Those trees look like they have not been pruned at all. So that should be easy to continue. I can't tell if there has been a spraying regimen, but I doubt it.
Do these trees yield fruit? Are there compatible pollinating trees nearby?

No spraying regimen for the past 9 years that I know of...Yes, they yield lots of fruit...last year it yielded none because we had a late frost that killed all the fruit...but this year it's going nuts..the apples are in the hundreds...just standing under one section I could easily count 100+...I just don't know what to do with them...will the apples grow bigger if I pull some off? There are several sections that have 5+ apples all lumped together..most have 3-4 I thought I should reduce them down to 2 to give the other fruit more energy to grow larger??

On the pollination, have no clue, we have bees, we're on a farm...there is an apple orchard about 5 miles away...a neighbor has 8 forms of fruiting plants (apple, pear, fig, grapevine, etc.) he's about 300 yards away from these trees...not sure what's pollinating them, but they're definitely putting out!

Thanks for any help!!
Tara

Tara:

If it were mine I'd reduce the apples to one per cluster and on some clusters none. At least 6 inches between apples. And they need to be thinned when they are much smaller, less than 1/2 inch. You'll know next yr if thinning is a real issue. If you have few bloom next yr it is because there were too many apples this yr. If you don't thin much this yr and still have a good crop next yr, you may not need to thin assumimg the crop isn't breaking limbs.

I'd also cut the top half out of both trees. But realize you may not want to do that. You may not need to spray unless you have codling moth. If you do, you should see evidence by now. If you don't see wormy apples this yr you may not need to spray.

The Fruitnut

Nice farm.

The rest of my response does not address the orginal post question, but may it still will be of interest.

At least the owner of the house shown in the photo does not have a significant other who instists on painting the house an electric pink color.

There is a small acerage not too far outside of my city limits where I pass by when driving to see my daughter in a neighboring town. On the property is built a rather large, modern appearing, yet still definately farm style house. which is painted an electric pink color with white trim. Still, the barn and other farm implement sheds on the property are as red as the farm structure shown in your photo.

It leads me to think that there probably are two distinctively different personalities living together on that property.

The electric pink house and all the red barns and other buildings can be seen by anyone simply driving past the property. When ever I drive by and am drawn to look, at the property and buildings, it often makes me wonder if the farmer is the one with the more moderate personality, but has compromised with a significant other and agreed to the house being painted that seemingly excentric color. Then I cannot help but wonder, what other seemingly over the top items the farmer must have felt compelled to agree with, when it came to decorating the inside of the house.

Good thing the occupants of that propety live on a farm, where city home owner's associations are not able to require their approval of the house paint color selection.

Red barns and houses

A long time ago my mother told me that houses, and barns that were not painted were required to paint them red when the person got a mortgage. I think she said that there wasnÂt much cheap paint back then except red.

It seems that red caught on and people liked the color.

Looks good to me.

Karyl
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Tara, skip the tree fertilizer spikes next time. Your trees and your checkbook will thank you. The only looser will be the snake oil, I mean fertilizer spike salesman.

Oh, BTW, your farm looks very neat. I wish the farms around my farm looked that tidy.

Don't know how we quite went from apples/pears to pink paint, but thanks for the observations! :) We're lucky to live around folk that keep a tidy place...it keeps us on our toes to make sure we don't lag behind! :)

I've got horses and I have loads of compost material if you know what I mean, I guess I'm okay just putting composted stuff under the trees and on lawn instead of doing the fertilizer spikes....they were fun to put in the ground atleast and I do have some healthy looking fruit! :)

Any tips on pruning, do I really need to cut the top half out of the tree??? Surely, there's a more attractive way..there's an apple farm just down the road, I'll have to go see what they do..if I cut the top of the pear tree out will the limbs grow out or do they always grow columnar like that?

Thanks for any help!
Tara

Trees are more manageable when the height is kept lower. Trimming the tops back is NOT like using a giant hedge trimmer. If trimmed like that, it will grow back even worse with a zillion skinny shoots...selective pruning is what you need.