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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] Rope + Red Elderberry

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  • From: hans brinkmann <hans-brinkmann@t-online.de>
  • To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Rope + Red Elderberry
  • Date: Fri, 30 May 2008 14:33:25 +0200

Hallo Bill + Ernest,

at Germany professionals for damaged trees do use always only Synthetic Woven Belt Material.
The loops should be loose (if possible) to have time for some years growth.
Producing factories may sell those belts (e.g. from safety belt production for cars) almost for nothing, if those belts are rests or productions with little woven mistakes. They are treating it like plastic waste and e.g. horse keepers are using them as very visible and fast fencing material.
The remaining pressure is very, very reduced - because of the large surface.

Your nursery has been right: Red Elderberry is an edible kind of elderberry!
Ripe Red Elderberry (Sambucus racemosa) fruits do NOT contain Sambunigrin - but the seeds.
Exactly like Black Elderberry (Sambucus nigra)! Seeds and unripe fruits are never used.
If some Sambunigrin is left, it is completely destroyed by boiling!
BOTH Elderberries may be used for juice, jam, soup, syrup...Never poisonous after boiling.
The Red Elderberry contains more acid than the Black one. The fresh none-processed taste is the opposite of good.

ciao
hans


William C. Garthright schrieb:
Long story short, I'm going to need to tie up some dwarf fruit trees, or they'll fall over when they get fruit. They've got branches on only 1/4 of the tree (yeah, I've decided this wasn't a particularly good idea). Cable is very awkward to use, but I've seen some 5/8" braided poly-something rope that's supposed to last awhile outdoors (the young clerk told me 5 to 20 years, but I suspect he was just pulling those numbers out of thin air). It's about 4-500 lb. test.

Anyway, if I tie a loop around the trunk using a bowline knot, it shouldn't slip tight, and I'll leave plenty of room for the trunk to grow (I imagine that tying a knot tightly around a trunk would be a bad idea). And the rope is soft enough that it will flatten out on the far side, so it should provide a pretty broad surface there, I'd think. But before I buy the rope, I thought I'd ask if there's any downside here. Something I haven't considered? (That wouldn't surprise me!)

Thanks,

Bill
Lincoln, NE (zone 5)

PS. If you *really* want the long version, read on: I came across this "backyard orchard culture" idea (http://www.davewilson.com/homegrown/BOC_explained.html) when I was first thinking of planting some fruit (I was, and still am, a complete newbie). So I planted four different kinds of dwarf apples in one spot, then did the same with plums and peaches. The first thing I discovered is that keeping these trees really small is much harder than it sounds. The second thing is that they're very hard to prune, when they're planted four to a hole (more or less). And now I'm realizing that, since each tree has branches on only one corner, they're likely to fall over as soon as they get any fruit on them.

I've got a steel t-post driven down in the center of each group of four trees, so I'll be tying each tree to that. Yeah, I don't expect the post to hold them up, but this way they'll be tied together. But let me tell you, it's already very hard to get to the center. The rope would be a lot easier to work with than anything else I've come up with.

And no, I wouldn't do this again. Maybe I'd try a row of closely-spaced trees, though. At least then, they'd have branches on two sides, to keep them somewhat balanced.






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