam, pies, or, according to a friend with a deep interest in his stomach, a sauce to flavour game. The fruit is not only blessed with culinary properties; it has, too, a rich, overripe, fruity smell; the process of acquiring this is known as "bletting,” one of those delightful old words that should be rescued from oblivion. Once there were many varieties of medlar in nursery catalogues and orchards, the three main ones (and the ones most likely

to be encountered here) being the Dutch, the Royal, and the Nottingham. Dutch is the biggest, and is the one that makes a really picturesque tree, with large fruit, flowers and leaves, and a weeping habit. Royal has smaller flavour, but, according to Raymond Bush, a better flavour and bigger crops. Nottingham also has small fruit, with good flavour, and is the one for small gardens; it has an upright habit. All these varieties can be found in old gardens round the country, but few people bother to propagate them nowadays, and prob-

ably many present owners do not even know what they are.

My own tree has come, via Millichamps of Ashburton, from just such a garden: a customer gave them some grafts to propagate for him, and they had a few spares, which are listed in their catalogue this year. I doubt if any other nursery in New Zealand has it. Several years ago there was a fine specimen of the Dutch medlar growing outside an old cottage on the road to Little River; I haven’t been that way for years, but I suppose it is still there.