I have Kidd’s Orange Red on G11 and its been a pretty terrible tree from the get go.
Probably the worst quality tree I’ve gotten from Cummins, it came twisted and lower grade than advertised.
It seems like no matter how much or little I water it or compost it puts out mediocre small fruit, which is odd for a rootstock touted to have large fruit size. I even have my rain water from 2 roof surfaces dumping out to it so I shouldnt have to water it as much.
The wood is small and spindly, the top flopped over.
It put out a spectacular blossom this year like my other trees only to set fruit mostly on the tips.
Just a junk tree IMO.
I have a G935 rootstock in my yard with nothing on it, so I’ve decided im going to dig out the Kidd’s and give it to my parents who have more clay soil than I do (sandy) and put the G935 about 2 feet in front of the old plot. I plan on grafting Reinette Gris on it.
I’ve read G.11 is smaller when propagated in a stool bed rather than tissue. I would assume most nurseries are stood bed.
My other bigger rootstocks like G.30, G.202 are looking good, relatively low maintenance, just water during droughts.
Anyone else have this kind of experience with G.11?
I have a G11 Alkmene tree, planted 3 years ago from Cummins nursery. It isn’t a very big tree, it’s about 7ft tall, the smallest of all my apples. But, it is the most dwarf rootstock I have.
G16 is also dwarfing, but not as much. I have two of those, and they’re both about 7-8ft. I had another G16 tree, but due to borer damage over the years, and a freak wind storm in late April, it was snapped off at the base.
My Alkmene has been very precocious, it bore a few fruit its second year, and a few more last year. The apples were small, maybe 2-3in in diameter. It bloomed this year, but a bad mid April freeze fried those. The tree isn’t very impressive looking, but seems to be doing ok.
I have three G30 trees and they have been very vigorous growers. There were two (Zestar and Suncrisp) that I planted the same year as the Alkie and they produced fruit last year, and would have this year if not for the freeze. The other G30 tree (Roxbury Russet) is a year older, bloomed for the first time this year, but, you know…
I had two G202 trees planted in '16, Liberty and Winecrisp. The Lib is about 8-9ft tall and produced a few apples last year. The other, a Winecrisp died after this winter.
Pretty amazing, both of them.
I am very lucky to have more shade in the fall when apples are ripening, keeps them cooler to develop more sugars.
Jonamac is more like a Mac early September and takes on Jonathan spiciness 3rd week in September. Apples are at their best when 3/4 of their surface are a dark crimson like a Jonathan. Some umami.
Orleans Reinette is a great apple for eating with meats and cheeses. Sharp flavor involves citrus and walnuts. Orleans Reinette is primo, but may not be appreciated by the casual chewer. Biennial, with a weird growth habit insistent on water sprouts. A pretty spreading tree though.
Every tree i had (just 2) on g11 died and every tree i have on a g11/mm111 interstem I am replacing the g11 part of that equation. I made mistakes on my apple tree order and not being willing to baby and use every chemical yet known to man to keep them alive just to have them winterkill or die from snap frosts so i did not besmirch it. However the g11 part of my interstems are failing and are a very large issue.
I would like to say that i like the geneva program.
G11 has been a dud for me - not enough vigor. I have five trees and only one is fully vigorous, the others are varying degrees of wimpy. The one going really well now is 15 years old, but it took it a very long time to get going. Another one is going sort of well now, it is 8 years old. The others are six years old and they are finally starting to put on growth, but I lost several years.
Before you pull it out, if you already have 6 years in it you may be better keeping it as it should get going soon … based on my experience anyway.
Thanks, I’ve got 8 years in.
I’ve removed all grass around the drip line, fresh compost, watering regularly, it just laughs at me.
I think I’ve had enough, its just too much sweat investment to get so little.
I’m going to top work Kidd’s to the top of my tall Jonamac (top is gnarly) to preserve it on a better root and move the tree onto someone else with more substantial soil.
We shouldnt be waiting a decade+ to get a bushel of apples off a tree on a Geneva root.
I also have a Kidds on G11 from Cummins, and just like yours it has put on spindly growth. For comparison and right beside it is a Crimson Topaz also on G11. They were both planted in 2015. The Crimson Topaz diameter is about 2.5" a foot up from the ground, while the Kidds is 1.5". It would seem that G11 and Kidds are a poor match, at least as far as vigorous growth goes.
Good to know its not just me.
Cant win them all I guess.
Lesson learned on G.11, use it for vigorous growers like Belle de Boskoop, Fuji, Gravenstein, Spigold.
Much weaker than advertised.
From PSU:
Geneva 11 (G.11)
Geneva 11 (G.11) is the second release of the Cornell breeding program; only limited plantings exist in Pennsylvania. In the 2007 Fuji trial G.11 was about 25% smaller than trees on M.9T337, but more productive. Has the advantage of being resistant to fire blight and crown rot as well as only rarely producing suckers or burr knots. Tissue-cultured trees are larger than trees propagated by stool beds.
Kidd’s Orange Red is listed as a light cropper on orangepippin.com . So small crops are not unusual. Your getting plenty of bloom but few fruit that sounds like a pollination problem. It may be that bees don’t find the blossoms of this tree attractive for some reason. You may want to try hand pollinating the blossoms next year and see if crop size improves.
Rootstock effect on fruit size tends to be minor. M7 produces apples that are bit smaller but in general there is little difference in fruit size between rootstocks. I have never seen any claims that G11 produces larger fruit size than other rootstocks.
Also Kidd’s Orange Red is listed as producing medium size apples so I wouldn’t expect the apples to be very big in any case. And of course flavor is dependent on climate, weather, growing conditions, etc.
I am not sure why everyone expects G11 to be a high vigor rootstock since it’s a dwarf. You’re not going to get a high vigor tree. I have two trees on G11. They’re both about 10 feet tall and that’s with some height control pruning. One of them set fruit the second year- Roxbury Russet. The second- Ashmead’s Kernel only set one fruit for the first time this year and it’s in the 4th leaf. But I expected this since Ashmead’s Kernel is a light cropper and I knew from the beginning I might never get any apples at all and at best they would be few in number. I think most of your problem is the scion not the rootstock.
We have two trees Kidd’s that we grafted on G41, so a notch or two more vigorous than G11, and they have grown very well for what we’re trying to do with them (Belgian fence espalier). Very nicely balanced growth habit in my admittedly limited experience. Still waiting for fruit, so I can’t speak to that aspect.
I have two G11 trees and they are horrible in size and growth. They have been in the ground since 2013/2014. They look very spindly and puny. Small fruits and very stingy with bearing any fruit. These are the worst rootstocks on any of my fruit trees. I am ready to pull them out and put another apple tree in its place. I have two other G series rootstock versions and one other one is not very good either. Only one G series looks decent. I will not be using any more G series rootstocks.
Some of the self supporting G roots may be better than M7 or M111 for early bearing, and better than M106 for root rots…
but the more dwarf ones apparently
don’t have anything new to offer unless it be
in replanting an old orchard with new dwarf trees.
The Malling roots don’t have ‘replant’ disease resistance.
And I don’t know about the B roots yet in that regard.
This link specifically lists G-11 as performing poorly in sandy soils. http://treefruit.wsu.edu/article/geneva-rootstock-performance-2016-rootstock-trial-update/
G-41 is prone to breakage, but it is unclear exactly how much of that is rootstock, and how much is culture. I have to wonder if bearing fruit in the 2nd or 3rd leaf makes the wood weak.
I bought 9x Geneva-969 this Spring that I want to graft in Fall or Winter. I can’t wait to see what problems come up.
My G-969 mini orchard. The two in the pink pots are G-41. I let them dry out a bit too much last week, so there is some yellowing. I am also running them light on nutrients. I will be lopping off the top growth when I graft, so I am not pushing nitrogen. I may apply a light dose of KoolBloom 2-45-28 fertilizer next week.
