PERMABREED

 Medlar. Mespilus germanica. I was lucky to get two very rare types of medlar. One kind was sent to me by a swiss collector who said it is the best tasting variety he knows. The second one is a seedless one that makes larger fruit than the ordinary seedless one, so also very special. There still is a huge potential in improving medlars through breeding simply by crossing them or even by trying to cross them with other fruit species. Medlars give fruit in my climate every year. No other fruit tree is as reliable for me as the medlar. superior tasting swiss type. large fruited, seedless type from bulgaria.

 Medlar (mespilus germanica) I made an experiment with a grafted medlar tree that i was trying to get to grow on its own roots. So i planted the grafted tree of the "Suessmispel" (sweet medlar) variety really low down into the ground, hoping that it would grow roots above the graft union. 2 years later i dug away the earth and it hadn't made roots, so i moved it. But what had happened was that the tree grew in a Y shape, so it had 2 main stems. I planted it in a different spot and last year, walking past it, i thought i could braid them together to form an arch. So i twisted and tied the two branches together and then took off the strings this winter. The result will be a curious, funny tree that forms an arch, somewhat like a portal or a doorway that children might be able to go through one day. The sweet medlar is a variety that's supposed to be edible before bletting but i find that that's not true. It doesn't taste good before it's ripe, but when it...

 Medlar (mespilus germanica). Growing medlar from seed is tricky. It is said to need a very long period of cold stratification followed by warm stratification and then again cold. I put my medlar seeds in sand in the fridge. They stayed there for 3 months. I then found a comment by a french guy on the internet who said he scarifies his seeds and soaks them in water for 8 to 10 days, regularly changing the water and then he sows them and they end up germinating. So i took half of my seeds out and scarified them and put them in water for a few days and afterwards into moist tissue at room temperature but nothing happened. I then thought of cracking them open with pliers. I did that and found only 8 kernels in 48 seeds. So i am thinking now that medlar seeds may often not be viable. Also they all sink to the bottom in a glass of water no matter if they are viable or not. The seeds themselves look a bit like raisins or a mix between a peach and an apple seed. The kernels of the seeds l...