Ted: I can suggest a few answers to your questions, but it would help to better understand what you mean by planting "along the road", the type of fence you have, and its spatial relationship to the road. Rootstocks like M9 and Bud9 will help to keep your trees small, with a little pruning, but often require external support since they are poorly anchored. Perhaps your fence could serve for this support, depending on what kind of fence you have there. Road salt is not good for any plant that I know of, including grass, but just how close to the road would the trees be planted, and how much salt is applied nearby? Has the grass or other vegetation in the planting area been affected by salt in the past? Apple trees are reasonably tolerant of alkaline soils, but everything has its limits. This appears to be a judgment call for you to make. If it were me, I would be planting rootstocks now or in the early spring, then would allow them to grow for an entire season before grafting. Placing the rootstocks in their final positions at the outset would obviously eliminate a later move and consequent setback. Yes, you can try to "benchgraft" new rootstocks immediately, but I think your chances of success would improve by allowing the rootstocks to grow and accomodate themselves for a year. There are no "must have" apple varieties, since everyone has a different take on this subject, but there are many wonderful varieties out there and I suggest you pick those that appeal to you. Grafting should be done with fully dormant scions, after the rootstocks have begun to push buds or leaves in the spring. Do not try to graft too early, or with scions that are themselves not dead dormant. Finally, suckers from rootstocks will be clones of the rootstocke that gave birth to them. Thus, suckers from a seedling rootstock would grow large trees of seedling size, but those from M9 or Bud9 rootstock would be clones of their parents, and behave in exactly the same way as the original. Viable suckers from these rootstocks are fairly uncommon, though some semi-dwarfing rootstocks like M7 often sucker freely. Too freely. Finally, healthy, well-shaped fruiting apple trees can be considered quite attractive, but their main appeal is the fruit they produce. Many cultivars of crabapple are considered decorative trees, and if that is more important to you than fruiting, you might prefer to choose one of those with purple leaves, heavy blossoming, or other characteristics that appeal to you. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

"...I'm guessing those get separated out at nurseries, right?..." I think I'd contact the supplier about these questions. Their practices may not be universal. "Any reason not to heel them in in containers to allow for easy removal?" Possible issues include drainage problems, root system formation disadvantages, increase in planting labor due to necessity of addressing distorted root system, and problems removing the container if roots grow out of the bottom. I'm not saying not to use containers, but I did want to mention some possible disadvantages. "...I know I'm supposed to leave a "mother limb" anyway..." I've never heard of the term "mother limb". If you are talking about a central leader, most fruit production pruning methods result in the termination of the leader. "I'll seal up any cuts, but is there much risk of seriously injuring the tree by pruning it back very heavily?" NO!!! Never (well, almost never) seal a pruning cut or wound, except when grafting. Sealing around grafts (for some techniques, is imperative). "Lastly, we have large mess of an ancient apple tree in the backyard that hasn't been kept in any way for decades." Here's my recommendation on that...Search the fruit forum for Harvestman's discussions on this topic, and/or email him for more info. I disagree with him on many topics and sometimes find discussions with him rather difficult (He enjoys being the contrarian, even when discussing fairly well settled matters), but renovating old fruit trees is the one topic in which he may be the most knowledgeable of anyone on GW.

It's not the grafting that results in better fruit, it's the particular scion (the cultivar that you graft onto the rootstock) that produces the good fruit. If you graft a Red Delicious onto one of your sapling rootstocks, you'll get Red Delicious apples from the Red Delicious scion. If you don't graft a known good cultivar onto your rootstocks, you'll get "wild" (non-cultivar) apples. Those might be wonderful, but your chances are slim. You are more likely to get something not all that great. Grafting a seedling onto another seedling still gives you seedling ("wild") apples. Another thing to consider is that the rootstock itself if often chosen for specific properties. One of the most often recognized is dwarfing rootstock's ability to control the growth rate (size per given amount of growing time) of the tree. A dwarf or semi-dwarf tree can be a lot easier to maintain and work with. There are also many other characteristics (soil and climate adaptability, etc, etc) that rootstocks can control. Using seedlings for rootstocks may be satisfactory, but won't provide the unique characteristics available with a custom rootstock cultivar. Have fun with your seedlings, whatever you do with them, BUT don't count on them to produce the same quality/type of tree that you could expect from a choice scion grafted onto a carefully chosen rootstock.

We have an old 30-40 some odd year old tree. Unknown variety. Earlier Apple variety. Looking at it a couple days ago there is one branch that has entirely different Apple than the rest of the tree. It has not been grafted previous to this year. First phot is the abnormal Apple It's a different shape and size, a different color (more yellow green than blue green) and it's shiny like a polished Macintosh where the other limbs have a waxy bloom. There's only one Apple like it because I cut the tree way back this year. So if it is a mutation and if I like this Apple, will the mutation be on the whole branch or just that spur? I've basically cut most of the main limb off to graft to this year via bark/rhind graft) and left a couple nurse branches and this mystery apple is on one of those branches. Branch is about 2-3" thick. Main limb is about 6-8" thick. I'll document size and shape with photos and dates and watch to see if it changes color. I'll have to taste it at some point too but will take photos of top bottom insides and seeds. Any input would be greatly appreciated!