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View attachment 59562
Big Dog is still holding some fruit. Two weeks ago there were lots of apples on the ground. Everything on the ground is now cleaned up.
Your kerr's all droped? I dug up the big dog tree and pruned it. Have it hilled in a planted for next week. MAde a big double leader, so I got some decent scion for other trees this spring. The rabbit nibbled antonovka got grafted with some of your kerr. 7 out of a dozen held grafts good, only rootstock died. The chesnt scion died over the summer. Got on on order from turkey creek for the spring.
Your kerr's all droped? I dug up the big dog tree and pruned it. Have it hilled in a planted for next week. MAde a big double leader, so I got some decent scion for other trees this spring. The rabbit nibbled antonovka got grafted with some of your kerr. 7 out of a dozen held grafts good, only rootstock died. The chesnt scion died over the summer. Got on on order from turkey creek for the spring.
I lost a buck to my very old pear tree by the road. I was walking the fence line actually just to go get a tractor for firewood and I noticed almost all the pears where cleaned up deer had been busy. I looked over towards the road and here lays a bucks carcass head missing. I rolled him over just make sure there where no bullet holes in him but I’m sure he was under that pear tree grabbing some easy sugar and a car startled him and he ended up getting hit.
I lost a buck to my very old pear tree by the road. I was walking the fence line actually just to go get a tractor for firewood and I noticed almost all the pears where cleaned up deer had been busy. I looked over towards the road and here lays a bucks carcass head missing. I rolled him over just make sure there where no bullet holes in him but I’m sure he was under that pear tree grabbing some easy sugar and a car startled him and he ended up getting hit.
View attachment 59789
This wild crab on the edge of a field exposed to the road is still holding fruit. There is not much deer sign around it which is good.
Any apples on the ground near my house are cleaned up nightly.
I prune the apples and crabs in my ‘home orchard’ which is basically what I can see from the house. A few other select trees get pruned and occasionally I take pruning gear out on snowshoes and do some of the rest. A few are never pruned.
When I think about it, I have planted apple trees in about five locations. Two strings are about 1/4 mile long. One string has 1-3 rows.
We have All-Winter-Hangover crab trees at camp that bore fruit in 3rd year on Anty. Not all of our trees on Anty bore fruit that soon.
A number of guys wonder why Anty-rooted trees don't take off right away, growth-wise. They see roots that look like carrots without many fine roots like other rootstocks have. Since we have a good number of trees on Anty, I can tell you gents that when they kick in - they GO. Our Anty trees are taller and woodier than our other rootstocks, and knowing what I know now, I'd have bought more trees on Anty or Dolgo roots to get bigger, woodier trees. We did buy some on P-18 which are full-sized trees too, but they're newer trees and don't have the time in the ground that the Anty trees do. Our Anty trees don't lean either, like some B-118 trees do.
Got a messed up mix at my home. whitetail crabs B118, tw or 3 who know what's on macoun, golden delicious, and pristine, Kerr and trailman on anty, most of the orchard is on M111. I did order 2 trees I wanted that were only available on M7. Sundance and another enterprise. But, Im OK wth that. They'll be the southern most trees where they park in the lot.
Posted this last year on the whitetail crabs growth thread last fall.
1st ic is B118 2nd ones is Antonovka. Survived -38 deg F in febuary up north. Planted them in dec with a touch of frost on the top layer of soil. Putting a droptine and crossbow on anty in rootmakers pots this weekend up there. Likely 12 inches of snow on the ground.