Little black inch worms and self thinning trees?

B

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5 year old buck +
Disease resistant trees don't mean problem free trees. All my trees have some bites on them. But enterprise and liberty got noticeably more on them. About tic tac length and maybe the size of the thick needle. They definitely walk like inch worms. Any good time of day or product to spray. I got sevin laying around ,but hesitant to use that. Also have the bonide fruit spray, which I have used before.

Also, do trees self thin? Got one of my better McIntosh trees where about 80% of the petal less stigma / ovary sections come of very easily, then one is a bit chubbier and holding onto the tree good. I have not seen alot of bees at my home. Love em or hate em, mostly seeing carpenter bees at my trees. 10 to 1 sighting of carpenter vs typical honey bee. Maybe these flowers were just not pollinated?
 
1. This time of year, black inch-worms are probably tent caterpillars. Easy to control with spray. Catch them early to mitigate damage. Bonide should work fine.
2. Yes, trees do self-thin, called June Drop, but usually not enough. Only about 7%-10% of the blossoms need to be pollenated for a full set. Too much fruit (no thinning) will usually cause trees to go biennial (bearing every other year).
3. The chubby blossom stem is called the King Bloom, it is the center bloom of the 5-bloom cluster and opens first. When the apple is mature the stem of a King Bloom will be fat, oval, and "fleshy".
4. Actually, honeybees are not the best pollinators. Most wild bees are hairier and accidentally pick up more pollen when collecting nectar.
5, Applets not pollinated will turn yellow within a week or so of petal fall. Frost damaged blossoms will turn black or brown inside almost instantly when dead.

Checking Viability of Frosted Blossoms
 
Use 1.25oz of bonide in a gallon sprayer. Used about a 1/2 gallon for 25 young trees and another 30 seedlings / grafts in the nursery.

Didn't see a single tent Caterpillar on the trees. LAst year it seemed the spray did some leaf damage, this year it did a bit less. Sprayed it around 7pm. You can see the young leafs look a bit scalded by the bonide, but less than last year's attempt. All apple flowers were gone and starting to make little apples when I sprayed.

Seems I picked my varieties pretty well. The old macintosh trees are all rusted up as usual. The whitetail crabs, enteprise, liberty, even the new mcintosh and granny smith look pretty rust free. However, my cedar trees didn't have much orange blobs in them this year. Freedom and white crab's crossbow have a bit of it here n there. The freedom was a monster sized rootball mess, so there may be some stress induced issues.

Any other times of year your orchards need spraying? I recall bonide fruit tree spray doesn't kill everything well.
 
Prof Kent,

How doe the bonide stuff work, does it have residual activity? Seeing alot less caterpillars on my trees, but there are some new visitors.
 
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