I thin the clusters to one apple in the first year and like to see as many as possible without breaking limbs or something. I am trying to grow apples. If I want to grow firewood I will grow ash. If your apple tree is not producing at least 40 pounds of apples for you in the fourth year, and about half that much in the third, then you need to do something different. I have fertile soil.

You needn't duplicate the commercial orchards approach, in fact you might be better served with higher scaffolds if you eventually plan to have turf underneath your trees and need mower access. Also, if you want to keep coons and possums off your trees (don't know if that is a local problem for you) you're best off with about 3.5 ft of branchless trunk to attach metal flashing to stop them from climbing trees- unless you have an electric fence. You live in a humid area and you may not want to apply as many fungicide sprays as your commercial grower neighbor(at least 10 a season, which you can reduce to 2). Leaving space between the wet ground and first branches will benifit air circulation and rapid drying after morning dew and rain. You don't have to get maximum yeald with the least possible ladder work to make a profit. I beilieve home orchards should have trees even more open than commercial ones for this reason.

Thanks for the responses. How toxic is Immunox/myclobutanil? The warnings of course make it sound horrible and our water comes from a well not far off. Unfortunately, there will be no getting rid of the cedars, for family reasons. And while the area around the trees is mowed and underneath is kept mulched and weeded, the rest of the field (and the surrounding fields) are basically tall weedy grass that gets mowed once a year. That's not going anywhere either unless someone gives me a brush hog and a tractor to pull it with. I guess the best bet moving forward is to try to spray at the right time(s) in the future. I'll look into the suggested sprays for this year, though. Randy - My William's Pride isn't bearing yet (just put it in this year). I've had them from farm stands though and thought they were good enough to try planting. I don't have any tasting notes or anything, though :) Anyway, I hope they're good. Thanks again. Sam

I think the sun-starved fruit tends to drop early for lack of adequate energy. I didn't keep up with scab on pears- I actually didn't realize that it can be a season long battle when it's as wet as it was this year. My 2 Boscs are 60% defoliated and dropped pears early though some are still on tree as did Highland which lost most pears too early to be worth anytning. Seckels did the same, but at least they have decent sugar. Bartlett and another unknown Bartlett type, but later, have completely healthy foliage and great fruit. Aurora stayed healthy but fruits not sweet enough. Most of the Honeycrisp apples, where foliage was fine, dropped a bit before ideal ripeness, or would have if I didn't pick them. Jonagold is thinning itself more than I'd like. All other apples were or are fine. I don't care at all about sooty blotch and fly speck.