Winter is our time to be planting trees here at Struan Farm. John has his backlog sitting in pots and "PBs" waiting to be planted out, and there's that special white oak due to be delivered shortly. My own list includes an heirloom "Henare peach" from Piopio, a mulberry tree, and two avocados trees that are essentially a risky experiment on my part. I've also got another heirloom fig tree from the surrounding area I've grown from a cutting, but I'll leave that to get a bit bigger before planting out in the paddocks somewhere.
The big news is DAMSON trees. We ordered and picked up two bare root trees from Smart Plants in Te Kuiti, and those have just been planted by John and fenced by nephew Mike in the orchard area where the Luisa plums and several peach and nectarine trees are planted. I'm still hoping that the damson stones I've been nurturing in compost in the fridge will sprout and grow in spring, and I'm about to go take scion wood or cut suckers from Grandpa Anselmi's heirloom damson tree in Piopio.
So I'm covering just a few bases on my damson journey. The spiced jam I made last season from fruit that was left at the Piopio Community Fruit & Veg Stand was rather special, as was the fruit paste, I'm a bit captivated by this fruit. I've just purchased a new food mill or "mouli" that has plates with different size holes that should make processing a wee bit easier this next season, and will report back. I'm also about to cut some scion wood from a few old apple and pear trees, also Hester's peach, for grafting onto rootstocks in September. The wood gets kept in plastic bags with damp towels in the garage fridge. The Piopio heirloom fruit tree project advances, albeit slowly, but I hope to be able to share some of these fruit trees eventually with the wider community.
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