Nursery News
On this page we will include
- items of interest and developments on the nursery
- things to do and watch out for on your own trees
- find us on Facebook (click logo on right) for more items of interest
Trained espaliers & containerised trees.
Though the majority of our trees are grown in the soil and available bare rooted we do grow some trees in containers:
- Espaliers - single tier in 12 litre ccontainers
- Maiden trees - that can be grow into various forms. Grown in 5 ltre containers.
All potted into peat free compost. Available for collection only or at any of the shows we attend.
As Espaliers we have available apples :
Cox's Orange, Discovery, Egremont Russet, Grenadier, Herefordshire Russet, James Grieve, Katy, Lord Lambourne, Howgate Wonder, Fiesta, Sunset, Winston.
Reasonably priced at £30 each
As 'Maiden' trees grown in 5 litre containers we have a small selection all grown on semi dwarfing M26 rootstock. All reasonably priced at £12.50. Apples :
- Adams Pearmain
- Ashmeads Kernel
- Bramley
- Fiesta
- Herefordshire Russet
- Howgate Wonder
- James Grieve
- Kidd's Orange Red
- Lord Lambourne
- Spartan
- Sunset
- Wyken Pippin
Plums :
- Marjories Seedling
- Purple Pershore
- Victoria
- Yellow Egg
Budding.......
Budding is a form of grafting, but more efficient and quicker and done during July & August. It is the way we prefer to propagate all the different varieties - well over 100 onto 11 different rootstocks. It requires careful planning to ensure the correct varieties are budded onto the right rootstocks. That everything is labelled correctly and recorded to ensure no mistakes further down the line.
Budding is the attaching of a vegatative bud to the side of a rootstock, ensuring the cambium of the two are meeting and covering with waterproof material, plastic tape usually, for a number of weeks until the cut surfaces have callused.
Managing growth
May is when tree growth starts. The weeds always start earlier however! It's a battle at times! We can all the plums as in the photo. Many varieties are particularly strong growing and require the cane to ensure straight growth. The problem this spring has been securing the canes - the very dry conditions and the high winds have made this awkward.
Rootstocks - May
I was reading the other day that Heron's nest very early! They start in February in fact. This year on one site in Shropshire they started two weeks earlier than last year! Perhaps even in February they could tell it was going to be an early and warm spring!
There is a link here! Growth on the nursery is about two weeks ahead of normal and growth has been strong enough on the stoolbeds, which produce our rootstocks, for us to start mounding them up with compost and sawdust. This operation is a form of layering and encourages the new shoots to produce roots where covered over.
We will repeat this job a couple more times over the summer.
New Mother trees - April
March & April are usually very busy - final bare root sales, doing planting and preparing for the new growth. 2011 has been no exception. We managed to plant more 'Mother' trees in early April. Ideally we should have done this earlier in the winter for better establishment.
'Mother' trees are for the production of our own organic budwood and graftwood. As the range of trees we supply has increased we have not increased our 'Mother' trees to match. So some catch up is required.
Roe deer have become more of a problem recently so the area has had to be fenced off to 1.8m high. Fingers crossed that that puts them off!
Planting - March
An intensive operation involving all on the nursery where we use a compact tractor and our planting machine late March / early April when the soil surface is dry, but beneath soil is damp for the roots top establish well in spite of the lack of rain this year.
Prior to planting quite a lot of preparation goes in, starting the previous autumn with soil analysis for nutrition, subsoiling, addition of organic matter, ploughing under the long term ley.
The rootstocks are planted close together between the rows and even closer within the long rows. For two summers they will grow on the site before being lifted as 'complete' or 'maiden' trees. Hence care & time is taken building up the soil fertility largely with a long term 'ley'.
