Maybe that's why we haven't had an apple yet. Our fruit trees are still young but have reached head height. We yearn for dappled light. Maybe this year the food forest will finally to arch over us as we garden beneath.
The Braeburn apple pip trees are doing the best unsurprisingly. I was going to use them as root stock, but an NZTCA friend said they may well produce nice apples, so I will leave them a wee while longer. They look to be handsome standard apples in the making.
Your advice to circle the tree like a fox circling a partridge made me feel more secure about the pruning I've done. Being a sculptor I applied general aesthetic logic to it, and took out the water shoots, the internally pointed branches and the crossed limbs.
It does sound like one or two more branches from each on a wassailing fire might be just the ticket, a little late but as Tim Cruickshank of Earthbridge says, a badly pruned tree is usually only a badly pruned tree for a year.
So Robyn and Robert and family, We wish you an abundant harvest this season with the Green Man gently whispering the cider to readiness. Jules and John from Puhoi.
You'll be blessed with apples this year, Julie-Anna, I'm certain. Our plums have just begun to unfurl their blossom, and the bees are a-buzz with excited anticipation of that early nectar. I too left root-stock to fruit, following a snapped-off graft (geese!)and it produced bushels of quite nice apples; crisp and tasty, but there's no romance in such a tree, as it has no name and no fans. I'm coming to the end of my desire to prune and want to let the orchard run free - Robyn however, is still keen to maintain some control. We'll broker a deal. That said, there's employment in pruning, now that there are so many new orchards planed throughout Southland. I do like to meet apple growers and I do like to help to make their projects a success, so may advertise my services next year, when I'll have so much less to do in my own orchard :-) Thanks for your kind wishes. We wish you the same and please think of us as you sample a wassailing cider yourselves.
2 comments:
Maybe that's why we haven't had an apple yet. Our fruit trees are still young but have reached head height. We yearn for dappled light. Maybe this year the food forest will finally to arch over us as we garden beneath.
The Braeburn apple pip trees are doing the best unsurprisingly. I was going to use them as root stock, but an NZTCA friend said they may well produce nice apples, so I will leave them a wee while longer. They look to be handsome standard apples in the making.
Your advice to circle the tree like a fox circling a partridge made me feel more secure about the pruning I've done. Being a sculptor I applied general aesthetic logic to it, and took out the water shoots, the internally pointed branches and the crossed limbs.
It does sound like one or two more branches from each on a wassailing fire might be just the ticket, a little late but as Tim Cruickshank of Earthbridge says, a badly pruned tree is usually only a badly pruned tree for a year.
So Robyn and Robert and family, We wish you an abundant harvest this season with the Green Man gently whispering the cider to readiness. Jules and John from Puhoi.
You'll be blessed with apples this year, Julie-Anna, I'm certain. Our plums have just begun to unfurl their blossom, and the bees are a-buzz with excited anticipation of that early nectar. I too left root-stock to fruit, following a snapped-off graft (geese!)and it produced bushels of quite nice apples; crisp and tasty, but there's no romance in such a tree, as it has no name and no fans. I'm coming to the end of my desire to prune and want to let the orchard run free - Robyn however, is still keen to maintain some control. We'll broker a deal. That said, there's employment in pruning, now that there are so many new orchards planed throughout Southland. I do like to meet apple growers and I do like to help to make their projects a success, so may advertise my services next year, when I'll have so much less to do in my own orchard :-)
Thanks for your kind wishes. We wish you the same and please think of us as you sample a wassailing cider yourselves.
Robert
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