Please direct enquiries for scion wood or trees of Gloucestershire varieties of apple (and pear/plum/damson) by contacting us, Dave Kaspar at Brookthorpe (below), or Rob Watkins of Lodge Farm Trees
Suppliers are also available on our nurseries page »
GOG Orchard Centre Museum Orchard, Brookthorpe
This Orchard & Rural Crafts Centre is home to the Museum Orchard of all the Gloucestershire varieties of apple. Scion wood is therefore readily available for the courses Dave Kaspar (GOG Chairman) runs with partner Helen Brent-Smith. The couple also produce award winning organic juice, cider and perry. The Centre received a £20,000 grant from the Gloucestershire Environmental Trust (Cory Environmental) in 2007.
For more information, see Day's Cottage, Upton Lane, Brookthorpe, Gloucestershire, GL4 0UT. Tel/Fax: 01452 813602 Email: applejuice@dayscottage.co.uk
Earlier developments (1990-)
The Mother Tree Orchard
Run by Alan Watson, County Arboriculturalist
The Mother Tree Orchard has been planted and developed by Gloucestershire County Council with support from Bulmers Cider Company in Hereford, Thornhayes Nursery in Devon, Charles Martell (a Gloucestershire farmer and the original collector of the varieties) and Common Ground. It is located on a county farm at Uckington near Cheltenham. The long term benefits will be for local communities. Local people will have access to the varieties to help restore their orchards or simply plant individual trees. Meanwhile as the Mother Tree Orchard establishes, it will safeguard the future of local distinct orchard trees within this county.
View listing of apples in the Mother Tree Orchard »
The Museum Orchard, Ebworth
January 2000 saw the first planting of the Museum Orchard. The objective is to establish all the Gloucestershire varieties as M25 standards in locations where they will form traditional orchards. To begin this project, the County Council in partnership with The National Trust, have agreed to set up a project base at The Old Ebworth Centre, near Birdlip. The Centre has the remnants of an old walled orchard, which is the focus for the new planting. Forty six standard trees have been planted as stem builders with view to grafting Gloucestershire varieties as top grafts. Meanwhile, other local varieties will be grafted and grown on by Bulmers and other nurseries to be replanted at other sites on county holdings to create up to 15 acres of new orchard to accommodate the county collection. Ebworth may also act as a future orchard interpretation centre with scope for further research and education of the value of the genetic bank that is being established here. This vision for the return of the county's wealth of distinct fruit trees starts in earnest in this new millennium, with the support of the National Trust, Murray Sharpe at Ebworth, the County Council, Richard Fawcett and Alan Watson, Bulmers Cider, John Worle and the research by Charles Martell.
NCCPG Gloucestershire Apple Collection
A project to save the indigenous apple varieties of Gloucestershire was started in the early 1990s. A county wide field survey was initiated, traditional apple growers were interviewed and graftwood was taken from their old varieties and propagated. Many of the varieties discovered were new to science, a survey of Gloucestershire apple varieties having never previously been undertaken, others were old traditional varieties. The Gloucestrshire Apple Collection orchards are located at Charles Martell's Laurel Farm, Dymock and are monitored and approved by the National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens (NCCPG). Planting of the collection started in 1992 and currently contains nearly 100 varieties. As in the past all trees are grown as standards, they are widely spaced and cattle graze under them. Graftwood from the individual varieties in the collection has been donated to the Gloucestershire County Council for establishment as a Mother Tree Collection to enable authenticated Gloucestershire apple varieties to be re-distributed for planting round the county.
View listing of apples in the Gloucestershire Apple Collection »
Ebley Linear Community Orchard
National Apple Day on 21st October 1994 saw the start of the planting of the Ebley Linear Community Orchard near Stroud. This is a first nationally, to create an orchard alongside an ex-railway line, now a cycletrack. Seventy standard trees along a half mile of the track have been planted. This will make a powerful landscape feature in the future. Each traditional and some rare varieties are interpreted by individual information boards giving such details as date of origin and uses of the apple per variety. Gloucester Underleaf, Ashmead's Kernel and Gillyflower of Gloucester, are just some of the varieties planted that will help renew people's memories and taste buds to some of Gloucestershire's past produce. The Community Orchard is now well established and is well worth a visit. It can be found on the left hand side of the Ebley bypass A419 from Stonehouse to Stroud. A car park is provided at the Kings Stanley turning.
Green Farm Community Orchard
This is Gloucester's first community orchard. It is a lovely orchard site, with huge old fruit trees set in flowery grassland, now surrounded by the new housing and commercial developments of Quedgeley. Restoration, including replanting, is in progress. Free access at all times. Green Farm Community Orchard, Sims Lane, Quedgeley.
View map »
