Just a quick one this time. I’ve grafted 30 trees, 20 mm106 apples and 10 quince a pears. They’ve spent a month in the shed and seem to be stsrting to callus. Last year i planted into reasonable quality plastic pots and they seemed fine, however, i don’t have enough pots this time around. I was thinking of using they cheap plasti “pots” that are almost like polythene. I think they may be sold online as polythene pots. Would this be ok for the root system or am i better trying to find a more sturdy pot?
I dislike low quality pots but i do not think it would be a problem putting them in those its more that they do not last as long and are not as sturdy to pick up after some time but they will last a year for sure and probably much longer. I would rather get a good nursery container and keep reusing them but do what you need and sometimes you gotta go with whats available i would try to keep them the same size as your other containers so that watering is more uniform.
Thanks Richard. That sounds good. The only issue may be in the depths of winter it can get fairly cold where i am in scotland. Talking minus 6 degrees celcius or colder. I wonder if the roots would be ok in a polypot then but yes i will look for more sturdy pots i think.
I doubt the “R-Value” of any one type of pot is going to be much better than any other. Potted and above ground, in winter, the roots are going to get cold and possibly damaged. Can you not plant them out this fall? If not, perhaps mostly/completely bury the pots in-ground?
In general roots are less ‘cold hardy’ than ‘above ground’ portions of the plant.
Ideally, potted, ‘hardy’ plants overwintered outdoors should be sunk in the ground or banked well with mulch, etc. to approximate bring in-ground, if they cannot yet be outplanted into a permanent location.
I did not get around to doing either with any of my potted trees last fall and despite a very mild USDA Zone 6 winter, there were a number of things that were killed outright that would have otherwise been just fine.
thanks lucky P, I’ll have to have a think about what I can do going forward with them. I might well be able to get them in the ground. Maybe just need to clear and area and prep it.
Pots do provide some protection. I have had fig trees die to the ground in containers, but the roots were fine. A fig seems to have hardier roots that it’s top growth.
I leave currants and raspberries in 15 and 20 gallon pots outside all winter and it can get down to -24C here.
It’s hard to predict… I’ve had trifoliate orange seedlings in unprotected pots come through tough winters unscathed…but just yesterday, I pulled a mass-planted pot of pawpaw seedlings, with only 3 survivors out of about 25. Most potted pecan/hickory and oak seedlings were fine, but mortality rate was up there for Chinese chestnut seedlings.
Cheap plastic pots? Why pay for pots. I work at a nursery and we have a huge pile of used pots from our own landscaping crew and take in used plastic pots from clients who return them. Once a year some company picks them up to “supposedly be recycled”.
Every time someone asks me if I will sell them a pot, I point them to the stack of used pots and say “help yourself”. #1-#25 pots free for the taking.
If you need pots ask at your local landscape company if they have any used pots they are trying to dispose of.
I agree with finding the free pots. A neighbor of mine is a landscaper (very small scale) and she always has pots if I need them - especially in the spring when there are a lot of new plants going in.
thanks everyone, sounds great. perhaps they would manage the winter in pots if need be. I’ll check out landscapers near me too, I never thought of that so thanks for that suggestion.
I added another 80+ to the 75 last year, to the 65 the year before…got quite a collection of apples growing in pots. Various sized pots. Eventually planting out, or selling, or continuing to upsize the pot to accommodate growing trees.
Haven’t tried MM106 in pots.
But winter hardiness has not been troublesome for me down to zero degrees Fahrenheit.
(Except the MM111 rootstock losses due to late freezes after trees came to life too early).
No harm to B9, B118, G11, G30, G202, G890, G222…or Antonovka.
I doubt you can buy a new pot any size for 50 cents…so if you have to pay a nursery for them, so be it. I seem to run short on 2 gallon size, but always seem to have plenty of 1 and 3 gallon pots.
Yeah they’re probably heartier than most people give 'em credit for. My neighbor had 6 apple trees he grafted, never planted and with little dirt in 2gal pots, sitting above ground in the shade under an oak tree for maybe 3 years. They were fine… I at first thought finglas was quoting really cold temps but -6C is just ~21F so not any colder than we regularly see here. Probably be OK to leave em as is over the winter.
Thanks everyone. I appreciate the responses. I’ll check out what I can get. Yes sorry, I’m in Scotland so temperatures are normally quoted using Celsius but I should have given Fahrenheit too. Apologies.
