It's spring and the birds are moving in...

Two hours ago I took this photo of a red kite flying over the 1940s orchard! What a sign of how successful the Chilterns re-introduction program has been. Indeed, whilst I was getting a bus to Gatwick airport last week I saw over fifteen of them when we passed down through Buckinghamshire towards London. In medieval times they were common in towns and cities where they fed on carrion and waste in the streets, rather like vultures do in other countries.


My funding has stretched further than anticipated and so I was able to direct Issac into the 1940s orchard for a spare day. Here he just concentrated in doing the chainsaw work I can't do on my own, such as raising the crowns and removing any large diseased branches. I saw a few yellowhammer down by the pheasant feeder where they always seem to hang out. It's a red list species due to recent population declines that are almost certainly due to the intensification of farming methods.



We have finished pruning the 1920s orchard now and its looking pretty amazing. The main job left is getting rid of the immense volumes of prunings that we have created. The offcuts are all very green and sappy and I have been agonising over the most efficient way of dealing with them. A mobile chipper is one option, but the prunings are quite hard to handle and I think the best option may be to make several large bonfires and leave the wood to season for five months before burning it all.

Planting vintage varieties

Yesterday I drove across to Drakes Broughton to visit Kevin at Walcot Organic Nursery and see if I could shark a few late trees to plant out. Finding fruit trees anywhere on proper standard rootstocks (i.e. M25) is quite difficult as more dwarfing forms tend to be preferred and are more convenient for a garden scale. Couple that with the fact that it's quite late in the year to be planting fruit trees and I was lucky they hadn't been completely cleaned out. I came away with an Ashmead's Kernel (Dave Kaspar's favourite) and the cider varieties Dabinett, Michelin and Tom Putt. I also got a crab apple as they are traditionally used to help improve pollination rates since they hold their blossom for a long time. I wanted to buy a few maidens to put in the ground this year and then by this time next year I will hopefully have fifty more trees of rare local varietes that I am grafting onto M25 next week. If you can't buy it, make it yourself.



The pruning is also going at a great pace - we now only have three trees to go before the 1920s orchard is completely pruned. (That's six years growth off fifty 90 year old Bramley apple trees.)


You can almost hear this old beast sucking in the fresh air!

38 trees pruned, 12 to go!

This sequence shows Isaac helping me tackle a tree that we thought was in danger of splitting down its trunk. It had become very spreading, with a large weight of wood a long way from the crown. The trunk appeared to have a clear weak point as well.


By bringing the arms in, the tree would be much less likely to split in two. Fortunately Issac is trained to undertake this kind of major surgery. It makes you think what would have been involved before the days of chainsaws!


On the right of this shot you can see the water shoots I have partially cut and bent down horizontally to grow out and eventually replace the branches we have removed. This technique seems rather brutal and may increase chances of infection at these wounds, but the trees are remarkably resilient and thus it is a risk worth taking.


Here is a tree we didn't get to in time to save. It is now supported by the ends of its spreading branches and will gradually decay. I plan to leave it in-situ as a habitat feature of these wood-pasture ecosystems.


The blue trees have been pruned by Issac and myself in the last few weeks. The five pink trees were pruned by my friends during the pruning party I hosted last weekend. The two yellow trees are standing dead or have split and will be left to decay gracefully.

Pruning party 2010

It was a question we had all been asking ourselves: what can a dozen people armed with saws do to an old orchard in a day? Will the outcome be disastrous? Can the ecological and horticultural aims be kept in balance? Will the cider kill the work ethic? Perhaps more than anything we were blessed by the weather on a day fine enough to inspire even the most dendrophobic Londoner into considering all those water shoots and congested crowns.


Teaching people about pruning is difficult, and especially so with the unusual situation at Charingworth. Here Bramley apple trees on vigorous rootstocks have been commercially managed for over 70 years. We are now attempting to ease them into a less intensive management regime, whilst at the same time preserving all the valuable types of habitat that orchards can accumulate over time.


I started my friends off on a couple of trees I had already half-pruned. This eased them into the basics of dealing with the water shoots without too many confusing or important decisions to make.


The basic message was: clear the crown and lower branches from water shoots and then thin the majority of the rest, choosing a few well positioned shoots to take the vigour. Remove anything crossing or pointing back in. Easy, breezy, beautiful.


I was lucky to have Harry and Tommy back from the pruning weekend last year. It looks like Harry is giving some advice to Luca in this photo - knowledge sharing for fruit bearing!




We brought a load of well seasoned wood into the orchard to try and create a fire ferocious enough to consume the piles of sappy offcuts that have been created. I think the only workable solution will be to hire a mobile chipper for a day once the pruning is finished.


A "Blitzkrieg" campaign on tree 31.




I picked up twenty litres of medium sweet Prior's Tipple cider to keep the mood buoyant. Alongside hot Cumberland sausages with mustard and onion marmalade, this made for an idyllic lunch amongst the trees.








By the end of the day we had pruned five trees (shown here in pink). This was more than I had hoped for and it was so thrilling that everyone seemed to really get into it. This takes the total up to 27, which is over half way!

More importantly it allowed a few people to experience the beauty of old orchards first-hand. There is nothing quite like sitting in the arms of a pruned apple tree with a glass of cider to allow communion with, in James Russell's words, that "man-made Eden".

A professional pruner in the orchards

This week Isaac Nixon started working for me at Charingworth to help with the pruning. He is a professionally qualified tree surgeon with lots of experience pruning in commercial orchards.


That smaller chainsaw in the middle is designed for carving wood. It is good to use for pruning as there is less kick back than from a top handled tree surgeon's saw and this makes it safer to use up ladders around your face. Obviously, this kind of work can only be done by a trained professional.


This tree had tilted over and needed a bit more major shaping to even up the weight distribution. Apple trees can recover from toppling and this tree should respond by increased buttressing around the trunk and more root growth. It will gradually realign its canopy over the next few years.


Chainsaws aren't often associated with the sound of progress, but this case is an exception. In three days we have pruned nine trees, pushing the tally up to nineteen. At this rate we should have finished the 1920s orchard in a fortnight!


For the first time in years we are revealing vistas through this ancient orchard. An exciting time!

Building a shelter for pruners

Today, Freddie (a regular helper for the Trust) and I constructed a temporary shelter in the upper orchard to harbour chilly pruners during lunch breaks and teas. We bought a 7m x 11m tarpaulin from Stow Agricultural Services in Stow-on-the-Wold and chose a south facing side to one of the more magnificent trees. One of the biggest challenges was ensuring we created more than just a huge apple sail!


Poking the fire - an age old tradition.


In sunny weather the sides can be rolled up for a more 'alfresco' feel.

Thinning fruiting branches by hand

Today I made up a flask of hot chocolate and scampered into the 1920s orchard above Charingworth village to make a real start on the pruning. I was only using a pruning saw as each tree needs a certain amount of trimming before its safe to get the pole pruner involved. The tree pictured is one of the largest in this orchard - can you see the water shoots protruding vertically from the main boughs? This is regrowth from the last pruning and tells me the tree is healthy and vigorous. You can also see a fair amount of congestion in the lower fruiting branches that needs to be reduced.



I plan to thin these congested lower areas by hand. I have three main things in mind while doing this:

1) to take in any excessive growth lessening the weight carried by the main boughs, thus minimising the chance of major splitting.
2) increase the gap between these fruit bearing branches and the floor to improve air circulation and (when the time comes) keep the trees out of reach of hungry sheeps
3) to thin the branches out allowing more air and light to the developing fruit

One thing to remember when doing this is to consider the characteristics the variety of apple tree you are pruning. Bramleys, for example, only fruit on growth that is at least two years old. This means that if I went around clipping the tips off all the shoots no fruiting buds would form in the coming season. Once this thinning is done I will have the room needed to safely manoeuvre my fairly unwieldy pole pruner that will help me to quickly remove most of the vertical water shoots.


Copyright © Cass Turnbull Plant Amnesty.

Basically there is a LOT of different advice about pruning fruit trees around. I need establish what pruning will keep the trees in the best health for the longest time. I think the trees I tackled last year were pruned too hard and so I plan to experiment with a few different approaches within a general framework of reducing the chances of splitting, raising the canopy, increasing fruit health and preserving ecological value (in scenarios where it doesn't immediately condemn the tree).

Getting serious about pruning

I have now invested in a Stihl pole pruner. It's basically a mini chainsaw on the end of a pole and will allow me to work much more quickly (and reach into first floor windows!). Not as accurate as pruning by hand so I will try and make any of the more critical cuts with a saw. Could struggle to fit it in my mini too...

Pretty snow, and pretty hard to prune

The weather has been, and continues to be, exceptional. I had intended to start pruning yesterday but have a look at this photo comparison of the 1940s orchard: Christmas Day on the right, today on the left. It's flaking away again right now. I saw a flock of long-tailed tits yesterday which is encouraging as they are very vulnerable to hard winters, being tiny and insectivorous. At night time they often roost communally with their bodies together and tails sticking out, a sight surely very few people have ever seen. Get the fat balls out!

Look at how the snow crystallises the branching shape of this old sycamore.

Pruning advice under a snowy sky

This morning Jim Aplin, a market gardener and experienced orcharder, came to Charingworth to give me some pruning advice. It was very useful to walk around with a pair of experienced eyes and helped to give me some confidence before the New Year's assault.

Jim was saying that a cold spell is often good for the health of an orchard as it helps to kill diseases and pests within the trees. It will also help the sap to sink out of the branches and reduce the stress from pruning.

The weather was bleak and moody.

Mount Pleasant Orchard

Last Sunday morning I went to Mount Pleasant near Shipston-on-Stour, Warwickshire for a second visit to Roger and Gudrun's fantastic orchard there. At ~4 acres, this non-commercial family orchard has around 220 standard fruit trees and a total of 93 identified varieties of apple, plum, pear and walnut. There is the full range of fruit tree ages, from those planted last year to the original trees from the first planting in about 1850. In other words, its a real treasure trove!

There are several features that make this orchard exceptional, and one of these is the abundance of very ancient apple trees. A sensitive regime of yearly pruning has allowed these trees to become 'over mature' and survive into old age still producing a few good fruit. The veteran tree features found in these trees hold great ecological value and they also develop fascinating twisted shapes. These trees are all Blenheim Orange and probably date from when the orchard was originally all this variety (with a few perry pears as well). It's a local variety that seems to like the heavy clay and makes for delicious eating.

This plum tree is quite bizarre- it is actually made up of two different varieties. The lower branches to the left and right are a wild form of Yellow Bullace (-apparently it is the first tree in the whole orchard to blossom, filling the air with a beautiful almond scent) and the top of the tree is a Blue Pershore. I think that technically you describe the Yellow Bullace as having been 'cuckolded'. This occurred when the Blue Pershore seeded itself in the original tree's crown and then grew down through its trunk.

This eating apple is called a Domino and is unusual on account of its hardness. The apples lie whole on the grass until well into spring and are an invaluable late food source for the overwintering fieldfare.

This is a Russian apple called Emperor Alexander, and one of Roger's favourites.

The illusive and mysterious Orleans Reinette. I have been told by the head of the Cambridge Botanical Gardens that this is best eating apple he's ever tried. Definitely worth a taster in a couple of months...

A multipurpose variety of apple that dates from Roman times called the Quoining. It was still producing until it toppled over this year, so the photos on the right show the tree in 2004 and the strange shape of the fruit. Roger took a graft from the remaining shoots but unfortunately the apples on that look more like a Bramley. Perhaps a second attempt will yield better results.

The orchard has a yearly prune where certain trees are taken in to balance them and minimise toppling or splitting. Recently one of the big original perry pear trees looked like it might split, so here are the before and after pruning shots. Even though it may look quite severe, the tree will quickly recover. This regime of continued maintenance has enabled so many of the trees in this orchard to reach a great age and remain in good condition.

These lumps in the foreground are ant hills of the Yellow Meadow Ant (Lasius flavus) . These ants need a well grazed sward to survive. The size of these ant hills indicates that this land has not been cultivated for a very long time.

The dead wood habitat provided by the orchard is phenomenal. Pruning offcuts are stacked in various places, both beneath trees and in more open areas along the orchard edge. This has provided a great range and abundance of decomposing wood habitats that will support a great diversity of invertebrates. It is a common misconception to assume that wildlife woodpiles must be damp and shaded for maximum benefit- dead wood that is dry and sun-warmed represents and equally valuable and endangered substrate. Gudrun says she can remember seeing stag beetles in the past and the trunk of this perry pear (photographed on the right) shows some evidence of quite large larval bore holes.

This picture says a lot about how well this orchard is managed. By replanting whenever gaps have appeared there is a full range of tree ages, something that is so often lacking in traditional orchards in Britain. Roger takes cuttings from exiting old trees and re-grafts them onto vigorous (M25) rootstocks ensuring they will develop into full size standard trees. This way varieties are preserved and the orchards future is planned for.