Topic: Young fruit tree dead?

[Galette]

About three years ago I planted a dwarf peach/apricot.  It was doing quite well when roughly this time last year it suffered serious damage from very low temperatures, it dropped all its new leaves and blossom and looked a hopeless case for the rest of the season.  I decided to leave it in place for a year, just to see what would happen.  I now find that yes, the tree is dead - no new buds and the little branches have clearly given up.  However, there are loads of healthy shoots appearing at ground level, presumably from the rootstock.  What will this grow into if I cut away the dead wood? Should I leave it or just dig it up and call it a day?

[goodlife]

Yep..that sounds like rootstock is growing..and leaving it to grow is not going to give you much edible fruit.
You would be better off digging it all up and start again.
If you feel like learning fruit tree grafting..that stump could produce for you lots of new rootstock material. It needs to be planted somewhere else and the new growth needs to be bellow soil level, raised mound of soil being easiest option..over the year all those new shoots will root. Later on the year..or next year you can scrape the soil off so that you can see where the shoots join to the main stem and cut out all those that have produce their own roots..those need planting up again individually, grown another season and you have yourself lots of copies from original rootstock..now you only need to learn crafting to attach new tops on them 
Not a actual short them plan...

[Big Boy]

Scratch the bark with your thumbnail. Green it's alive  Brown/White it's dead.

[Galette]

Thank you both.  I will give it a scratch tomorrow just to double check. 

Goodlife - how very interesting!  How long would (for example) a grafted plum take before it produced fruit?  I have three very ancient little plum trees that produce gorgeous Victoria-type fruit.  I would love to have some young clones ready to take over from them when they finally do give up the ghost!

Galette

[goodlife]

How long would (for example) a grafted plum take before it produced fruit?

You would expect to get first few fruits from 3-4 years old tree...providing that tree has produced plenty of new growth. But you won't count the year when the tree is actually crafted as that summer all the effort will go for craft to harden off/get established and produce some growth from the new wood. The tree don't really get going until following year.

[chriscross1966]

If I had a known dwarfing rootstock stump suckering I'd be propagating from it and turning prunings of other folks interesting drupes (the plum/peach/apricot/almond family) into small trees... they'd fruit in 3-4 years depending on how extremely dwarfing the rootstock was..... and you could probably get them to do it in biggish (18") pots... so keep an ongoing orcahrd on the patio, plant out the ones that taste good and "take" properly........

[Galette]

This all sounds like a very good idea!  It will give me the chance to experiment with cuttings - something that has always seemed interesting to me.  If I am going to replant it, when would be the best time of year?  There is lots of activity going on there at the moment, perhaps if I cut away the dead wood then make a small mound of earth to encourage the shoots during this season, then I could move the whole lot to a holding bed during next winter.

[goodlife]

If I am going to replant it, when would be the best time of year?  There is lots of activity going on there at the moment, perhaps if I cut away the dead wood then make a small mound of earth to encourage the shoots during this season, then I could move the whole lot to a holding bed during next winter.

It would be best if you don't have to move it at all but could mound the earth...but if you do need to change its place..ASAP would be good.
If you can make nice mix of grit, soil and handful of bonemeal and use that around the stump. Keet the soil mix moist to encourage the rooting and growing ..don't cover the new growth totally..but leave some mount of growth visible and as the new shoot start stretching out add some more of 'mixture'. By end of summer/autumn, carefully scrape some soil off to see if there is any development as regarding new roots. Once the new shoots have gone dormant (next winter)..you can then either separate those with new roots and grow them on or if nothing is happened as yet..that is good time to move the whole lot into new position and give it another growing season to root. It is just waiting game and little bit TLC and surely you WILL get some new plants 

[Galette]

Great, I will give it a go.  Many thanks.

Vixter

[goodlife]

..oh and to add....once you've managed to cut of new now rooted saplings from the 'mother'..you need to grow them at least another year, possibly two, to get the stems to thicken up. You don't need to do worry about pruning, you just want to the new root stocks to grow until the bottom foot of the stem is right thickness for to take a craft. You only need to trim the stem into 'right' length once you actually are in crafting process..and match thickness of the stem for the thickness of the craft wood.