Step 10: Final results
Here are some pictures after the seeds have grown a little. These pictures are from my first batch (I didn't wait for all of the seeds to sprout before I planted them. I ended up getting 2 seeds that sprouted, and four plants. They look great and seem really healthy. Maybe in 14 years I'll have a massive tree and some fruit.
I guess this isn't really worth it if your only goal is fruit, but they make really interesting plants, and are a great conversation starter. The trees are actually really attractive when they're full grown and they have a nice scent.
I had to plant some for my friends that live on the floor, so I must've done something right. I hope you enjoy this instructable as much as they did.
I guess this isn't really worth it if your only goal is fruit, but they make really interesting plants, and are a great conversation starter. The trees are actually really attractive when they're full grown and they have a nice scent.
I had to plant some for my friends that live on the floor, so I must've done something right. I hope you enjoy this instructable as much as they did.
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I took an idea from the "tree sculptures" and wrapped the two sprouts around each other, so they hold each other up. Works very well
i also use 2 litter pop bottles for green house starts
That's an apple seed haha, but good try.
One thing though, the trees you are growing are not likely to grow well. Most orchard trees are grafted. A rootstock tree is started, usually a crabapple tree for apples. I don't know what they use for Oranges. Then a small sapling is started, about the size of the ones you have there and they are grafted onto the hardy root stock. For some reason, trees that have fruit like we're used to don't grow healthy roots and so never fruit. At least thats how I've come to understand it. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. . .
In certain areas, grafting is not just common, it's absolutely necessary to get certain varieties to grow in a particular area.
My girlfriend's got a grapefruit tree that essentially sprouted wild. She's also got a pot-bound navel orange tree that I want to graft onto something I know will do well in the soil on her property. But I probably won't try to graft the navel orange to the grapefruit. I might end up sprouting some of the tart oranges that also grow on the property and then graft some cuttings of the navel orange to that.
Other sites explain what kinds of citrus trees make better rootstock, in terms of how likely they are to overrun the scion. Some googling on "citrus tree grafting" might be helpful.
With apple trees, you have a very low rate for good fruit. Many times the trees breed with other trees and give inferior fruit genes to the resulting plant.
Grafting makes all of the fruit bearing branches have identical fruit. Many store bought fruit varieties actually came from the same tree (an example of this is the navel orange which is seedless). Grafting onto a dwarfing rootstock will make shorter plants for easier fruit picking.
Since the top part of the tree came from a mature tree, a grafted tree will fruit the next year. A non grafted tree will take longer to fruit because the tree needs to mature first.
A non grafted tree doesn't have inferior roots. I actually have a bunch of apple trees behind my house back at home. Each and every tree was started from seed from an orchard that was there 200 years ago. The trees are gigantic, but all fruit. Unfortunately, out of the 20 or so trees that are out there, only two produce large tasty apples. I think I'm going to try to graft trees from from that stock someday.