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Dakota Gardener: Amazing apples

By Carrie Knutson 

NDSU Extension – Grand Forks County

My son came home from school one day last month and emptied out three apple seeds from his jeans pocket. He saved them from his lunch. He asked to plant them so he could grow his own apples. Be still this gardener’s heart!

However, I was in a pickle. I knew that the chances of the apple seeds growing, thriving and producing apples were slim. Why is growing an apple from seed challenging?

For starters, apple seeds need a period of cool, moist conditions, also called stratification, before they will germinate. Usually, seeds are placed in moist potting soil and then put in the fridge for 90 to 120 days.

Second, apples are cross-pollinated so the seed will not grow apples that are the same as the original tree. In order to get the same tree, you would have to take vegetative cuttings from the original tree.

That brings us to a third point, apple trees are commercially produced through grafting. A scion (top of the tree) is grafted on rootstock.

Rootstocks have a big impact on the way the scion grows, and there are many different types of rootstocks for apple tree growers to pick from. Some characteristics determined by the rootstock are cold hardiness, disease resistance, fruit quality, how long it takes the tree to fruit, and mature tree size. In addition, some rootstocks can improve the strength and growth potential of a less-robust scion.

How does this impact the apple seeds we are trying to grow? The seeds will not have the benefit of a hardy rootstock to support the tree as it grows.

Sometimes, gardeners can graft scion wood from other apple trees directly on a tree that is already established in their yard. There are multiple methods of grafting. The goal is to line up the thin growing region underneath the bark of the scion and rootstock. Then wrap the union up tight and wait for mother nature to take its course. There are a few more details, but we will save those for another day.

Our little apple seeds have 60 more days in the fridge before we can plant them. So, we have to wait to see what happens. But, you don’t have to wait to grow apples in your yard this summer. Make a trip to your local greenhouse this spring and purchase a ready-to-grow apple tree. Happy gardening! 

Source : ndsu.edu

Trending Video

Wheat Yields in USA and China Threatened by Heat Waves Breaking Enzymes

Video: Wheat Yields in USA and China Threatened by Heat Waves Breaking Enzymes

A new peer reviewed study looks at the generally unrecognized risk of heat waves surpassing the threshold for enzyme damage in wheat.

Most studies that look at crop failure in the main food growing regions (breadbaskets of the planet) look at temperatures and droughts in the historical records to assess present day risk. Since the climate system has changed, these historical based risk analysis studies underestimate the present-day risks.

What this new research study does is generate an ensemble of plausible scenarios for the present climate in terms of temperatures and precipitation, and looks at how many of these plausible scenarios exceed the enzyme-breaking temperature of 32.8 C for wheat, and exceed the high stress yield reducing temperature of 27.8 C for wheat. Also, the study considers the possibility of a compounded failure with heat waves in both regions simultaneously, this greatly reducing global wheat supply and causing severe shortages.

Results show that the likelihood (risk) of wheat crop failure with a one-in-hundred likelihood in 1981 has in today’s climate become increased by 16x in the USA winter wheat crop (to one-in-six) and by 6x in northeast China (to one-in-sixteen).

The risks determined in this new paper are much greater than that obtained in previous work that determines risk by analyzing historical climate patterns.

Clearly, since the climate system is rapidly changing, we cannot assume stationarity and calculate risk probabilities like we did traditionally before.

We are essentially on a new planet, with a new climate regime, and have to understand that everything is different now.