so we now have our support structure in
place and it's time to plant some of
these trees
now this particular episode's all about
planting as a cordon typically as a
cordon you would have a Oney old tree
that doesn't have any branches but um we
have some 2-year-old here which are bare
rooted and we're going to prune these to
suit
[Music]
so it's going to look quite drastic for
the first year but ideally when you're
planting a cordon you need to be going
at about a 45° angle like this okay so
what this does it gives us um a bit of
an idea where we need to
plant uh where we need to dig our hole
now
typically we want our
hole much longer than what we
require and this will give the root run
some space so I'm just going to dig this
hole
now and we're going to literally come
right up here to where this
postage take out any of these
things okay
break up
the soil
underneath and we want to be
looking at positioning our plant at that
45° like this now there's a couple of
things to bear in mind here
guys we on the plant here we have what's
known as The graft Okay so so initially
what it means is that this part of the
plant is different to this part of the
plant okay this is a root stock which um
for this particular variety is a dwar
fruit stock what that means is that this
tree is only going to get to a certain
height but the other thing it does is it
um makes the tree think it's a lot more
mature than it actually is so it fruits
much much earlier the other thing about
it
is we can control the Vigor of the tree
but then add the particular fruit
variety that we we require so it's
really important that we do not bury
this area here if we bury this area
what's going to happen is that roots
from
the uh fruiting part of the tree are
going to form and we can't control that
okay so um due to these root being a
little bit deeper than
I originally thought we need to go down
a bit
more
okay the next step is we need to put in
a
support
now we're going to add a cane
at the angle that we want and what
that's going to
do we tie the cane to these
crosswires and then uh with some wire
and then we will tie the tree to the
cane okay um but for now um I'm just
going to get this
in and uh and tie it up bear with me one
second
all I'm using here is a stingless steel
wire um I'm not going to use this on the
tree guys this is just for tying the
cane to the
wires so we need five
pieces and it is quite a simple
process what I will say to you is don't
twist it towards the tree because you're
going to end up with sharp pieces
towards where the trunk of the tree is
so when you twist it bring it this way
if that makes any sense to you guys so
that the the part that's Twisted is
not um around where the tree is and then
it's literally just a case of pull it
nice and tight where you want
it and then twist this would have been a
lot easier with the players but I
haven't got one with
me and once you done that just cut off
those so that's what we're looking for
here guys a nice tight it's not moving
as you can see
and uh it's
uh it will show us all the way up here
okay so uh I'm just going to get on with
doing that excuse me coming in front of
the
camera so we now get our tree and this
particular one is a plum and the variety
is called opal and we lay
it
along if we take our tree
now um this is a variety um it's a uh a
plum and it's uh called opal the variety
is opal okay so what we need to do we
need to sit this down in the
hole right alongside this thing now as
you can see here we have some branches
that are stopping us doing what we want
to do and they they're too long anyway
so the first thing we need to do is get
our pruners and we you need to cut back
to two or three beds and cut on a slope
like that
okay
ideally uh two or three beds will be
plenty now normally like I said you
would do
this with trees that
are are a year
old now we already have that second
years's worth of growth on here after I
pruned it and I'll show you that in a
moment so now that's in there like that
the next thing we need to do is tie
it and by tying it we're going to
use this
wire and uh coated it's a a wire but
it's coated in like a
rubber and uh you don't need a lot for
this but we are actually tying now to
the uh to the steak okay not to the
wires and it's literally just the case
of bringing it around again all right
any tying you do always goes on the back
of
the on the back of the uh cane so that
it doesn't affect the um the wire
now I showed you that there but what I
want to do is show you something a
little bit uh different cut yourself a
longer
piece okay you can create a buffer
between the wire just by doing this
around and I see a lot of people doing
that but if you do that if this trunk
tightens up you really you know starts
sticking out you really need to be on
top of altering the wire because it will
cut into the trunk I prefer to just
leave it relatively loose there and just
tighten that up on
itself after all it's only there as
a a way to guide this tree because it's
going to be anchored into the ground
anyway we're going to do it up a little
bit higher as well probably around
here right and we
will put
one actually I'm quite happy with what
was but there let's see if we can move
this Branch
around
yeah and that one so this br you need to
trim him
back see if I can put him around
there there we are that's
better that's much better
okay
and periodically guys we will come and
check these ties and make sure that um
and make sure that they are tied in now
all we have to do now is fill in with
some
soil what I have in this tub here is uh
some M raisal funy and we just going to
put some of this over
and around the
roots this will help give the tree a
really good start and then we just need
to get some soil in on top of
that try and work it down around the
roots give the tree a little
Shake it's really important that we get
rid of any air bubbles or air pockets I
should
say right so we're up here on the graft
okay so we just got to make sure no soil
goes up there
okay just
get that soil right down around those
roots there we are
great right folks so as you can see here
last year this was pruned because we had
plenty of side branches now when you
have a oneye
plant okay you don't have none of these
side branches it's just a stem and the
idea is that we cut it quite low to
create that bedding out little way down
but because we already have that I cut
it up higher and that's created off a
new a new growth so now what we need to
do is tie that new growth in so again
we're going to take a bit of our
W and we're literally just going to tee
this new piece of GR in to the
cane just like that I
will actually that created a bit of a
bulge let's put him back there let's put
one in here
first to support this
one
and we will put one up here to support
this
one what I will do with this one is
we're now going to prune it back again
now we need to come if you look here
we've got a bed that is
facing down and out and that's what we
did here unfortunately it was it grew
slightly out but that's not a problem we
were able to train it back we able to
train it back in now we're going to cat
just above that bed at a 45°
angle what what's going to happen here
is this now okay will force all of these
beds here to break and that's what we
want with um uh with creating cordons we
need all this now to bed and that's why
we kept the tip out otherwise the tip
will just keep growing by cutting this
tip here all these beds now further down
it's already bedded okay but all these
beds here now will all be forced out
into little branches and then we'll take
this Bud here as our next leader okay
but over the next growing season now all
these beds are going to break out into
little branches any branches over two or
three beds we are going to cut
back and uh to little
stabs
and that's what's going to
create
uh this is what's going to create our
fruit over time so guys that's
essentially it this is how you plant a
cordon tree like I said this year these
are 2-year-old trees these ones but
normally you would use a Oney old tree
okay um which wouldn't have any of these
and then you'd have to force these off
you can do it with two and threey old
trees it just gives you that little bit
of extra lead um because all of this
because I when I did have them I did cut
it it forced all of these side shoots
and then we got a new leader now and
again we've cut that and we'll continue
with another new leader right till we
get to the top we'll cut it off and then
that will give all the fruit that we
require Now by planting as a cordon you
actually get more fruit
in uh in an area in a given area so what
we're going to do is we'll just continue
along this line now putting in probably
around 18 in apart another tree and
another tree and another tree right till
we get to the end of this row so there
you have it guys we've planted six trees
on cordons right along this one trellis
here and uh We've laid down some carpet
now we we're putting this carpet down
what this is going to do it's going to
stop any weeds it's going to suppress
anything else that's competing with uh
these young trees we're going to give
him a good watering in and as you can
see we put down some bark chip on top of
the carpet and that's just going to
obviously make it look a little bit
better but um it's just a case of
cutting a carpet now around these all
the way around bar chiping them and this
section is done we've pruned them all so
some are much shorter than others um
depending whether they bued out or not
but the six are in and we're going to
get on now to our next series or or next
sort of episode in this series and that
will be
AAL um but we'll do that in the next
episode so anyway guys uh I hope this
was of interest and for myself and the
team hope you have a great day we'll see
you in the next one
bye-bye