The Tall-Spindle (TS) apple seems to have become the standard hi-density orchard production system in the Northeast. Promoted by Cornell’s Terence Robinson for several years now, the TS uses fully dwarfing rootstocks planted at 3-4 feet between trees and app. 12 feet between rows (~1,200 trees per acre) to achieve high early yields, high sustainable yields, reduced labor costs, and highest return on investment compared to apple orchards planted at lower or higher densities.
Although Robinson has been on the TS speaking circuit for several years now, and co-authored several publications on the TS apple production system, there is a new website – tallspindleapple.com (Fig. 1.)– with links to other websites, publications, and videos on how to do the TS.
Tallspindleapple.com is broken down into Publications, Presentations, and Video with links to the best TS resources on the web. For example, under Publications, there is a link to ‘The Tall-Spindle Apple Production System’ by T. Robinson in the New York Fruit Quarterly. Presentations include ‘Different Approaches to Tall-Spindle Establishment in Apple’ by R. Perry, and ‘The Tall-Spindle: critical steps to Suceess’ by J. Clements. Videos show ‘4 Rules for Pruning Tall Spindle Apple’ and ‘Pruning the Tall-Spindle from a Platform’ among others. New content and links will be added as they are published. Website visitors are encouraged to submit or identify new content for publication on tallspindleapple.com.
Tallspindleapple.com is the work of me and is hosted by the UMass Fruit Advisor (umassfruit.com). I bring 10 years of experience to tallspindleapple.com beginning with a 2001 visit to Italy where the Tall-Spindle apple is grown in quantity, visits to other progressive apple growing regions such in Europe and North America, studying Terence Robinson’s teaching, and my own experience growing Tall-Spindle apples at the UMass Cold Spring Orchard and cooperating apple growers throughout Massachusetts.
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