An apple a day

Nestled in the rolling countryside of North Shropshire, close to the border with Wales, is Tom Adams’ fruit tree nursery. These border lands, often referred to as the Welsh Marches, have a rich history of fruit growing, but the impact of two World Wars, the growth of intensive agriculture, the rise of supermarkets and cheap food imports all contributed to the demise of orchards in the 20th century. Tom, however, is one of a burgeoning number of growers who are taking a sustainable and holistic approach to tending land.

“I had been working as a jobbing gardener for years when a client asked me to prune some of their fruit trees,” says Tom. “I wasn’t really sure what to do, so I went on a few courses, read lots of books on the subject and was hooked. Then I took some apples from my cousin’s farm to a botanist at the Marcher Apple Network to see what they were and it turned out that the varieties – ‘Bringewood Pippin’, ‘Roundwood Nonsuch’ and ‘Gipsy King’ – hadn’t been seen for over 150 years and that the trees they came from were quite likely the last of those particular varieties. So, from there, I learnt how to propagate, mastering the technique of chip and bud grafting. It’s such a magical process I decided I wanted to do more of it.”

Tom started his nursery in late 2018 and has since built up a collection of around 150 different varieties, mainly from the English and Welsh border counties but also from elsewhere in the west of Great Britain. Apples from these areas are better able to cope with high rainfall and tend to be more resistant to fungal diseases such as scab and canker, which can proliferate in a damp climate. “Because I grow organically, natural resistance is really important to me,” explains Tom.

For Tom, the idea of growing mainly heritage varieties is a way of celebrating local distinctiveness. This is being lost becaus