The Bramley Orchards of Wisbech

The area just to the south of The Wash has been known for its orchards since the 1880s. The heavy marine silts and clays of Wisbech and Norfolk Marshland were difficult to cultivate before the advent of large tractors and power harrows, but proved to be good orchard land.

Expanding Victorian industrial towns needed cheap, portable and storable foodstuffs. The railways created the necessary transport link between producer and consumer,  and so a culinary orchard and fruit processing industry developed around Wisbech to provide fresh fruit, canned fruit and jam for the factory workers and miners of the East Midlands.

Right from the beginning, these orchards were developed in accordance with a horticultural, rather than a pastoral, tradition. Culinary apples became a speciality. Young orchards were underplanted with a wide range of soft fruit, vegetables and flowers. Hardy plum varieties were planted on the dykesides to act as profitable windbreaks.

Emneth Early and Red Victoria were two very early culinary apples that were  born and bred in the locality. Old trees of both  varieties linger in disused orchards to this day, misunderstood and unloved. Other varieties used included  Ecklinville, Lord Grosvenor, Green Harvey, Lord Derby, Newton Wonder, Lane's Prince Albert and (later) Howgate Wonder.

However, Bramley's Seedling was the king and became the mainstay of local production for a century or more. The Bramley is a particularly vigorous and long-lived variety, especially when grafted onto crab or free stock and planted in the rich, deep, fertile marine silt/clay soils found around Wisbech Without the restrictions of dwarfing rootstocks, Bramley trees were capable of making tremendous growth and so great efforts were made to train them into a weeping form to curb excessive growth and promote fruit bud formation.

Because the Fen orchards were not grazed, there was no need to create trees with tall, clean trunks. Traditionally, the stems of the trees were stopped at a very low level and the branches trained in long, tall, curving arcs. A multilayer canopy was developed, with two or three tiers of framework boughs, all well above head height. The fruiting periphery of the tree was carefully pruned to create and maintain the weeping form. The resulting tree shape is very distinctive - not unlike a giant umbrella!

Although the tree trunks range from just a few inches to 2 or 3 ft in height, the branch canopy was developed to a height and spread of 20-30 ft. Such trees are known locally as standards, even though they lack the traditional tall trunk associated with that name.

A considerable number of 100 year-old Bramley trees still exist in the area. Some must be amongst the biggest apple trees in the country, with trunks like old pollard oaks. The majority of  these aged giants are in a sadly neglected state and suffer under dense ivy growth or fall apart for want of pruning. However, there are still a handful in commercial cultivation, producing fruit for the local markets and the processing/juice/cider trade. One or two are in Organic schemes and Environmental Stewardship grants have helped to bring several others back from the brink of extinction.

 Bob Lever