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Apple trees
geoff979
Posts: 16
in Fruit & veg
We moved recently and inherited 3 apple trees. One I'm sure is a bramley and the other two are eaters of some sort. One has slightly pink flesh. The wasps & blackbirds are getting into them now and not being a gardener as such we're not sure if we should pick some now, and if we do will they store? Don't think they're ready yet as the eaters taste a little sharp and dry. Also wondering if they could be stewed & frozen at this stage.
Any advice much appreciated. Thank you.
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Thanks very much for the reply. The trees are around 12 feet high and the trunks 4 - 5 inches in diameter. As I don't know the varieties I'll approach it on a trial & error basis as you suggest.
Thanks again.
You can tell if they are ripe when they detach from the tree with a gentle twist and lift.
If you attend an Apple Day with examples of your fruit there will usually be someone to identify them. They are usually in late September or in October.
You can use unripe apples for cooking, especially jam making. I suspect they won't be ripe for a good few weeks. They tend to change colour when they're ripe and come off the tree with just the slightest lift or twist. Since they're in your garden there's no point picking them until they're ripe as far as eating fresh goes since the flavour will be better when they're fully ripe and won't develop offer the tree as well as they would on the tree but I realise you are worried the wasps and birds will get them all, but I'd prefer to have fewer better apples. You can still cook or juice the ones that are a bit pecked.
Thank you both for your very helpful replies. I shall do my utmost to trap as many wasps as possible. I don't begrudge the blackbirds their share.
I agree with pansyface there's far worse things you could have in your garden. I've got a wasp nest just a meter from my bench. You'd never know there was a wasp nest there unless someone told you. I only found out because I was clearing away the grass from the bottom of the tree when I wondered what the wasps were congregating around then I saw the hole. They really are the gardeners friend, a few fruit with a little hole in is a very small price to pay and they're welcome to it in my book. If you apple tree is worth keeping then you'll have far more apples than you can deal with yourself. If it's not then get it grafted over or plant another one instead. (not in the same hole)
I have a portable wasp's nest - though I haven't risked porting it! They built inside an old galvanised bucket that was left lying on its side in the long grass. It is gradually getting larger and I can watch them come and go. Not usually any trouble - we had a nest one year in a conifer and brushed past it many times daily without knowing, until the autumn rains brought it down. Did have to destroy the one they started on the door frame though, as we would have had to leave the door open and duck underneath!
I didn't realise wasps were so beneficial in the garden, they always seem so aggressive. I have noticed though that it's the blackbirds that do the most damage. They peck them until they drop and the wasps clear up after them. I had one tree that didn't fruit very heavily with only around 40 apples on it. Every single morning at least one would be lying on the ground with the wasps doing there work. This prompted my original question in that if the apples are weeks away from ripening than it doesn't take a mathematical genius to work out that there will be none left to ripen.
I didn't think that wasps nested in the same place year after year.