I recently read about hawthorn's use as rootstock for many other pome fruits, and there's a huge grove of black hawthorn (C douglassi) growing in the woods behind my house, with lots of easy to dig suckers. I have some small pieces of pear scionwood leftover from the exchange in Eugene (which is also how I found these forums), so I'm going to try grafting those.
But, I'm very curious about quince, medlars, and aronia on hawthorn. I think there were some old forum posts where folks had successfully done it - anyone still have them producing? I know aronia is becoming big business in the south and midwest, but does aronia do well out here? Lee Reich had me all sold on Nanking cherries, and then I read that they have issues with our wet springs.
Please tell me about your favorite quince varieties, either by eating standards, or for low maintenance/organic gardening. If it can store well in "homestead" type conditions (I.e. unheated garage, or maybe even on the tree) into late winter/spring, even better. Oh, and anyone make quince based "cider" or meads? I'm guessing aronia would make an interesting wine, since it's commonly juiced.
mezzaluna,
Welcome to the forum.
Quince can be propagated pretty easily from hardwood cuttings.
John, a regular contributor here, has probably grafted some of the combinations you're asking about.
Aronia seem pretty care free in our region, although the fruit can be quite variable. They are generally quite astringent, for which I have a pretty high tolerance, and they can reach high brix, so I can see why they'd be useful for wine.
I have little experience with hawthorn, aside from grafting a Hosui pear onto one with an Old Home interstem. It has lived 6 years or so since the graft, and flowered the last couple of years, but still now fruit and it grows about 6 inches a year. But its been neglected with respect to soil and lack of water and fertilizer or care.
mezzaluna said:
I'm very curious about quince, medlars, and aronia on hawthorn.
A friend who has a different type of wild hawthorn has tried medlar and aronia who lives near Lebanon OR. His medlar has overgrown the graft union and therefore recommended to place the graft below the soil line to encourage rooting. I think he still has aronia on hawthorn which seemed to work okay for several years before almost pulling the plug, then use same insurance as for medlar.
Other examples involving serviceberry:
Surprisingly this person is a collector of wild serviceberry and is having good luck working them long term on the wild hawthorn. Elsewhere in Canada serviceberry is having issues when using mountain ash (sorbus) as a rootstock. One idea might be to try aronia on what might be mutually compatible mountain ash as an interstem to adapt to hawthorn. I never heard elsewhere that it has been tested other than the same test location (referenced above) where on that same haw tree the aronia proved wrong, the mountain ash proves right.
Have no information about quince, but I have had black aronia made with honey added in. Yum. I'm wanting my hybrid contoneaster-Mountain ash that I have grafted to pear to work as an interstem that I can grow black aronia. I'm aiming at getting away from some of the root suckering that aronia have a reputation for.
Yes, I have grafted many pears onto hawthorn. Very few have had compatibility problems, although a few have. Many continue to fruit. I haven't grafted aronia or quince or medlar to it, because they grow from their own cuttings, and I don't need more of them. I am trying to grow more pears. I have also grafted comice pear on mt ash, which works quite well.
John S
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