Hi all,
I’m looking to plant some EMLA.111 apple trees and curious what spacing others have found successful. I’d prefer to keep somewhat close together and don’t mind heavy pruning, but how close is too close?
This depends somewhat on the vigor of the scion variety, also level of management, soil , etc…
I have many apples on M111 at 16’ x24’ ~ 20 yrs old.
Over all this has been good spacing . Some are crowding now , some just filling their space.
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I looked at a mature orchard a month ago with mm111, 18 X 30 spacing. It is mountaintop, lightly sloping topography. Trees are older still in production, not crowded.
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You could look at this tree spacing calculator. As mentioned earlier in the thread you can space trees closer if you use an aggressive tree management system.
http://fruitadvisor.info/tfruit/clements/appletreespacing.htm
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If you put them in rows running side by side then 15’ between the trees, 30’ between the rows. At least 25’ between rows.
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If you’re wanting to keep the trees on M111 in a small space I would look at the Solaxe training system. See the link below which includes some videos on how to prune using this method.
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It is easier to manage trees widely spaced and easier to sustain high quality fruit once trees reach relative maturity. Beginners like to crowd their trees together if there is any land limit. I learned to regret my early close spacing- easier to plant a tree than cut it down and often doubling the original space creates more empty space than you want.
As stated, variety of apple is as important as rootstock in determining vigor, and depth, quality of soil as well as water are factors. For 111 I think 15’ X 20’ tends to be ideal and 15’ X15" as close as I’d want them. If you want more varieties in less space, learn how to graft.
The solaxe system decreases vigor by constantly removing all upward growth that isn’t pulled below horizontal. It is both productive and labor intensive. In commercial orchards speed of high production is more important than in home orchards, thus the solaxe.
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Agreed that 15 x 20 is the way to go.
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Thanks to everyone for sharing their thoughts. I had not heard of the solaxe system before, so will check that out. I won’t have true rows of trees, so I’m going to explore something like 16x16 or 18x18.
The trees on 111 may physically fit in a 16 x 16 or 18 x 18 space.
But it’s good to have some airflow,And access which the the
16x 24 provide .
Sometimes packing stuff too close results and more diseases and less yield . Allow some space for the air to move, and dry .
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Any closer than HBH suggest…bad to prune, pick and for darn sure spray. Maybe closer on 106, not 111.
I’m sure if he uses the solaxe system he can space them as close as 15X15 with no problem- it is seriously dwarfing. Just gotta prune a couple of times during the growing season. Once trees are in serious bearing mode, growth slows and the solaxe brings them to it when they are a smaller size. I have often pulled branches down in similar manner in orchards that were planted too tightly and it does allow closer spacing.
The question is whether the extra maintenance is worth it.
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I agree with you here as well concerning if they are too close you possibly get more disease issues as well as possibly less yield. Especially the disease issues, humidity and rain with less chance of drying out is never a good thing.
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That’s about my experience here in Kansas. They are easy to keep low and they dont get very wide. Mine are 10’ w × 12’tall. The soil here is dwarfing because it’s heavy clay.
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It seems soil and perhaps vigor of variety have an issue on this topic. I once worked at a commercial orchard that had lots of apples on MM111. They were spaced 15 x 20 and were awful. They all grew together in a solid hedgerow and the fruit was not so well colored due to being shaded out.
Same orchard had M7 spaced15 x20 and it worked out perfectly. My vote would be to plant at 18’ apart on MM111 if you can spare the room. The variety I recall was Cortland and quite vigorous so perhaps spacing closer will work for less vigorous varieties or doing special pruning.
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Just my opinion,
I planted my first 15 trees on m111. I will not do that again. My trees get too big and require too much pruning.
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111 is the only rootstock for the most part that stays alive on parts of my property. We have tried others at the expense of thousands of dollars. I’ve got 2 now after nearly 30 years at 20 feet but the soil is slightly deeper and richer in that spot.
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This year I’m trying m111 rootstock with a b-9 intersteam, to darf the trees but also give me a good root system, so I won’t have to worry about supporting the tree,and my soil is a little questionable as well. Hopefully it all works out.
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Hopefully that works out well for you Chris. I started doing M111/BUD9 and M111/G41 interstem grafts 2 years ago and so far so good.
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This post was my first on this discussion board, and I’m really impressed and grateful for the sharing of knowledge and experience. I am not sure if I’ll go with solaxe method, so I’ll have to put more thought into what I’m going to do. I do want to think long term so would hate to make an avoidable mistake now by planting too close.
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