Today 
Grow & eat
An apple a day
Posted by: Jane Moore, 26 October 2007, 11.09AM
I love a good bargain and always like to have a quick scour through the bargain basement section of my local garden centre every time I'm there. Most of the time this perusal is fruitless - everything has completely had it or it's something I wouldn't buy in a million years anyway.
But last year my persistence paid off and I came away with a standard apple tree shoved into the car for the bargain price of a fiver! Okay my little 'Fiesta' apple was a bit battered and careworn - not least after the trip in my tiny motor - but I thought it would pick up. And it would have if I'd treated it well; planting it with plenty of organic matter and bone meal, pruning off the dead, diseased and damaged wood, and watering it in the dry summer last year. But of course I didn't. I bunged it in a big pot with a bit of soil and old compost because I didn't know where to plant it, neglected it horribly and only chucked a bucketful of water at it when it looked like it was about to pop its clogs.
I really do not deserve this apple tree because this year it flowered bravely in the spring. (I thought this was its final swansong and I can't tell you how guilty I felt - call myself a gardener!) So I still ignored it thinking it was still on its way out. But this summer's rain has revived it and on Apple Day last weekend I plucked the first apples from my battered little 'Fiesta' and beautiful they are too. Next weekend I'm going to plant it out finally. I feel this little tree has earned its place on the plot as a true survivor and that's the kind of plant I need.
Comments
Scot Heavens
02 November 2007, 10.14AM
michael c.
09 May 2008, 05.55PM
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