Malus John Downie

Malus John Downie crabapple trees are attractive and heavy cropping plants that produce some of the best yields of crabapples for use in the kitchen. They are commonly planted in orchards and their narrow canopy makes them a great specimen tree for a small garden. John Downie has abundant white blossom in mid-late spring and good red-gold autumn colour. It is a vigorous tree, but is naturally tidy. The long, conical, bright red-orange fruit are some of the prettiest of any crabapple tree. They can either be left on the branches for their ornamental value, or used to make crabapple jelly, apple sauce or pressed and blended with the juice of other apples to make cider.
John Downie is one of the best pollinators for apple orchards, along with Golden Hornet. It can reach a height of about 8 metres.

Browse our variety of crabapple trees or see our full range of trees for sale.

How Standard Trees are Measured:
All the plants in the ornamental trees section are graded as standards, which means that they are measured by their girth in centimetres 1 metre above ground level (basically, their trunk's waist measurement). They aren't measured by their height, which will vary. So, a 6/8 standard has a trunk with a circumference of 6-8 centimetres and an 8/10 standard has a trunk 8-10 centimetres around. This measurement makes no difference to the tree's final height.
Standard trees are 2 - 3.5 metres tall (on average) when they arrive; they are the most mature trees that you can buy from us. We cannot tell you precisely how tall your trees will be before we deliver them.

History & uses of Malus John Downie
This tree was bred in the 1870's by Mr E. Holmes and he named it after his friend, who was a Scottish nurseryman. It has won both the RHS Award of Garden Merit and and Award of Merit for displays of its cut flowers.

Notes on planting Malus John Downie:
Crabapples are tough plants that thrive in any moderately fertile soil. They tolerate shade well, although we recommend planting them in full sun to get the best display of flowers and fruit. Although a moist, well drained site is ideal, crabapples like heavy clay and don't mind a bit of waterlogging in winter.
They won't grow in deep shade and may struggle in very poor dry soil.

Prepare your site before planting:
It is good to dig over the site where you plant a tree several months in advance. Kill the weeds first: for tough weeds like nettles, brambles and ground elder, you will usually need a glyphosate based weed-killer to get rid of them. When you dig the soil over, remove stones and other rubbish and mix in well rotted compost or manure down to the depth of about 2 spades.

Watch our video on how to plant a tree for full instructions.
Remember to water establishing trees during dry weather for at least a year after planting.

Tree Planting accessories:
Prepare your site for planting by killing the weeds and grass with Roundup weed killer.
You can buy a tree planting pack with a wooden stake & rubber tie to support the tree and a mulch mat with pegs to protect the soil around the base of your tree from weeds and drying out.
We suggest that you use mycorrhizal "friendly fungi" on the roots of all newly planted large trees: if your soil quality is poor, we strongly recommend it.
You can also improve your soil with bonemeal organic fertiliser and Growmore.

Read our full terms and conditions here.

Delivery: The basic delivery charge for orders of bareroot plants is £6.50 + vat, which increases to £12.55 + vat if you add any pot-grown plants, standard trees or fruit trees to the order.
Because couriers sometimes experience delays, we schedule delivery by week, not by day. Therefore, please plan your planting day for the weekend at the end of the delivery week or for the week following delivery, at the earliest.
We will email you the day before your plants are due to arrive.

*Surcharges to the Highlands and Islands still apply.

Payment: We do not charge your card until we begin to prepare your order for packing.

Guarantee: If any plants die within a year, we will replace them. We only ask that you follow our planting & growing instructions and sent us clear photographs of the dead plants in situ, so we can help to make sure that the replacement plants succeed. You only pay for the delivery of the replacements.

Please note that our guarantee is void if there is a hosepipe ban in your area: your newly planted hedging must be watered in dry weather while it is establishing. The best way to water is very thoroughly every few days: at least once a week if there is no heavy rain.

Our nursery has been supplying container grown and bareroot hedging plants to gardeners, farmers and town planners since 1949. Our website started in 2003, so we do understand the concerns that you may have about buying hedging plants online. If any of your plants are damaged when they arrive or if you are otherwise not satisfied with your order after you inspect it, please repackage it and contact us. We will give you a refund or send replacements and send a courier to come and collect the unwanted plants.

Misc	RHS AGM, Edible Fruit / Nuts, Wildlife Value
Type	Native
Also Good	Autumn Colour

	NUMBER OF PLANTS Inc. VAT
SIZES	1-2	3-9	10+
1/2 std Bareroot	Plenty of Stock£24.90	Plenty of Stock£21.90	Plenty of Stock£19.90
6/8 std Bareroot	Plenty of Stock£34.95	Plenty of Stock£31.20	Plenty of Stock£21.75
8/10 std Bareroot	Plenty of Stock£49.95	Plenty of Stock£47.95	Plenty of Stock£45.95

John Downie Crabapple Trees

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Malus John Downie