Categories: General
      Date: 18 Aug 2010
     Title: Graft and . . . concentration

10 of us spent a glorious late winter day in the beautiful Huon Valley and Channel area last Sunday, listening to and learning from Bob Magnus, founder of Woodbridge Fruit Trees nursery, and all round fruit guru. Bob is a bottomless mine of information concerning everything to do with temperate fruits. We didn't test him on tropical species . . .

The day involved plenty of hands-on practice at digging rootstocks (Vanessa and Ben have a go watched by the master, above). We also learned and practiced performing whip and tongue grafts with scion wood of interesting apple varieties. The laughter and banter became a little strained when it was tme to get into action with the very SHARP pruning knives! But everyone mastered the technique enough to produce several grafted trees that were pronounced "acceptable" by Bob.

After lunch and grafting practice by the fire at Cradoc we continued with a tour of old and interesting fruit tree trellising methods, and were very fortunate to finish with an inspection of the amazing collections of fruit varieties and growing methods at Bob's place. VERY impressive vegie garden too, including the most amazing 'forest' of self seeded oakleaf lettuce to be found anywhere.

Thanks Bob for your time and generosity, enthusiasm and patience!