I have a seedling apple rootstock that I planted several years ago. I initially grafted it to fugi. This caused four suckers to push out at the base. I have had what I believe is a late season fireblight issue with the fugi so it has been pruned back very short. I grafted the four suckers over to gold rush, hudsons golden gem , honey crisp and a wild apple from Kazakhstan. The fugi and original trunk are basically gone now and this will be third leaf on the grafted suckers. I have staked and pulled each sucker away from the center of the mother stump . If they were vertical they would be six to eight feet tall( honey crisp is shorter , it is only second leaf) . Looks sort of like four trees I one hole. By having the root system sending energy into four leaders will it help control the vigor and possibly encourage the apples to come into bearing sooner?
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I am not sure but here is a link to the WS university and this man talks about controlling rootstock vigour by creating two stems that extend out into a V. it is at minute 32
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Very interesting, it sounds exactly like what I am trying to accomplish. I just have the vigor split four ways
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