Cultivating your own fruit is rewarding
Why not try your hand at growing more fruits?
As the ‘season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’ approaches, early ripening dessert apples have been picked and stored in the garage-based stack of trays. Remaining varieties, both cooking and eating, will join them as they ripen. Come midNovember, all fruit crops will have been secured, the exception being autumn raspberries which continue giving until frost arrives.
Cultivating our own fruits and foraging for those growing wild in the countryside, is part of the human psyche, and such pursuits can be so rewarding.
Not only in the variety and amount packed in cold storage for approaching winter but also in the sense of achievement. it’s tempting to wonder what primaeval hunter-gatherers would think, could they see how organised we appear to be.
There’s nothing exclusive or difficult attached to growing a few fruits of your own. Nor do you need a garden. Indeed, the trend toward smaller outdoor spaces for modern homes prompted the development of dwarf fruitbearing plants suitable for containers.
Strawberries have always adapted well to cultivation in a diversity of containers anyway – hanging baskets, tower pots, old boots! All they need is a reasonable compost, spot of sunshine and TLC. ‘Ruby Beauty’ is a dwarf raspberry suited to large pot or tub cultivation. Brambles ‘Black Cascade’ and ‘Reuben’ are ideal for hanging baskets and pots respectively. ‘Ben Lomond’ is a good blackcurrant choice for a large pot.
With October/November planting in mind, browse fruit catalogues or go online now and decide which of the soft fruits you want to grow.
Once you’ve tasted success with container grown fruit bushes, it’s a small step to try your hand at growing apples, plums, cherries, pears, apricots. They’re all available on dwarfing rootstocks.
Giving thought to the practicality of planting them is important. Dwarf soft fruit bushes need a growing medium that absorbs and holds moisture.
So, a soil-based type is my choice. Furthermore, there must be adequate drainage. This can be achieved by placing a layer of pebbles or crocks in the container base.
An alternative is to lay a turf, grass down, soil up, in the bottom of the tub. This adds to the bulk of a compost, and it works for me. Most importantly, plant the container up on the spot, preferably sunny, it will occupy in future, this is to avoid moving it with heavy, moist compost and risk back strain!