Topic: Woolworths family apple trees

[sawfish]

Woolworths are selling FAMILY APPLE TREES, Discovery apple trees and Sunset apple trees for £9.99, they also have plums and cherries. The trees look really good! Just bought a Discovery which is ideal for the cold north.

[tricia]

I bought a family pear tree last year which is looking good. It has lots of big fat buds on it so I'm hoping it will flower this year - and maybe give me a couple of fruit.

Tricia

[Marymary]

They sound like interesting trees.  How do you think they would do in a large container?

[sawfish]

I'm unsure marymary I dont have the tree here. I'll have a look tomorrow at the label and see what rootstock its on, if its a dwarf type it'll probably be fine for a container.

[Amazin]

I bought my pear, nectarine and cherry trees from Woolies last year and have them in very large pots - nothing fancy, just those huge big mock grecian types in finest Poundstretcher Plastic. They've come on a treat - I'm expecting fruit this season.

[jennym]

To be honest, I'm not that keen on family trees. Unless the 2 types are very well matched, you tend to eventually get lopsided growth, wherere one variety is more vigorous than the other. Sometimes the pruning regime is different. On the one you have, the Discovery is a sort of half tip bearing tree, and the Sunset is a spur bearer, so it would be a good idea to bear this in mind when pruning, if you know which side is which.

[manicscousers]

our ordinary discovery tree topped 25 feet last year, we've had to prune it down to 15 feet or we just can't get at the top branches !  :)

[sawfish]

Will a Discovery be cross pollinated by Braeburn, Jonagold or Elstar?

[Robert_Brenchley]

Elstar's in the same group (B), meaning that it flowers at the same time. Jonagold is a triplod, so it won't pollinate anything. I'm not sure about Braeburn.

[sawfish]

Thats great thanks Robert.

So the Elstar and Discovery will help each other out. All three Elstar, Jonagold and Braeburn bore lots of fruit last year so I'm hoping for the same this year with added Discovery.

[tricia]

Marymary - my family pear tree is in a large pot. With having a paved courtyard style garden I don't have space for fruit trees in the ground, so have the pear, a plum and a morello cherry in large pots. I'll keep them pruned to a manageable size as they mature.

Tricia

[Marymary]

Thanks, Tricia, I'm really tempted by the cherry.

[shirlton]

I wanted to grow a Bramley cooker but you have to have 2 other trees with it to pollinate and I don't really want 2 more. Cooking apples are so expensive to buy.

[manicscousers]

we cook with our discovery apple, no sugar needed so ray's o.k, make nice stuffed apples  ;D