Glossary · Orchard
Diploid
Definition
A cultivar with the normal two sets of chromosomes, producing viable pollen. Most apple and pear cultivars are diploid, and an orchard’s pollination planning is built around them.
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- Orchard
Related terms
Terms that belong to the same part of the subject, or that this one is routinely confused with.
Orchard
Triploid
A cultivar carrying three sets of chromosomes rather than two. Triploids are vigorous and often heavy croppers but produce sterile or near-sterile pollen, so they cannot pollinate anything and need two other cultivars in the orchard.
Orchard
Pollination group
A numbered band grouping cultivars by the timing of their blossom, so that a grower can plant varieties that flower together and can therefore pollinate one another.
Orchard
Self-incompatible
Unable to set a useful crop from its own pollen. Almost all apples and pears are self-incompatible, so an orchard needs at least two cultivars flowering together.
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Sources
What this page rests on. Where a source is marked as registered rather than read, CiderHQ is recording that the body is authoritative on the subject without claiming to have worked through the document itself. See our evidence policy for what each state means.
NIAB (incorporating East Malling Research)
NIAB · research institute · retrieved 2026-08-24
East Malling developed the M-series apple rootstocks that determine tree size in essentially every modern orchard, cider orchards included. The authority CiderHQ uses for rootstock behaviour.