Garden Tree - How To Create A Multi-fruit Or Multi-fruit Tree. Features Of Vaccination. Photo

2023 Author: Ava Durham | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-27 07:13

There were times when the concepts of "tree-garden", "family tree", "collection tree", "multi-tree" simply did not exist. And such a miracle could only be seen in the household of the "Michurinists" - people who marveled at their neighbors, looking at their gardens. There, on one apple, pear or plum, not only varieties of different ripening periods ripened, but also of various colors and sizes. Not many were desperate for such experiments, but only those who were not afraid of experiments and believed that nature would share its secrets with them.

Today the “tree-garden” continues to amaze and delight, raises many questions, and sometimes fears, but is not something out of the ordinary. The data obtained empirically made it possible to enter "family trees" into the category of available ones, and, if desired, to form the necessary "super-set" independently. We will talk about the secrets of creating such trees in this article.

Content:

• The principle of creating multi-varietal and multi-fruit trees
• Is it possible to buy a ready-made garden tree?
• How to create a garden tree yourself
• Benefits of a multi-sorted tree
• Cons of a garden tree

The principle of creating multi-varietal and multi-fruit trees

Generally speaking, a "garden tree" is a tree in the crown of which several varieties or crops are grafted. Moreover, if different varieties of the same culture, for example, several varieties of apple trees, are planted on one skeleton, the plant is called a multi-varietal tree. But if there are several different crops - apricot, plum, cherry plum - a multi-tree.

Such trees are created by grafting. In this case, it takes up to 6 years to form a plant. First, a carrier of varieties or a "skeleton former" is grown, and only then suitable varieties are grafted onto it.

Often, gardeners start this business for the sake of a multi-cultivar plant with different ripening periods of grafted cultivars. However, experienced plant breeders advise against doing this because of the mismatch in the timing of the so-called phenophases (periods of plant development).

It is correct to graft summer varieties for summer, autumn for autumn, winter for winter, or with close ripening periods. But here, everyone chooses for himself - after all, any family tree is a kind of experiment.

Is it possible to buy a ready-made garden tree?

Not all gardeners are ready to wait, experiment, improve an unusual multi-varietal tree. But, fortunately, this is not required! Today you can buy a ready-made specimen with carefully selected varieties, guaranteed to be adapted to the area. This greatly simplifies work and eliminates the need for waiting.

The only complication is not just finding the varieties that interest you. But if there are no special preferences, and it is the experiment that is important, then there will be a choice.

How to create a garden tree yourself

As mentioned above, creating a family tree is possible only by grafting. Which one? At this point, whoever likes what, what the hand is full of. Good results are given by grafting for the bark, and grafting into the cleft, and grafting with a kidney into the butt, and budding in a T-shaped incision, and grafting with a grafting shears.

A more difficult question is survival rate. Not all breeds agree well with the scion. For some, the wood oxidizes so quickly that it nullifies all attempts. Here you need to study the experience of other gardeners, be interested in published data, read special literature, try.

And one more, very important factor that should not be forgotten is the skeleton builder. The durability and productivity of the "tree-garden" depends on it.

An ideal skeleton must meet the following requirements:

• be resistant to winter terrain conditions;
• have good compatibility with a large number of varieties;
• be characterized by the correct angle of departure of skeletal branches (close to 90 °) and the level of their location above the ground (1-1.5 m);
• be distinguished by the ability of strong fusion;
• do not give extra growth;
• have (preferably) restrained growth.

The best skeleton formers for apple trees

In the case of the apple tree, the simplest version of the skeleton-former is the wild. If you transplant a tree with a large clod of earth, trying to damage the roots as little as possible, then the grafting can be carried out in the first year.

However, such a solution has a significant disadvantage - the trees turn out to be vigorous, it is not known what the seedling's compatibility with other varieties is, how winter-hardy it is.

The second solution can be two-three-year-old low-growing seedlings (on an insert or clonal rootstocks) of such winter-hardy varieties as "Grushovka Moskovskaya", "Cinnamon striped", "Antonovka ordinary", "Moscow later" and others from the category "folk selection" …

"Dobrynya", "Purple Ranetka", "Bystretsovskaya" showed themselves well in a cold climate. However, after transplanting, they need time for rooting. Positive indicators are given by grafting on seedlings from the dwarf rootstock "YAS-1" and "Bystretsovskoe" (Seregin), columnar rootstocks of Stepanov, on a clonal rootstock or seedling "Sharopay".

The best skeletons for pears

And what about a pear? The first solution, similar to the apple tree, is to pick up the wild. But finding a pear seedling is not so easy, and taking root shoots from old varieties is dangerous - if the crown is damaged, it will give abundant root suckers, which will be extremely problematic to get rid of.

The way out is to grow a winter-hardy skeleton-forming agent on your own from the seeds of a forest pear or semi-crop. For the middle lane, you can take the "Cathedral" variety or the "Chizhovskaya" variety. For the Urals - "Altai late", "Volozhka", "Volzhskaya summer". For Siberia - "First Swallow", "Kuyumskaya".

Skeleton formers for stone fruits - plums, cherry plums, cherries, apricots, peaches

Stone fruits are even more problematic to create a multi-varietal tree. In the northern regions, there are practically no good skeleton-formers for them. In a cold climate, vaccinations do not take root well enough, and the productive period of crops is not high enough to spend energy on this venture.

However, for Siberia, you can try to plant apricot and plum on the Ussuri plum, and in the Urals, plum and cherry plum - on the local thorn. In the middle lane for cherries and cherries, you can take varieties of cherries "Dobraya", "Shubinka", cerapadus (P-3, P-7). For plums - cherry plum variety "Gift to St. Petersburg" or plum "Tula black" (apricot can also be grafted onto it), "Eurasia 49", "Skorospelka red".

In addition, for plums, cherry plums and apricots, you can pick up a thorny or the same thorn. However, it should be remembered that they have great growth potential and the formation of root shoots.

Vaccination rules for a garden tree

Found a suitable "skeleton" ?! You need to prepare him for vaccination. Cut branches that have an angle of departure less than 60 °, very thin, too thick, broken, located above 1.5 m (so as not to get a very high crown) and below 1 m. Only evenly spaced branches with a thickness of a pencil should remain on the "skeleton" - they will be vaccinated.

The optimal choice of varieties for a tree garden is 3-4. Why? If only two varieties are grafted onto a skeletal former, you will get two skeletal branches growing in different directions - this is a direct danger of their breaking from a high yield. If there are 5 or more varieties, the varieties will begin to compete and those that are stronger will dominate the weaker ones. The scion of the central conductor will also be prone to dominance, therefore it is better to graft a variety with low growth on the leading branch.

In order to preserve the winter hardiness of the garden tree, the grafting is carried out on the lateral branches of the first order with an indent from the trunk of 20-30 cm. The rest, as well as the branches of the "skeleton" left without grafting, are cut off. The timing of vaccination for different regions, different crops, different methods of vaccination vary.

It is clear that in the spring on the "skeleton" of the tree-garden will begin to grow not only cultural, but also "wild" shoots. Their presence is important for the full development and preparation of the tree for winter, for this reason they are not cut out all at once, but periodically they are limited in growth during the growing season. They are completely removed only next spring.

You can create a garden tree on an adult plant if, for some reason, it does not satisfy you. To do this, it is necessary to carry out a strong pruning of the crown, and next year the varieties of interest should be grafted into the overgrown shoots.

Benefits of a multi-sorted tree

The tree-garden has many advantages. First, there is no need to uproot the plant if the variety has not shown itself well enough - you can use it as a skeleton builder, gradually picking up what you really like.

Secondly, in a small area, you can "start" several different varieties at once using the minimum area. You can combine several crops into one tree, which will allow you to collect a sufficient amount of harvest without unnecessary loss of surplus.

A big plus is the cross-pollination of several varieties. Trees give more consistent yields. More resistant to external factors, such as frost resistance, heat resistance, drought resistance, since for their formation the best rootstocks for a given area are selected. Their crown often looks interesting with a variety of foliage, different colors of fruits, and of course, spring flowering

Cons of a garden tree

The garden tree has its disadvantages. They were mentioned above, but it is worth repeating. The first is a complex formation process. It takes from 4 to 6 years to create one plant, and this, if everything works out the first time.

The second drawback is that it is not so easy to find a good skeleton for the future miracle plant. Not all varieties have good graft survival. Not all of them fit together. However, if you experiment, you can achieve very successful results. One has only to start and then it will be impossible to stop.