seeds from apples, will they grow?

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Sufficient Life
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Probably but they will be unlikely to reproduce the tree that produced the seed. Most apple trees have been grafted varieties for more than a couple of centuries- the seed will be a hybrid between that grafted apple and whatever pollenated it. Even if the same apple tree happened to be able to pollentate it, it still would be a genentic crap shoot.
Having said that, that is the way most new varieties are developed. You may create the next wonder apple.
Many of the seedlings in new varieties are still grafted onto other root stock to make faster growth and disease resistance.
Not far from where I live is the old orchard of a pretty famous apple developer- hundreds of experimental trees that he grew from seed to test out. Most of course did not prove to be good- he developed the Walthana apple amoung others.
 

patandchickens

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If they're from store-boughten named varieties, it is probably not worthwhile. (e.t.a. - I mean either the apples *or the trees* being store-boughten)

If they're from hedgerow trees, in a stand of several or a bunch of them that are all pretty similar or tasty, your odds might be better. A little better.

It's still a looooong time and a lot of work and space just to get to the point where you can tell whether the progeny are worthwhile (like 5 yrs or more from planting - I wouldn't place too much faith on what the fruit is like the first year).

Also remember that seed-grown apples will not be on dwarfing rootstock and thus they will very rapidly get to the point where only crows and raccoons can harvest most of the crop. This is ok if you are just trying to do a good deed for wildlife, but may be unsatisfying otherwise. No, you canNOT keep regular-sized apple trees small just by pruning the heck out of them - they will get sad and diseased and weebly, and die, probably after STILL having grown too darn tall :p

Pat
 

Beekissed

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I've heard you can freeze the whole apple in the fall and plant it the following spring. I've got some in my freezer and will let you know how it turns out! :D My trees are the old-fashioned big trees, very old and tall. Could one plant one of these and graft a dwarf one on to it? What would happen, Pat?
 

patandchickens

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Beekissed said:
My trees are the old-fashioned big trees, very old and tall. Could one plant one of these and graft a dwarf one on to it? What would happen, Pat?
You'd get crappy apples, twenty feet up in the air ;)

It's the *rootstock* that needs to be dwarfing. What you could do, if you have space and time, is to obtain dwarfing rootstock (serious appletree specialists carry 'em - you would have to mailorder unless you are geographically fortunate) and then graft a scion off yer great big apple trees onto *that*. Then you would get the same apples as your big trees, only at a more pickable altitude.

(e.t.a - it occurs to me that if rootstocks per se are not readily available in your location, you really could use ANY ole appletree that is being sold commercially, providing it is on dwarfing rootstock, and graft your big appletrees' scions onto that. It really would not matter what the purchased apple variety was, because you could just get rid of it after the grafts were in good enough shape. I would only do this with young vigorous healthy well-grafted well-tended plants, though, not the walmart parkinglot-sale discount special ;))

Pat
 

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I've taken a few small trees, cut them back to the main stem and grafted them with multiple scions to change the fruit on the whole tree. I'm not particularly experienced but still never had one fail. The man who showed me how always said "If you don't like the fruit, change it." It's easy and cheap- especially if you can get the scions from someone for free- most people don't mind.

Also have grafted a cross-pollenizer on a tree that was not setting well and I didn't want a whole tree of the proper pollenizer- worked well too.

If you find a dwarf apple tree that has suckered, you can dig up the sucker and graft that. Dwarfs will fruit way earlier that full sized trees. But you also could graft on a bunch of different scions onto an existing tree- make one tree with different kinds of fruit.

Right now I have a plum grafted from an unknown tree that has been passed around the area- it has sweet skin and insides too. No other plum I have ever had compares to this one. I am also allowing some rootstock to grow so that I can do another graft when the tree is big enough to spare it. The original tree was killed by a bear last year and so I want to insure that I have more than one.

Forgot to mention that I have one super dwarfing apple that gets to be all of three feet high and bares full size apples. It was a fun idea I thought but is too easily robbed of it fruit by dogs and foxes.
 
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