[oakridge]

I posted this list on 'What I did on the plot today', but I decided it needed its own topic.

She also made a list of the fruit trees that my retired farmer friend had bought and then realised that he didn't have 350acres any more but an old folks bungalow, so they came to me.  Here's a list:

Pear Conference, Pear Concorde, Apple Gravenstein, Apple Superb, Plum Yellow Pershore, Plum?, Damson?, Damson Shropshire Prune
Plum Victoria?, Damson?, Plum?, Greengage?, Plum?
??, Apple Guilevic, Apple Vilberie, Apple Harry Mater's Jersey, Crab Apple John Downie, Apple Dabinett
7 Gooseberry bushes - serious risk of finding lots of babies methinks.

Lots of these we have never heard of so any advice would be gratefully received.  I now know that the apples in the third row are for cider.

They are all bursting into life.  The middle row, apart from the Victoria Plum are all 3 years old, all the rest are last years saplings.

[Trikidiki]

Not sure what advice you are after apart from "sharpen your spade".

Do you have a specific question?

I haven't checked for your varieties but http://www.orangepippin.com/ is a good reference site for top-fruit varieties.

Would love some scions from your apples in a few years time when you get round to serious pruning. 

[oakridge]

Thank you Trikidiki for your reply I'm sorry not to come back to you earlier.  It is things like - is 'pears for your heirs' still true, I haven't heard of the Gravenstein apple and what about feeding.  I have put a few shovel fulls of compost around the roots this week and I have taken off the tree tubes and replaced them with transparent spiral ones.  There are a couple of photos of the trees taken last year in the signature link below. 

[Trikidiki]

"Pears for their heirs" is a new one on me, if it's referring to planting a tree which will take a long time before fruiting then that isn't the case. You can expect to start cropping from a modern grafted tree within a few years.

Re. feeding. Putting some muck around them is good, not just from the feed viewpoint but it also mulches the ground stopping competition from weeds. I have to admit some of my trees have grass right up to the trunks, I am not too bothered as I want to keep them fairly small anyway. A sprinkling of BFB each year would probably suffice with a bit of muck.

Gravenstein  Have a look at this link (great website) http://www.orangepippin.com/apples/gravenstein

Start pruning for your desired shape in the summer.

[oakridge]

Thank you Trikidiki.  The actual 17th Centuray saying was 'Walnuts and pears you plant for your heirs', but I didn't want to show off.

[Mum2mj]

Thank you Trikidiki.  The actual 17th Centuray saying was 'Walnuts and pears you plant for your heirs', but I didn't want to show off.

 

[Trikidiki]

Isn't it Eric Robson on GQT that often says that anyone who plants a walnut is an optimist.

[Casey76]

Walnuts are a blooming menace.

Mine (planted by the houses previous owner) went from a 7ft twig, to a 25ft tree in 6 years.  I actually had tonnes (well, maybe not literally) of nuts last year, but I had the tree cut down this year as it was taking over the whole front garden and had been planted in a really stupid place.

Had I known what it was when I moved in, I would have had it removed straight away.