I love how apricot trees look, almost like a quaking aspen met a cherry tree. I value apricots highly as ornamental trees, and love planting them based on looks alone.
The fresh fruit is sweet and petite! It’s a wonderful summertime snack when available. In our zone 5 context, apricots aren’t available often though. Apricots flower early in spring, so they are quite susceptible to frost damage. You can probably expect fruit crops every few years in colder zones.
This year we are offering Coffee Pot Road apricot grafted onto Myrobalan rootstock. This tree is an extremely cold hardy selection discovered in Colorado, with small but great tasting fruit. Well known to be reliable down to zone 4. Myrobalan is a very reputable plum rootstock that grows quickly, and does well in wetter and heavier soils.
What is Grafting?
Grafting involves taking a branch from a plant you want to clone, and performing special cuts to make it fit onto an existing stem-with-roots.
The two pieces fuse together to form a new plant
The branch you cut is called a scion. The scion is how you select what variety you want to clone Example: you would cut a branch from a Macintosh apple tree to clone it by grafting, the branch you cut is now a Macintosh scion.
The stem-and-roots you graft onto are called a rootstock. Rootstocks generally impart physical characteristics to the tree like size and vigour, as well disease resistance.
These trees are now two year old and have grown really well in the ground, so expect a tree at least 3-4ft tall.
Growth Parameters:
Expect a large orchard tree with moderately fast growth. Fruit production could begin anywhere between 3 and 6 years. Give it as much sun as possible, and ideally avoid stagnantly wet locations.
Tree Sizes
Small Trees can generally be managed from ground level.
Orchard sized trees can often be managed from ground level but generally will require a ladder for pruning and harvesting at maturity.
Full size trees are large trees that, after a certain point, will require assistance from an arborist to manage pruning safely.
