Ridge Top orchards were in my community at about the same era. It is my understanding that planting on the ridge tops helped with the frost problem. The trees bloomed later.

The orchard property starts up near the top of the mountain and goes down a big ridge and out on a few little points here and there. The whole place is a little over 300 acres, with maybe a third of it cleared, and planted in apple trees. As of a long time ago.

Here's a picture from the lower end of the orchard, there is 1 apple tree in the center of the picture. First time I've been in that area for years, kind of surprised how nice the fields look. They do pasture cows up there through the summer months.

Looking at the tree pictures above, all of the trees are about dead. They're hollow, just hanging on. But that's one nice thing about grafting, if my grafts take and grow, I'll be able to keep that variety of apple going. We'll have a new tree.

More than likely the apple trees in the orchard aren't anything special or a lost variety of apple. But you never know.



One thing that does kind of impress me about the trees, they've been neglected for, pretty much all of my life. They haven't been trimmed or sprayed, and yet they will still produce a few apples every year. The apples that I remember are a late variety, I remember picking off apples in late November. As well as I remember the apples are a dark red in color and super sweet. Very good eating apple.

We'll see what happens.

I called my tree man John the other evening, told him what I had going on and all. John has over 50 different kinds of apple trees growing on his place. He said that he was getting behind on taking care of them.

He told me how to grow rootstock, that's been 15 or 20 years ago. We went over it again, it's called "stooling". That's what I'm going to do with my 2 remaining pieces of rootstock. Malus "M111". Looks fairly simple.

https://www.google.com/search?q=stooling...me&ie=UTF-8

I watched the one video from KeffelCreek. Several other links on the page too. If it works like it's supposed to work, John and I will never need to buy another piece of rootstock.

John and I talked about the price I paid for the rootstock, these folks are geared for big operations, big orchards. Folks that are buying rootstock by the 1,000's. John had to buy a gallon can of Doc Farwell's grafting seal, it only takes a single drop to seal up a graft. John gave me a pint jar full, that's a lifetime supply.

This is an interesting video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MbvGAny4bA

Also found videos from: Dave Wilson Nursery. It's in California.

Excellent tutorial. Especially enjoyed the machines that make that huge plantation possible. Smart people in this world!

Frank.

There is some good information in the videos. These folks are in a different climate than me. One thing that I will point out, you don't want your graft to freeze. If it freezes it will kill the graft, but the rootstock should keep on growing.

In a way I screwed up with my grafts. I could have waited another 2 weeks to make the grafts, until about the first of April. That would have still given me 2 weeks for them to heal, before I plant them outside. I'm thinking April 15th.

My biggest concern now is that their roots might get all tangled up in a wad, and I'll need to cut them apart. I have 8 plants in one bag. If I find that's going to be a problem, I'm going to plant them in a tub for a couple of weeks. That might be a good thing

I agree that is fancy, top of the line equipment on those orchards, nurseries. Well maintained and good looking property.

I'll tell you, sitting on that 4 row planter, behind the tiller and eating dust for 8 or 10 hours would make a long day. So would walking those rows snipping off half of the top leaves.

Above I said that there was big money in apples. Think about those rows of trees, and the retail price.

Yeah, watching those folks labor makes me happy I chose the occupations I did. Missing planting a few trees in a row because of a sneezing jag would make the orchard look like it's missing a front tooth! The machines they use reminds me of an 'hit-n-miss'machine. Like a babbling brook, I could watch those things all day.

Frank.

It's been years since I've heard a hit and miss engine. They have a big steam & gas engine show over in Berryville, VA every year. Dad and one of my uncles loved to go.

Watching that 4 row planter and the guys feeding it, first thing that came into my mind was: Damn good way to lose a hand or worse. And then the caption said it was following GPS. So the tractor is running on autopilot. I wouldn't care for that. I'd certainly think that they had some type of kill switch, that everyone could reach. People do stupid stuff, and it only takes a second.

After watching these different people make their grafts, it's all basically the same, but using different materials to hold it in place. The one guy used a rubber band, and sealed up all of the exposed wood with some type of sealer.

Folks using paper type and Parafilm tape, the way I did my trees. Also watched someone use nothing but the Parafilm tape. And in the one link above, they recommended using a plastic bread bag cut into strips.

I used about a 4 inch piece of Parafilm tape on each graft, so all together I used up less than 20 feet of tape. I think a 90 foot spool was $6 give or take. I did use up a spool of the paper tape, $2. So it's not expensive.

It's a good hobby to know. If a feller really wanted to you could make money.