Creating Multi-Grafted Fruit Trees with Sam Van Aken | The Tree of 40 Fruit (Eps 65)

All fruit trees require hands-on care, pest and disease management, and specialized pruning knowledge; naive expectations of zero maintenance will result in poor outcomes; fruit trees are a commitment similar to puppies—they require feeding, care, protection, and attention.

“I've been growing fruit trees for over 10 years now, and all fruit trees need hands-on care. All fruit trees get pest and disease problems. All fruit trees need specialized pruning. It's not rocket science, but you need to know what you need to do and you need to do what you need to do. So anybody who's naively going in and thinking, I'm gonna get one of those trees, I'm not gonna prune it, I'm not gonna protect it from p and disease. You may not have a positive experience.”

The Tree of 40 Fruit produces blossoms in a carefully sequenced color progression: starting with white blossoms from apricots and Asian plum varieties, followed by pink blossoms from red leaf plum varieties, then dark crimson, pink, and white blossoms from peaches and European plums, creating clusters of blossoms on branches that look like little clouds—a visual effect achieved by deliberate placement of each variety on specific branches rather than random arrangement.

“They start off with a white blossom. So those will be apricots and Asian plum varieties. I've been able to source some Asian or red leaf plum varieties that have pink blossoms. So they're white and then pink. And then after the Asian plums, then it's the peaches and European plums and the peaches have really dark crimson colors and pinks and whites. it's almost like little clouds or clusters of blossoms on each of the branches.”

The cold-hardiness of a multi-grafted tree depends on the hardiness of the varieties grafted onto it; colder climates require selecting only zone 4 or zone 5 varieties to ensure tree survival.

“in terms of cold hardiness, they're gonna be as hardy as the varieties that you graft onto them. So if I am placing a tree in a colder environment, I'm only gonna select varieties that are, zone four, zone five”

Apple and pear trees grow slower than stone fruit trees, and testing varieties to understand their blossom timing and sequential blooming patterns requires extended observation periods before designing trees with coordinated blossom displays.

“it took a while cuz I test out all of the varieties to see their blossom first and then I record when. Blossom in relationship to each other. So apples they also grow apples and pairs grow slower than stone fruit. And so it just took a while for me to get enough information where I could make a tree like that”

Sam is working with a Japanese biotech firm that has found a natural way to graft inter-family plants, and on a smaller scale they're working with plants to graft bouquets of flowers that can continuously grow, suggesting future possibilities for cross-family fruit grafting.

“Although I am working with a Japanese biotech firm that has found a natural way to graft inter-family plants. So grafting the, we're working on right now, it's a smaller scale. We're working with plants that you can graft an entire bouquet of flowers to so that continuously grows.”

Sam is working on a Spanish mission peach tree project for Arizona that traces and collects historically authentic Spanish mission peach varieties introduced to North America via the Camino Real (the royal road from Mexico City through New Mexico where Spanish missions were built); Native Americans cultivated these peaches for 200-300 years and traces still exist, making it a living reconstruction of agricultural and colonial history.

“I'm working on a project now actually for Arizona that are It's all about the Spanish mission peaches. There used to be the Communo Royal that ran from Mexico City into New Mexico, and it's where the Spanish built missions and it's where they first introduced peaches into North America. And those peach seeds escaped. And they were cultivated by Native Americans for two, 300 years and there's still traces of them. So we're trying to track down as many as we can to create one of those Spanish mission peach trees.”

Artists in former communist Poland after the transition to capitalism (early 1990s) were labeled 'dissonant' and it was illegal for them to make art; they held clandestine exhibitions in living rooms and abandoned buildings, risking jail time and passport revocation if caught; young people from the US witnessing this recognized art's political importance in a way Americans typically dismiss.

“right after I got out of undergrad, he I went to Poland. And I just got dropped into Poland, and this probably dates me, but this was the early nineties, so this is really a year or two after they transitioned from communism to capitalism. And it was almost, it was like lawless to be honest. And the thing that was really impressive to me is the artists that that I worked with, they were considered dissonant, which under the communists meant that they couldn't by law make art, right? So it was illegal for them to make art. And what they did is they would have art exhibitions in living rooms in abandoned buildings, and ran the risk that if they were caught, they would have to do jail time. They'd have their passports revoked, and the government felt that art was so important. That they tried to limit who could officially make it.”

The main limitation of multi-grafted fruit trees from an industrial agriculture perspective is that they produce a limited number of fruit continuously across a 4-5 month season (June through early October) rather than a large uniform harvest all at once, making them impractical for mass agriculture but ideal for home gardeners who can pick 20 pieces of fruit per week at peak and have fresh fruit for 12 weeks.

“from an agriculture perspective, the, from mass agriculture perspective, the downside is that it produces a limited number of fruit from June through. You can even pick fruit, beginning of October, right? Whereas, industrial ag, they want to be able to harvest everything at one time, move through an orchard. It works out great if you have one in your yard because you can pick, at its peak you can pick 20 pieces of fruit a week and have fruit for 12, 12 or so weeks out of the year.”

Sam Van Aiken started the Tree of 40 Fruit project because his great-grandfather grafted fruit trees (whom he never met but family described as having magical capabilities), and growing up on a farm then attending art school, he merged both influences by wondering if he could control how tree blossoms appeared in spring to sculpt the blossom of a tree.

“I started because I wanted to have one for myself and it actually started from a bunch of diff different places, but I had my great-grandfather grafted fruit trees, so I had never met him, but everybody in my family that talked about him, spoke about him as if he was a magician or had some magical capabilities. So I, I had always, as I grew up on a farm, I went to art school, which was exactly the opposite of farming. And, but grafting always kept coming back to me, and I knew that you could grasp stone fruit together. And then I started to wonder if I could control how the blossom appeared in spring, right? So I could essentially sculpt the blossom of a tree.”

In upstate New York over the past 6-7 years, erratic weather patterns have required Sam to grow fruit varieties from colder zones than his location because successive frosts (not cold temperatures themselves) kill blossoms; for example, January or February 75-degree weather causes trees to blossom early, then spring frosts kill all the fruit, so later-blooming cold-hardy varieties mitigate this risk.

“here in upstate New York with how erratic the weather's become in the past six or seven years, I actually have to grow varieties that are from a colder zone. Because one of the things that happens it isn't necessarily the cold that kills the tree, it's just the success of frosts that kill the blossoms and you don't get the fruit. And there were several years where we had 75 degree weather. In January or February, the trees would blossom and the frost would kill it. They'd kill all the fruit. And by using cold hard, your fruit that blossoms later, you can avoid that.”

Every multi-grafted Tree of 40 Fruit sold is customized for the specific geographic and climatic location; some customers request specific fruits they want included, though most allow Sam creative freedom; he researches historical fruit varieties from the region and sources them from USDA germplasm collections or UC Davis Foundation Plant Services to ensure virus-free stock.

“They usually let me do what I want, but then some people will they'll have special requests. It's, they're like, but I'd really like to have apricots on there.”

In China, commercial warehouse operations successfully grow two crops of peaches annually by artificially controlling weather conditions inside warehouses, demonstrating that technology can override natural seasonal constraints.

“in China, they're actually doing warehouse grown peaches where they can grow two two crops of peaches by controlling the weather within in the warehouse each year.”

Marion, a California home gardener, has successfully created multi-grafted trees with 450 different apple varieties on one tree, 60 pear varieties on one tree, a 30-in-one plum, a 30-in-one citrus, an 8-in-one avocado, and an 8-in-one persimmon; her neighbor's fruit garden has become a conversation piece and tourist attraction despite being a personal hobby experiment.

“Marian has developed her grafting skills and listened to what she's been up to. Marian writes, I have created a 450 and one apple, so one apple tree with 450 different types of apples on it. She's also created a 60 in one pear, so one pear tree with 60 different varieties. She's created a 30 in one plum, a 30 in one citrus, an eight in one avocado, an eight in one persimmon”

Sam grows the multi-grafted trees in square planters for the first 2-3 years, then root prunes them and transfers them to larger containers, gradually working up through progressively larger containers before planting in the ground; he grafts 15-20 varieties onto each tree before they are planted in soil, because once trees exceed 1-1.5 inch caliper size, they take longer to establish in the soil than saplings.

“I grow them in my nursery is I grow them in a square planter. When I exhibited them, I could just take the sides off and it's just this perfect mound of dirt and it has the tree coming out... they grow in the first planter for two to three years, and then I'll root prune them and then transfer them to a larger container and gradually keep working up. And with the tree of 40 Fruit, I try to graft them so that there's 15 to 20 varieties on each tree before they get planted.”

Sam Van Aiken first exhibited the Tree of 40 Fruit at the Armory Show in New York City in 2011, displaying 8-10 foot tall trees with 1.5 inch caliper diameter, grown in square planters that could be displayed and transported.

“I exhibited them for the first time at the Armory Show in New York City in 2011. And the first tree was actually planted here on the Syracuse University campus”