Matt Kaminsky is known eponymously as Gnarly Pippins. It’s an apple pun and a nod to the wild apple trees he studies and works with. Kaminsky, who is Sunderland, Massachusetts-based, works as a full-time farmer, arborist, and cidermaker. He’s the caretaker and pruner for thousands of apple and pear trees throughout New England. He tends his orchards with custom modified Silky saws that he uses for both pruning and grafting.

Kaminsky specializes in restoring old fruit trees, helping them recover from neglect and other issues that affect veteran trees. Silkys are critical to his work. Fruit trees are more sensitive to the soundness of pruning cuts. Cuts need to be clean, sharp, properly timed, and angled ‘just so’ to keep these trees healthy.

“It’s been nine or ten years for me of exclusively using silky saws,” says Kaminsky. “They’re the best. Historically orchardists were wedded to the Wheeler saw, a 150-year-old patented hack saw frame saw with a 14” section of band saw blade. People are extremely dogmatic about it. And in my experience, it’s hateful to use. The new generation of apple growers has more of a mind towards optimizing ergonomics and gear.”

When Kaminsky took a short break from working with apples and pivoted to being a residential arborist, he discovered Silky.

Back in the orchard, Kaminsky started pruning with Silkys. After six to eight hours of hand pruning a day, he got blisters. So Kaminsky decided to make custom wooden handles for his saws that fit his hand perfectly. He used trimmed wood from his apple and pear trees, cutting that wood with the same saw for which he was crafting a handle.

“I’ve had a long-term passion for carving greenwood and spoons, so I fashioned a new handle for my Zubat from apple wood," said Kaminsky. "I bought new replacement blades and matched them with common threaded rods and nuts and bolts, and I made my own Silky handles”.

Over the next six years, Kaminsky refined his design and made his custom wooden Silky handles ”nicer and cooler.” He and his partner started a sheep herd in 2019, and during the lambing season, he had a lot of time on his hands. “While I was waiting for my ewes to lamb, I whittled and carved dozens of handles," said Kaminsky. "I started making them cottage industry-scale. I gave them to friends.”

“I’m having fun figuring out the shape that feels best in my hands for long hours of cutting,” said Kaminsky. “Making handles got me excited about exploring Silky’s catalog. Every blade is so specialized. I expanded my collection.”

For bulk-cutting fruitwood limbs, usually six to eight-inch diameter branches, Kaminsky likes a more aggressive blade. He prefers a small, fine-toothed blade for grafting.

“For fine work, I have taken a liking to the fine-toothed, straight-blade Gomboy 270 or 300,” said Kaminsky.” April to the end of May is a busy time for top working apple trees. Top working is a type of grafting--t’s how you convert a tree from one variety to another to deal with disease and create new varietals. Kaminsky says that It’s an important technique, especially for wild apples. "It lets me install experimental plantings of funky, weird varieties and do it affordably," said Kaminsky. "I can take an older tree that’s not delivering well for a grower and change it to a new varietal we want more info on." Kaminsky says that he's become dogmatic about what saw he uses for grafting, and it’s always his straight-blade Silky Gomboy.

It’s typical to prune in winter when fruit trees are dormant. But top work has to be done in spring when the tree’s sap is moving. Kaminsky is particular in how he makes cuts when he’s top working. “They need to be super clean with no ridges on the surface of the tree from a lesser saw or chainsaw,” said Kaminsky. “Any ridges can catch bacteria spores and the graft can fail.”

For bulk cutting, Kaminsky’s standby is his Silky’s Gomboy 300 with medium or coarse teeth. “It’s almost as quick as a chainsaw,” said Kaminsky. “It delivers a good balance of speed and cutting ability. It’s a nimble, skinny saw that lets me get into tight spaces. Apple and pear trees have a lot of tight narrow angles, and the Gomboy is perfect.”

For big cuts, Kaminsky uses a Silky Longboy blade with a handle not the pole that Silky sells it with. “It’s 360mm, long and curved, and the tip of the blade has a toothless beak, a curved point, that’s awesome for grabbing stuff, whether that’s my rope to reset it without damaging it, or poison ivy vines I want to tear off my apple trees. Because it’s such a long blade, I don’t have to get too close to the leaves or the vine. The beak is sharp enough to snap the vine in half. The point hooks and I can wrench on it.

Kaminsky has authored several books on wild apples, including Pomological Series, which documents the wild apples submitted to his annual Wild and Seedling Pomological Exhibition, a free public event each November in Western Massachusetts where wild apples from all over the continent are displayed for tasting, scheduled.

Granly Pippins publishes quarterly blog posts on all things apples and trees. In the winter and spring, he sells apple tree saplings and scion wood for home and commercial growers interested in planting an experimental cultivar derived from wild seedling apples.

Kaminsky co-owns Meadowfed Lamb Silvopasture in Hadley, Massachusetts, with his partner Rachel Haas. It’s part of the Preservation Orchard Farm Co-operative. Their work centers on silvopasture—the intentional combination of growing tree crops and rotational grazing of sheep and chickens. They raise tree crops–cider apples and pears, chestnuts, and heartnuts–using animals to help manage soil fertility, pest and disease issues, and understory weed management. If you're passing through Hadley, MA, stop at their farmstand at 295 River Drive (on Rt. 47) or find Matt at Carr's Cider Garden on the weekend, sample a pint of hard cider, and ask Kaminsky about his custom Silky handsaws!

Follow Matt on Instagram @gnarlypippins.