Cold Hardy Apples and Crabapples: Winter Field Notes

almost done taking stock, this is my office today, inside the root cellar counting bins of apple trees.

siberian crabapple seeds collected from various sources showing the diversity. apples are generally a mixed bag of several species, malus baccata often have some percentage of hybridization, the trees will be very similar as rootstock and for zone 2/3 hardiness, but the fruit will range from tiny and red to 1" and red or yellow. #appleseed

we’ve had a couple ft of snow this month, here’s the drifts in one of our apple trees along the laneway. this is a wild crab that I’ve been shaping for a few years and has about ten varieties grafted

morden russet. one of the few russet apples you can grow in zone 3, developed at the morden research station and was rescued before the tree was removed years ago. I have a few left in stock. #russetapples

root grafted apples. an old school technique that used to be the most common way to propagate them. I found the trees take an extra year to grow, these were grafted spring 2023. Inspired to research this in old gardening and nursery books after reading an article by @elizapples #grafting #rootgraft #applegrafting

bench grafting apples last spring, the conventional and a few root grafts. I so look forward to doing it again this year, I didn’t count but there were at least a few hundred and I’ll do more this year. So far I’ve preferred parafilm and then a rubber on top. maybe I don’t need both, but parafilm quickly holds a whip and tongue together and keeps it clean and dry inside, and the rubber feel like it holds everything tight.

6 different sources of siberian crabapple. there’s so much generic variation and with likely hybridization the apples range in size and color.

started the winter garden. apple seeds direct into 2.5” pots to start Siberian crabapple rootstocks. with this head start they’ll be up to size for grafting by the end of the season #indoorgarden

apple rootstocks in the fall, seedling Siberian crabapple. this time of year I’m collecting scion wood and planning to start bench grafting as soon as the ground thaws. #grafting #rootstock

new apple seeds on plates to dry overnight in the dehydrator. First is Siberian crab, second is an unknown variety, both fully cold hardy in zone 3. After the seeds are clean I dry them on low heat at around 90-100F for 1-2 days to get the moisture content down close to 10% and store in a fridge. #seedsaving #appleseed

collected these crab apples today for seeds. it’s a 30 yr old tree in a family yard, late hanging 1” apples always loaded, hardy to the tip in zone 3. Thinking of planting some and also offering the seeds. #seedsaving #crabapple

malus baccata (Siberian crabapple, the worlds most cold hardy apple) seeds at 40 days cold stratification about 2 days out of the fridge are starting to germinate. These little seeds are getting planted out into 200 cell trays under led light until may when they will go into our greenhouse, then into nursery beds in June. Last year we timed it differently and had some transplant shock so we learned a lot and we try again. Hoping for 80% survival to planting out so about 1000 seedlings with a head start on the year. Here in Manitoba we get about 3 months of growing frost free from June - Sep. All of these little tree are planned for rootstocks, if they’re large enough we might even bud some this fall, they pull it off in warmer climates maybe it’s possible here. #backyardorchard #backyardnursery #appleseed

Siberian crabapple with purple genetics. One of the trees we harvested seed from in the fall had stunning purple leaves, and about 50% of the seedlings carried that trait. #appletrees #appletreenursery #siberiancrabapple #applerootstock #appletree #crabapples #treenursery

Siberian crabapple (Malus Baccata) rootstocks from our winter garden getting potted up. #appleseedling #rootstocks