Don't write off older, partially hollow apple & crab trees!! We have a couple old, partly hollow apple trees at camp, and they are still producing decent crops each year. They've been partly hollow for the last 25+ years. Those old trees are about 30 ft. tall, and still put on crop loads heavy enough to break some branches.I started pruning today and found some things.
My oldest tree that we planted is now hollow on two sides. It is a chestnut crab. I have about 10 root suckers from it for new trees through the years.
It’s knees and back are giving out, kind of like old habitat managers!
:)
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Both trees produced last year. Hopefully again this year.Don't write off older, partially hollow apple & crab trees!! We have a couple old, partly hollow apple trees at camp, and they are still producing decent crops each year. They've been partly hollow for the last 25+ years. Those old trees are about 30 ft. tall, and still put on crop loads heavy enough to break some branches.
I have never payed any attention to bloom time. Maybe I should have.Bloom time is around the corner. Any particuarly late or particuarly early bloomers. Any comparables to big dog?
I think you have both chestnut and kerr. Which one blooms later? Thats my backup scion source, left a few branches unclipped.
Holy cow, that Kerr!Kerr is the big white blossom tree on left. Chestnut short white tree between the purple and pink. Picture was taken April 22 southern Michigan around the Lansing area. Hope this helps.
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I pruned a few more trees that I had passed over earlier and was looking at what I could top work.I went for a short walk out back at the home property this weekend in between storms. Found one new crabapple tree that is 8-10' tall. Never noticed it before. Had 3 mushy fruit still hanging on. I will keep an eye on this going forward. I dug up 3 rootsuckers from various trees and planted them in my nursery to baby for a year. Also did a count of the crabapples that will be topworked - currently sitting at 10 trees so far.
I ran across a photo of winter Apple survival and a few notes from the past. Memory tells me this is the winter when we had record cold of -60 at Tower, Minnesota.-40 recently?Coldest at camp so far is about -38 maybe -40. Dolgo, antonovka, and 30-06 did well. Cant tell if crossbow was not cold damaged or animal injury to the leader, tree was only 5ft tall. Been fine since though. Added alot more trees since then, but nothing over -20 past 2 years.
Thats was 2022/2023 winter. Click the link before for NOAA hstorical data-40 recently?
Interesting. Rice, Mn is close by.Thats was 2022/2023 winter. Click the link before for NOAA hstorical data
go on here, pick your location, then pick monthly summaried data on collumn 2, then collumn 3 variable in min temperature.
I did a summary for Rice, MN too. Ave december is -24 deg F, January is -27 deg F. Coldest since 2006 was a 2019 cold snap -38.
I changed collumn 2 to first/last dates, then used 28 deg F instead of 32. Thats the line for apple blossoms. Average date was may 1st, with a range from april 6th to may 15th.
I did this for camp, station data was sketchy one site closed then a new one came around a few years later. But I got an average of may 14th, last time to be 28 deg F anywhere from april 26 till june 1st. And season end sept 29 to october 22, average october 6th. If its the same 28 deg F for maturing apples / leaves in the fall.
I did this for my home's local area 4 hours Southeast of camp. Average last/frist 28 degree day is april 12th and october 27th. I got around 50 more days to make plants grow at home.
So, I compare 15 deg F last average dates for camp and at home. This is when oats die. Give it 3 months to grow, I should be planting by august 10th at camp, and no later than sept 10th at home. Got a whole extra month for fall grains.