It's actually not very complicated to propagate an apple tree in your own garden. However, you have to be patient until the first harvest from the new tree after about seven to ten years.
How to propagate an apple tree?
To propagate an apple tree, take cores from local apples, stratify them in the refrigerator and then plant them in loose soil. The variety and fruit yield can only be controlled by grafting with scions on a suitable growing base.
The right propagation methods for an apple tree
Basically, the apple tree is one of the trees that can be propagated by laypeople even with little specialist knowledge. However, it should be said that the following propagation methods for apple tree offshoots work poorly or not at all and are therefore not practiced commercially:
- moosing
- the formation of sink cores
- rooting cuttings
With a little patience, apple seedlings can be pulled from a core and planted in a pot relatively easily. The cores from apples bought in grocery stores are also suitable for this, but due to the climatic and geographical suitability, you should prefer cores from domestic apple cultivation with tried and tested varieties.
Grow a seedling from the core yourself
To grow an apple tree from a core, you have to use a little trick if you want the core to germinate in the same year it was harvested from a fruit. Since the cores of the apple tree in nature have built-in germ protection for certain reasons, the cores must first be stratified with a simulated winter. To do this, place the cleaned apple cores between two layers of damp kitchen towels and place them in a bowl in the refrigerator for at least two weeks. The seeds are then placed in a loose soil substrate (€6.00 at Amazon), where they sprout in a few weeks with regular watering.
Nutr through refinement, the variety can be precisely controlled
Outside of special plant breeding facilities, it is hardly possible to control which pollen gets into the apple blossom and thus also into the genetic material of the seeds during the reproduction of apple trees. There can only be certainty about the variety and fruit yield of an apple tree if it is grafted with scions onto a suitable growing base. To do this, the scions are grafted at a certain trunk height so that, for example, a half-stem or high-stem results.
Tips & Tricks
Seedlings made from apple cores can generally also be used as a rootstock for a refined trunk form, but weak-growing rootstocks such as the widespread M9 provide better properties.
