Advice re apple trees

[Ikeeptrying]

Have bout a Bramley apple tree and a Conference pear, waiting for a Concord pear to arrive. I just wondered how far apart it would be advisable to plant them. We live 500 ft above sea level, about a mile from the sea and it's very windy. We have decided to plant the fruit trees in a protected area with a nice hedge to reduce the impact of the wind and some beautiful soil! We intend to keep the trees under control and not allow them to grow too large.


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[simon12]

I don't know but the person who does will need to know what root stock they are on.

[FB.]

The mature size will vary greatly, with many factors affecting the outcome:

1. The rootstock onto which the tree is grafted.
2. The depth and fertility of the soil.
3. The amount of rainfall (or watering/irrigation).
4. The amount of fertilising.
5. The amount of chemicals used to protect the tree from pests and diseases.
6. The amount and type of any plants growing nearby and competing for water and nutrients (including
grass).
7. The local climate (temperature, sunshine etc).
8. The way you prune/train it and the amount of pruning skill (including special pruning needs of tip-bearers such as Bramley).
9. Whether it is grown in the soil or in a pot.
10. The natural vigour of the scion grafted to the rootstock (e.g. Bramley makes unusually large trees capable of overriding dwarf rootstocks; Conference makes medium-size trees).

To emphasise what I mean: I have some seedling pears (considered to make massive trees) that I have easily kept to 1-2ft by restricting their root growth in small pots, starving them of food and water and not protecting them against aphids and other pests/diseases.
If they were planted in deep, fertile soil with generous amounts of rainfall and a full spray routine they might well manage 3-4ft per year of growth for their first several years; reach a size of 20ft in 10-15 years and maybe 60ft in 50 years - and even larger by the end of their life in 200-300 years time.

However, the most likely answer is that you probably have:

1. Average soil.
2. Normal amounts of rainfall.
3. Slightly short growing season.
4. MM106 rootstock (or Quince A for pears)
5. A very vigorous scion in Bramley and a medium vigour scion in Conference.

So a height of 12ft and spread of 15ft when mature in 10-15 years would not be surprising for the Bramley - and it may reach twice that size by the time it is at the end of its useful life in several decades time.
The Conference pear will probably be about 12ft in height and similar or a little less spread (i.e. 10-12ft spread). As a rule, pears that aren't pruned tend to be much more upright than apples.
Unpruned apples generally make round-headed bush-trees about as wide as they are tall, while unpruned pears generally make conifer-shaped tall/narrow trees. Good pruning technique will keep the trees more of a mushroom shape so that the trees aren't too tall for easy and safe picking with a stepladder or long-handled picking tool (a plastic cup on a stick will do!).

[FB.]

Bramley is not an ideal choice if you want to keep it small. If you do want to keep it small, don't pamper it. Bramley does well when treated so badly that you wonder if someone will report you to the RSPCAT (Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Apple Trees).

Bramley tends to take quite a long time to start fruiting and tends to want to get quite large before it fruits well.
It often isn't well-branched enough to make nice compact bushes (not even with pruning; besides; pruning delays fruiting and encourages vigorous shoot growth).
More than the lightest pruning will encourage vigorous regrowth and the crop may be ruined by bitter pit as the tree directs all its energy into regrowing what was cut off rather than fruiting (so fruit quality suffers badly).
Bramley's tip-bearing habit means that pruning isn't straightforward: a lot of the fruit is borne on the end of young shoots and those are the shoots that most amateur pruners will cut off - with no fruit and vigorous growth the following year.

Bramley and the other heavyweight triploids tend to do best when grown as a large tree in fairly infertile soil, slightly dry soil, under grass cover, with no feeding, very little pruning and very little care.......well, unless you're prepared to undertake the intensive feeding, spraying and irrigation routines of a commercial orchard and grow your trees on dwarf M9 rootstock.

Finally; Bramley has been so widely grown for so long that it isn't reliably disease resistant nowadays because new strains of diseases have gradually emerged which can overcome its resistance. In some areas scab can be a serious problem, causing much of the fruit to split and rot. In other areas it is still trouble-free.

[Ikeeptrying]

Many thanks FB, should have contacted you before buying methinks....however we are from Southwell, and therefore do have a partiality to Mr Bramley's seedling! Also the climate is so inhospitable here that we need something that's very robust in order for it to survive, especially without lots of TLC.


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[FB.]

Also the climate is so inhospitable here that we need something that's very robust in order for it to survive, especially without lots of TLC.

In which case Bramley might be a good choice - if your conditions are as difficult as you suggest (although if your soil is good it suggests lots of organic matter and leaf litter from many centuries of very happy plants living there).

The vigorous triploids tend to be more tolerant of difficult conditions, neglect and tend to be more disease resistant.
I grow a lot of unsprayed/unfed/non-irrigated triploids (on MM111 rootstock) because the soil is little more than shallow chalky sand sitting on gravel, in the driest part of the UK.