Growing and Taking Care of Fruit Trees For Beverages

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WortMonger

WortMonger

"Whatcha doin' in my waters?"
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:insert: OK, I am starting this thread in the hopes it will get a lot of responses and additional threads and information about the subject. Who knows, maybe the subject will get its own place on the main board with specific threads dedicated to the different genus and species. I know fruits can be used to make wine and cider, in addition to additions to beers and meads, but there is no specific thread to post about how we grow and take care of these wonderful trees that help us in our great hobby. This introduction may be removed later if the thread takes on so it sticks with the subject 100%, but for now it needs the explanation of what I am trying to accomplish. Saying this, let me start it off the way I foresee it looking in the hopeful future.:insert:

I have recently purchased a Bing cherry tree to start practicing grafting and Espalier tree shaping. In doing so I have opened up another hobby for myself that fits into this forum and the discussions that gain me so much more information than I could ever find on my own. I would like to open up a thread to find out more about this subject so others might get interested like I have. I'm planning on grafting on pollinators to the Bing since it requires one to be fruitful. I waited to long and now I can't buy the Black Tartarian I was hoping for to get the buds needed for T-budding later this month once the bark starts slipping on my Bing. I am wondering if there is anyone out there in HBTland that might have scion wood with buds I might could purchase or trade for? I am also planning on a separate tree with several varieties of peaches, but that will be next year.

Other than the grafting, the Espalier is something that has me really interested. I cannot wait to train my branches along my fence to grow the tree in 2D rather than a huge bowl or pyramid shape like orchards do for easier picking and better fruit. I'm hoping we have some experienced growers and tree artists out there in our wonderful forum that could bestow their educations on me.

Now, I will set back and wait to see how much I can learn from you guys. Oh, and TxBrewer can stick this where ever he sees fit. I posted in the winemaking group but this could easily be in cider too. Looking forward to a long discussion with you guys.
 
We have a Wineyard with berries and fruit trees for making wine and mead plus beehives. We are adding about an acre of apple trees for cider this year, first time grafting apples, lots of fun, to bad you cant do it anytime you want. Did you know you can get budwood from the USDA Geneva station in late summer to bud with? They might have cherry, didnt look for them as we were looking for apple. For making wine and mead the fruit doesnt have to be beautiful like in the grocery store so less spraying or even no spraying. We do spray roundup under the young trees to keep the weed pressure down.

http://www.ars.usda.gov/Main/docs.htm?docid=10013 for scions and budwood

WVMJ
 
Very good info. I'd love to hear more of what you do. I was planning on cider apple tree planting in the future. Are your apples on crabapple rootstock?
 
There are a few good nurseries now with cider apple trees and sources of scions like Maplevalley and Fedco plus there is a scion exchange and North American Fruit Explorers group. You need to get studying, there are a lot of rootstocks out there now. We are spreading our trees out on different rootstocks just to play around with them and see which ones really do well in our soil. Our bigger trees are on M111, and we like the disease resistance of the Geneva stocks and have some on G11, G41, G30 and others in that line, plus some P2 and B9 dwarfs and EMLA7 and Antonoka for some full sized trees we are grafting to crab apples. Lots of decisions to make. You guys are in growing zone 6-8 so you should be able to grow apples temperature wise easily. If you learn to graft apples, at least in our plan, you can try a lot of different varieties by grafting them yourself cheaper than paying for a whole tree but you have to wait longer, if the variety you choose doesnt work in your area, like it gets apple scab really bad, you can then regraft or topwork that tree with another variety, that way you dont loose the rootstock and all those roots that the tree made before you found out this wasnt the tree for you. We are trying to find some good bittersweets to grow in our area, we have plenty of sharp apples and a great bittersharp crab apple but want a bittersweet to add more tannins but not more acid. Lots of fun playing with apples. When you can graft if you see an interesting wild tree you can jump out of your truck, snip off a few scions and take them home and see if they are worth growing, who knows, you might find the next great cider apple that way. WVMJ
 
So much fun just getting into this hobby. I was actually going to go clip some wood over a fence off a peach I saw the other day to bid graft to this cherry just to see how it took. I'm thinking I'd rather have the whole tree be peaches though since they're my favorite. Malus sounds so much fun to mess with though. So many decisions to choose from on this venture. I wish I had room for more trees. Maybe I will cut down these ugly Siberian Elms (see huge woodsy weeds someone just let grow) and that would give me tons more room for Espalier fruit trees.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
You might need to do some homework, I dont think grafting a peach onto a cherry going to work very well. WVMJ
 
I have and am confused. About half says that prunus to prunus is doable. Others say doable with interstem. And then there is the only same fruit to same fruit school of thought. It gets confusing.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
Do you have a better resource for what can and can't be done? I'd hate to have a graft take that never produced, or just never took because it shouldn't have been done. There is too much confusion out there to be definitive. Thank you for your information so far by the way.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
Wortmonger, i live in OKC and I'm a sales rep for a chemical and fertilizer company. I sell to growers all over the state and can hook you up with wholesale pricing on anything you may need to grow your stock. I'd be glad to help in any way I can and discuss our common interests.
 
Pity this thread seemed to die early, and without catching my eye.

I have about 10 apple trees planted 6-7 years ago mostly from Cummins Nursery. My son and I also attended a grafting workshop and two of the trees are from there.

I originally planned to espalier them all, but bailed on that opting for more fruit. I transplanted them 3 years ago and that set them back, so I just got my first peck of apples this fall.

I do have a Damson plum tree fan espaliered for grins. I had 2 cherry trees as well, but I lived over seas for a couple years and they went their own way unattended. I cut them out last fall as I've rethought how I wanted everything laid out after being here a few years now.

This past spring I bought 10 apple rootstocks to try my hand at grafting again. One was reserved to establish a stoolbed to propagate more rootstocks. Of the other 9 I had 6 succeed. 1 of those I'm confident was a rootstock failure rather than the graft. And another I think I'll be able to salvage the rootstock to try again.

I ordered more rootstocks for spring and 8 more varieties of scion wood to increase my varieties. I also have 14 new trees coming from Cummins. My goal is 12 varieties each of UK, US, and French cider varieties in a blend of sweet, bittersweet, sharp, bitter sharp roughly appropriate for each regions traditional cider styles. I'll be shy a handful after next spring assuming no losses. I have a Jonathon from 2007 which I didn't move and has a decent size trunk, which I grafted 4 varieties onto with complete success.

I also have 4 perry pear trees planted last spring. I'll be ordering some OHxF333 rootstock from Maple Valley to try grafting more in the future. I'm told they are more difficult than apples. I planted one of those 4-in-1 pear trees which was a $5 special as part of a seed catalog order a few years back. However it seems the rootstock is what grew and none of the original grafts. It produces cherry sized fruit, but it's about 15' high now. So I'm thinking I'll top work it this spring into multi perry varieties.

I also have some cherry trees coming, but no plans to propagate them in the future. A variety of berries are producing as well with a handful of beehives to sweeten the pot.

Maple Valley, Big Horse Creek Farm, nwcider.com, and Northwest Cider Supply are scion sources I've found with good selections. Maple Valley and Northwest both have other fruit tree scions besides just apples.

I may have gone overboard, but my wife is clearly supportive considering she just bought me a press for Christmas. Hopefully I'll get more than a peck next fall.
 
Guess it's not a dead thread now! Awesome hearing your experience with the trees and hope to hear more. Maybe a couple of more people like yourself going back and forth will build this thread to a place myself and others can draw information from. I will look into the scion suppliers you mentioned and hopefully continue with my newfound hobby soon. Thanks for your input, and hopefully keep it coming.
 
When we moved onto 5 acres about 10 years ago, I rejuvenated 7 neglected 30+ year old apple trees, and have planted 11 more so far. Ditto plums and pears.

Lesson #1 - To the uninitiated, "pruning" seems like a beastly harmful act. You'll feel like a tree killer. But soon you'll realize apple trees in particular thrive on pruning. I now see lack-of-pruning as the beastly harmful act. I actually get grumpy when I drive by unpruned trees, and debate having a word with their owners ;)

Lesson #2 - because pruning is a given, I no longer see much merit in more-dwarf and dwarf rootstock like M27 and M26. Apples trees don't maintain themselves! The few semi-dwarfs that I planted years ago are producing more, and the additional speed of the wood growth has allowed me to better visualize, identify year to year, and prune a decent looking scaffold. I have a mix of EMLA7, M9 and ?Geneva 41?, and would like to know what others recommend for semi-dwarf stock.

--SiletzSpey
 
siletzspey said:
Lesson #1 - To the uninitiated, "pruning" seems like a beastly harmful act. You'll feel like a tree killer. But soon you'll realize apple trees in particular thrive on pruning.



--SiletzSpey
Click to expand...



True. I'm sure I've set myself a little back by aggressively pruning to develop a good structure early, and I had to correct some unmonitored growth from a couple years overseas. Later this winter, the neighbor's pear tree will get some much needed love. It's been neglected for years. I can't stand to see it becoming a tangled mess. This past year was it's off year, so between a heavy pruning and it's biennial tendencies I'm sure it will be laden with fruit come fall.



I have a wide range of rootstocks on my current trees (M7, G16, G30, Nic19) and more variety coming with the new ones (G222, G935, MM111, B118, G202). I don't have the time or experience with them to judge yet. I've lost 3 trees in total. 2 were the year I transplanted them, both were on M7. I assume I did too much root damage. One was also in a fairly wet spot in a wet year which most likely did it in. The latest was a Brown Snout on G.16 which couldn't hack the -20s last winter. I don't know that I can blame the root stocks for any of those.



The first to ever produce was on a G16 in a quite shaded spot with a few apples last year. This year I got a handful off each tree. So no clear advantage apparent.
 
The folks at Cummins are great, I had to stop going to their site as I was going to get a couple of each of their trees and I am already probably full up after learning to graft. Then you get to looking at wild trees and you graft them into your orchard, who knows, you might find the next bittersweet that can grow anywhere:) Out of curiosity, did your pears from the rootstock have a lot of tannins? WVMJ
 
I didn't sample one. Guess I should have. They were dinky thumbnail sized things. Although Charles and Milissa at AEppeltreow Winery around here told me the Normannischen Ciderbirne pears are similar sized. I'll have to sample some next year.
 
My father in law has a wild fig tree in his front yard. I make fig wine every year. He's going to get me a cutting or two. Fired up.
 
Really impressed with all the experience on this thread so far. I have no experience raising anything other than succulents, so appreciate any advice i can get. Im down in Houston, and in the process of doing a landscaping plan for my house. There is already a sizable banana tree in the back yard, and I have room for a big fruit tree or two, and some small bushes.
Currently my plan is to definitely plant 1-2 Pomegranate bush/trees and maybe a Tangerine as the big tree, but still not sure.

Trying to pick out a tree that I'll want to make wine from/eat all the fruit and will do well in gulf coast weather

My wife likes sweet fruit wines but hates peaches, cherries and figs, so I'm limited in what I can plant.

Do any of you have any experience with making wine from citrus fruits, or more specifically, what would you recommend I put in for my one tree?
 
I would plant 3 trees right next to each other, a cherry, a fig and a peach:) There are some low chill apples, some are being developed for growing in tropical areas, sorry dont know the names as we are in zone 6 so we have plenty of chill. WVMJ
 
I've never bothered researching citrus due my location. However whatever you plant, you should confirm it is self pollinating, or you'll need to plan on planting two different varieties of the same family.

Considered apricots or cumquats?
 
I did my hard winter pruning on a warm sunny day a couple weekends ago. I always feel if I do it right that it's an evil chore. I finally have trees getting tall enough to have branches out of reach.

I desperately would like spring to come, but I know it's still a long way off. The fact that I did some orchard chores and checked on the bee hives was just a tease of springtime activity.
 
To Wortmonger: A google search of your area turns up three orchard locations growing mostly peaches, nectarines and plums. Your first stop should be getting to know your local growers and what varieties they are growing. I'm not saying cherries won't do well in your area, but the local commercial growers may have information about that.
Large orchards can be a good place to buy seconds and damaged fruit that are good for making juice and using in wine and beer.
I get apples (seconds) as low as $4-$6 a bushel, you should be able
to get cheap fruit in your area as well.
I actually scaled back my plans for a small orchard after being able to get apples for $.08 to .15 a pound.
When you start buying the farmer's rejects you can get to know them a little and you'd be surprised at the free education you get if you just show an interest, be respectful and shell out a little cash for items he otherwise has trouble selling. If they don't sell rejects, ask if you can pick the damaged fruit yourself and of course offer to pay for it.
There has been a lot of research into high yield fruit production using high density plantings and new pruning methods. You can adapt many of these ideas into your personal orchard if thats what you want.
Here's some information about cherry production from Cornell University:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct...=Wn3vPTkUkRp19KKczz-Vag&bvm=bv.86475890,d.eXY
 
The thing about commercial orchards is they have to grow the fruit normal people want to eat or have been told to eat like red delicious. If you are lucky the orchard might have Staymans, Goldrushes, Grimes Goldens but you are going to be hard pressed to find high tannin apples that you can buy for cidermaking. If you have access to sweet apples then just plant the tannic ones better for cider and buy your sweeter apples to blend with it. We are lucky where I live, Staymans and Grimes and Goldrushes plus most of the orchards planted trees like Smokehouse, Ark Black and Blacktwig out of curiosity. If you can source any of those apples make sure to take a bottle of cider made from their fruit back to them so they remember you. WVMJ
 
Hey all, hopefully now that spring is lurking just around the corner there will be more interest here. We are in NE Iowa, and just starting some trees. So far Cortland is the only one we have gotten a few apples from.
I was going to note that there are some antique apple orchards like Weston near Milwaukee WI that sell both apples and trees. I would love to take their grafting class... All of our trees are purchased, but want to try my hand at grafting. (Varieties listed in profile.)
Since most of our trees are just being planted this spring, it will be a while. We are going to try to stay pretty much organic, lower nutrient, using some the "holistic" practices per Michael Phillips. For instance I am planning to keep a bunch of comfrey going near the trees for green mulch. We are surrounded by woodlands, so pest management is my biggest concern. Including big white-tailed cloven-hoofed rats!
 
*Cox's Orange Pippin and Honeycrisp are probably going to be the first ones to die, my Honeycrisp I think had every disease except fireblight.

*Golden Russet, Roxbury Russet. we just made a cider from these from our local cidery that sells cidermakers cider and it is just perfect. Our Golden Russet trees are not very vigorous while the Roxburry and growing like weeds.

You can always topwork some if you want to switch later. Go ahead and take the grafting class, people always bring extra scions to trade and if you buy some rootstocks right now before they are all sold out you can bring some scions home and go ahead and do some grafting. It really is easy and fun and you will have extra trees and you will soon be seeking out crazy wild trees because now you can rescue them and clip a few scions off in the winter and graft them at home, and then you will learn about chip grafting and this spring when you mark the spot of a nice looking wild tree you can go back in August and see how its doing and if it looks like nice leaves and the fruit is in good shape clip off some budsticks, take them home and do some more grafting, its not just a spring hobby anymore. We have some cool wildlings if you ever want some scionwood, one I hope turns out to be a good bitter sweet and good for cider. WVMJ
 
I took Weston's grafting class with my son back in 2008. It was useful, but wouldn't be worth the trip. I'd bet Seed Savers would have a workshop in Decorah.

I can't say I learned anything in the class I hadn't read or that couldn't be found in Stephen Hayes UK You Tube videos. But it did give me the confidence to do it.

My first order of scion wood was delivered last week from NW Cider. It's just a brutal tease, since the weather is far from breaking. I have some coming from Maple Valley and Big Horse Creek yet. That's also where most of my rootstock is coming from too, plus some G.202 from Cummins.
 
WVMJ, Honeycrisp was developed in Minn, just north of us. So far the tree has been fine, although has not bloomed yet. (Its demise may occur from my impatient husband cutting it up for smoking wood!) It is kind of iffy looking but my understanding is that is normal for the variety - Grandpa's Orchard website says "In the summer its leaves will often have a mottled green appearance that might be mistaken for insect damage, but it due to a problem this variety seems to have in moving carbohydrates from its leaves to the fruit and roots". We shall see.

Cox's OP - I am crossing my fingers. We live above the Mississippi, which Cox is supposed to like being near water, but I don't know if that is close enough.

Quaker, I've seen Hayes' Youtubes, and I do have a friend who grafts, having learned from his forester father. Maybe I will just arrange to exchange some cuttings with him, and get a lesson from him.

As for pruning, that will be after temp goes sub-zero again tonight - we can only hope it is the last time this year!!

On another note - who in the north is growing wine grapes, and what is your favorite kind and why?
 
THen you should get a Frostbite developed there, supposed to be good for cider also. WVMJ
 
WVMJ, just noticed you're in the Cider Workshop as well. I've probably only commented on one thread, but I read it regularly with the daily feed. I think I'm in there as mastdw. Maybe in a decade I'll feel I have more to contribute there.
 
Those guys are a little bit serious about cider! One day when our little orchard starts to make a few apples I can see what kind of cool blends we can come up with. WVMJ

Quaker said:
WVMJ, just noticed you're in the Cider Workshop as well. I've probably only commented on one thread, but I read it regularly with the daily feed. I think I'm in there as mastdw. Maybe in a decade I'll feel I have more to contribute there.
Click to expand...
 
Scion wood from NW Cider was delivered earlier this month. Rootstocks and scions from Big Horse Creek were delivered today.
View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1426294104.452852.jpg

More rootstocks and scions are due from Maple Valley yet. And I have a 20 trees plus some Geneva rootstocks coming closer to May from Cummins.

Spring time activities are just around the corner. I wish I didn't have a toiletless, half-tiled bathroom in my way.
 
*am jealous*
Won't get the new trees until...April? After 12 inches of snow this week, rapidly disappearing, it better be late April!
 
We've been up and down between the 40s and 16 degrees this week with a bit of snow. I'm waffling between just healing the rootstocks in or going ahead grafting and planting them this weekend. Of course I may discover the ground is frozen an inch below the surface. In which case they just keep resting in the keezer.
 
You could graft them now and put them back in t he keezer until it was nice enough to plant them out, this gives them time to heal. We just got our rootstocks from Cumins, going to start grafting this weekend. WVMJ
 
I grafted 11 varieties onto a variety of M.7, M.26, and M.111 today. I still have a handful of G.202 rootstocks coming from Cummins, so 4 scion pieces are stored in the fridge. I planted them out in a little nursery bed to see what survives the year for transplanting next year. I also planted 4 pear rootstocks in their permanent place to bud graft later. I planted 1 each of the apple and pear rootstocks on its own to establish a stoolbed to propagate if needed in the future.

It was good to get the hands in the dirt for the first time of this spring.
View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1428276402.969001.jpg
View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1428276419.219528.jpg
 
Those bees were watching you plant but its going to be at least 3 years before they get any flowers you will let them keep for making apples. We grafted a bunch this weekend, I was yakking and forgot where the knife was and I hope blood helps the grafts this year! WVMJ
 
Yeah fruit trees are a *****. Be super clean. Never leave trimmings or fallen leaves under them. Take away and burn.
 
WVMJ said:
Those bees were watching you
Click to expand...


The bummer is those hives are empty. I had 5 at the end of January, down to 1 after February, and 0 now. Wisconsin winter is a *****. I'll be starting over with 3 new packages coming in a few weeks.

My Cummins order will be shipped soon. Included in that are 6 sweet cherry trees to bring some variety around. I've only had Nanking and Hansons bush cherries until now which work nice as a beer adjunct, but they are worthless for eating fresh.
 

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