North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["kieran or donna" <redherring@tnaccess.com>]

I'm having another thought on this subject....  about how many times I've planted trees the proper distance apart, only to have some wimp out or die outright or the voles get some.  If I'd planted closer, I'd have wasted less space and tried out more trees.  Most of my trees are costing little or nothing, so that's not a limiting factor. 

    I have grafted more pear varieties from Lucky than I know what to do with.   (Though at 3 to a hole, I think I could fit them in nicely!)  Went to buy feed at the farmer's coop today and my buddy there told me about this apple tree that his father had gotten as a sprout from a previous tree.  (Either a seedling or more likely a root grafted tree)  It's in bad shape now, so he got Hidden Springs to graft him a couple, but turns out the tree has plenty of root sprouts, so I may get an ownroot tree for nothing.   Another friend told me last year about a Yellow Sheepnose that was given to him as root sprouts and came true, I got some from him and passed along the extras.  Feed stores are a good place to hang out if you want to find old locally adapted varieties.  I'll bet if some of you would put up a notice saying you'd custom graft, you'd collect all kinds of interesting stuff.  My buddy tells me he thought this tree was an Ark Black because it's very dark and very late, but says it's not real hard.  Hmmm.... could be Mammoth Blacktwig, I already collected that one in town.      Donna