Fireblight?

[Catscratch]

Hopeful it isn't fireblight but I'm kind of new to fruit trees so give me some help and advice here (And don't scold me for the shape of the tree. We planted it around 20yrs ago and walked away... never pruned it). What would you do with this thee?

 

[wooduck]

Looks like it , going to be hard that tree is pretty involved , may not survive , prune and pray that's all you got

 

[Turkey Creek]

Looks like it. However, seeing it is a older tree it obviously has some resistance to fire blight, becasue I am sure it has been exposed to it FB before. I wouldnt worry about it. Just pruned a old apple tree at my Grandparents house yesterday because it was hindering the mowing. Signs of several FB strikes in it from the past. Tree is still going strong. You could do some pruning next dormant season to open it up a bit, that will increase fruit production and help reduce disease issues.

 

[Catscratch]

Thanks guys. I'm around this tree on a regular basis and this is the first time it's ever looked sick at all.
Next winter I should prune it back a lot? Open it up in the middle?
Is there a spray that will help?
Would it be better to just remove the tree and hope fireblight doesn't become common on the place, or just assume it's already everywhere and live with it?

 

[Native Hunter]

That is definitely fireblight, but I doubt this is the first time in the 20 years since you planted it that the tree has seen fb. Lots of trees will show some fb but still go on to make a good crop of apples. Since it appears to be a full sized apple tree, that helps it even more to deal with fb.

We had a full sized tree that looked much worse than that one every year, but it went on to make a good crop of apples annually. I wouldn't be too up tight about a tree that looked no worse than that unless it started looking much worse.

Just curious - what variety is it and has it produced fruit before?

 

[Turkey Creek]

I am thinking that there is something else going on with the tree as well. There are lots of bare areas on the outer areas of those branches. Leaves would still be attached like the ones you have pictured if it was only recent FB. Maybe it got hit bad with FB last year and you just didnt notice. Last year was a bad year for FB across much of the USA. Some larger FB cankers down on the trunks of the tree?

 

[Catscratch]

Just curious - what variety is it and has it produced fruit before?

No clue what variety it is, it was bought in the early 90's (shortly after parents bought this land) from Walmart probably.
It has never produced much. We have a much smaller tree that produces better.

 

[Catscratch]

I am thinking that there is something else going on with the tree as well. There are lots of bare areas on the outer areas of those branches. Leaves would still be attached like the ones you have pictured if it was only recent FB. Maybe it got hit bad with FB last year and you just didnt notice. Last year was a bad year for FB across much of the USA. Some larger FB cankers down on the trunks of the tree?

It had more dead leafs attached but we had a hail storm Friday night and everything not attached WELL was pounded off.
I looked at the trunk of the tree and didn't notice anything I thought was unusual. But I'm not familiar with fireblight cankers so I could have looked over something.

 

[Turkey Creek]

It had more dead leafs attached but we had a hail storm Friday night and everything not attached WELL was pounded off.
I looked at the trunk of the tree and didn't notice anything I thought was unusual. But I'm not familiar with fireblight cankers so I could have looked over something.

That would explain the bare areas. The lack of pruning could be contributing to the poor production.

 

[Catscratch]

I had always thought it should be pruned, but didn't know what I was doing and didn't want to experiment on my parents tree. Figured I should learn on my own stuff. If this thing is sick I might as well start though. They've always said I could...

 

[WTNUT]

Those on here regularly know my pain with FB last year. The good news is I am here as your support group of one! Do you have any other Apple trees in the area? If so, how old are they? For now, I would do nothing to that one. As someone said, it must have some resistance AND
It is simply too big at this point to prune all of that out right now. If you don't have other smaller trees near by to try and protect, I would not prune anything right now and start working on this thing late winter.

 

[Catscratch]

Lol, thanks for the support!
We have three others no closer than 1/4mile away. Two in my parents yard and another one in the pasture. Other than these there may not be another apple tree for 10-20 miles. They do not grow wild here. There are some wild pears around.

 

[WTNUT]

Based on your answers, I would not touch this one until winter. Then I would trim it according to a plan to get it where it needs to be in 4-5 years. Too much trimming is worse than none. And, I would then start to look for cankers. If you see any, then if you can get access to them they can be removed. So far, I have not FB in the orchard this year.