growing apples

There are many varieties of apples you can choose to grow and my best advice is to choose a variety that is suitable to your climate and taste. You can even choose some that are immune or quite resistant to apple scab or some that are resistant to fireblight, and if you choose a non-disease-resistant apple you will have a very wide range of choice, but these will require more effort in controlling pests and diseases. Propagation of apple trees is usually done by grafting a known variety on to a root stock. When this is done it allows the grower to get the particular type of fruit they want bestow other advantages such as disease resistance or tree dwarfing. While it is possible to grow trees from seeds, the results can be varied at best and at worst disappointing. Now I am not saying you can not get a fine tasting apple from a seed, but most gardeners will choose a known variety and purchase stock for their gardens.

Apples can grow hardy in any open, sunny area, as long as they are not exposed to strong winds. They will tolerate a wide range of soils but flourish in a clay loam. They prefer a neutral to slightly alkaline soil which is rich and free draining but moisture retentive. With every newly planted tree, treat it with a general purpose fertilizer like fish,blood and bone and mulch with well-rotted organic matter to help the soil retain moisture. you will need to mulch at regular intervals, as old mulch gradually breaks down. Keep them well watered in dry areas and feed each tree with a general-purpose fertilizer every spring. There are some varieties that only bear well every second year, with light crops every other year, you can prevent this by thinning excess fruit in the good years to give the tree strength for the following year. If you have an excess of fruit that are dropping this may be sign of magnesium or boron deficiency or not enough moisture.

You will notice flower buds and fruit developing on the tips of the branches or on short two year old spurs along the branches. You will need to train apples early in their life to achieve the desired framework. When the tree matures, pruning mainly involves removing crowed branches, and annual pruning encourages new growth shoots and continual fruit spur development. All apple varieties, need pollination with another apple variety. To do this plant two trees near to each other, and a good way to make sure that most varieties will be pollinated is to use a crab apple tree that has a long flowering period. There are many of these and two of the best varieties are the Malus- John Downie, and the Malusx zumi var. calocarpa- Golden Hornet.

Harvest the fruit when they are fully matured and well colored to the variety that you are growing. When you are planting trees for the first time, you may want to consider planting disease-resistant cultivars, this will go a long way to solving disease problems before they start. Use common sense to avoid some disease problems like prune trees for good air circulation, which will reduce fungal problems and clean up fallen apples.