This seems to be the best topic to ask this question, without starting another one - having started on a project to replace a couple of apple trees which had been lost from my mom's backyard, we planted 2 trees this spring at very short notice. Having found out that it was the best planting time, we didn't want to miss another growing season; it's been nearly 3 years since her last tree split up and fell over! Having continued to learn since then, maybe not the bst choices but they're growing at least - a Granny Smith on MM 111 planted late May; and a 4 in 1 combo tree on EMLA 106 planted straight from the cooler at Raintree in mid April; it's a bit late and confused I think but now leafing out like crazy, though I think it's going to skip blossoming this year. Having now heard that EMLA 106 isn't the greatest rootstock for the clay soils here the Willamette Valley (I'm in Corvallis); I've been researching for future trees - my ladyfriend is searching for rural land to buy & build a house on in this area, so I'm planning to try starting 4 or 5 fresh apple trees spring '08 for her place when / if she finds it; she's been looking for 9 months so far without luck.

We'd both like somewhat smaller trees than both of the two I ended up planting at mom's, my GF currently has 4 trees which came with her place in Clatskanie; all somewhat dwarved but only 2 of the varieties known - she sure wants to bring one of the unidentified ones along when she moves! I'll be at the HOS All About Fruit Show with samples this fall, to see if it can be better identified than my guesses of a Newtown Pippin or NW Greening are correct; it's described as being very like a Granny Smith but somewhat sweeter and mild red blush; harvests very late and keeps well - she was told by the prior owner that it was a "Winter" apple, and it was there when they bought the house 40+ years ago.

Anyway, I'm attempting to decide on rootstocks to start with; and am being very tempted to try MM 111 rootstock with an M 9 or maybe M 7 interstem - since the M 111 rootstocks seem good for this area as well as being larger and freestanding, but we'd like a smaller size tree for ease of care; 10 to 15' ideally - and since we have no idea exactly what the property she'll eventually find will be like; having the oversized roots sounds like a good idea. As well as not knowing if irrigation will be readily available or desired, the drought tollerance of the MM 111 could be handy.

I'm still working on deciding what cultivars to graft eventually (going to do several next spring onto the Granny Smith at my mom's) but it sounds like actually creating an interstem tree usually takes longer, since more grafting is involved - though I have seen several people say that you can bench graft both the interstem & the cultivar at the same time; but most information describes benchgrafting the interstem one year; letting it grow into a whip; then either budding it to the cultivar later in the summer or another graft the following spring - either way, it takes longer than budding or grafting directly onto the rootstock.

Having started this project 2 weeks after the Scion Exchange, I'll be waiting and hopefully ready for the next one - my questions are:

Any feedback about interstem usage, pros & cons other than more time and expense involved? In this case, we have time since land and then getting a house built isn't going to happen that quickly!

If an interstem is good; any sources anyone knows of for low quantities of rootstock with interstem already done? I see lots of info about them on the web, but no mention at all on any non-defunct places that sell them; even the large wholesale nurseries which sell lots of rootstock - though I'm sure they'd be happy to make them for me, if I want to order a few thousand! Does the rootstock at the Scion Exchange normally have enough excess length which would get pruned off when grafting a cultivar directly onto it to be used as an interstem on another tree?! I'd guess so, but not having so far even seen commercial rootstock I'm not sure!

So far, I have absolutely no grafting experience; but a local aquaintance who has several hundred apple cultivars says he can teach me in a few minutes, if nothing else I'm pretty sure he's got the experience and I can tist his arm into doing it:) And he's also got lots of apples to taste to help decide in cultivars when fall comes, as well as being a good source of Scionwood if I need it.

Thanks much for any help or feedback people can give this newbie!
Dave
lotus026@yahoo.com

Thanks much Ted, that's pretty much what I wanted to know!
I know this isn't the time to be looking for rootstock, since this is past the timeframe when they're normally used; just figured I might as well decide what to aim for starting next spring. Then I can move to sampling fresh apples in a couple of months & selecting cultivars to bud onto these roots:)
Planning to start 6 trees I think, including one as a spare.

And since you didn't say anything negative about using an interstem in our climate and growing conditions, I'll assume this isn't a bad idea - read about it first in Warren Manhart's book; then followed up on it searching the web. Just seems like it will grow into a tree more tolerant of local growing conditions and desired size than anything grown on the common rootstocks. You also answered my unasked question about M.7; since that's the rootstock I'd been closing in on as the desireable size and characteristics - just wasn't totally sure it'd work well in our soils; and hadn't gotten to the point of asking locals yet! Though I really like the idea of having the larger MM111 rootsystem on a smaller tree.

And the info about Mill Creek Nursery is good, maybe I'll give them a call - though now that I know that rootstock should have enough excess length to use cast off pieces for an interstem; what better place to do that than at the HOS Scion Exchange next year?! I'll assume that mostly the same list of popular rootstocks will be there, and I'll just have to be there ready to snag the cast-off M.9's to graft onto MM111; than as you suggested either bud the cultivars onto them later in the summer or if that doesn't work; then graft them the following spring. And as I said, I'm not in a hurry - don't want these unstarted trees to get too big for the room in my mom's garden before there's a place to move them to!

And yes, I'd figured out that "Winter" seemed to be the what the homestead era people called any apple that harvested late and stored well through the winter:) Just would be nice to know what it actually is before I propagate it; but once it's in fruit again that shouldn't be hard to do - in fact, my brother in Oregon City has asked me to help him identify the 5 trees at his house; his father in law planted them long ago but was the only one who really knew what they are....and he's not here anymore. I'm pretty sure they're all more recent commercial cropping cultivars, so probably not that hard to do when there's fruit on the tree.
Thanks for the help -
Cheers!
Dave