Choosing Eating Apple Tree

Heavy soils will present a few problems:

Firstly, the risk of waterlogging, which can be a death sentence for many of the modern rootstocks such as MM106 (medium vigour) and M25 (very vigorous). Your best bet would be to plant the tree on a mound of about 2ft width and about six inches above normal ground level. This will channel water away from the base of the trunk and reduce the risk of crown rot or collar rot.

Secondly, heavy soils can be quite acidic, which is thought to increase the risk of canker infection on the branches (although this may simply be a coincidence because canker likes wet weather and therefore will be more prevalent in wet regions where the soil will often be heavy).
In any case, I would look for a variety which has at least average resistance to canker.

So, I'd recommend that you use M9 rootstock if you want a tree of about 5ft (1.5metres), or MM111 rootstock if you want a tree of about 12ft (4metres). They are the "best in their size class" for tolerating heavy soils, although M9 usually needs staking unless in a very sheltered position. M26 is slightly more vigorous than M9 and may also be OK in heavier soil (I find it does quite well, but others say it does poorly).

Choice of variety and the pruning/training/maintenance given will considerably affect the final size, so that, in practice, MM111 trees will vary, depending on variety, from about 2metres to about 5metres; some varieties grow slowly, while some grow rapidly, even when on the same rootstock - for example: Bramley grows very rapidly, takes many years to crop well and makes a very large tree. On the other hand, Reverend Wilks grows slowly, crops at a young age and makes a rather small tree. Both are cookers, so not what you need, but to illustrate the vigour difference.

Simply shortlisting for MM111 or M9 rootstock will dramatically reduce your options, but will dramatically improve your chances of a healthy and reasonably-long-lived tree.

You ought to also avoid varieties with any other known disease weakness, such as scab-prone or mildew-prone varieties.

I'm just off to have a think about some potentially suitable varieties......back later.....

In the meantime, what kind of apples have you eaten and liked, from shops or markets?
Would you prefer and early-ripening variety which is ready in August but only keeps a week or two?
Would you prefer a pick-and-eat mid-season variety which is ripe in Sept-Oct and can be eaten from the tree or keep until about Christmas?
Or would you prefer a long-keeping variety which ripens in Oct-Nov, keeps until Easter but is not sweet enough to eat until after Christmas?

The following link will give you estimates of tree size:

> Link <

Since moisture retention is the biggest need for a tree and yours is plentiful, but also the cold wet soil may impair root growth, I would say that your soil should be about average quality.

Varieties which I'd shortlist:

Annie Elizabeth (Leicestershire - dual purpose)
Beauty of Bath (Somerset - eater)
Belle de Boskoop (Netherlands - dual purpose)
Brownlees Russet (Hertfordshire - dual purpose)
Cockle Pippin (Surrey - late eater)
Crawley Beauty (Sussex - dual purpose)
Discovery (Essex - eater)
Egremont Russet (Sussex - eater)
Golden Noble (Norfolk - dual purpose)
Katy/Katja (Sweden - eater)
Rosemary Russet (Middlesex - eater)
St.Edmunds Pippin/Russet (Suffolk - eater)


Dual purpose generally means it is not ideal for eating until it has ripened in storage - but until then it can make a good cooker which doesn't usually require much added sugar and which often retain some of their shape when cooked due to lower acidity.
In more Northern areas, dual purpose often don't ripen enough to eat, while in the South they may ripen too much and not be suitable for cooking.

Depending on how far North you are might tip the dual-purpose more towards cookers.

On heavy soils plums and pears sometimes perform better than apples. The St.Julien A plum rootstock or the Quince A pear rootstock are easy to find and reach 3-4 metres on a reasonable soil (slightly smaller than apple MM111 and about the same as apple MM106).

You could also consider a "family tree" with 2,3 or 4 varieties grafted.

Or you could have several bushes on M9 or M26 (M26 is slightly smaller than the plum and pear rootstocks above), with an early, a mid-season and a late-season variety - and also pears or plums.
By having several smaller ones, you will be spreading your risk for root-rot damage and also there will be no problems of inadequate anchorage or limitation of vertical roots if the bedrock is closer to the surface in some areas. However, even big trees tend to have most of their roots in the top couple of feet of soil (you said that you have about 2ft clayey topsoil over rock).

I'll make this my last post, so as not to clutter......

Looking at some ancient fruit catalogues rather than my "personal experience and gut feel" list above, the following varieties were noted to perform better than most when grown on clay and, in addition, were also recommended for the East Midlands:

Annie Elizabeth
Brownlees Russet
Cockle Pippin
Golden Noble

.

I would suggest that Annie Elizabeth most closely meets your needs for a variety which originates in the East Midlands, which is thought to do well in the climate of the East Midlands, which grows better than most when on clay soil, and which isn't especially prone to any particular disease.
However, if a variety is too widely grown, it can happen that the diseases gradualy adapt to attack it. I have no idea how popular she is in the East Midlands, but the three Annie Elizabeths which I've owned have not been troublesome for disease (two died of rootstock crown rot; MM106 and M25, while the other, on M26, was trouble-free but given to a friend when I re-developed my former cordon plot).