Fruit sub-forum? Q about air layering

[Deleted]

I wondered if there is a fruit tree and vine subforum, or would there be a reason for one in the near future. I have not read everything here. Yet.  A lot of gardeners are not involved with fruit trees and I would not want to take up their space asking or discussing fruit trees.

Anyway, I want to know if anybody has any hands-on experience with air layering as a method of reproducing fruit trees. I have several varieties that are not easy or cheap to find and I'd like to reproduce some of them. I may not live long enough for some of them, it seems like some trees take many years to bear fruit, but somebody else can have the fruit of my labor, if I don't. AND, some of my relatives and friends are drawn to some of the varieties I have. One is William's Pride apples, which are already in season, I've been eating ripe apples since July 1st! I can look stuff up on the internet, but writers usually aren't growers. Is grafting better, or faster?(I do know the size of the tree is directly related to the rootstock, and the bigger a tree will become, the longer it will take to fruit. 

[here to stay]

I have tried air layering a couple of times with zero success. I have grafted dozens of times with 100% success.

I have a Williams Pride and it has just set fruit to ripen some time in December. Which makes me think you must be at the opposite side of the earth?

[Deleted]

No, I'm right here in zone 7. Williams Pride is one of the earliest ripening apples. From Purdue University: 'Williams' Pride' is an early-maturing, attractive, dark red apple (Malus xdomestica Borkh.) with excellent fruit quality and field immunity to apple scab incited by Venturia inaequalis (Cke.) Wint. The fruit is of medium to large size and matures with the very earliest known commercial red cultivars in the midwestem United States. It ripens 1 week after 'Lodi' and 7.5 to 8 weeks before 'Delicious'. 'Williams' Pride' is released as a potential commercial cultivar for use as a summer dessert apple. The apple is named in honor of Edwin B. Williams, Emeritus Professor and long time leader of the disease-resistant apple breeding program at Purdue Univ.

So, no luck at all, huh. How about putting the end of a live, still attached branch in a pot of dirt? I've done that with fig bushes before. And grape vines, blackberries, etc. I'll start studying up on grafting, I suppose. For some reason, I seem to think it takes a long time to do. I talked to a local nursery owner who described rootstock notching and refrigerating over winter. At which point I mostly quit paying attention. He did offer to sell me dwarf or semi-dwarf rootstock, though.

[here to stay]

Sheesh- ixm wondering now what it is i've been calling Williams Pride......

[here to stay]

I was thinking Hauer's Pippin. How I managed to confuse the two names I never know.

[oxankle]

Rahaminka; Most fruit trees will not air layer. Citrus is an exception. Lemon, orange, grapefruit will air layer, figs will air layer.

Where do you find Williams Pride? I'd like to buy one for myself.

Ox

[Deleted]

See!! If I'd studied up on this last year, I could send you one myself. Oh, well. I see a few places in the northeast, boyernurseries.com full sized trees, cumminsnursery.com has dwarf and semidwarf. Fedco, and maplevalleyorchards.com all in the northeast. raintreenursery.com is in Washington state. I'm sure there are more. However, I researched when I got my trees, and decided that ediblelandscaping.com in Virginia suited me best. They had them on semidwarf rootstock, and had larger trees, which meant I got fruit in a couple of years, as opposed to the 5 or 6 years I'd have to wait for the dry root whips that everybody else had. Not cheap. But, to me it was better than waiting those extra years.

[elkhound]

i will show results later in year.


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