Orchard drops?

trampledbyturtles

5 year old buck +
What is everyone doing about drops in the home orchard?

Put in 15 apple trees a couple years back, for cider and storage.

Wife wants nothing to due with it, and is already complaining about all the drops there will be.

Had a couple different ideas in mind to manage.
1) let the grass grow tall and leave them be and rot in place.
2) bring in goats and fence them in and hope they eat them.
3) buy one of those expensive machines that pick them up.

Any info on your process appreciated.
 
I make cider and apple sauce and the deer eat everything else.
 
put them in front of trail cameras.
 
Is wildlife fenced out?
 
Let the critters eat them. I have a nice apple tree in my front yard that drops more apples than we can eat. My kids and dog play outside all day and that keeps the wildlife away then, but at night the critters (deer, raccoons, etc.) swing through and clean them up. If you have decent deer number around your house they will take care of the problem for you.
 
It ain't safe walking around in my yard at night with anything less than a 577 Nitro Express..........
 
Critters are hit an miss, sometimes pass through, mostly later in the fall/winter. Not something I'm banking on. Plus I'm thinking for down the line when I get real old. Planted most on standard stock so I expect them to be here awhile. Dont envisin myself wanting to pick up apples real bad when I'm in my 80s ha.
 
Dropped fruit near the house is a PITA. Wasps, yellow jackets, and asian beetles are all drawn to ripe and rotting fruit. It also stinks.
If animals aren't going to clean them up quickly, I'd be picking most before they can hit the ground. The issue with picking most of the fruit on old standard sized trees is that there's going to be bushels and bushels of them and a lot of them won't be easy to reach unless you've trained your trees to large, low horizontal limbs.
 
I have 14 fruit trees in my yard granted I do not live in town but the deer pretty much keep the yard clean of fallen fruit as long as there is not a dog on night patrol running loose.
 
Anything that hits the ground here doesn’t last 2 days. Wildlife cleans everything up.
 
A little Toro Polo anyone....... Chop em for fertilizer.

My life doesnt like the apple trees in general. Her yourgest gets a nasty reaction from bee and yellow jacket strings. Not anaphalaxys, but the site blows up.
 
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Put a sign out in the yard. " free deer apples". There will be plenty of people that will gladly clean them up for you.
^^This^^
Or fire up the chainsaw and thin the orchard.
 
I am anxious to get to the day where I have too many apples on the ground ... 😲

Let 'em rot or create a compost pile. I would thank that once the deer find them will do a good job cleaning them up.
 
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Last year, a friend came and carried away bushels of them for his pastured, butcher hogs.


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