North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["ROBERT W JUDY A HARTMAN" <hartmansfruit@msn.com>]

I don't leave more than one per cluster and WSU recommends that you have them at least 5 inches and preferable 6 inches apart.  You do that when they are between a dime and nickel in size, leaving the King fruit if available (the largest in the middle) or one of the others if it happens to be deformed.  You can see their suggestions at http://mtvernon.wsu.edu/FruitHorticulture/Thinning03.html.

 

Bob

Western Washington

----- Original Message -----

From: Ginda Fisher

To: NAFEX Fruit Explorers

Sent: Saturday, May 02, 2009 4:19 AM

Subject: [NAFEX] apple blooming too much?

I have a small Ashmeads Kernal on M7, with two Karmijn grafts on it.  
The tree has been in the ground a couple of years.  It is about 4 feet 
tall and has lots of root competition, as it's planted on the edge of 
a wooded area.  It also has moderate winter-moth damage.  I've had 
winter moth troubles for the past few years, have treated aggressively 
with spinosad the last two, and treated a little less aggressively 
this year.

This year it is covered in flower buds.  Maybe the amount of flowering 
is normal in some conditions, but it's way in excess of what I've ever 
seen on my eating-apples.  It looks more like the ornamental crabs.  
(We have wild seedling crabs all over the place, but even for being 
random seedlings, they are very ornamental this week.)  None of my 
other domestic apples has anything like the density of flower buds -- 
the two trees I planted at the same time (golden russet on one of the 
new geneva rootstocks, G30, and Tydemans late Orange on M111, all 
planted spring '05) don't plan to bloom this year.

Should I be worried?  Should I remove the blossoms?  Most of the 
blossoms?  There's even a flower cluster on one of the Karmijn grafts, 
which I'm oh so tempted to allow to fruit.

Thanks,
Ginda Fisher
eastern Mass., zone 6
where the crab apples are at peak bloom, and the eating apples are 
just beginning to bloom.  Mmmm, perfumed air.
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