Fan training an apricot

ulysse caughtCaught in the act. Ulysse, stripping a cherry of bark. The little rotter.

He didn’t even look sheepish when I shouted at him. Who me? I wasn’t? It was the other horse.

It made me go around all the newly planted cherries and check I had the wire well in place.  Actually the horse is so tall he could reach in and snap off the top of the branches.  Which is why I am hoping the fencinulysse skylineg is well secure around the farm this spring.

He munched the top of a beautiful mulberry tree near the hedge and it has taken a year to recover the mauling.

But back to the apricot. I had hestitated for years about planting apricots.  First up the mountain has to endure a persistant peach leaf curl problem I inherited from some very neglected cling peaches.

I am almost but not quite winning the battle with the nectarine and peach in the orchard.

apricotSo I have decided to go ahead and plant an apricot, but hopefully far enough away so that the spores of the wretched peach leaf curl won’t blast it from the beginning of its young (two year old) life.

I chose a self fertile variety that is also a late flowering and is good in cold climates.  This one, Bergeron, is particularly suitable for altitude and is one that starts out saffron yellow and gets richer and redder as it ages. If I can wait that long. I’m a greedy apricot fiend.

Fig pig, apricot fiend. I can’t find the right alliteration here. Lisa, help me out.

I have planted the apricot south facing and right up against the lean too shed at the very end of our house.  And as I was doing so I had An Idea. apricot planting

I’ve always wanted fan trained fruit, but as most of my trees are free standing in the orchard, this was my first chance to have a play.

I tied the whippiest of the lower branches to bamboo canes, and gently attached them to the slats of wood of the shed.  And then repeating the process for the next branches higher up.  It couldnt have been easier.

I’ll keep an eye on the loose ties as the tree grows.  And all being well, I shall have a handsome addition to the fruit bowl that is pleasing on the eye and to eat.

apricot fencedBut first you are going to have to endure the sight of the green wire fencing to keep out all four footed admirers for a few years yet.

And an annoying wooden stake hammered in right in front of the tree. Sorry, deer protection first, aesthetics second for this one.