Article
Alys Fowler: apple trees
I cannot imagine a garden without an apple tree
Big apple: 'Egremont Russetts' have a wonderful nutty flavour. Photograph: Gap Photos/Mark Bolton
I am rich in red apples. Every morning before breakfast I pick up the windfalls. There are so many I have to use the front of my nightie to carry them inside. For the next month I can pick the reddest, roundest ones straight from the tree and sink my teeth into a perfect crisp sweetness. In another month I'll have a nutty russet to bite into. This makes me feel very rich indeed.
I didn't plant these two trees, a very early red 'Discovery' and a keeper, 'Egremont Russet' (pictured). Judging by their size I'd say they are 10 years old. The first year I came here there were few apples. I fed the trees with rich organic matter in the form of mulch in late autumn, and now I get 80 or so apples from each tree.
I cannot imagine a garden without an apple tree. You get wonderful spring blossom and eventually you get lots of apples (they take a bit of time to bed down and get going, so don't expect a great deal in the first three years). Trees can be up to 20ft or as small as 5ft, depending on the rootstock. My trees are on M9 dwarf rootstock so are 7ft high. I don't need ladders and they don't shade the garden.
There are hundreds of varieties – you could have one local to your part of the world, one for cooking, one for eating immediately off the tree or one to store right the way through to spring. Or if you care for pruning it's possible to grow apples into a low-growing hedge (step-overs), on slanting poles (cordons), as a fan trained against the wall or as a "family tree", where several varieties are grafted on to one trunk. I have a friend who in his modest back garden has over 30 apples and still space for a lawn.
You can pick up an apple at any garden centre; mostly these will be container-grown. If your garden centre is worth its salt it will know where the tree is from, which rootstock it is grafted on and how old the tree is. Expect to pay £20-£30 for a three-year-old tree. I buy most of my trees mail order from specialist nurseries, which send beautifully packaged heritage varieties for great value (bare-root trees for around £15). I use Keepers Nursery in Maidstone, and Walcot Nursery in Worcestershire because they are local to me, organic and their advice over the phone is impeccable. But there are many nurseries out there: the RHS plant finder will guide you to your nearest.
Autumn is the time to establish a container-grown tree – bare-root trees are despatched from November to March, but get your order in soon – the best ones go fast.
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User Comments
sparclear
10 September 2011 9:33PM
Discovery is a tremendous apple, if eaten straight off the tree. It soon loses is texture once picked. We are keeping them quite flavousome and crisp still, three weeks later, in a set-to-rather-cold T* fridge (big plastic bag inside the salad drawer).
IMHO this is a great tree to choose on community pick-your-own schemes. It is so pretty, as well, both at blossom time and as the fruit ripen.
It would be interesting to read your findings about particular varieties of apples and pears that can be dried, or otherwise stored and ripened gradually for all the months ahead. Long ago this knowledge informed the design of orchards and cellars and lofts. Storage so they don't rot is difficult. What do commercial producers do? One family I knew used plastic dustbins and generous layers of newspaper to make their apples keep.
Rather than bottling, wine-making or sugary preserves I would prefer very simple keeping methods for plain fruit. Perhaps some varieties of apples and pears would store well as frozen slices and then yield high-vitamin fresh juice on thawing?
casarlach
10 September 2011 7:28PM
Alys,
Thanks for a great article. Unfortunately the apple cultivars which we are exposed to in the supermarket barely scratch the surface, and so it's great to think of people in the UK growing desert/eating apples and (finally) witnessing the great variety this genus offers.
One question, how can Maidstone and Worcestershire both be local to you?