[Sharondp]

Hi all 

Now I know there's no such thing as a silly question on this forum, but I believe I may be about to ask a really silly one! 

Can you grow an apple tree from seed?

The reason I'm asking is that my boys have taken it upon themselves to plant some apple seeds which have sprouted and are looking very healthy! All the trees I bought earlier this year were grafted onto rootstock - so is it possible to produce apples on a tree from seed?

I'm embarrassed already! 

[doganjo]

Don't be. I did it when I was a kid! And my fiftyish next door neighbour gave me a lemon tree - just a teeny baby one - that she grew from a pip.

[bloomer]

the answer is yes they will grow but not necessarilly true to type

cross pollination in orchards is very common, an apple tree is a bit of a tart it will take any apple trees pollen and grow fruit which looks and tastes like the mother plants fruit should, but the seeds could produce something very different.

grafting produces accurate copies of the parent plant so this is used commercially to get us the fruits we know and like....

[plumseverywhere]

i think most of our plums tree's may have come from a plumstone going in one end of a sheep and coming out of the other so it makes sense to me!

[Sharondp]

Thanks guys - I just wondered why they grafted most commercial trees -thanks bloomer. So we'll see we what end up with then! 

[Fleecewife]

And the full name for the famous Bramley is Bramley Seedling, because the original was grown from a pip   

[scattybiker1972]

grafting is done to control the height and the vigour of the tree in question so the bottom rootstock  is of a variety known to fit to the size wanted for the purpose while the top is the variety of fruit wanted so growing trees from seed can be done but you wont know how big it will get or how productive it will be. and some get big!     

[Sharondp]

I'm learning new stuff all the time! 

[ellied]

I grew an apple from a seed as a kid too - it grew in a pot tho and never produced fruit..

Can I be rude and divert to another silly apple question - I've a new tree that I've had 3 years, nothing the first year, a few hard tiny ones the second year and this year they're the size of a golf ball and have turned red but how long til they actually produce full size decent crops?

The one I have is a patio type which supposedly grows millions of fruit on a tiny area and never grows above shoulder height, and it's a Discovery grafted onto whatever the dwarf rootstock is..

I also have a pear, same length of time, and it is still producing nothing other than an odd tiny peanut sized excuse for a fruit

I have a mature cooking apple and plum orchard and even the 2yo damson gave me 9 fruit of normal size this year but I'm obviously not feeding it something it wants?

[bloomer]

size of fruit is normally limited by water

if its a patio type they usually fruit well if given a lot of water!!!

im talking gallons, my 3 year old apple tree produced 30 full size fruits this year but it got watered every day unless the weather had been really wet!!!

as for food a good top dressing with blood fish and bone in the spring is usually enough unless your soil is really bad!!!

as for the pear they can take 5 years to start fruiting so don't panic yet!!!

[Fleecewife]

I have a similar problem to ellied.  I have a 'family' tree in a half barrel by the door.  The first couple of years it produced huge fruit and plenty of them but this year the apples are tiny and not many.  Only a couple are the top variety, which is of course the tastiest.  I water it frequently with the potato washing water which always has soil from the veg patch in it, so it should have plenty of extra nutrients added gradually.  Obviously that's not enough so I will repot it this winter.  I wonder just how successful potted patio type trees are in the long run.  I prune mine drastically each winter and it's covered in flowers in the spring.....  Do you think they need to be repotted annually?

[northfifeduckling]

I had that as a question in my biology Highers (how do you propagate apples) - and that's what I wrote (just stick a pip in the ground and wait a few years). I think I would have got more points with bloomer's answer...

[scattybiker1972]

ive just sorted out my fruit garden and planted  2x family apples with 4 scions so 8  types of apples on 2 trees a dual plum and a 4 type pear tree plus just waiting for fig,cherry and grapes to arrive.also have currants blueberries rasperries goosegogs and rescued a ton of strawberry plants from the local pick your own farm...worth a shot..

[ellied]

Is this a good time to repot the patio apple and pear trees?  If so what do they need as I have a load of 2-3yo well composted horse manure I could add in the base of a bigger pot or how about wood ash?

I don't want to direct the tree into root making if it should be onto leaf and blossom development by now, but in November it just wasn't possible to dig anything

[Blonde]

Hi all 

Now I know there's no such thing as a silly question on this forum, but I believe I may be about to ask a really silly one! 

Can you grow an apple tree from seed?

The reason I'm asking is that my boys have taken it upon themselves to plant some apple seeds which have sprouted and are looking very healthy! All the trees I bought earlier this year were grafted onto rootstock - so is it possible to produce apples on a tree from seed?

I'm embarrassed already! 

Yes  you can grown an apple tree from a seed.  This is  how some of the varieties we have today have developed.  Then when the variety is chosen it is tissue culture or grafted  on to root stock and grown on in the nursery and then sold to orchardists or small land holders to grow on for either commercial production or for family use.