Wild apple tree: a description of the tree and fruits. Can I plant a wild apple tree

On the boundless territories of Russia and Ukraine, wildlife can be seen everywhere, but most of all they are found in the forest, among thickets, near rivers, on the slopes of ravines. A wild apple tree prefers to grow in the form of a bush or a small tree. Probably, each person has a memory of childhood, when, running away from their parents, they enjoyed small fruits with bitterness.

Places of growth of wild apple trees

This plant belongs to the few lucky people of the plant world, to which the man turned his attention. Tree apple-tree wild can often be found in our broad-leaved, mixed and coniferous forests. Especially well it takes root in northern places. The best apple-tree develops and yields a plentiful harvest, growing on illuminated territories. "Planting" the plant is mostly solitary in the field or along roads, sometimes in small groups on the edge of forests.

In the forest itself, under the canopy of other trees, where a solid shadow, the tree feels uncomfortable, which affects the growth and yield. A wild apple tree is used for planting in field shelter belts, in planting plantations of settlements as a living protection against harmful "aromas" of highways. It can be found in fruit trees.

Large distribution of wildlife is observed on the territory of the European part of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. In the suburban areas and near individual houses, it is planted quite rarely in rare cases, since the plots are small, and the owners are slow to spend precious area on such a tree.

Wild apple tree: description

The apple tree is wild, sour, wild, apple-tree is a tree whose height is from three to five meters, sometimes reaches 10 meters, the thickness is 40 centimeters. The crown is dense, mostly round, the bark is brown in color, old in gray, with cracks. Young shoots are herbaceous, dark brown in color, some have thorns. The leaves of the apple tree are slightly covered with hairs, elliptical, sometimes round with denticles on the edges. In their mature form they are dark green, sometimes bright green on top and matte from below.

Blooms in late April - early May. The appearance of the apple tree at this time is irresistible! The tree is covered with rather large white or pink flowers, which are collected on several pieces in the inflorescences - scutes. Simultaneously with the flowering, the leaves of the apple tree begin to bloom. Cross-pollination.

Fruits of the apple tree

Fruit-bearing tree begins at the age of ten. The yield of wildlife is incredible, but the problem is that the fruits of the forest apple tree are bitter-acidic and woody. In fresh form they become suitable for food only a month after collection. Seeds contain a weakly poisonous substance - amygdalin.

Fruits are small, varied in shape. Their color is mostly green-yellow, it can be red and whitish-yellow with a pink blush. It is scientifically proven that these little apples outperform other cultivars in their useful properties. The reason for this are useful substances that are contained in them:

• Organic acids (1.9%): apple, tartaric, lemon, and others.
• Approximately 30 names of mineral substances, including iron, calcium, potassium and zinc.
• Carotene and vitamins "B", "C", "RR".
• Up to 16% of different types of sugar (glucose, sucrose and fructose).
• Phytoncides and essential oil.

These indicators are influenced by age and grade of wood. The chemical composition of the fruit depends on the location and climatic conditions in which the wild apple-tree grows, and also on the size of the fruit. The smaller the apple, the more it will contain the vitamin "C". The leaves of the apple tree contain much more. In the skin of the fruits there are flavonoids.

Collection and storage of fruits

The timing of the collection of apples depends on the timing of maturation and continues from the end of summer until late autumn. Collection of fruits should be carried out, taking into account all qualitative features. Apples should fully ripen, only then they have rich nutrients and normal taste, as well as the greatest capacity of vitamins.

In order to achieve high labor productivity during harvesting, it will require a high organization, as well as a technique to carry out this work. Since apples are further used for technical processing, the simplest method is used for their collection - the fruiting apple-tree wild is shaken, and the fruits are on the ground. However, with this method, large losses are noted, and apples are mechanically damaged.

There will be a high performance only if you place a stretched cloth under the tree. Falling on it, the fruits are less damaged, do not get so clogged up and, most importantly, you do not have to spend much time searching for and picking up fallen fruits. If apples are intended for consumption in fresh form, they must necessarily be torn by hand.

Collect wild apples in a solid container, that is, in boxes. In them, they will be in special rooms until they are sent to their destinations. The collected wild-growing raw materials must be sorted by quality and size, it should not have foreign objects and damaged fruits.

In order to preserve the fruits of the apple tree for a long time, they must be placed in a room with a temperature of 0 degrees or stored in a forest under a thick layer of foliage. The later the fruit ripens, the longer their shelf life, which ranges from two to five months.

Cultivation of apple-trees from seeds

Probably, each person had such a case in life, when he out of curiosity buried in the ground a bone from an apple with the hope to grow a real tree. But this spontaneous desire could not be crowned with success. In order to have a good view of the apple and tasty apples, you need to do a lot of work, as well as have the necessary knowledge. The tree, grown from seeds of wild apple-tree, will be very frost-hardy, it is able to withstand even forty-degree frosts and at the same time bear fruit every year.

Before planting the apple tree, young seedlings from ordinary seeds are grown. Usually this work is carried out in nurseries, but it is possible, using the hints of specialists, to get seedlings of seeds on their own at home. First you need to pick up quality seed. It is better to take the ripened fruits on that part of the crown, on which they receive sufficient lighting and are well supplied with nutrients, this is the last branch of the apple tree. Good germination is observed in seeds harvested from ripened fruit in early autumn.

Preparation of seeds for germination

So that the seeds can ascend in the spring, they need to stratify. But first you should carefully rinse the seeds, dry them, then put them in warm water, changing it every day. For the best effect, add a growth stimulant.

After swelling, the seed material should be placed in a container with a mixture of wet sawdust and moss or wet sand and sawdust. To prevent the occurrence of mold, it is desirable to add active carbon. Then the container should be sent to the cellar or in the refrigerator for two to three months.

When there is no way to create the right conditions for growing seeds, you can plant them directly in the ground. In this case, all the necessary landing rules must be observed. For wintering, young seedlings in autumn are transferred in a suitable container to a greenhouse. With the onset of warm spring days, this tiny wild apple tree moves to its permanent place of growth. That the chance of germination was high, it is recommended to place several pieces of seeds in one landing nest.

Land for planting

One knowledge of how to grow a plant from a bone is not enough. To the tree (the apple tree in our case) later could properly develop and bear fruit, it will be necessary to determine correctly when choosing a site for planting. Pay attention to the characteristics of fruit culture.

The open area is in no way suitable for planting apples. They also lag behind in growth and give a poor harvest of fruits, planted next to the forest and at the foot of the slopes. The best place is considered to be a sun-protected area from the winds. If you pay due attention and carry out the proper care, the apple tree, grown by seeding, will give positive results. A competent approach to such a procedure makes it possible to obtain a strong material for a variety inoculation.

Inoculation of wild apple trees

Very often, gardeners face such a situation, when a seedling bought on the market after long five years does not give long-awaited results. Fruits are of a completely different kind. Sometimes you want to keep your favorite variety in your garden, not even knowing its name, using wildfowl, but the question arises whether it is possible to plant a wild apple tree. From this situation, there is one way out: to learn how to vaccinate a cultivar to the wild stock.

Such work is very exciting and interesting. On one trunk you can make several scoops from different varieties. In this case, each branch of the apple tree will bear different grades of beautiful and delicious fruits. It is not enough to feel like a breeder, it is necessary to study the technique of vaccination of cultivars for a young seedling, grown by own hands.

During the vaccination, the transfer of a part of one plant to another is carried out, for further coalescence. The part that is intended for grafting is called the graft, the plant to which the graft is made-the stock. There are different ways of grafting trees. A wild apple tree is often planted with a handle. In spring, this method is better performed at the beginning of the juice movement, when the first leaves begin to appear on the tree.

Preparing the scion

The young shoots of the current year are the graft. When choosing them, you need to pay attention to ensure that they are strong enough and well developed. Cuttings are harvested in the autumn after the first frosts to allow them to harden. Branches are taken from the southern side of the tree and cut into pieces 20-30 cm in length.

For storage, cuttings should be placed in a refrigerator or in an unheated room. The ideal way to store them is to bury them in the snow, but it is acceptable only in snowy winters. The cut branches are placed in a plastic bag, the ends are not tied, then wrapped in thick paper and in a metal mesh to keep from rodents. When stored in the fridge cuttings can be wrapped in a damp cloth and placed in a plastic bag.

For summer inoculations, cuttings will not be needed. Everything can be prepared on the spot, and the faster it is done, the better the work will be. For the cuttings an annual branch with the presence of good buds and the desired apple is selected. All leaves are removed from it, then everything is done according to the technique of inoculation by the chosen method.

All about the diseases and various troubles of apple trees

None of the gardeners is immune from the fact that on its site there may be some troubles. Good care is not a complete guarantee that the garden is not attacked by pests, trees pass diseases, weeds will be completely destroyed. Of course, experienced gardeners, properly caring for plants, face such problems infrequently and know what, if necessary, quickly protect their favorite trees. In life, people who have no experience, if they have a garden, have to deal with many problems from time to time.

The yield and ornamentality of trees is greatly reduced due to diseases. A wild apple tree is also susceptible to certain diseases. The plant is affected by living organisms that are transferred from the plant to the plant. But most often the cause of diseases are mushrooms. There are diseases of leaves, flowers, shoots and fruits caused by bacteria and viruses, against them in our country there are still no such chemicals that would function effectively.

The most common diseases of apple: powdery mildew, brown spot, rust, scab and others. As a result of such diseases, the apple tree loses its leaves prematurely, weakens. Flowering is not so abundant, resulting in a drop in yield. The trunk, branches and roots of the plant suffer from the following diseases: black cancer, cytosporic necrosis, rot of roots and trunks.

Nuisances for apple trees are severe frosts, drought, poor soil nutrients. This all adversely affects the viability of plants. They in this case start to hurt, but such diseases are not contagious.

Pests of apple trees

On apple trees develops more than 200 species of harmful insects, such as flies, butterflies, beetles, as well as herbivorous mites. They feed on different parts of the tree: buds, buds, foliage, fruits and, very unpleasant, trunks. Pests are often microscopic animals, which are nematodes, and larger ones are proteins and birds.

Pests are divided into the following groups: leaf-eating insects, sucking, gall-forming, miners, xylophagous or stem pests and pests of fruits. The most common pests of apple fruits are apple moth and apple tree sawfly. Plodozhorka for the season gives three generations. Its caterpillars can damage all the fruits of the apple tree. In winter, the apple tree can hide the moth during its bark.

Protection of apple from pests

Protect trees from pests on time, and if the garden is in the private sector, try to use pesticides only in emergency cases. Effective action against suction pests is provided by herbal preparations. For example, decoctions of leaves and flowers of elderberry herbaceous or black, camomile dacum, medicinal or Dalmatian are used against aphids.

One of the prerequisites for the normal development of the plant is to increase resistance to such unfavorable environmental factors as climatic conditions and harmful organisms. To achieve this, you need to make fertilizer in time, conduct an annual pruning of the crown, and destroy the weeds. Such a complex of agrotechnical measures will increase the circulation of juice through a conducting system. It will fill completely the strokes pierced by stem pests. In this connection, the larvae will die.

If it is necessary to treat trees with chemical preparations, it is very important to observe all precautions, exactly following the instructions for the use of poison. It is imperative to withstand the terms after which you can consume fruits in your food, which will help to preserve human health. The first treatment of the garden with pesticides should be carried out before the beginning of the sap flow.

Unfortunately, spraying with poisons will not save the garden from the invasion of pests. The fight against them begins already at the time of the acquisition of the seedling, and ends with the competent cleaning of the site in late autumn. It is necessary to try to choose a healthy planting material, so as not to introduce into the garden pests and diseases that are better to prevent. But at their appearance it is necessary to act decisively and very quickly. Only then the wild apple tree planted on the street or in the garden will make the air much cleaner and cooler. People who are close will feel much healthier.