TPP

In the link below has good infos about apple rootstocks for espaliering. Wow you have a massive garden. What do you do with all the extra veggies? BTW, I like how you keep your garden weeds free.

Tony

Here is a link that might be useful: Rootstocks

This post was edited by tonytran on Thu, Dec 25, 14 at 8:46

thanks tony, good link.

Can rootstock be bought at any time of the year and can i put them in pots and grow them in the house until spring?

Family and friends enjoy the benefits of such a large garden as much as I do.

TPP
Apple rootstock still need to go into dormant. It is not an evergreen. You can put it under growth light in January for a head start.

Tony

You could bench graft to your dormant root stock. Then bring those grafted trees to life indoors if you were bored or wanting a jump start on spring.

A little bored and a little excited to get started on trying something new.

Seems there is much more to it in regards to picking what to grow and what to grow it on.
For the area I'm living in I know that i need something to handle the cold winters and I know that I do not want something to grow into a full size tree.

There is also the dilemma of fitting 6 trees in a 32' row (is this possible?)

A little bored and a little excited to get started on trying something new.

Seems there is much more to it in regards to picking what to grow and what to grow it on.
For the area I'm living in I know that i need something to handle the cold winters and I know that I do not want something to grow into a full size tree.

There is also the dilemma of fitting 6 trees in a 32' row (is this possible?)

Bud 9 rootstock is a dwarf, cold hardy rootstock that you can easily fit 6 trees in the row if you go with a trellis type system.

I will be doing espalier so that would work for me.

will all apple scions be good to graft onto this rootstock? I would like to have a different apple for each tree.

Most apple cultivars will be compatible with Bud9, if you have any doubt, just search nursery availability for the cultivar in question and see if they offer it on Bud9. Very non-vigorous varieties may be slow growing on a dwarfing stock.
You may want them all to grow as uniformly as possible and if so you may want to choose all vigorous varieties or all non-vigorous. Since espalier takes some fiddling with to look real nice anyway, I'd choose vigorous varieties to speed growth.
I'm shooting from the hip here though, as I've never tried espalier before. Have thought about it though.

Makes sense to me Appleseed. I will get all vigorous varieties once i choose the rootstock that will do best in zone 6.

Fact check me on that before you do. It may be the case that vigorous varieties are difficult to maintain in a neat appearance. Personally I like to get on with my projects and get them to fruition as quickly as possible, but that may or may not be the best way to proceed depending on what you want.