Another sapling installed

Today, I took advantage of the good weather to transplant a Black Walnut sapling into the orchard. I'd pre-prepared the hole and support post so the process was straight forward. This time it already had soil on the root ball so it should take without too many problems. I had some treeguard tubes available so I was able to protect the slim trunk from rabbit/squirrel damage.

It is fascinating to wonder if I'd still be alive to see the nuts harvested from the tree I just planted. I'm in my mid-sixties so I should have a decade or too left to me. It's the old story, you plant trees for the next generation.

There's a great backlog of work to catch up in the orchard. Mother nature doesn't care if you've been unfit. The sunny weekend day saw plenty of people stopping by for a chat. It slows the work but is most welcome.

First apple in the Orchard

When checking the orchard we saw the first apple growing on the Cobra apple tree. We're not expecting any fruit this year as the trees are young and will have to overcome the shock of transplanting into their new home in Turnditch Orchard. It will be interesting to see if the apple survives through to maturity in the autumn. The crab apples are loaded with tiny fruit, but at the moment we don't count them as fruit, but rather as a decorative pollinator plant.

Our first Cobra Apple in the orchard

We are allowing clumps of Comfrey to grow as their flowers are a good source of food for bees. The foliage also makes a good base for fertiliser. At the moment it is all looking very healthy and prolific.

Wild Comfrey in the Turnditch Orchard

We have had a bit of a failure with the Guinevere Plum tree. It was supplied as a potted three year old tree complete with root ball, but for some reason a lot of it has died back. However there is some signs of partial growth, so we'll get the secateurs out in the autumn and prune back the deadwood.

Struggling plum tree in the Orchard

Overall we are pleased with progress. Both the quince and the walnut tree are looking particularly healthy and happy in their new locations. The walnut tree will be fed by the body of our faithful old dog Rocky who was buried by it's roots in the Spring. Rocky lived to be 23 years old and now has the job of guarding the orchard. He was a Staffordshire Bull Terrier Labrador Cross who we took in as a rescue dog when he was 6 years old.

Rocky, died 2014  aged  23

Planting trees

We had a busy day in the orchard site yesterday planting most of the fruit trees. We'd planted the maiden bare root apple/cherry trees a couple of days ago. The first thing was to transport the trees in their pots from where they'd been overwintering in our garden. The buds were beginning to sprout so we had to transport them carefully two at a time in the back of our estate car from Belper. It took a total of five return trips. 

Next we visited Lester Lowe for a bundle of 50 hedging stakes which we'll use to provide to provide protective enclosures for the trees. They are about 20 mm square and 150 cm tall with tanelised sawn wood. They should last for the first few years of the tree's lives after which the trees should be tall enough and tough enough to resist the predations of any marauding sheep who sneak into the orchard. Hopefully by then our newly laid hedges will be providing some protection too.

We had a good three hours hard work, assisted by our German Shepherd Dog, digging holes and driving fencing stakes to provide the new home for the trees. The heavy post knocker we purchased last year has proved to be a great investment. The bottom of each pit was lined with a mix of coarse sand and manure compost to give the trees  a bit of a head start. We planted all but three of the fruit trees. We'll complete the tree planting today, then during the next week we'll build the protective enclosures for the trees. It is interesting to hear the comments of people walking by on the Ashbourne Road, clearly there is some interest in the progress of the  project from our neighbours.

Elka the GSD puppy discovered a mud wallow

We had a bonus in the shape of a walnut tree given to us by our neighbours in Belper. The tree is about four years old and about 2 metres tall. This also has been planted in the orchard. It took a rather large hole to accommodate the root ball! Our dog Rocky has been left to guard this tree.

It looks like all of the hundred willow wands we planted are sprouting new leaves in the grove we planted earlier this year. We should be able to harvest some of these for the spilling work on the river bank next  Autumn.

In many places we found clay and builders rubble which had been dumped on the land during previous ownership. Odd garden flowers such as crocus are appearing on the land. This is a clear sign of dumping which has effectively ruined the land for agricultural purposes. However the original alluvial soil is good and should be good for the trees of the orchard. I'm sure we'll build quite a large rubble heap over the years as we extract bricks from the soil.