It is a year since we sat pouring over heritage apple trees at the kitchen table at Oaklands and selected a number of trees including Worcester Pearmain and Egremont Russet. My brother bought me a gift voucher for my 50th birthday from an outfit called Tom's Trees who specialise in varieties from the Welsh marches/Western and South West Counties (Think Shropshire down to Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Gloucestershire and on into the Somerset and the deep South West of Devon).
We had a few disasters with attacks from rabbits and deer stripping the bark on the young whips (literally whips as they arrive as bare rooted trees, each a little over a metre in height). We persisted and replaced and eventually created a pool of about 8 trees which have now been planted out to final locations. As well as 6 varieties of apple there is a quince and a crab apple. My first experience with a crab apple was a birthday present in my 30's which grew to a grand height of 3-4 metres unnoticed by me in our back garden in Hale through my forties. That tree had to stay in Hale.
Tom Putt and two of his friends have been planted in a triangle either side of the apex of the winding woodland way (or whatever it eventually comes to be called). On Jane's original plan there are two or three groupings of apples/fruit trees more closely together. We have been worried though about blocking the view from the terrace to the back of the garden and through into the morning sky and sun as it arcs around by the wood. I guess our views on that view will develop over time. There may not be much of a vista at all given a small curtain of trees outside of our own land and the trees that make up the field border and current hedge line. We have thought about raising the canopy on several of the trees to assist the view. Our tree man Adam Hope talks about raising and thinning crowns on trees. The beauty is that we can shape things over time. We are both keen to borrow as much of the view as we can. It is difficult though as we are on the end of the back slope of the hill as you look East. To the West we are blocked by the Manor Wall and buildings. Clearly when the first farm was built the priority for setting out the vistas was not given over to the barn and farmyard. We still have though options to borrow in trees and the countryside around and can just keep "looking" which is a good thing to do. Sitting in different places. The space is big so we have to work with big building blocks as well as the details.
In time then old Tom Putt, or young Tom Putt as he is now is may become an important part of the view. I love his name - he has something of the Green Man about him and reaches out to Puck or Robin Goodfellow and even to Old Tom Bombadil from the start of the Lord of the Rings in my mind.
None of which is of course correct. The name reaches out to an Eighteenth Century landowner from Devon called Thomas Putt who was associated with Combe House in Gittisham. Thomas was a barrister and nicknamed "Black Tom" (I know not why from the scribblings on line from apple enthusiasts - perhaps he sent men to the gallows !) He died in 1787 but not before perfecting his tree and winning several prizes at the growers fairs in nearby Honiton (not far off Hobbiton !) A further story supplied by the old growers of Somerset according to Harold Taylor as he wrote the Apples of England in the forties is that Thomas Putt was a rector from Trent and the nephew in fact of Thomas Putt of Combe. Trent being in the Yeo Valley across the border into Dorset. It is possible according to sources that one Thomas Putt supplied a tree to his nephew, the other Thomas Putt and that the tree spread in that way. All of this is course lifted from the GoogleWikiNetopedia as I have one book on apples which is back in Herefordshire on the shelf in the kitchen (I felt like saying "parlour" then as I am transported back to a time of hanging country judges and clergymen). What is clear is that the tree has been around for over 200 years which gives it a special place in our gardens. It is lovely that these old trees are being saved for posterity by collectors.
The tree itself was grown widely throughout South-West. It is primarily a cider apple but can also be used as a cooking or desert/eating apple. It has the nickname of the "Cottage Apple" which seems apt.
So Tom or Thomas has not quite come home but finds himself colonising a sandstone ridge in the Bromyard Downs in Herefordshire - and planted by a "blow in" solicitor this time - a "bugger from off" as the locals would have it. I hope the tree can cope with the wind from the Welsh borders.
The process itself involved lifting each tree carefully and preparing a simple hole. I held the tree in place while Jane made sure that the compost was shaken down and around the small rootball to prevent air cavities. The stake is put in first to make sure that you do not damage the roots. There is something about angling a stake to provide better support but we did not get that technical. Finally we filled up each hole and the trees where firmed in with our boots. Only time will tell.
I think the fruit from the trees should make a beautiful addition to the colour of the cornflowers which are now colonising the long bend around the path.
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