help a skint gardener grow a green gage from stone

[alanmac1984]

hey everyone.
iv got maybe 15 delicious greengages i bought from a local shop and i wanted to try grow them from seed.
1-is this possible?
2-will it grow true to seed?
3-if it does work when would i expect fruit?
4-people talking about rootstock and grafting gages onto rootstock,what does this mean and what are the commonly used rootstocks?
only reason im doing this is thanks to the NHS not helping my ruptured discs in my back,or helping to solve my severly damaged nerves because they wont operate on the disc,and ATOS saying that me my wife who is now unemployed due to looking after me full time and helping me look after our 3 yo son and 11month old daughter are only entitled to £34 a week, so we have to try grow our own food as we cant buy alot of veg and fruit.
so please someone give me the good news that growing them from seed will work.
many thanks

[zazen999]

It's going to take you a long long time to grow a greengage from seed.

[veggiechicken]

Its a long term project - you're talking years, not months!! If you want to eat before then, better to put your energy into something quicker maturing

[FB.]

1-is this possible?

Yes.
.

2-will it grow true to seed?

Probably not, but plums and gages often aren't too bad when grown from a pip - many acceptable-quality seedlings live in hedgerows.
.

3-if it does work when would i expect fruit?

Best-case scenario three years if it is managed in a professional way. Most likely scenario several years. A small chance that it could take over ten years.
.

4-people talking about rootstock and grafting gages onto rootstock,what does this mean and what are the commonly used rootstocks?

Rootstocks are a different plant (sometimes a different species).
A rootstock gives some degree of size control (helps make a tree of roughly a certain size when mature, although it varies with soil, climate, spraying etc).
The most suitable rootstocks for plums in gardens are Pixy (dwarf), St.Julien A (medium).
Plums are extremely water-hungry fruits so in drier regions such as mine the dwarf and medium plum rootstocks aren't able to gather enough water and the trees often "runt-out" and become poverty-stricken; so in drier/sandy/light soils a stronger rootstock such as Brompton (large) is needed to make a medium-sized tree, while Myrobalan/seedling is needed to make a large tree.
Some dwarf and medium-vigour rootstocks - but not the really strong rootstocks often required for more difficult soils - are available (in mid-winter) from here:
Rootstocks For Grafting

[FB.]

Oh - the pips/seeds of most hardy tree fruits require a "winter chill" to activate the seed - this is to prevent a seed germinating in autumn and being killed by harsh winter frosts.
After a suitable winter chill (equal to a couple of months in the fridge) the seed is ready to germinate.

So either put them in pots in the garden and let winter chill them, or put them in the fridge for a couple of months, then germinate in pots indoors which should only take a few weeks. You could have some seedlings growing before Christmas - but the growing young plants will not be hardy enough to cope with a transfer outdoors until all risk of frost has passed (around May 2014).

[FB.]

Its a long term project - you're talking years, not months!! If you want to eat before then, better to put your energy into something quicker maturing

Fruits such as rhubarb, strawberries and raspberries quickly come into production and are relatively low-cost compared to the value of the fruit they can produce.
Potatoes and parsnips are also easy-to-grow and give good yields in a short space of time without much effort (we don't bother earthing-up; the green ones get stored over winter and used to grow next year's crop).
Planting in raised beds, where the soil (compost - preferably home-made compost) can give the very best growing conditions for the biggest crops. We get our compost free from a local-ish recycling - as much as we want for free if we collect, or I think about £30 for a skipful delivered anywhere within about ten miles.

[FB.]

I just used the Blackmoor site to put together a quick hypothetical batch of varied fruits for about £100, which ought to be a superb long-term investment, with at least a small crop in the first year (the fruit bushes are semi-dwarf and being two years of age already, they should be able to produce a light crop in average soils soon after planting), full cropping capacity only a few years later if well-managed, and taking only a few years to pay back what they cost, yet continue producing good quantities of fresh, chemical-free fruit for 20 years or more with only a small amount of effort required.

For the record: I think Blackmoor's size guides for fruit tree rootstocks are optimistic and only achievable with the most perfect growing conditions, no competing plants or grass within a metre or two, and a full spray routine. In the real world of unsprayed trees in an average back garden soil, the "trees" are likely to be between half and two-thirds the size guide. I've never seen a M26 reach even 3m (more like 2m), let alone the 3-4m stated by Blackmoor. An over-vigorous M26 or semi-dwarf could soon be slowed right down by letting grass grow closer to the trunk.

Starting with rhubarb in early spring, followed by strawberries in early summer, followed by plums in mid-summer, followed by Discovery apples in late summer, followed by raspberries in early autumn, followed by Falstaff apples in late autumn and through to mid-winter.

[Two_Sheds]

only entitled to £34 a week, so we have to try grow our own food

I'd say that greengages are a luxury item, in that case. They're delicious, for sure, but they aren't going to fill empty tummies with protein & carbs.

Fruit is cheaper to grow than to buy, but there are easier fruits to have at home: raspberries & strawberries for one. Gages can be foraged for in the wild, along with brambles, damsons & sloes.

[boundtothesoil]

so we have to try grow our own food as we cant buy alot of veg and fruit.

If you want to start growing fruit really cheaply, I'd ask around any local allotments this autumn for cuttings of gooseberry and blackcurrant. Strawberries are producing their runners now and many people have far too many for their own use. If you can get hold of 10-20, planted now, they'd probably start cropping next year. Same applies to raspberry canes. Some garden centres are selling off this year's soft fruit stock cheaply by now - you can find some good bargains. I bought a single Cambridge Favourite strawberry plant for £1-50 a couple of weeks ago, but it had 7 or 8 rooting runners coming off it (equals at least 9 plants for the price of one.) As to apples, pears and plums, if you can wait an extra year or two, buy rootstocks for a couple of pounds each and graft them up in Feb or March with cuttings provided by neighbours/allotment growers (you can easily learn how to graft by watching you-tube videos - I did!). Alternatively buy very cheap trees (under £5) from the supermarkets and keep an eye out for ones that have been further marked down in price because they have a snapped branch or some other damage. I reckon you could be in total fruit production for under £20, but it will take a little time and luck.

[Penellype]

Blueberries are also easy to grow (providing you can give them acid soil - they will grow in large pots), and if you buy them now they should have plenty of immediately edible fruit on them. You may need to cover the bush with a net to stop the birds from eating them.