In article , Sacha writes:
| On 9/8/06 13:34, in article , "Malcolm"
| wrote:
|
| I remain very puzzled and still a little sceptical, not least because I
| can find no mention of this in one or two old gardening books I have.
|
| I can assure you it used to be done. Peter Thoday, who was one of the
| advisers on the Victorian Kitchen Garden series (IIRC) also talked to Ray
| about it.

I have seen a reference to it, but I can't remember where. If I recall,
it was used for the same purpose as a dwarfing rootstock, on the basis
that many trees will continue to grow straight upwards as long as they
can run a taproot straight downwards. From my very limited experiments
on trees in pots, there may be some truth in that, but I can't say any
more than "there may be".

| It's certainly fascinating, but why just apples if it was just apples?
| Are they more prone than other trees to send their roots, in your words,
| "straight down", that they need this treatment? And why is it necessary
| to stop this happening when the tree is first planted?

No, they aren't - less so than most, if anything.

| I always thought
| roots rarely went straight down but tended to spread out sideways
| completely naturally unless confined by some barrier.

It depends on the species. Many (e.g. walnuts) do drive a taproot a fair
way down. Some (e.g. most? conifers) spread immediately.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.